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+The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Catholic World, Vol. 16, October
+1872‐March 1873 by Various
+
+
+
+This ebook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
+other parts of the world 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
+http://www.gutenberg.org/license. If you are not located in the United
+States, you’ll have to check the laws of the country where you are located
+before using this ebook.
+
+
+
+Title: The Catholic World, Vol. 16, October 1872‐March 1873
+
+Author: Various
+
+Release Date: September 12, 2015 [Ebook #49948]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF‐8
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CATHOLIC WORLD, VOL. 16, OCTOBER 1872‐MARCH 1873***
+
+
+
+
+
+                            The Catholic World
+
+           A Monthly Magazine of General Literature and Science
+
+                                Vol. XVI.
+
+                        October 1872 to March 1873
+
+                     The Catholic Publication House.
+
+                                 New York
+
+                                   1873
+
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+
+Contents.
+The Catholic World. Vol. XVI., No. 91.—October, 1872.
+   Bismarck And The Jesuits.
+   Choice In No Choice.
+   Fleurange.
+   Review of Vaughan’s Life Of S. Thomas.
+   The Progressionists.
+   Gavazzi Versus The See Of S. Peter.
+   Number Thirteen. An Episode Of The Commune.
+   On A Picture Of S. Mary Bearing Doves To Sacrifice.
+   Centres Of Thought In The Past. First Article. The Monasteries.
+   Versailles.
+   Father Isaac Jogues, S.J.
+   Doña Ramona.
+   The Distaff.
+   A Martyr’s Journey.
+   Odd Stories: III. Peter The Powerful.
+   New Publications.
+The Catholic World. Vol. XVI., No. 92.—November, 1872.
+   Centres Of Thought In The Past. Second Article. The Universities.
+   Fleurange.
+   The Poor Ploughman.
+   A Dark Chapter In English History.
+   The Progressionists.
+   The Virgin.
+   The Homeless Poor Of New York City.
+   The House That Jack Built.
+   Where Are You Going?
+   Number Thirteen. An Episode Of The Commune. Concluded.
+   Use And Abuse Of The Novel.
+   Review Of Vaughan’s Life Of S. Thomas: Concluded.
+   To S. Mary Magdalen.
+   God’s Acre.
+   Personal Recollections Of The Late President Juarez Of Mexico.
+   New Publications.
+The Catholic World. Vol. XVI., No. 93.—December, 1872.
+   The Spirit Of Protestantism.
+   Fleurange.
+   Sayings Of John Climacus.
+   Dante’s Purgatorio. Canto Fifth.
+   Sanskrit And The Vedas.
+   The House That Jack Built.
+   S. Peter’s Roman Pontificate.
+   Sayings.
+   The Progressionists.
+   Christian Art Of The Catacombs.
+   Beating The Air.
+   A Retrospect.
+   The Russian Clergy.
+   The Cross Through Love, And Love Through The Cross.
+   Odd Stories. IV. The White Shah.
+   Signs Of The Times.
+   New Publications.
+The Catholic World. Vol. XVI., No. 94.—January, 1873.
+   A Son Of The Crusaders.
+   At The Shrine.
+   A Christmas Recognition.
+   Fleurange.
+   Sayings.
+   Prince Von Bismarck And The Interview Of The Three Emperors.
+   A Christmas Memory.
+   The House That Jack Built.
+   A Retrospect.
+   The Cross Through Love, And Love Through The Cross.
+   Europe’s Angels.
+   The Nativity Of Christe.
+   The Progressionists.
+   ὙΠΝΟΣ
+   A Legend Of Saint Ottilia.
+   The Year Of Our Lord 1872.
+   New Publications.
+The Catholic World. Vol. XVI., No. 95.—February, 1873.
+   Who Made Our Laws?
+   Dante’s Purgatorio. Canto Sixth.
+   The Church The Champion Of Marriage.
+   Fleurange.
+   Cologne.
+   John.
+   The International Congress Of Prehistoric Anthropology And Archaeology.
+   The See Of Peter.
+   Atlantic Drift—Gathered In The Steerage.
+   A Daughter Of S. Dominic.
+   The Progressionists.
+   F. James Marquette, S.J.
+   Prayer Of Custance, The Persecuted Queen Of Alla Of Northumberland.
+   Acoma.
+   New Publications.
+The Catholic World. Vol. XVI., No. 96.—March, 1873.
+   The Relation Of The Rights Of Conscience To The Authority Of The State
+   Under The Laws Of Our Republic.
+   The Widow Of Nain.
+   Fleurange.
+   American Catholics And Partisan Newspapers.
+   Brussels.
+   Sayings Of S. John Climacus.
+   Marriage In The Nineteenth Century.
+   A Pearl Ashore.
+   The Benefits Of Italian Unity.
+   Sonnet.
+   Recollections Of Père Hermann.
+   A Daughter Of S. Dominic.
+   The International Congress Of Prehistoric Anthropology And Archæology.
+   Atlantic Drift—Gathered In The Steerage.
+   Martyrs And Confessors In Christ.
+   The Roman Empire And The Mission Of The Barbarians.
+   New Publications.
+Footnotes
+
+
+
+
+
+
+                               [Cover Page]
+
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS.
+
+
+Acoma, 703
+
+Atlantic Drift—Gathered in the Steerage, 648, 837
+
+American Catholics and Partisan Newspapers, 756
+
+Beating the Air, 783
+
+Benefits of Italian Unity, The, 792
+
+Bismarck and the Jesuits, 1
+
+Bismarck and the Three Emperors, 474
+
+Bolanden’s The Progressionists, 40, 192, 358, 541, 674
+
+Brussels, 766
+
+Centres of Thought in the Past: The Monasteries, 79;
+  The Same: The Universities, 145
+
+Christian Art of the Catacombs, 372
+
+Christmas Memory, A, 502
+
+Christmas Recognition, A, 448
+
+Church the Champion of Marriage, The, 585
+
+Climacus, S. John, Sayings of, 318, 775
+
+Cologne, 615
+
+Craven’s Fleurange, 18, 158, 303, 459, 600, 737
+
+Cross through Love, and Love through the Cross, 412, 523
+
+Crusaders, A Son of the, 433
+
+Cyprian, S., Martyrs and Confessors in Christ, 844
+
+Dark Chapter in English History, A, 176
+
+Daughter of S. Dominic, A, 658, 813
+
+Deschamp’s Bismarck and the Emperors, 474
+
+Distaff, The, 133
+
+Doña Ramona, 122
+
+English History, A Dark Chapter in, 176
+
+Episode of the Commune, An, 61, 227
+
+Europe’s Angels, 533
+
+Father Isaac Jogues, S.J., 105
+
+Father James Marquette, S.J., 688
+
+Fleurange, 18, 158, 303, 459, 600, 737
+
+Gavazzi _versus_ the See of S. Peter, 55
+
+God’s Acre, 264
+
+Hermann, Père, 808
+
+Homeless Poor of New York City, The, 206
+
+House that Jack Built, The, 212, 336, 507
+
+International Congress of Prehistoric Anthropology and Archæology, 639,
+            829
+
+Italian Unity, The Benefits of, 792
+
+Jogues, Father Isaac, S.J., 105
+
+John, 622
+
+Juarez, Personal Recollections of, 280
+
+Legends of Saint Ottilia, 557
+
+Marquette, Father James, S.J., 688
+
+Marriage in the XIXth Century, 776
+
+Marriage, the Church the Champion of, 585
+
+Martyr’s Journey, A, 137
+
+Martyrs and Confessors in Christ, 844
+
+Monasteries, The, 79
+
+Mission of the Barbarians, The, 845
+
+Nativity of Christe, The, 540
+
+New York City, The Homeless Poor of, 206
+
+Novel, Use and Abuse of the, 240
+
+Number Thirteen, 61, 227
+
+Odd Stories, 138, 420
+
+Ottilia, Saint, A Legend of, 557
+
+Partisan Newspapers, American Catholics and, 756
+
+Pearl Ashore, 788
+
+Père Hermann, 808
+
+Personal Recollections of Pres. Juarez, 280
+
+Peter the Powerful, 138
+
+Prince von Bismarck and the Three Emperors, 474
+
+Progressionists, The, 40, 192, 358, 541, 674
+
+Protestantism, The Spirit of, 289
+
+Relation of the Rights of Conscience to the Authority of the State under
+            the Laws of our Republic, 721
+
+Retrospect, A, 395, 516
+
+Review of Vaughan’s Life of S. Thomas, 31, 254
+
+Roman Empire and the Mission of the Barbarians, 845
+
+Russian Clergy, The, 403
+
+S. Peter’s Roman Pontificate, 345
+
+Sanskrit and the Vedas, 322
+
+Sayings, 357, 473
+
+Sayings of S. John Climacus, 318, 775
+
+See of S. Peter, Gavazzi _versus_ the, 55
+
+Signs of the Times, 422
+
+Son of the Crusaders, A, 433
+
+Spirit of Protestantism, The, 289
+
+Universities, The, 145
+
+Use and Abuse of the Novel, The, 240
+
+Vaughan’s Life of S. Thomas, Review of, 31, 254
+
+Versailles, 92
+
+Where are You Going? 221
+
+White Shah, The, 420
+
+Who Made our Laws? 578
+
+Year of Our Lord 1872, The, 558
+
+
+
+
+Poetry.
+
+
+Anselm’s The Poor Ploughman, 175
+
+At the Shrine, 447
+
+Chaucer’s Prayer of Custance, 702
+
+Choice in no Choice, 17
+
+Dante’s Purgatorio, 319, 581
+
+On a Picture of S. Mary bearing Doves to Sacrifice, 77
+
+Poor Ploughman, The, 175
+
+Purgatorio, Dante’s, 319, 581
+
+Prayer of Custance, 702
+
+S. Mary Bearing Doves to Sacrifice, 77
+
+See of Peter, The, 647
+
+Sonnet from Zappi, 807
+
+To S. Mary Magdalen, 265
+
+Ὕπνος, 556
+
+Virgin, The, 205
+
+Widow of Nain, The, 735
+
+Zappi, Sonnet from, 807
+
+
+
+
+New Publications.
+
+
+Adams’ Young America Abroad, 859
+
+Agnew’s Geraldine, 573
+
+All Hallow Eve, etc., 428
+
+Ambition’s Contest, 144
+
+Arundell’s Tradition, 430
+
+Athenæum, The, 859
+
+Beloved Disciple, The, 143
+
+Bibliographia Catholica Americana, 713
+
+Bolanden’s New God, 573
+
+Book of the Holy Rosary, The, 140
+
+Brownson’s Life of Gallitzin, 712
+
+Burke’s Ireland’s Case Stated, 857
+
+Caswall’s Hymns and Poems, 858
+
+Catholic Class Book, 288
+
+Catholic Family Almanac, 429
+
+Catholic Worship, 571
+
+College Journal, 576
+
+Commentary of the Fathers on S. Peter, 286
+
+Conversion of the Teutonic Race, 567
+  The Same, Sequel, 567
+
+Coppée’s Elements of Logic, 285
+
+Craven’s Fleurange, 570
+
+Cusack’s Life of F. Mathew, 572
+
+Daily Steps to Heaven, 572
+
+De Mille’s Treasury of the Seas, 859
+
+De Vere’s Legends of S. Patrick, 570
+
+Ellis’ Two Ysondes, 719
+
+England and Rome, 286
+
+English in Ireland, The, 716
+
+Finotti’s Bibliographia Catholica Americana, 713
+
+Fleurange, 570
+
+Formby’s The Book of the Holy Rosary, 140
+
+Froude’s English in Ireland, 716
+
+Gardening by Myself, 144
+
+God and Man, 430
+
+Gratry’s Henry Perreyve, 141
+
+Great Problem, The, 575
+
+Guillemin’s Wonders of the Moon, 574
+
+Hart’s Manual of American Literature, 431, 860
+
+Heart of Myrrha Lake, The, 569
+
+Henry Perreyve, 141
+
+History of the Sacred Passion, 427
+
+History of the Blessed Virgin Mary, The, 573
+
+Holland’s Marble Prophecy, 431
+
+Holley’s Niagara, 432
+
+Holmes’ The Poet at the Breakfast‐Table, 858
+
+Hope’s Teutonic Race, 567
+  The Same, Sequel, 567
+
+Hübner’s Life of Sixtus V., 567
+
+Hymnary, with Tunes, 431
+
+Hymns and Poems, 858
+
+Illustrated Catholic Family Almanac, 429
+
+Index Circular, 860
+
+Ireland’s Case Stated, 857
+
+Issues of American Politics, The, 431
+
+Jenna’s Elevations Poetiques et Religieuses, 717
+
+Keel and Saddle, 857
+
+Kroeger’s The Minnesinger of Germany, 575
+
+Lacordaire’s God and Man, 430
+
+Lasar’s Hymnary, 431
+
+Lectures on the Connection of Science and Religion, 573
+
+Legends of S. Patrick, 570
+
+Leifchild’s The Great Problem, 575
+
+Liberalisme, Le, 714
+
+Life and Times of Sixtus V., 567
+
+Life of Demetrius Augustin Gallitzin, 712
+
+Life of S. Augustine, 714
+
+Liza, 573
+
+Macdonald’s Hidden Life, 432
+
+Macdonald’s The Vicar’s Daughter, 143
+
+Manual of American Literature, 431, 860
+
+Memoirs of Mme. Desbordes‐Valmore, 715
+
+Minnesinger of Germany, The, 575
+
+Moriarty’s Life of S. Augustine, 714
+
+Morris’ Troubles of Our Catholic Forefathers, 287
+
+My Clerical Friends, 567
+
+New God, The, 573
+
+Oakeley’s Catholic Worship, 571
+
+Orsini’s History of the B. Virgin Mary, 573
+
+Paquet’s Le Liberalisme, 714
+
+Palma’s History of the Passion, 427
+
+Parsons’ Biographical Dictionary, 572
+
+Parsons’ Shadow of the Obelisk, 572
+
+Peters’ Catholic Class Book, 288
+
+Polytechnic, The, 859
+
+Photographic Views, 714
+
+Poet at the Breakfast‐Table, The, 858
+
+Pocket Prayer Book, 286
+
+Potter’s The Spoken Word, 142
+
+Rawes’ The Beloved Disciple, 143
+
+Revere’s Keel and Saddle, 857
+
+Roundabout Rambles, 432
+
+Sainte‐Beuve’s Memoirs of Mme. Desbordes‐Valmore, 715
+
+Shadow of the Obelisk, The, 572
+
+Skinner’s Issues of American Politics, 431
+
+Spoken Word, The, 142
+
+Stockton’s Roundabout Rambles, 432
+
+Tradition, 430
+
+Treasure of the Seas, The, 859
+
+Troubles of Our Catholic Forefathers, 287
+
+Truth, The, 571
+
+Turgeneiff’s Liza, 573
+
+Two Ysondes, and other Verses, 719
+
+Unawares, 143
+
+Vicar’s Daughter, The, 143
+
+Warner’s Gardening by Myself, 144
+
+Waterworth’s Commentary of the Fathers on S. Peter, 286
+
+Waterworth’s England and Rome, 286
+
+Weninger’s Photographic Views, 714
+
+Wiseman’s Lectures on Science and Religion, 573
+
+Wiseman’s Works, 714
+
+Young America Abroad, 859
+
+
+
+
+
+THE CATHOLIC WORLD. VOL. XVI., NO. 91.—OCTOBER, 1872.
+
+
+
+
+Bismarck And The Jesuits.
+
+
+    “1. The Order of the Company of Jesus, orders akin to it, and
+    congregations of a similar character, are excluded from the German
+    territory. The establishment of residences for these orders is
+    prohibited. The establishments actually in existence must be
+    suppressed within a period to be determined by the Federal
+    Council, but which shall not exceed six months.
+
+    “2. The members of the Company of Jesus, of orders akin to it, and
+    of congregations of a similar character, may be expelled from the
+    Federal territory if they are foreigners. If natives, residence
+    within fixed limits may be forbidden them, or imposed upon them.
+
+    “The measures necessary for the execution of this law, and for the
+    certainty of this execution, shall be adopted by the Federal
+    Council.”
+
+
+Such is the amendment on the original motion for the recent legislation
+with regard to the Jesuits which was proposed to the Reichstag by Dr.
+Friedberg. The original motion was identical in aim and almost in
+substance. The amendment is more exact and well‐defined, leaving not the
+slightest loophole for possible evasion or escape. It was framed and
+pressed on by the kindly spirit and generous hand of Prince Clovis of
+Hohenlohe, the brother of the cardinal whose rejection by the Pope as
+ambassador from Germany to his court gave such high umbrage to the
+exquisitely sensitive Prince Bismarck.
+
+Such is the law: plain, clear, and well‐defined. There is no mistaking it:
+it is “goodly writ.” Paraphrased, it runs thus:
+
+There is a body of men—and women even; for though we attach ourselves to
+the chief point at issue, the phrase, “Those congregations of a similar
+character,” may cover a very extensive ground, and seems ingeniously
+framed for abuse—in Germany, possessed of certain property, colleges,
+churches, seminaries, schools; possessed of certain rights as free
+citizens of a free land: liberty of action and of thought. Most of them
+are natives of the soil; many of them members of the highest families in
+the empire. They have been doing their work all these years without let or
+hindrance, or rumor of such. The state found no fault with them, or at
+least never expressed it. Consequently, they went on without changing one
+iota of their principles or mode of action, teaching in the universities,
+colleges, and schools: preaching in the churches; gathering together
+communities; giving themselves free voice in a free press, that all might
+hear and tell openly what they were doing, and what they purposed doing.
+Without a moment’s warning, without a trial or even a mockery of a trial,
+the state swoops down on them, seizes their property, breaks up their
+communities, turns them out of their homes adrift upon the world,
+proclaims them outlaws, banishes them the empire, save such as were born
+in it—one of whom happens to be a cousin to the emperor himself; and these
+latter they proscribe to fixed limits under the surveillance of the
+police.
+
+And such is law! The law of the new German Empire: the first great step in
+its reconstruction!
+
+Short of death, the state could not do more utterly to destroy a body of
+men. Condensed into a word, these measures are—demolition. As death alone
+can make their penalty supreme, the crimes of these outlaws ought to be
+proportionately great. What, then, are these crimes that in a moment
+produced such a sentence?
+
+Here we must confess to as great an inability to answer the question as
+Prince Bismarck or his followers found themselves; for the very simple
+fact that there are no crimes to answer for. This may account in part for
+the extra severity of the sentence. Only make the penalty big enough, and
+the popular mind needs to hear nothing of the crime. Prince Bismarck knows
+the value of the old adage, “Give a dog a bad name, and hang him.”
+
+When the Communists seized upon Paris, we all knew what to expect: scant
+justice and speedy sentence; none of your careful balancing of right and
+wrong. They took what they could and gave no reason. This model German
+government, this new power which we all tremble at, though it promises to
+regenerate us, follows _la Commune_ pretty closely in this its first essay
+of power.
+
+In the even balance of the law, it is useless to _talk_ of conspiracies,
+parties, plots, and this, that, and the other. Show us those conspiracies;
+point them out in black and white; let the law lay its inexorable finger
+upon them, and say, such and such actions have been committed by such and
+such persons; here are the proofs of guilt—and we are satisfied. Though
+the condemned may have been our dearest friends, we have only to
+acknowledge the justice of the sentence, to deplore that we have been
+deceived in them, and to range ourselves as honest men and true citizens
+on the side of the law. But in the present case, we have not had one
+single fact produced nor attempted to be produced; not a crime in the
+varied category of crimes has been laid at the door of the accused. We
+have had instead from such men as Bismarck and his tools vague
+generalities of “conspiracy,” “enemies at home as well as abroad,”
+intermingled with fears for the safety of the new empire—“the new
+creation”—padded in with bluster and empty bombast, “full of sound and
+fury, signifying nothing.”
+
+And in the face of this advanced nineteenth century, this era of facts,
+figures, and freedom, on the strength of evidence that would not suffice
+to condemn the veriest scoundrel that ever stood face to face with justice
+in the dock, a body of intellectual gentlemen, beloved in the country from
+which they are banished, are proclaimed outlaws, enemies of their own
+nation, faithless to their country and their emperor, unfit to live in the
+land that is proud of them, and driven without scrip or staff into the
+world.
+
+Let us bear it in mind, before quitting this point, that the feeling of
+their countrymen as well as of the whole Catholic world is with them. We
+all know how a government, and particularly a strong government, can
+influence the public voice and manipulate votes. Well, petitions rolled in
+for the suppression of the Jesuits; but, strange to say, roll in as they
+might, a still vaster number came to retain them; and on the strength of
+the former, the measure was put before parliament and passed. This fact of
+the popular voice proclaiming itself boldly in favor of the Order is very
+significant when we take into account the forces arrayed against each
+other, though, in truth, the battle was all on the side of the government.
+On the one hand we have the Prince‐Chancellor working the engine of the
+state—his own creation—with every nerve that is in him, joining himself in
+the debates with speeches of the bitterest and most inflammatory
+character; on the other, we have a body of 708 men! Such was their number
+in Germany according to the statistics of last year; the total number
+throughout the world being 8,809.
+
+To this, then, the contest reduces itself apparently. These are the
+ostensible foes. The new and powerful German government, in the first
+flush of an unprecedented success, headed by the “terrible Chancellor,”
+pitted might and main against 708 individuals, staking its very life on
+the contest. What evenly matched foes! For the Jesuits are the sole object
+of this attack, mind. Listen to Minister Delbrück in his speech on the
+third reading of the bill: “It is my duty, in the name of the confederate
+government, to repudiate anew that view of the question which identifies
+the Society of Jesus with the Catholic Church.... In such an allegation
+they can discover nothing more than an arbitrary perversion of notorious
+facts: a falsification which is the more to be deplored, as it might serve
+to deprive the measure in circles outside of this assembly of its true
+character, and impress on it another which it does not possess.”
+
+This minister was the mouthpiece of Bismarck—“the hands indeed are Esau’s,
+but the voice is that of Jacob.” Was there ever such a picture of injured
+innocence and righteous indignation?
+
+Seven hundred and eight men who spend their lives, as all the world may
+see, in teaching, preaching, studying, visiting the sick, performing their
+daily household duties, are such terrible plotters, dangerous political
+leaders, that they cause the great Chancellor actually to tremble in his
+shoes. It is a strange fact that he did not find this conspiracy out
+sooner. Bismarck and the Jesuits are old neighbors, not to say friends.
+They have lived very happily together up to yesterday. They accompanied
+him to his wars, and took the place that is always theirs in the battle
+front, among the wounded and the dying, when no succor was nigh, in the
+endeavor to give rest and peace to the last moments of those whom Bismarck
+summoned from their quiet homesteads to die for him under the empty name
+of glory and patriotism. Some of them were rewarded by the Emperor with
+the Iron Cross—the proudest decoration which he can bestow on a man; as
+some others of them on the other side brought their science to bear on the
+dismal walls of the beleaguered city, spreading out light far and near to
+discover the crouching foe, and they were rewarded with death. Why, then,
+after living in harmony so long together, does the Chancellor turn round
+in a moment and make such a sweeping attack upon them, only _them_? The
+body, numerically, is absolutely too insignificant for all this uproar.
+Why, we could pack them all into some of our hotels, and they would
+scarcely make an appreciable difference in the number of visitors. Had
+there existed a conspiracy on their part against the empire, as is
+alleged, is it possible that with Bismarck’s unlimited power and
+resources, aided by those wonderful spies of his, who so infested France
+that his generals knew the country better than the French themselves
+did—is it possible that he who esteems so highly the value of the opinion
+of “circles outside the empire,” could not produce _one_ sorry fact to
+bring forward against them? Their most determined opponents must confess
+that he has utterly failed to do so; and failing to do so, he has
+exercised, and the majority of the German Parliament has sanctioned, a
+barefaced abuse of power, such as we thought had died out with the good
+old days of Henry VIII. and Queen Bess, or lived only with the Sultan of
+Turkey or the barbarous monarchs of the East. May it not recoil on their
+own heads!
+
+The quarrel is scarcely confined to these limits, then, terrible as the
+power of the Jesuits may be. We do not intend to insult the intelligence
+of our readers by going into a needless defence, for the millionth time,
+of the Jesuit Order. Their defence is written on the world with the blood
+of their martyred children. Their defence rests on the fact of their very
+existence under such persistent and terrible persecutions as their mother,
+the church, only has surpassed. It rests in the record of every land upon
+which the sun has shone. And as for the time‐worn themes, ever welcome and
+ever new, of secresy, unscrupulous agents, blood, poison, daggers, and all
+the mysterious paraphernalia which the Jesuit of the popular imagination
+still bears about with him under that famous black gown, which the
+intellect of the age, in the persons of the London _Times’_ correspondents
+and those of the _Saturday Review_, are never weary of harping on, we
+leave them to the enlightened vision of these gentlemen, and their rivals
+in this respect—the concocters of the villains of fifth‐rate novels. But
+they object: Well, we are ready to admire your Jesuits. They live among us
+and we know them, and really, on the whole, they are not half such bad
+fellows; in fact, we may go so far as to say they are very peaceable,
+intelligent, respectable gentlemen. When we wish to hear a good sermon we
+always go to listen to them. They are very fine writers, and very clever
+men. They have done much, or tried to do much, for America, Africa, Japan,
+and every out‐of‐the‐way place; they have done something in Europe, even.
+But after all you must acknowledge that they are very dangerous fellows.
+Why, your own Pope, Sixtus V., could scarcely be prevailed upon to permit
+the foundation of the Order at the beginning; and another of your Popes,
+Clement XIV., actually condemned them. Come, now; what do you say to that?
+
+Must we soberly sit down to answer this absurdity once more? Our readers
+will pardon us for merely glancing at it, and passing on to the more
+immediate subject of our article.
+
+First of all, granting, which we by no means intend to do, that all that
+they allege is true, that it was with the greatest difficulty they even
+crept into existence, and that a Pope found it necessary to suppress them;
+there stands out in the face of such opposition the telling fact of their
+existence in the broad light of these open days, when no sham can pass
+muster, when the keen, eminently honest eye of these folk pick out the
+false in a twinkling, expose it, hoot it down, away with it, and there is
+an end. Such a fact opposed to such never‐failing opposition is a very
+stubborn thing, and bears with it something very like reality and truth.
+As for the difficulty of their beginning, that is the history of all
+orders in the church, so careful is she of new‐fangled notions. In fact,
+if our recollection serves us, that, we believe, is the history of the
+church herself. So much for the alleged opposition of Sixtus V. And now
+for the quelcher: the suppression by Clement XIV.
+
+Here we give in: our opponents are right. Clement XIV. actually did issue
+a _brief_ suppressing the Jesuits. Of course it is perfectly unnecessary
+to inform these theological and mediæval scholars that a brief is a very
+different thing from a bull; that a brief is in no wise binding on the
+successor of the Pontiff who issues it; that a brief has no more to do
+with infallibility than these gentlemen themselves have. And now we would
+beg them to listen a moment to the very few Jesuitical words in which we
+explain this whole thing away.
+
+Clement XIV. issued this brief in exactly the same way that King John
+signed the Magna Charta; Charles I. the death‐warrant of Strafford; or
+George IV. the act for Catholic emancipation. We believe none of our
+readers would blame King Charles for the death of Strafford, or thank King
+John for Magna Charta, or George IV. for Catholic emancipation; as little
+do we, can we, or any one who has read the history of the time, blame
+Clement XIV. for the brief which suppressed the Jesuits. The timid old
+monk—he was consecrated Pope at what the Bourbons considered the very safe
+age of sixty‐four—was strong enough to resist this wicked demand of their
+suppression to the utmost. We must bear in mind that the demand was made
+by no body in the church; but only by the ambassadors of France, Spain,
+and Naples. “I know what you want,” he said, “you want to create a heresy
+and destroy the church.” Another time he writes, “I can neither censure
+nor abolish an institute which has been commended by nineteen of my
+predecessors.” In the meantime, we have a disinterested witness, happily
+enough from Prussia, a man whom we have no doubt even Prince Bismarck has
+some respect for. It is no less a person than Frederick the Great, who
+writes to _Voltaire_:
+
+
+    “That good Franciscan of the Vatican leaves me my dear Jesuits,
+    who are persecuted everywhere else. _I will preserve the precious
+    seed, so as to be able one day to apply it to such as may desire
+    again to cultivate this rare plant._”
+
+
+At last, notwithstanding his entreaties and prayers, they wrung the brief
+from the heart of the tottering old man. They gained their point while he
+lost his peace of mind, and was ever after murmuring, _Compulsus feci,
+compulsus feci_. We should be more correct in saying that they only half‐
+gained it; for they were wild with rage at its being only a brief. What
+they wanted was a bull: destruction, not suspension. And such is the
+history of the famous suppression of the Jesuits.
+
+To make the story complete, we may as well add that, as soon as the brief
+became known, Switzerland, knowing that it was the production of the
+Bourbon faction and not of the Pope, refused to submit to it and deprive
+the Jesuits of their colleges. Catherine of Russia interceded in their
+favor, and gave the poor Pope a crumb of comfort in the few days that were
+left him. Well did he say, “This suppression will be the death of me.”
+While Frederick the Great—but he shall speak for himself, and we commend
+his utterance to Prince Bismarck. He writes to his agent at Rome:
+
+
+    “Abbé Columbini, you will inform all who desire to know the fact,
+    but without ostentation and affectation, and you will moreover
+    seek an opportunity of signifying soon to the Pope and his chief
+    minister, that, with regard to the Jesuits, _I am determined to
+    retain them in my states_. In the treaty of Breslau, I guaranteed
+    the _status quo_ of the Catholic religion, and I have never found
+    better priests in every respect. You will further add that, as I
+    belong to the class of heretics, the Pope cannot relieve me from
+    the obligation of keeping my word, nor from the duty of a king and
+    an honest man.”
+
+
+These words would be weakened by comment. We pass with relief from this
+worn‐out subject, and wish our adversaries joy of their mare’s nest. Men
+who have won the praise of their bitterest foes need small defence from
+their friends. We leave them in the hands of such men as Voltaire, Lord
+Macaulay, Sir James Stephens, Bancroft, Prescott, Parkman, and a host of
+other eminent men of all nations and all creeds save our own. When those
+who carp at the Jesuits have studied and refuted these writers to their
+own satisfaction, they may be in a fair way to meet us.
+
+Now we are met with the further objection: if the Jesuits are such an
+excellent body as we make them; as Protestant historians and infidel
+writers make them; as Catherine of Russia, as Frederick the Great, the
+founder of the Prussian empire, and in this respect the proto‐Bismarck,
+make them—why should Prince Bismarck pick such a deadly quarrel with them?
+
+Have we possibly been mistaken in him all this time? Have we had another
+Luther lurking beneath the person of the burly Chancellor? Has his aim
+been all along not merely to create a German empire, but a German religion
+and a German popedom? Has his zeal been inspired by religion? In his
+speech the other day he protested against the pretensions of the Pope “as
+a Protestant and an evangelical Christian.” We congratulate the
+evangelical Christians, whoever they may be, on their new apostle. For
+ourselves, we could not help laughing, and thinking that the height of
+solemn farce had at length been reached. The words reminded us of one
+Oliver Cromwell, who, in common with a well‐known kinsman of his, had a
+knack of “citing Scripture for his purpose.”
+
+No; we confess it, notwithstanding this solemn affirmation from his own
+mouth, and before the German parliament too—(we think the printer must
+have omitted the “laughter” at the end)—we cannot bring ourselves to look
+upon the Chancellor as a “vessel of election,” though he may be a “vessel
+of wrath.” We consider that his worst enemy could scarcely say a harder
+thing of him than that he was a religious man. His is “Ercles’ vein: a
+tyrant’s vein.” The Emperor “is more condoling.” Now he presents the
+picture of a religious man _par excellence_. Why, his nostrils discerned a
+sanctified odor rising up from those reeking fields of France; and he
+could pray—how well!—after he had won the victory. But his Chancellor is a
+man of another complexion. He found a rich humor in it all. We have not
+forgotten that grim joke of his yet about the starving and doomed city. Is
+he not the prince of jesters? No, however bad may be our opinion of him,
+we will not accuse him of religiousness.
+
+Where, then, lies the difficulty between them? The answer to this
+necessitates a review of the whole present question of Bismarck with the
+Papacy; and we must beg our readers’ indulgence in carrying them over such
+beaten ground in order to get at the root of it all, fix it in our minds,
+and keep it there, so that no specious reasoning may blind us to the
+reality of it, to the true point at issue.
+
+We recollect the position of the Papacy prior to the Franco‐German war.
+The Pope was supported in his dominions by the arm of France—we say France
+advisedly; not by Napoleon. The war came and smote this right arm. Victor
+Emanuel stepped in; took possession: coolly told the Pope he would _allow_
+him to live in the Vatican. The world shrieked with delight at seeing a
+powerless old man reft of the little that was left him. The world was
+astonished at the generosity of Victor Emanuel in _allowing_ the Pope a
+fraction of what happened to be his own property. The world looked for the
+regeneration of Italy, and it has had it. The _New York Herald_ furnished
+us with the increase of crime since Victor Emanuel’s possession: if we
+recollect rightly, it is about fourfold. So the Pope rested, as he still
+rests, a virtual, in plain truth an actual, prisoner in the Vatican,
+without a helping hand stretched forth to him. Came his jubilee, and with
+it kindly and solemn gratulations from a quarter least expected—the new
+emperor. Our eyes began to turn wistfully to the new power, and people
+whispered, Who knows? perhaps our Holy Father has at last found a
+defender. Here was Bismarck’s opportunity of winning the hearts of the
+Catholic world, of binding us to him with the strongest chain that can
+link man to man. Time wore on, and the gloss wore off. Home questions
+arose, the Chancellor began to feel his way, to insinuate little measures
+such as the secularization of schools, which the Catholics, strange to
+say, found reason to object to. Prince Bismarck grew a little impatient;
+he was anxious to conciliate the Catholics as far as he possibly could;
+but really “his patience was nearly exhausted.” Our golden hopes began to
+grow dim. We have heard this sort of thing before; we hear it every day,
+from some whose opinions we respect; and we know what it means. It is the
+old cry, “We have piped to you and you will not dance; we have played to
+you, and you do not sing.” You are irreconcilable; there is no meeting you
+on debatable ground. And that is just the point. Our religion has no
+debatable ground, for it is founded on faith, and not on what goes by the
+name of free investigation. So that whether it be Bismarck or nearer
+friends of ours who would force or woo us in turn from our position, we
+must meet them in matters that touch our faith with the inevitable “Non
+possumus.”
+
+Prince Bismarck began to grow weary of us; and he soon showed signs of his
+peculiar form of weariness. He scarcely agrees with “what can’t be cured
+must be endured”; his motto is rather, “What can’t be cured must be
+killed.” The secularization of schools was carried in the face of the
+protest of the Prussian Catholic bishops, assembled at Fulda. The
+solemnization of the sacrament of marriage is handed over to the civil
+jurisdiction, the same as any other contract. Still not a whisper against
+the Jesuits, though, as we have already quoted, his quarrel is purely and
+entirely with them. We pass on to the crowning act in his list of
+grievances: the embassy to the Court of the Vatican.
+
+What a noble thing it looked in the all powerful Chancellor to despatch an
+ambassador from the high and mighty German empire, the mightiest in the
+world, to the old man pent up in the Vatican! What a condescension to
+acknowledge that such a person existed!
+
+Of course the Pope would receive such marks of favor with tears of
+gratitude and open arms. What! is it possible? He actually rejects the
+ambassador, and sends him back on Bismarck’s hands. Well, well! wonders
+will never cease.
+
+Now there never was such a tempest in a tea‐pot as the explosion this
+carefully laid train created. The very fact of sending an ambassador at
+all to a monarch acknowledges the perfect right of that monarch to receive
+or reject him as he pleases; and to common sense there is an end of the
+question. The Pope did not choose to receive this ambassador; he had every
+right to exercise his freedom of action; he exercised his right, but
+Prince Bismarck’s sensibilities were hurt. It was not so much the fact of
+rejection as the Pope’s want of politeness that afflicted him. In his
+speech before the Reichstag he declared that such a thing was without a
+parallel in the history of diplomacy. What martinets these Germans are for
+punctilio! We remember Mr. Disraeli actually refusing to accept as
+sufficient reason for the late war the “breach of etiquette at a German
+watering‐place.” Now, with all due respect, Prince Bismarck knew, as those
+he addressed knew, as all the world knows, that this statement was
+anything but correct. Ambassadors have been rejected before now, and
+probably will be again. In fact, had certain individuals of this class to
+and from ourselves been rejected at the outset, it would have saved
+national difficulties, or at least wounded feelings and displays of
+school‐boy recriminations scarcely creditable to such high and mighty folk
+as gentlemen of the diplomatic body. But there is more in the question
+than this. The Cardinal‐Prince Hohenlohe is a prince of the church. He is
+in addition attached to the Pope’s household. He gave himself freely and
+voluntarily to the service of the church. He is not a mere ordinary member
+of the Catholic body. He stands in relation to the Pope as Von Moltke, the
+Dane, stands in relation to the Emperor William; as those who were once
+fellow‐citizens of ours stand in relation to the Khedive, whose service
+they have entered; as Carl Schurz and millions of our fellow‐citizens
+stand in relation to the government of the United States. When the
+Italians entered Rome, Cardinal Hohenlohe left it; and the next the Pope
+heard of him was that his own servant had been appointed ambassador to his
+court from Berlin! Just as though tomorrow we received intimation that a
+new ambassador had been appointed to us from England, and that ambassador
+was no less a person than—Minister Schenck. We can imagine the _New York
+Herald’s_ comments on such a proceeding. And yet Prince Bismarck is sore
+aggrieved at a breach of political etiquette.
+
+We think we need trouble our readers with no further reasons for Cardinal
+Hohenlohe’s rejection. What share the cardinal had in the whole proceeding
+we do not know. Probably Prince Bismarck would eventually have found
+himself sadly disappointed in his ambassador had he been accepted. S.
+Thomas of Canterbury made an excellent chancellor till the king, against
+his wishes, compelled him to enter new service. But it is very clear that
+if Bismarck, as we do not believe, ever contemplated the possibility of
+the cardinal’s acceptance at Rome, what he wanted was a tool, one who, to
+use his own very remarkable words, “would have had rare opportunities of
+conveying _our own version of events and things_ to his [the Pope’s] ear.
+This was our sole object in the nomination rejected, I am sorry to say, by
+Pio Nono.”
+
+We have no doubt of it: it was his sole object; and the acceptance or
+rejection of his ambassador was one to him; for Prince Bismarck is
+generally provided with two strings to his bow. Had the cardinal been
+accepted, he believed he had a churchman devoted to his interests, another
+Richelieu; his rejection suited him still better; for he could now declare
+open war, and throw the onus of it on his adversaries. Through the whole
+proceeding we detect the fine hand of the man who forced on the Danish,
+Austrian, and French wars. Prince Bismarck must not be surprised if, in
+the face of such speaking examples, we come at last to have a faint
+conception of his strategy. His policy always is, and always has been, to
+egg his adversary on; to goad him into striking first, taking care all the
+while that he himself is well prepared. They strike, and he crushes
+them—all in self‐defence. He is exonerated in the eyes of the world. He
+can tell the others they provoked him to the contest; he can say to them,
+“Your blood be on your own heads.”
+
+And so this carefully prepared train exploded. It looked such a noble,
+generous, friendly action to send an ambassador to the Pontiff’s court in
+the present position of the Pontiff, that, when the ambassador was calmly
+rejected, the world could not believe its ears; and Prince Bismarck
+entertains a very high respect for those ears notwithstanding their
+length. What could we say but that it was too much? There was no
+conciliating these Romanists and Ultramontanes, do what you would. It was
+clear that the Pope was altogether out of place in these days; and his
+obstinacy only served to keep very respectable bodies of men from agreeing
+and living neighborly together, and so on _ad nauseam_. Thus Bismarck
+could afford to froth and fume about insult, unprecedented actions,
+etiquette, and so on; urge upon the German nation that they had been
+insulted in the person of their august emperor, who seems as touchy on
+points of etiquette as a French dancing‐master; and ring the changes up
+and down till he closed with the loud‐sounding twang, “Neither the emperor
+nor myself are going to Canossa!”
+
+Could anything be more theatrically effective? Could anything be more
+transparently shallow?
+
+Well, in the face of this awful outrage and unprecedented provocation,
+what does the wrathful Chancellor do? March on Rome; declare war against
+the Catholics; utterly exterminate them; smite them hip and thigh? Nothing
+of the kind. He not only lets the Pope alone from whom he received the
+outrage, _but he actually looks about for another ambassador, __“__in the
+event of unlooked‐for eventualities.__”_ He entertains the greatest
+possible respect for Catholics. Indeed, he seems to be aware that the
+small fraction of 14,000,000 of them go to swell his empire; the most
+Catholic of whom, by the way, bore the brunt of the battle in France. He
+accepts his rebuff more in sorrow than in wrath. He lets the whole
+question slip; he has no quarrel with the 14,000,000; but there are 708 of
+them whom he pounces upon as the policeman on the small boy; and nobody
+can quarrel with him for letting the steam of his wrath off on this small
+body, which is at the bottom of every mischief that turns up.
+
+Is not this excellent fooling? He says to the Catholics: I will not touch
+you; you and I are very excellent friends; I will not touch your
+mother—the church; I will content myself with murdering her eldest son,
+who is the cause of all the trouble between us.
+
+Now, we may fairly ask the question: Is the quarrel confined to these
+limits? Why does Bismarck turn aside from the church, from the Pope who so
+angered him, from the bishops who protested against his laws and refused
+to submit to them, from the Centre in the Reichstag who so boldly, calmly,
+and logically oppose him?—why does he turn from all these legitimate foes,
+and fall on the small body of 708 men who compose the Jesuit Order in
+Prussia?
+
+The answer is not difficult. The Jesuits as a body represent the intellect
+of the church. They represent indeed more, much more, than this; for
+intellect, great as it is, is not the highest thing in the eye of God or
+of his church; but our present point deals with their intellectual power.
+The _Pall Mall Gazette_ said the other day, writing on this question:
+
+
+    “One of the most remarkable traits of the Society of Jesus has
+    always been its literary productiveness. Wherever its members
+    went, no sooner had they founded a home, a college, a mission,
+    than they began to write books. [We beg to call the attention of
+    those who would fain make the church the mother of ignorance, to
+    testimony of this kind from such a source.] The result has been a
+    vast literature, not theological alone, though chiefly that, but
+    embracing almost every branch of knowledge.”
+
+
+The Jesuits in Germany, as in all countries where they have freedom,
+possessed the best schools and colleges. They made themselves heard and
+felt in the press. “In Italy, Germany, Holland, and Belgium,” says the
+journal above quoted, “the most trustworthy critics are of opinion that
+there are no better written newspapers than those under Jesuit control.”
+It says further, and nobody will accuse the _Pall Mall Gazette_ of being a
+Jesuit organ:
+
+
+    “Why indeed is their Order so dangerous, if it be not on account
+    of the ardent, disinterested conviction of its members, their
+    indomitable courage and energy, their spirit of self sacrifice, to
+    say nothing of their intelligence and their learning? The effect
+    of all this can but be heightened by persecution. On the other
+    side [Austria, if we recollect rightly], the danger which the
+    existence of the Order in the country really offers is much less
+    than it is supposed to be. In Germany, it does not really exist.”
+
+
+These extracts from various numbers of one of the leading rationalistic
+organs in England, which it were easy to supplement by many others of the
+same import, notably from the _Saturday Review_ and the _Spectator_, we
+merely present here to such of our non‐Catholic readers as might receive
+our own testimony of whatever value with a certain suspicion. They embody
+very sound reasons for Bismarck’s unprovoked and unlawful attack. We
+purpose going a little deeper into the question.
+
+The Jesuits now, as always, small as their number is, were the leading
+Catholic teachers in Germany among high and low. Their access to the
+chairs of the universities made them to a great extent the moulders of
+thought, the teachers of the teachers, the great intellectual bulwark
+against the spread of rationalism and every form of false doctrine which
+strives to creep in to the hearth of the commonwealth and endanger its
+existence. As they were the strenuous upholders of Bismarck in all that
+was right; as their influence against the maxims of the International,
+though not so immediate and showy as his, was infinitely deeper and more
+lasting, so when he would intrench upon rights that are inalienable to
+every man of whatever complexion and creed, they turned and boldly faced
+the Chancellor himself. Were the character which their opponents would fix
+upon them true, they had their opportunity of showing it—of going with him
+at least at the outset. He would not have disdained the assistance of such
+able lieutenants. But instead, the wily Jesuits, the men of the world, the
+plotters, the schemers, the Order that is untrue to everything and
+everybody save itself, throws itself with undiminished ardor, with a
+devotion worthy of the fatalist, with all their heart and soul, into a
+losing cause; into a cause which they have ever supported; which has been
+losing these eighteen hundred and seventy‐two years, but which has never
+lost.
+
+These considerations bring us to the root of the question.
+
+This marvellous German empire, this more than a nine days’ wonder, has
+been convulsed into life; and sudden convulsions are liable to as sudden
+relapses. Bismarck’s heart is in it; he is the corner‐stone; it is built
+upon him; and he of all men knows on what a rocking foundation it is
+built. Listen to his mouthpiece once more, Minister Delbrück, in his
+speech on the third reading of the bill against the Jesuits:
+
+
+    “We live under a very new system of government, called into
+    existence by mighty political convulsions: and I hold that we
+    should commit a great error in abandoning ourselves to the
+    delusion that everything is accomplished and perfected because the
+    Imperial German constitution has been published in the official
+    organ of the empire. For a long time to come we shall have to keep
+    carefully in mind that the constitution—the new creation—has
+    enemies not only abroad but at home; and if the representatives of
+    the empire arrive at the conviction that among these internal
+    enemies an organ is to be reckoned which, while furnished with
+    great intellectual and material means, and endowed with a rare
+    organization, steadily pursues a fixed inimical aim, it has a
+    perfect right to meet and frustrate the anticipated attack.”
+
+
+We have shown how nobly they met and frustrated the anticipated attack—a
+rather summary mode, we submit, of dealing with those who _may_ be
+enemies, for it has grown into only an “anticipated attack” now. Worse and
+worse for the wielders of law. It may be as well to note also that the
+Chancellor lets nothing slip. He allows the “great intellectual means” to
+go; but the “great material means” is a far more important thing. He
+sticks to that. There must be something of the Israelite nature in him. He
+out‐Shylocks Shylock. As in France, so here; he is not content with the
+“pound of flesh,” he will have in addition the “monies.” After all, what
+is there to surprise us in this? The great Chancellor, who coldly wrung
+such griping terms from bleeding France, could scarcely be expected to
+leave to the church the great material possessions, that is to say, the
+schools, seminaries, and churches, which belonged to her children.
+
+But to resume: The first sentence of this quotation strikes the key‐note
+of the whole movement. And, we avow it, Prince Bismarck is right. This
+empire has enemies at home as well as abroad, and the Jesuits are in the
+van. All Catholics are its enemies; and we make bold to say that all free
+men, and particularly all Americans, are its enemies. For it is not a
+German but a Bismarck empire; a Bismarck creation, that started into life
+men scarce knew how; a momentary thing for mutual defence, but never to be
+made, as he has made it, as powerful an instrument of tyranny as ever was
+forged to bind and grind a free‐born people in fetters of iron for ever
+down. Never, in the vexed history of nations, has power, and such awful
+power, fallen into the hands of any one man at such an opportune moment
+for good; and never, at the very outset, has it been so basely and so
+openly abused. The state of Europe, at this moment, is deplorable;
+revolution in Spain, revolution in Italy, revolution in France. The
+government, the supreme control of the whole continent, shifting from hand
+to hand; yesterday it was Napoleon, to‐day ’tis Bismarck: Europe cannot
+stand these successive shocks, from empire to anarchy, from anarchy to
+empire, without warning and without ceasing. Under all smoulders the
+burning lava, breaking out from time to time in fitful eruptions—here the
+Carbonari, there _la Commune_, in other places as trades‐unions—which
+threatens to overwhelm and engulf the whole in one red ruin. It is simply
+the evil effect of evil spirits working upon dissatisfied and ill‐governed
+bodies of men. While over all, in the dim treacherous background, looms
+the vast giant power of Russia, that seems to slumber, but is only biding
+the event, and shows itself in dangerous signs from time to time. Europe
+yearns for something fixed, permanent, and strong. Napoleon held
+it—failed; and the reins fell into the hands of Bismarck. He commences his
+reign by declaring war against the only element that can humanize these
+conflicting masses, and cause this wild chaos of passion to adhere,
+coalesce, and become one again as its Creator made it: religion. Religion
+alone can make them bow to law; for religion alone can teach them that
+there is a law that is above, and gives a reason for that law which _they_
+themselves make for themselves. And what has Bismarck done with this power
+that was given him?
+
+To begin with, he has banished religion from the schools, where it has
+flourished to the mutual satisfaction of Catholics and Protestants ever
+since its establishment. He has profaned the sacrament of marriage and
+handed it over to the civil courts. We will omit the expulsion of the
+Jesuits now. His empire is the most autocratic and aristocratic in Europe.
+Almost as a consequence, it is the most military. To make assurance doubly
+sure, he is making it more military still; not a nation of peaceful men,
+but a nation of warriors. Instead of allowing the weary nation a rest
+after a strife where centuries were condensed into a few months, and
+fabulous armies shattered in days, the military laws are made more
+stringent than ever. The Prussian system of service is to prevail
+throughout the empire, notwithstanding Bavaria’s remonstrance. Von
+Moltke’s declarations in his late speech are very clear and concise.
+Summed up, they mean discipline, discipline, discipline; and this is
+Bismarck’s word also. To produce this perfection of discipline, the power
+of the state must be supreme in every point. Nothing must escape it;
+nothing must evade it. The state must be religion, the state must be God,
+and Herr von Bismarck is the state. This sounds like exaggerated language;
+but Bismarck shall speak for himself:
+
+
+    “I may tell the preceding speaker [Herr Windhorst] that, as far as
+    Prussia is concerned, the Prussian cabinet are determined to take
+    measures which shall henceforth render it impossible for Prussians
+    who are priests of the Roman Catholic Church to assert with
+    impunity that they will be guided by canon law rather than
+    Prussian law.”
+
+
+This referred immediately to the case of the Bishop of Ermeland and
+others, for excommunicating disobedient priests.
+
+The Bishop of Ermeland was ordered to withdraw his excommunication,
+because it might affect those who came under it in their civil capacity,
+under pain of suspension by the government. The answer of the Bishop,
+Monsignor Krementz, was admirable in every way, and we regret that our
+limited space compels us to exclude it. It is enough to say that the
+bishop shows, beyond the possibility of doubt, that he is actually within
+the law, by a special provision of the Prussian Constitution, which
+declares in Article XII. “that the enjoyment of civil and political rights
+is independent of religious professions,” while he declares at the same
+time that in such matters he is not bound by the civil law. Those opposed
+to him in faith must support him in this. Recent decisions in the English
+courts on behalf of the Established Church support him. And we need hardly
+waste the time of our readers by entering into such a question. If a
+government acknowledges a church at all, it must allow that church to work
+in its own way so long as it does not intrench upon the civic rights of
+the subject. The men in question, who were condemned, received their
+orders and powers of teaching, preaching, and saying Mass from the church,
+to which they made the most solemn oaths of entire obedience in matters of
+doctrine. If afterwards they grew discontented, they possessed the civil
+right to leave it. But as honest men, how could they remain in it,
+receiving emolument from it, using its property, and all the while
+persisting in preaching doctrines contrary to it, and endeavoring to
+destroy it? Those who defend the decision of the German government must
+allow that when, as not unfrequently happens, a Protestant clergyman
+becomes a convert to our faith, he may still abide in the Protestant
+church, preaching the Catholic faith to his congregation.
+
+Our battle, then, and in this we are all Jesuits, is with the Bismarck
+empire, with the supreme power of the state. These ideas of Prince
+Bismarck are not new; they are as old as old Rome. The Roman was taught
+from his infancy that he belonged body and soul to the state; and no doubt
+Rome owed much of her vast power and boundless acquisitions to the steady
+inculcation of this materialistic doctrine from childhood upwards. “The
+divinity of the emperor” is not far removed from the divinity of the
+Chancellor. It is a very simple doctrine, and no doubt very convenient for
+those whom it benefits. But unfortunately for it and its defenders, One
+came into this world to tell us that we were “to render unto Cæsar the
+things that are Cæsar’s, and to God the things that are God’s.” This is
+the Catholic golden rule of politics, as we believe it to be of all
+orthodox Protestants. Prince Bismarck will excuse our obeying Jesus Christ
+in preference to him.
+
+And here is the reason for the expulsion of the Jesuits: They are the
+ablest exponents of these doctrines, not necessarily the most earnest—all
+Catholics are alike in that; but their education has made them as a body
+the ablest, and therefore they are driven out from the schools, colleges,
+universities, and churches; from the land utterly. And by whom are they
+replaced?
+
+By the tools of Bismarck, by men who are ready to preach his doctrines
+“for a consideration.” We had a sample of them the other day at the
+opening of one of the universities in Alsace. The correspondent of the
+London _Daily News_, among others, described them to us: how they fought
+like wild beasts to get something to eat, and attacked it with their
+fingers; how, at the end of the day, they, the German professors, reclined
+in the gutters, or reeled drunk through the public streets.
+
+And now, to complete our glance at this very large subject, a word on the
+ambassador to Rome that is to be. While Bismarck is still determined to
+send one there, he leaves us no room to doubt of his intentions in the
+significant words—“unlooked‐for eventualities.” That is to say, he looks
+to the speedy prospect of the present Pontiff’s death, and intends to
+affect the election of his successor. While refraining from remarking on
+the outspoken indelicacy of this, we do not at all doubt his intention, as
+little as we doubt concerning the prospect of its success. It is perfectly
+true that when the church had some influence over the state—and how that
+influence was exercised, let the spread of education, the abolition of
+serfdom, the persistent defense of liberty, and prevention of so many wars
+speak—the three great Catholic powers, France, Spain, and Germany, had a
+veto on the election of the Sovereign Pontiff, which they duly exercised
+in the persons of their respective representatives. These representatives
+were heard and felt in the councils of the church, and the measures they
+brought forward taken into due consideration. But we were under the
+impression that the relations between church and state had been altered to
+some purpose in our days. Lot has parted from Abram. The state said to the
+church: Our compact is at an end; you have nothing more to do with us; you
+may fulminate your thunderbolts as you please, and let them flash abroad
+through the world. We laugh. Their day is passed. Papistical pyrotechnics
+may frighten women and children, but we are too old for that. We know the
+secret of it all; that at bottom the thunderbolt is only a squib, and must
+fall flat. The church accepted the situation. The state had proclaimed the
+separation final and eternal. It could scarcely be surprised at the church
+taking it at its word. It could scarcely be surprised to find the doors of
+the Vatican Council closed against it. It can scarcely be surprised to
+know that the veto no longer has force—no longer exists in fact; least of
+all could it be expected to have force in the hands of a Protestant and
+heretical power, even when held in the safe keeping of the pious Emperor
+William and the “Christian and Evangelical” Prince Bismarck.
+
+One effect, and we think a very important one, has grown out of all this
+which we surmise Prince Bismarck scarcely counted upon. We believe the
+mass of thinking men, whatever their sympathies might have been prior to
+and during the late war in France, once they beheld the great German
+empire an accomplished fact, wished it a hearty Godspeed; for it held in
+its hands the intellectual, the moral, and that very important thing in
+these days, the physical force sufficient to regenerate Europe. We looked
+to it with anxiety to see whither it would tend; we looked to it with
+hope. Our anxieties have been realized, our hopes dashed to the ground.
+
+Prince Bismarck has alienated all Catholics and all lovers of freedom. And
+our eyes turn once more, all the chivalry in our natures turns, to the
+rising form of his late prostrate foe. We are amazed at the intense
+vitality of the French nation. Bismarck but “scotched the snake, not
+killed it; ’twill close and be itself.” All our hearts run out to it in
+the noble, the marvellous efforts it is making for self‐regeneration. And
+if France, as we now believe, will, and at no very distant date, regain
+the throne from which she has been hurled, the hand that hurled her thence
+will, by a strange fatality, have the greatest share in reinstating her.
+“The moral columns of the new German empire have begun to tremble as
+though shaken by an earthquake,” says the _Lutheran Ecclesiastical
+Gazette_, after deploring, as we have done, all the recent measures that
+have passed.
+
+As for the manner in which the Catholic Church will come out of this
+trial, we will let the Protestant press itself speak. We have already
+heard it in a half‐hearted way in England and among ourselves. The _Kreuz‐
+zeitung_, the organ of the orthodox Protestants, speaks more plainly:
+
+
+    “An eminent Catholic, a member of parliament, said lately that the
+    outlook of the Roman Church in Germany was never more favorable
+    than it is to‐day. It seems that this judgment is not without
+    foundation. The defections produced by the old Catholics are
+    without signification: we have to state a fact of altogether
+    another importance. Formerly, the greater part of the German
+    bishops, the greater part of the lower clergy, and almost all the
+    laics, were adversaries of the new dogma [we give those words of
+    the _Kreuz‐zeitung_, with our own reservations as to faith in
+    them], but now that the council has spoken, we only find thirty‐
+    two apostate priests; that is an immeasurable victory won by the
+    Roman Church.... Though the Roman Church thus appears day by day
+    more and more in the ascendant, the Evangelical Church sees itself
+    with deliberate purpose pushed down the inclined plane, or, what
+    is still worse, the government does not seem to be aware of its
+    existence. We have been able to remark this recently in the
+    discussion on the paragraph relating to the clergy in the
+    Reichstag; and lately again on the occasion of the law on the
+    inspection of schools. In the debates, at least those which
+    concern the manifestations of the government, the question has
+    been altogether with reference to the Roman Church. There has been
+    no mention made, or scarcely any, of the Evangelical Church. The
+    impression produced on every impartial observer must be this: the
+    Roman Church is a power, a factor which must be taken into
+    account; the Evangelical Church is not. This disdain is, for the
+    latter, the most telling blow which can be inflicted upon it, and
+    which must aid in strengthening the cause of Rome in a manner that
+    must become of the deepest significance for the future. After all
+    that, it is not strange to see the adherents of the Roman cause
+    conceive the loftiest hopes.”
+
+
+The _Volksblatt von Halle_ states that “the Catholic Church has become
+neither more timid nor weaker, but more prudent, bolder, of greater
+consideration, and in every respect more powerful than ever.” We might go
+on multiplying such extracts, but our space forbids us.
+
+The result then to us, to Catholics, is not doubtful, as the result of
+persecution never is. It is strange that such a keen‐sighted, eminently
+practical man as Prince Bismarck should become so suddenly blind to all
+the teachings of history. The meanest religion that exists among men
+thrives on persecution even when it has nothing better to support it. As
+for us, as for the Jesuits particularly, “suff’rance is the badge of all
+our tribe.” Their great Founder left it to them as his last legacy. And
+indeed, the measure he meted out to them has been filled to overflowing.
+While we are thus strong in faith, while we know that Prince Bismarck is
+only beating the air in his vain and impious efforts to extinguish that
+fire which God kindled and bade to burn, while we are calmly confident
+that he will shatter his mightiest forces against the Rock of Ages, and
+come back from the conflict battered and bruised—finding out too late that
+he made the one grand mistake of his life, which greater than he have made
+before him—still we cannot shut our eyes to the fact of the great injuries
+he is inflicting upon us, and the many fresh trials imposed upon the
+church and our Holy Father in his declining years.
+
+What, then, are we to do?
+
+We have power, and we must use it. We have voices, and we must make them
+heard. We have the silent, if not the outspoken sympathy of powerful
+bodies opposed to us in creed. We have the heart, when we show ourselves,
+of every free man and hater of oppression in any form. We have the genius
+of our own constitution on our side. We must speak out plainly and boldly
+as Catholic Americans. We must do what has already been done in London at
+the meeting in S. James’ Hall, presided over by the Duke of Norfolk; where
+peer and ploughman, gentle and simple, priest and layman, were one in
+protesting against this slavish policy of Prince Bismarck. Let us do the
+like. Let our eminent men, and they are not few, call us together here in
+New York, in every city throughout the nation—in behalf not only of our
+suffering brethren, but of those rights which are inalienable to every man
+that is born into this world—in protestation against a principle and a
+policy which, if they found favor here, would sap the life of our nation,
+and throw us back into the old slavery that we drowned in our best blood.
+Our standpoint is this: as there are rights which the state does not and
+cannot give us, those rights are inviolable, and the state cannot touch
+them. To God alone we owe them; to God alone we give them back, and are
+answerable for them. The state is not supreme in all things, and never
+shall be. These are the principles we defend, and are happy in being their
+persecuted champions.
+
+It is not merely a question of creed; Bismarck does not attack a creed. It
+is a broad question of right and wrong, of justice and injustice, of
+_absolutism_ and freedom. Power was never given into the hands of the
+German Chancellor to be abused at the very outset, to oppress his
+subjects, Catholic and Protestant. It is not and it must not be supreme;
+and we very much mistake the genius of the great German people if they
+long allow it to continue so. It is not for him to deprive 14,000,000 of
+his people of their natural rights; the right to educate their children as
+they think proper, _and as the law allowed them_; the right to consider
+marriage a sacrament sanctified by God, and not a civil contract, to be
+loosed or unloosed at will by a magistrate; the right of listening to
+their most eminent teachers; the right of holding the seminaries and
+churches, built by their own money, for the use of their own priests; the
+right, above all, of believing that there is a God beyond all governments,
+from whom all government, which people make for themselves, springs; that
+God has set a law in the conscience which they must obey, even though
+princes and kings rage against it, and that it is not in the nature of
+things for this first and final law of conscience to clash with any other
+unless that other be wrong. When Prince Bismarck succeeds in eradicating
+these inborn notions from the minds of the German people, he will then
+have attained his supremacy; but that then is—never.
+
+
+
+
+Choice In No Choice.
+
+
+I know not which to love the more:
+  The morning, with its liquid light;
+Or evening, with its tender lore
+  Of silver lake and purple height.
+
+To morn I say, “The fairer thou:
+  For when thy beauties melt away,
+’Tis but to breathe on heart and brow
+  The gladness of the perfect day.”
+
+And o’er the water falls a hue
+  That cannot sate a poet’s eye:
+As though Our Lady’s mantle threw
+  Its shadow there—and not the sky.
+
+But when has glared the torrid‐noon,
+  And afternoon is gasping low,
+The sunset brings a sweeter boon
+  Than ever graced the orient’s glow.
+
+And I: “As old wine unto new,
+  Art thou to morn, belovèd eve!
+And what if dies thy every hue
+  In blankest night? We may not grieve.
+
+“Thy fading lulls us as we dote.
+  Nor always blank the genial night:
+For when the moon is well afloat,
+  Thou mellowest into amber light.”
+
+Is each, then, fairer in its turn?
+  ’Tis hence the music. Not for me
+To wish a dayless morn, or yearn
+  For nightless eve—if these could be.
+
+But give me both—the new, the old:
+  And let my spirit sip the wine
+From silver now, and now from gold:
+  ’Tis wine alike—alike divine!
+
+LAKE GEORGE, July, 1872.
+
+
+
+
+Fleurange.
+
+
+By Mrs. Craven, Author of “A Sister’s Story.”
+
+Translated From The French, With Permission.
+
+
+
+Part Third. The Banks Of The Neckar.
+
+
+“Brama assai—poco spera—nulla chiede.”—Tasso.
+
+
+XXXIV.
+
+
+“Return, Gabrielle! if possible, return at once; at all events, come
+soon.” These simple words from Clement to his cousin give no idea of the
+agitation with which they were written. Fleurange herself would never have
+suspected it, and less than ever at the arrival of a letter at once so
+affecting and so opportune. She even paid very little attention to her
+cousin’s assurances as to the inutility of any further sacrifices for the
+sake of his family. Clement, however, had written her the exact truth. The
+situation of Professor Dornthal’s family was of course very different from
+what it once was, but the change was far from being as great as they had
+all anticipated and prepared for a year before, when ruin overwhelmed and
+scattered them.
+
+To leave the house in which they had lived twenty‐five years; to see all
+the objects that adorned it offered for sale; to give up the place where
+the happiest moments of their lives had been spent; all this at first
+excluded the possibility of anticipating anything but privation and
+sadness without alleviation. Madame Dornthal herself did not look forward
+to the future in any other light, and the courage with which she left her
+native city was the same she would have shown had her husband been
+condemned to suffer exile; she would have shared it with him, endeavoring
+to soften it as much as possible, but without anticipating the least
+possibility of joy in their changed lives.
+
+Joy, however, returned. It not unfrequently happens that reverses endured
+without murmuring receive unexpected compensations.
+
+In the first place, their new home, though simple, and even rustic
+compared with their old one, was neither gloomy nor inconvenient. Two
+spacious rooms on the ground floor allowed the whole family to assemble
+not only for their meals, but the evening reunions—their greatest pleasure
+when all the absent ones returned. A small garden surrounded the house,
+and a grass‐plot extended down to the river with a covered alley on each
+side. This place, called Rosenheim, merited its name by the abundance of
+flowers, and especially of roses, which on every side cheered the eye and
+embalmed the air. Their very first impressions, therefore, were quite
+different from what they had apprehended. Besides, Clement had reserved
+two or three of his father’s favorite paintings, several engravings, as
+well as a number of other familiar and precious objects, which preceded
+them, and were there, like old friends, to welcome them.
+
+In the next place, the professor’s rare collections, and the works of art
+he had selected with so correct a taste and such profound knowledge,
+proved far more valuable than they had anticipated, so that, if no longer
+rich, an independence more than sufficient was assured them. Moreover,
+Clement’s prospects were exceedingly promising. His extraordinary ability
+was soon recognized to a degree that justified Wilhelm Müller’s foresight.
+To tell the truth, fortune is not so blind and capricious as she is often
+represented, and if she sometimes bestows her favors on those who are
+unworthy of them, there are some she reserves exclusively for persevering
+industry, perfect integrity, shrewd calculation, strict economy, and
+undeviating exactness. These virtues—and not chance—lay the foundations of
+durable and honorably acquired fortunes, and where they are lacking the
+greatest skill does not prevent them from being frequently lost in a day.
+
+It was one of these legitimate fortunes Clement was worthy of and capable
+of acquiring. His success was already sufficient to dispense his father
+from the share of labor he had taken upon himself, but he could not turn
+him from his purpose, and soon perceived he ought not to attempt it. He
+derived the poetry of his nature from his father, and was indebted to his
+mother for his force and energy. Of these the professor, with all the rare
+and exquisite gifts of his mind and heart, was entirely destitute. A
+profound dejection mingled with his apparent resignation to misfortune,
+which sprang from the humiliating conviction—felt too late—of having
+brought it on himself by a want of foresight, and thus being responsible
+for the ruin of his family.
+
+He needed something to divert him from this rooted idea, and therefore the
+necessity of exerting himself to fulfil the duties of the position he had
+accepted, and of pursuing his favorite studies, was too beneficial to make
+it desirable he should renounce it. His new life, no longer burdened by
+any material anxiety, gradually became both active and serene, and when
+the family assembled together, everything would have had nearly the same
+aspect as before, had it not been for the vacancies around the hearth. But
+after the arrival of Hilda and her husband, and subsequently of Dr.
+Leblanc, the evenings at Rosenheim became once more cheerful and almost
+lively. Ludwig and Hansfelt resumed their favorite topics of conversation;
+Hilda’s beauty and happiness delighted her father; the merry voices of the
+children resounded anew; and Clement often favored them as of yore with a
+lively air on his violin, but more frequently, at his father’s request,
+with some graver melody, which he would play with such skill and so
+pathetic an expression as to surprise Hilda, who asked him one day how he
+had found time in his busy life to develop his talent to such a degree.
+Clement did not at first hear, he was so absorbed in some strain of
+Beethoven’s, which gave forth a heart‐rending accent under his bow. She
+repeated her question.
+
+“I often play in the evening at Frankfort,” he then replied. “Müller and
+his wife accompany me. Music refreshes me after the tedious labors of the
+day, and this prevents me from losing what you are so kind as to call my
+talent.”
+
+Such was the state of things Fleurange would have found at her new home
+had she arrived a month sooner. In that case, her involuntary sadness
+might have excited more attention. But the serenity of the household, so
+recently regained, had been violently disturbed again. It was not
+surprising therefore that tears should mingle with her joy at seeing once
+more those she loved, especially as among them she found Dr. Leblanc’s
+sister in mourning for him, and she had to be informed of another
+misfortune, scarcely hinted at in Clement’s letter.
+
+Professor Dornthal’s life was indeed no longer in danger, but his memory
+was greatly impaired, and his noble mind, if not extinct, only gave out a
+feeble and vacillating light. This was hoped to be merely a transient
+state, which time and absolute cessation from labor would soon remedy. But
+it was a severe affliction to them all, and Clement for the first time saw
+his mother’s courage waver. It was with truly a sad smile Madame Dornthal
+saw her husband recognize and embrace Fleurange without manifesting the
+slightest surprise at her presence, or realizing the time and distance
+that had separated them. It was the same with Clara; but when she placed
+her infant in his arms, there was a momentary reawakening of the invalid’s
+torpid memory. Tears came into his eyes; he embraced the child, murmured
+“God bless him!” and then gave him back to his mother, looking at him with
+an expression that filled them for a moment with hope. Then the gleam
+vanished, and he fell back into his former state.
+
+In consequence of all these circumstances, when the family assembled in
+the evening in the large salon on the ground floor, every brow was
+clouded, all the young smiling faces were grave and anxious, and the same
+cause for sadness weighed on every heart. Perhaps this was best for
+Fleurange, who, ever ready to forget herself, seemed to feel, and indeed
+only felt the sorrows of the rest.
+
+Ah! how her sadness, which seemed only sympathy, touched one person that
+night as he gazed at her in silent admiration. She was sitting between his
+sisters, the lamp suspended from the ceiling threw a halo around her
+charming face, and the voice, so dear and so long unheard, resounded for
+the first time in this place where everything seemed transformed by her
+presence!
+
+The evening, so sad for all the rest, was not so for Clement. Even his
+anxiety for his father was suspended: he felt a renewed hope for him as
+well as for everything else—yes, _every_ thing. He no longer took a dark
+view of things: he was, as it were, intoxicated with hope. With what a
+sweet confiding look she had pressed his hand! In what a tone she cried:
+“Dear Clement, how happy I am to see you again”! Could the future, then,
+be as doubtful as he had so recently feared? As to the smiles of fortune,
+he no longer doubted: he was sure of winning them henceforth. He once
+thought himself inefficient, but he was mistaken. Might he not also be
+mistaken in thinking himself incapable of ever pleasing?—To this question
+he heard no other reply but the quickened pulsations of his heart, and the
+rippling of the water flowing past the seat to which he had betaken
+himself on the banks of the river.
+
+Meanwhile, Fleurange and her cousins went up‐stairs. Clement soon saw them
+all talking together in low tones on the large wooden gallery that
+extended around the house, and on which all the windows opened. Then they
+retired; but the light that shone for the first time that night was a long
+time visible, and Clement did not quit his post till he saw it was
+extinguished.
+
+
+XXXV.
+
+
+Fleurange gradually resumed the habits of domestic life—once the
+realization of all her dreams—and then, only then, she realized the extent
+and depth of the change she had undergone while separated from her
+friends.
+
+She was no longer the same. No effort of her will could conceal this fact.
+Her heart, her thoughts, her regrets, her desires, and her hopes, were all
+elsewhere. Italy in all its brilliancy did not differ more from the
+peaceful landscape before her, charming as it was, with the little garden
+of roses and the river winding around it, the ruins beyond, and the dark
+forest in the background, than the vanished scenes—still so vividly
+remembered—of which that land was the enchanting theatre, differed from
+those now occurring beneath the more misty sky of Germany. At Florence,
+her struggles and efforts, and the necessity of action, stimulated her
+courage. The peace she found at Santa Maria revived her strength. But
+there, as we have said, the past and the future seemed suspended, as it
+were. Now the struggle was over as well as the pause that succeeded it,
+and she must again set forth on the way—act, live in the present, and
+courageously take up life again as she found it, with its actual duties
+and new combats. Fleurange had never felt more difficulty and repugnance
+in overcoming herself.
+
+After the long restraint she had been obliged to make, it would have been
+some relief to be dispensed from all effort, especially at concealment,
+and freely give herself up to a profound melancholy, to pass away the
+hours in dreamy inaction, to weep when her heart was swelling with tears,
+and, if not to speak to every one of her sadness, at least take no trouble
+to conceal it.
+
+This would have been her natural inclination, and it was only by an effort
+she refrained from yielding to it. But this would have shown the strength
+gained in her retreat to have been only factitious, and her intercourse
+with Madre Maddalena to have left, this time, no permanent influence. We
+have, however, no such act of cowardice to record respecting our heroine.
+
+On the contrary, whoever saw her up at the first gleam of light in the
+east to relieve her aunt from all the cares of the _ménage_; whoever
+followed her first to the store‐rooms to dispense the provisions for the
+day, accompanied by little Frida, whom she initiated into the mysteries of
+housekeeping, and then to the kitchen to give directions and sometimes
+even lend assistance to the old and not over‐skilful cook; whoever saw her
+even going sometimes to market with a firm step, basket in hand, and
+returning with her cloak covered with dew, would not have imagined from
+the freshness she brought back from these matutinal walks, and the
+brilliancy which youth and health imparted to her complexion, that, more
+than once, the night had passed without sleep, and while hearing her early
+Mass, never neglected, she had shed so many scalding tears.
+
+Other cares, more congenial and better calculated to absorb her mind,
+occupied the remainder of the day. Her special talent for waiting on the
+sick, and the beneficent influence she exercised over them, were again
+brought into requisition around her uncle, and Madame Dornthal blessed the
+day of her return as she witnessed the evident progress of so prolonged
+and painful a convalescence—a progress that gave them reason to hope in
+the complete restoration of the professor’s faculties, if not in the
+possibility of his ever resuming constant or arduous labor. The young girl
+found these cares delightful, and her new duties towards her dear old
+friend Mademoiselle Josephine no less so.
+
+Josephine Leblanc’s affections had all been centred in her brother. She
+lived exclusively for him, and had never once thought of the possibility
+of surviving him. A person left alone in a house standing in a district
+devastated by war or fire, would not have felt more suddenly and strangely
+left alone than our poor old mademoiselle after the fatal blow that
+deprived her of her brother, so dear, so admired, and so venerated—the
+brother younger than herself, and in whose arms she had felt so sure of
+dying!
+
+She remained calm, however, and self‐possessed. But the mute despair
+imprinted on her face as she went to and fro in the house, troubling no
+one with her grief, affected every beholder. She only begged to remain
+there that she might not have to return alone to the place where she had
+lived with him. From the first, Madame Dornthal had invited her to take up
+her residence near them, and Fleurange’s return brought her old friend to
+a final decision, which proved so consoling that she firmly believed it to
+have been in the designs of Providence. The doctor left considerable
+property, which now belonged entirely to his sister. All their relatives
+were wealthier than they, and lived in the provinces. There was nothing
+therefore to induce Mademoiselle Josephine to return to Paris, and she
+resolved to settle near her new friends, that she might be near her whom
+long before she had adopted in her heart. It was a formidable undertaking
+for a person who for forty years had led a uniform life, always in the
+same place, and who was no less ignorant of the world at sixty than she
+was at twenty years of age. But it seemed no longer difficult as soon as
+she again had some one to live for. As to Fleurange, she found it pleasant
+and beneficial to devote herself to her old friend in return, and, in
+acquitting herself of this new debt of gratitude, her heart gained
+strength for the interior struggle which had become the constant effort of
+her life.
+
+Notwithstanding the marriage of her two cousins, everything now resumed
+the aspect of the past. Clara and Julian, established in the neighborhood
+where the pursuits of the latter would retain him a year, did not suffer a
+day to pass without visiting Rosenheim. Hansfelt no longer thought of
+leaving his old friend, and Hilda’s calm and radiant happiness seemed to
+lack nothing between her husband and her father, whose case now appeared
+so hopeful.
+
+Clement alone was not, as formerly, a part of the regular family circle.
+He only came once a week—on Saturday evening—and returned to Frankfort on
+Monday morning as soon as it was light.
+
+Business for which one feels a special aptitude is not generally
+repugnant. But Clement had such a variety of talents, and among all the
+things he was capable of, the duties of the office where he passed his
+days were certainly not what he had the greatest taste or inclination for.
+Nothing would have retained him there but the conviction of thereby
+serving the best interests of those dear to him. He must accept the most
+remunerative employment, and, this once resolved upon, nothing could
+exhaust the courageous endurance so peculiar to him. His courage was not
+in the least increased by the desire of surprising others or exciting
+their admiration, and nothing under any circumstances could daunt or turn
+him from his purpose. And he knew how to brave _ennui_ as well as
+disaster. But this _ennui_, which he generally overcame by severe
+application, became from time to time overwhelming, and he would have had
+violent fits of discouragement had it not been for the cheering evenings
+he passed in the modest household of which he was a member.
+
+Wilhelm Müller perceived that Clement’s varied acquirements were useful to
+him, and his devotedness to him was mingled with an admiration bordering
+on enthusiasm. On his side, he procured Clement the opportunity and
+pleasure of talking of something besides their commercial affairs, and
+with the aid of music their evenings passed agreeably away.
+
+But the kind and simple Bertha, with the instinct that often enables a
+woman to put her finger on the wound the most penetrating of men would
+never have discovered, had found a sure means of diverting him. The
+children had never forgotten the great event of their lives—the journey
+and the beautiful young lady they met on the way. Clement never seemed
+weary of listening to this account, to which Bertha would add many a
+comment; and this had been the commencement of a kind of confidential
+intimacy, which she discreetly took advantage of, and which was of more
+comfort to him than he realized. In short, this was the bright spot in his
+weary life. He would need it more than ever when, after a leave of absence
+on account of his father’s terrible accident, which had been prolonged
+from day to day, he would have to return to his bondage, and this time
+with an effort that added another degree of heroism to the task he had
+imposed on himself.
+
+It was now the eve of his departure. Fleurange and Hilda were sitting at
+twilight on a little bench by the river‐side conversing together, and
+Clement, leaning against a tree opposite, was looking at the current of
+the water, listening silently, but attentively, to the conversation that
+was going on before him. They were discussing all that had occurred during
+their separation, and Hilda began to question Fleurange about her
+journey—about Italy, and the life she led at Florence away from them all.
+Fleurange replied, but briefly and with the kind of apprehension we feel
+when a conversation is leading to a point we would like to avoid. She
+foresaw the impossibility of succeeding in this, and was endeavoring, but
+without success, to overcome her embarrassment, when Count George’s name
+at last was introduced. After some questions, to which Fleurange only
+replied by monosyllables, Hilda continued:
+
+“Count George!—A friend of Karl’s, who met him, was pretending the other
+day in my hearing that no one could see him without loving him. As you
+know him, Fleurange, what is your opinion?”
+
+The question was a decided one, and Fleurange, as we are aware, had no
+turn for evasion. She blushed and remained silent—so long silent that
+Clement abruptly turned around and looked at her. Did she turn pale at
+this? or was it the light of the moon through the foliage that blanched
+her face, and its silver rays that gave her an expression he had never
+seen till now? He remained looking at her with attention mingled with
+anguish, when at length, in a troubled tone and with a fruitless effort at
+a smile, she replied:
+
+“I think, Hilda, Karl’s friend was right.”
+
+These words were very simple after all, but the darkest hour of Clement’s
+life never effaced from his memory the spot or the moment in which they
+were uttered, the silence that preceded, or the tone and look that
+accompanied them.
+
+
+XXXVI.
+
+
+The blindness of love is proverbial. His clairvoyance would be equally so,
+were it not for the illusion that unceasingly aids the heart in avoiding
+the discoveries it dreads. The very instinct that gives keenness to the
+eye is as prompt to close it, and when the truth threatens one’s happiness
+or pride, there are but few who are bold enough to face it regardless of
+consequences.
+
+To this number, however, Clement belonged. There was in his nature no
+liability to illusions which had the power of obscuring his penetration.
+Therefore the truth was suddenly revealed to him without mercy, and his
+newly budding hopes were at once blasted for ever.—That moment of silence
+was as tragical as if all his heart’s blood had been shed on the spot, and
+left him lifeless at the feet of her who had unwittingly given him so
+deadly a blow!
+
+Within a year—since the day he thought himself separated from her for
+ever, not only by his own inferiority, but by the sad necessity of his new
+position—two unexpected changes had occurred: First, in his exterior
+life—then he was apparently ruined: now, he felt capable of repairing his
+fortunes. Secondly, in the opinion he had of himself.
+
+Not that a sudden fatuity had seized the modest and unpretending Clement.
+By no means; but the great reverses of his family had certainly effaced in
+a day every trace of his youthful timidity, and a kind of barrier had all
+at once melted away before him. Hitherto his worth had not been recognized
+beyond the narrow circle of his family, and even there he was loved
+without being fully appreciated. Necessity threw him in contact with the
+world; all his faculties were brought into action and developed by
+exercise. His features, his attitude, his manners, and his general
+appearance all participated in this transformation. The silent awkwardness
+that once left him unnoticed was overcome by the necessity of asserting
+himself, and also by that increased confidence in himself produced by a
+widening influence over others. This influence, at which he himself was
+astonished, was not solely the consequence of the superior ability he
+manifested in the dull and prosaic life he had embraced. But in this
+career, as everywhere else, he brought his highest faculties into
+exercise; and while observing and seizing all these details of his
+material life, he understood how to impart a soul to them by his dignity,
+trustworthiness, unselfishness, and generous ardor—which are the sweet
+flowers of labor and the noble result of a well‐regulated nature.
+
+He also reserved a prominent part of his evenings for the favorite studies
+in which he had not ceased to interest himself, as well as a thousand
+subjects foreign to his daily occupation, but exceedingly useful in the
+development of his mind. Thence sprang a simple and persuasive eloquence,
+which gave him an ascendency over every one, and caused him to be
+especially sought after on a thousand occasions that had no immediate
+connection with his actual position. Once or twice he had even been
+invited to speak at some public assembly which had for its object either a
+question of public interest, or one relating to literature and the arts,
+and he acquitted himself so well as to attract the notice not only of
+those to whom the name of Dornthal was already familiar, but of a great
+number of strangers. Numerous advances to acquaintance were made him on
+all sides, and Clement might easily have passed his evenings elsewhere
+than in the unpretending home of the Müllers. But he had no such
+inclination. Their company satisfied his present tastes. Music, which he
+would not willingly have been deprived of, was the delight of his hosts;
+and as is frequently the case in Germany, they were able to join him in
+duets or trios which many a professional singer would not have disdained
+to listen to.
+
+Over his whole life, with its varied and absorbing interests, reigned one
+dear and ever‐present form. It seemed at first like some celestial vision,
+far‐off and inaccessible, but for some time, under the influence of all we
+have referred to, it appeared to have drawn nearer to him.
+
+On this account, he began to appreciate the increased consideration with
+which he was regarded, but which he valued so little on his own. He
+ventured at last to ask himself if the good‐will that seemed to beam on
+him on all sides did not authorize him to hope sooner or later for
+something more, and if his favorite poet was wholly wrong in promising
+that he who loved should win something in return.
+
+Such thoughts and dreams, if allowed entrance in the heart, are apt to end
+by taking entire possession of it; and, as we have said, Clement was
+intoxicated with hope when Fleurange reappeared in their midst. But his
+dreams, fancies, and hopes were now all crushed by one word from her—one
+word, the fatal meaning of which was clearly revealed by the expression of
+her eyes, which Clement caught a glimpse of by the pale light of the moon!
+
+The grief that pierced his soul enabled him to realize the full extent of
+his illusions, and he was astonished he had ever before considered himself
+unhappy. For some time after his return to Frankfort, he was overpowered
+by a dejection such as he had never experienced. He felt as incapable of
+any further effort as he was indifferent to all success. His daily task
+became insupportable, and study in the evening impossible. Instead of
+returning to the Müller’s at the usual hour, he would leave the city afoot
+or on horseback, and roam around the country for hours, as if to wear out
+his grief by exhausting his strength.
+
+Now he clearly saw he had only lived, planned, and exerted himself for her
+the two years past; he had given her not only his heart, but his entire
+life, and that life had had but one aim—the hope of some day winning in
+return the heart which would never belong to him now—because it was given
+to another! And while repeating Count George’s name with rage, he
+sharpened his anguish by recalling him, as he had once seen him, clothed
+with irresistible attractions. His noble features, his look of
+intelligence, his taste for the arts, the charm of his manners, his voice,
+and his language, all came back unpityingly to the memory of his humble
+rival. He remembered him in the gallery of the Old Mansion, through which
+he accompanied him at a time when he was a mere student, and absolutely
+wanting in everything that was, not only attractive, but capable of
+exciting the least attention. His imagination mercilessly dwelt on the
+contrast between them. Was it surprising (and he blushed at so ridiculous
+a comparison) such a man should be more successful than he? And should he,
+inferior as he was, be astonished that this man, living so near Fleurange,
+under the same roof—At this thought a bitter anguish, a furious jealousy,
+took possession of him, and excited a tempest in his heart which neither
+duty, nor his sense of honor, nor the energy of his will, could succeed in
+calming. There are times when passion rises superior to every other
+impulse, and they who have not learned to seek their strength from a
+divine source are always vanquished. But Clement had been accustomed to
+the powerful restraints of religion; his strength consisted in never
+throwing them off. Therefore, he was not to fail in this severe struggle:
+he would soon turn his eyes heavenward for the aid he needed in again
+becoming master of himself.
+
+
+XXXVII.
+
+
+Disinterestedness, energy, and the power of self‐control were, as may have
+been perceived, qualities common both to Clement and Fleurange. There was,
+in fact, a great resemblance in their natures, which, on his part, was the
+secret of the attraction so suddenly ripened into a more lively sentiment;
+and, on hers, of an unchanging confidence, in spite of the transformation
+of another kind she likewise experienced. And now they were both engaged
+in a like struggle: they were united by similarity of suffering, which
+separated them, nevertheless, as by an abyss.
+
+Ah! if Clement could have hoped, as he once did, that a more tender
+sentiment would spring out of this sympathy and confidence, with what joy,
+what sweet pride, he would have regarded this conformity so constantly
+manifest between them! But the aspect of everything was now changed: there
+was no longer any possibility of happiness for him, he could now only
+suffer; and by the light of what was passing in his own heart he was
+enabled to read hers—at once open to him and yet closed against him for
+ever!
+
+With all Clement’s self‐control, he would have been utterly unable to
+conceal the state of his mind from his cousin had he remained at
+Frankfort. But, after the days of overpowering anguish we have already
+referred to, after yielding without restraint to a despair bordering on
+madness, Clement at length succeeded in regaining his clearness of
+judgment.
+
+One morning he rose before day, and left the city on foot. His walk was
+prolonged to such an extent that it might be called a pilgrimage, and the
+more correctly as its goal was a church, but so unpretending a church that
+it only differed from the neighboring houses by a stone cross to be seen
+when passing the door which it surmounted. The door was opened by the very
+person Clement came to see—a pious and simple young priest who was
+formerly his schoolmate. He was inferior to Clement intellectually, but
+his guide and master in those regions the soul alone attains. What Clement
+now sought was—not merely to pour out his heart by way of confidence—not
+even the consolation of discreet and Christian sympathy—but to recover his
+firmness by a courageous avowal of all his weakness, and afterwards make
+an unchangeable resolution in the presence of God and his representative
+at the holy tribunal. He had made a similar one while yet a youth, but now
+in his manhood he wished to renew it in a more solemn manner. It would of
+course require greater effort after the gleam of hope he had just lost,
+and the devotedness he pledged himself to would be more difficult after
+the revelation that she whom he loved, and must ever love, had given her
+affections to another. His voice faltered as he declared that no word,
+look, or act of his should ever trouble her, or reveal the sentiments she
+had inspired in the heart of one who would live near her, without her, and
+yet for her!
+
+It was, in fact, his old _devise_: “Garder l’amour et briser l’espoir!”
+which he now solemnly assumed with the grave and pious feeling that
+accompanies all self‐sacrifice.
+
+Such piety may be regarded by some as rather _exaltée_. They are right,
+but it is the kind of exaltation which accords with the real signification
+of the word, which elevates the soul it inflames, and which, though
+powerless in itself, can effect much when the divine assistance is invoked
+to co‐operate in aiding, increasing, in a word, exalting human strength!
+
+That evening Clement quietly resumed his old seat at the Müllers’
+fireside. In reply to Wilhelm’s questions, he said that during his long
+visit at Rosenheim he had neglected affairs that required his attention.
+“And then I confess,” continued he, “that I have been in a bad humor, and
+thought it wiser to relieve you from my society.” But to Bertha, who also
+questioned him, in a less vague way, however, he acknowledged more
+frankly, but no less briefly, that he had met with a great affliction, but
+requested her never to mention the subject to him. Then he took his violin
+and began to play a strain from Bach.
+
+Bertha seated herself at the piano, and played an accompaniment to this
+and several other pieces. Her husband, who was beating time beside her,
+remarked that their young friend’s bad humor had a singularly favorable
+effect on his talent.
+
+“I assure you, Dornthal, you never played so well as you have this
+evening.”
+
+“Perhaps so,” replied Clement with a thoughtful air. “Yes, I think you are
+right.”
+
+It was really the truth. Music was the veiled, but eloquent, language of
+his soul. The very feelings he so successfully repressed, the words that
+no temptation or impulse could induce his lips to betray, made the chords
+vibrate beneath his bow, and gave their tones an inexpressible accent it
+was impossible to hear without emotion and surprise.
+
+When, at the end of a fortnight, Clement reappeared at Rosenheim, all
+exterior traces of the excessive agitation he had given himself up to had
+disappeared. He resumed his usual manner towards Fleurange. No one would
+have dreamed—and she less than any one else—that between the past and
+present he found the difference of life and death. She little imagined
+that the new and strange sympathy that existed between them revealed to
+him the secret of all her thoughts and struggles. She also, apparently,
+had become the same as before. Her time was actively employed, the care
+she had of little Frida and that she lavished on her uncle, the _ménage_,
+sewing, exercise, and study filled up the days so completely that it was
+very seldom she could have been found inactive or pensive.
+
+Hilda, her favorite cousin, though likewise struck for a moment by the
+hesitation with which she replied to her questions about Count George,
+almost ceased attaching any importance to this slight incident when she
+observed the apparent calmness with which Fleurange fulfilled the duties
+of her active life. Only one clearly read her heart and understood the
+passing expression of weariness and sorrow that now and then overshadowed
+her brow for an instant, and saddened her eye. Only one noticed her
+absence when the family assembled in the evening, and followed her in
+thought to the little bench on the bank of the river, where he imagined
+she had gone to weep awhile, alone and unrestrained. All she suffered he
+had to endure himself, and he lived thus united to her, and yet every day
+still more widely separated from her.
+
+The weeks flew rapidly away, however, and the tranquility and happiness of
+the family were continually increasing. The professor’s mental and
+physical strength gradually returned. Work alone was forbidden him, but
+reading and conversation were allowable and salutary diversions. His
+conversations with Hansfelt were sometimes as interesting as of old, and
+he might have been supposed to have regained the complete use of his
+faculties had not a partial decay of memory sometimes warned his friends
+he had not entirely recovered from his illness. For example, he often
+imagined himself in the Old Mansion, and this illusion became stronger
+after all his children, including Gabrielle, gathered around him. But in
+other respects his memory was good. Hansfelt found him as correct and
+clear as ever on all points of history or literary and religious subjects.
+It seemed as if the higher faculties of his nature recovered their tone
+first, and were invigorated by contact with the noble mind of his friend.
+Thus the evenings passed away without _ennui_, even for the youngest,
+while listening to their conversation.
+
+These evenings frequently ended with music, which the professor craved and
+indeed required as a part of his treatment. Clement would take his violin,
+and not at all unwillingly, for he saw his cousin always listened to it
+attentively. In this way he dared address her in a mysterious language,
+which he alone understood, but which sometimes gave her a thrill as if she
+were listening to the echo of her own cry of pain.
+
+One evening, when he had excelled, she said: “You call that a song without
+words, Clement, but the music was certainly composed for a song, which
+perhaps you know, do you not?”
+
+“No,” replied he, “but like you I imagine I can hear the words, and feel
+they must exist somewhere.”
+
+Hansfelt had also been listening attentively to the music.
+
+“Yes,” said he smiling, “they exist in the hearts of all who
+love—especially in the hearts of all who love without hope. Here I will
+express in common language, but not in rhyme, the meaning of what Clement
+has just played.”
+
+He took a pencil and hastily wrote four lines nearly synonymous with those
+of a French poet:
+
+
+    “Du mal qu’une amour ignorée
+      Nous fait souffrir
+    Je porte l’âme déchirée
+      Jusqu’à mourir!”(1)
+
+    The pang of unrequited love
+                I feel;
+    ’Tis death the bleeding heart I bear
+                Must heal!
+
+
+Clement made no reply, but abruptly changed the subject. The children rose
+and clapped their hands as he struck up their favorite tarantella, and
+became noisy as well as gay.
+
+Fleurange left the room, unperceived as she supposed, but Hilda, who had
+been carefully observing her all the evening, followed her, determined to
+obtain a complete avowal of all that was passing in her heart. She softly
+entered her cousin’s chamber. Fleurange was not expecting her. She had
+thrown herself on a chair, with her face buried in her hands, in an
+attitude expressive at once of dejection and grief.
+
+Hilda approached and threw her arms around her. Fleurange sprang up, her
+eyes full of tears.
+
+“Do you remember,” said Hilda in a soft, caressing tone—“do you remember,
+Gabrielle, the day when I also wept in the library at our dear Old
+Mansion? You asked me the reason of my tears, and I answered by opening my
+heart to you. You have not forgotten it, have you? Will you not answer me
+in a like way now?”
+
+Fleurange shook her head without uttering a word.
+
+“It has always seemed to me,” continued Hilda, “that the happiness which
+has crowned my life dates from my confidence in you that day. Why will you
+not trust me in a like manner, and hope as I did?”
+
+“Happiness was within your reach,” replied Fleurange; “an imaginary
+obstacle alone prevented you from grasping it.”
+
+“But how many obstacles that seem insurmountable vanish with time or even
+beneath a firm will!” She continued slowly and in a lower tone: “Why
+should not the Count George, then—”
+
+“Stop, Hilda, I conjure you,” cried Fleurange in an agitated manner.
+
+Her cousin stopped confounded.
+
+“Listen to me,” resumed Fleurange, at length, in a calmer tone. “As it is
+your wish, let us speak of him. I consent. Let us speak of him this time,
+but never again. Tell me,” she continued with a sad smile, “can you make
+me his equal in wealth and rank? Or deprive him of his nobility and make
+him as poor as I? In either case, especially in the latter,” she cried,
+with a tenderness in her tone, and a look she could not repress—“ah!
+nothing, certainly nothing but his will, could separate me from him! But
+it is reasonable to suppose the sun will rise upon us to‐morrow and find
+us the same as to‐day: we no longer live in the time of fairies, when
+extraordinary metamorphoses took place to smooth away difficulties and
+second the wishes of poor mortals. Help me then, Hilda, I beseech you, to
+forget him, to live, and even recover from the wound, by never speaking to
+me either of him, or myself!—”
+
+Hilda silently pressed her in her arms for a long time, and then said: “I
+will obey you, Gabrielle, and never mention his name till you speak of him
+first.”
+
+
+XXXVIII.
+
+
+The summer and autumn both passed away without anything new, except some
+variations in the professor’s slow recovery, and an occasional gleam of
+happiness for Clement—the revival of a spark of his buried hopes—but such
+moments were rare, and succeeded by a sad reaction; nevertheless, they
+were sweet and lived long in his memory.
+
+One day in particular was thus graven on his heart—a fine day in October,
+when he had the pleasure of rowing Hilda and his cousin to a shady point
+further up on the river, which gracefully winds nearly around it. There
+they spent several hours, conversing together with the delightful
+familiarity of intimacy, and now and then reading some favorite passage in
+the books they brought with them. As he sat listening to the silvery tones
+of Fleurange’s voice, and met her expressive, sympathetic glance when he
+took the book in his turn and read nearly as well as herself; as he sat
+thus near her in that lovely, solitary spot, with no other witness but her
+whose affection for both seemed only an additional tie, hope once more
+entered his heart, as one breaks into a dwelling fastened against him,
+but, alas! to be promptly thrust out, leaving him as desolate as before.
+
+While he was rowing them back in the evening, with his eyes fastened on
+Fleurange, he saw her delightful but evanescent emotions of the day fading
+away with the light, and another remembrance arise, sadder and more tender
+than ever, which gave to her eyes, sometimes fastened on the dark and
+rapid current, sometimes fixed on the shore, the expression he had learned
+to read so well—an expression that made his heart ache with pity and
+sympathy, but at the same time quiver and shrink with anguish, as if a
+lancet or caustic had been applied to his wound and caused it to bleed!
+
+Two months later the festival of Christmas again brought him one of these
+fleeting moments of happiness. On the eve—the never‐forgotten anniversary
+of Fleurange’s arrival in their midst—the whole family were reunited, and
+felt as if they were living over again the delightful past. The Christmas
+tree was as brilliant as of yore; Mademoiselle Josephine, as ready to
+participate in the joy of her friends as she was to avoid saddening them
+with her sorrows, aided in adorning it, and every one found on its
+branches some offering from her generous hand. Then, as in bygone days,
+they wove garlands of holly, which Fleurange, as well as her cousins, wore
+at dinner, and this time without any entreaty. At a later hour they had
+music and dancing, which, ever ready as she was to catch the joy of
+others, gave her a feeling of unusual gaiety, to which she unresistingly
+abandoned herself—the gaiety of youth, which at times triumphs over
+everything, and sometimes breaks out with an excess in proportion to its
+previous restraint. Fleurange’s laughter rang like music, and her joyous
+voice mingled with the children’s, to the great joy of him who was looking
+on with ecstasy and surprise. Her radiant eyes, her glowing complexion,
+the brilliancy happiness adds to beauty, and had so long been wanting to
+hers, gave him, who could not behold it revive without transport, a
+feeling of intoxication which once more made him forget all and hope
+everything! But he was speedily and sadly recalled to himself.
+
+Madame Dornthal was seated beside her husband’s arm‐chair, which she
+seldom left. A pleasant smile reappeared on her lips as she looked at her
+children moving around her. From time to time she leaned towards the
+professor, and was glad to see him entering into all that was going on
+with his usual pleasure and with perfect comprehension of mind. All at
+once she thought he turned pale. She looked at Clement, and made a gesture
+which he understood. The noise disturbed his father. In an instant
+profound silence was restored, and they all gathered around the
+professor’s chair. He appeared suddenly fatigued: his eyes closed, and he
+leaned his head on his wife’s shoulder. They all anxiously awaited his
+first words after this sudden fit of somnolency. Presently he opened his
+eyes and gave a vague, uneasy glance around. Then, turning to Madame
+Dornthal, he said in a sad tone, passing his hand over his forehead:
+
+“Tell me why Felix is not here: I knew, but cannot remember.”
+
+This new failure of his memory, the name associated with so many painful
+recollections and uttered in so distressing a manner, put an end to all
+the gaiety of the evening. The effect of so much agitation and fatigue on
+the professor was not regarded as very serious, but it left a painful
+impression, especially on Fleurange, who had fresh reasons for feeling his
+words.
+
+Clement, who had been informed by Steinberg of what had occurred at
+Florence, silently entered into her feelings, and once more the flash of
+joy that lit up his heart vanished in a night darker than ever.
+
+But he could not foresee that a public event of serious import was at that
+very hour transpiring far away, in a different sphere from his, which
+would have an important and painful influence on his humble destiny.
+
+To be continued.
+
+
+
+
+Review of Vaughan’s Life Of S. Thomas.(2)
+
+
+It is but too seldom that the reviewer has to welcome a work like that
+which we have already had the pleasure of introducing to our readers, and
+to which we now desire to render more fitting honors. An original life of
+a saint, and of an epoch‐making saint like Thomas of Aquin, treated on a
+scale adequate to its importance, in the English tongue, by an English
+Benedictine monk, is a refreshing novelty to those who, like ourselves,
+have so much to say to what is slight, or frivolous, or common, or
+hostile. The contemplative reviewer, looking at the two thick volumes of
+the English edition, feels inclined, like a man who guesses before he
+opens a letter, to conjure up fancies as to what he will find in this new
+life of S. Thomas of Aquin. Two volumes, each consisting of more than 800
+pages, are a great deal, in these days, for one saint. They are a great
+deal to write, and what is perhaps of more importance, they are a great
+deal to read. But no one can suppose that they are too much for such a
+saint as Thomas of Aquin. Considering that his own works, as printed in
+the splendid Parma edition lately completed, would make up some forty
+volumes of the size of these two goodly ones, it is not much. Considering
+that Thomas of Aquin has been more written about by commentators for four
+or five centuries than any other man, except perhaps Aristotle, who ever
+lived—considering that every student of theology is always coming across
+his authority, and that he has been the great builder‐up of the vast
+building of Catholic philosophical and theological terminology, it is not
+much that he should have two volumes. Indeed, when we look into the book,
+we expect to find Prior Vaughan not seldom complaining of being obliged,
+through want of space, to leave out a great deal that he would have wished
+to say. And this leads us to notice the author’s name. Father Bede
+Vaughan, though fairly known by reputation in England, is perhaps a
+stranger to the greater number of American Catholics. It is sufficient to
+say at present that he is a brother of the Very Rev. Dr. Herbert Vaughan,
+whose presence in this country lately, in connection with the mission to
+the negroes, will have made his name familiar to many even of those who
+had not the pleasure of personally meeting him. Father Bede Vaughan is
+Prior of the Benedictine Cathedral Chapter of Newport and Menevia. A
+cathedral‐prior is a novelty, not only in literature, but absolutely.
+There were a great many cathedral‐priors in England once upon a time—men
+of power and substance—wearing their mitres (some of them) and sitting in
+the House of Lords. Whatever be the lands and the revenues of the only
+cathedral‐priory in English‐speaking hierarchies of the present day, it is
+pleasant to meet with the old name, and to meet it on the cover of a book.
+That a Benedictine should have written a sterling book will not surprise
+the world of letters. It is perhaps a little new to find the great
+Dominican, the Angel of the Schools, taken up by a member of an order
+which S. Thomas is popularly supposed to have in set purpose turned his
+back upon. But this is a point on which the work itself will enlighten us.
+Meanwhile, on opening the first volume we catch sight of a portrait of the
+Saint. It is a reproduction, by photography, of a painting by the Roman
+artist Szoldatics, which was painted expressly for the present work. It
+represents the well‐known scene in which the crucified Master, for whom
+the great doctor has written and taught his life long, asks him what
+reward he would desire. Portraits of S. Thomas of Aquin are not uncommon.
+We are all familiar with the large and portly figure and the full and mild
+countenance, the sun upon his breast, the black and the white, and the
+shaven crown of the Order of St. Dominic, the open book and the immortal
+pen. Some of the representations of the saint exaggerate his traditional
+portliness into a corpulence that almost obliterates the light of genius
+in his face. On the other hand, there exist many which give at once the
+large open features and the look of inspiration and of refinement. Those
+who have turned to the title‐pages of the best Roman or Flemish editions
+of his life or works will remember these. The new portrait, photographed
+in the first volume, is very successful. Thomas of Aquin had Norman blood
+in his veins, and the fairness of his skin and the contour of his head are
+not those of the typical Italian. The artist has managed to convey very
+well that massive head, in which every lobe of the brain seems to have
+been perfectly developed and roomily lodged, thus furnishing the
+intelligence with an imaginative instrument whose power was only equalled
+by its delicacy. In the corresponding place in the second volume there is
+a photograph of a meritorious engraving, from a picture or engraving
+unknown to us, in which, however, the head of the Saint is not so noble or
+refined.
+
+Passing, however, to consider the substance of the work itself, it is not
+too much to say that, as a life of S. Thomas of Aquin, it is perfectly
+original. We do not mean, of course, that the writer has found out new
+facts, or made any considerable alteration in the aspect of old ones. But
+his plan of working is new. He has had the idea of giving, not merely S.
+Thomas, but his surroundings. Some saints, even of those who have spent
+themselves in external labors for their fellow‐men, require but little in
+the way of background to make their portraits significant. Ven. Bede’s
+biography would not gain much light from discussions upon Mohammedanism,
+or upon the state of England or of Europe during his life. To understand
+and love S. Francis of Sales, it is not necessary to study the growth of
+Calvinism, to follow the steps of the _De Auxiliis_ controversy, or to
+become minutely acquainted with the character of Henri IV. But it is very
+different with S. Thomas of Aquin. Opening his mouth, like a true doctor
+of the church, “in medio ecclesiæ,” he had words to speak which all
+Christendom listened to, and acted upon, too, in one way or another. He
+was a power at Paris, at Cologne, at Naples. Every great influence of the
+thirteenth century felt the impulse of his thought: S. Louis the Crusader,
+Urban IV., Gregory X., the Greek schismatics, the Arabian philosophers,
+the opponents of monasticism, the mighty power of the universities. Prior
+Vaughan thus speaks in the preface to the first volume:
+
+
+    “The author has found it difficult to comprehend how the life of
+    S. Thomas of Aquin could be written so as to content the mind of
+    an educated man—of one who seeks to measure the reach of principle
+    and the influence of saintly genius—without embracing a
+    considerably wider field of thought than has been deemed necessary
+    by those who have aimed more at composing a book of edifying
+    reading, than at displaying the genesis and development of truth
+    and the impress of a master‐mind upon the age in which he lived.
+    It has always appeared to him that one of the most telling
+    influences exerted by the doctor‐saints of God, has been that of
+    rare intellectual power in confronting and controlling the
+    passions and mental aberrations of epochs, as well as of blinded
+    and swerving men....
+
+    “The object which the author of these pages has proposed to
+    himself is this: to unfold before the reader’s mind the far‐
+    reaching and many‐sided influence of heroic sanctity, when
+    manifested by a man of massive mind, of sovereign genius, and of
+    sagacious judgment, and then to remind him that, as the fruit
+    hangs from the branches, so genius of command and steadiness of
+    view and unswervingness of purpose, are naturally conditioned by a
+    certain moral habit of heart and head; that purity, reverence,
+    adoration, love, are the four solid corner‐stones on which that
+    Pharos reposes which, when all about it, and far beyond it, is
+    darkness and confusion, stands up in the midst as the
+    representative of order, and as the minister of light, and as the
+    token of salvation.
+
+    “Now, the Angel of the Schools was emphatically a great and
+    shining light. To write his life is not so much to deal with the
+    subject of his personal history, as to display the stretch of his
+    power and the character of his influence. Indeed, few of the great
+    cardinal thinkers of the world have left much private history to
+    record. Self was hidden in the splendor of the light which bursts
+    out from it—just as the more brilliant the flame, so much the more
+    unseen is the lamp in which it burns. It stands to reason that the
+    more widespread the influence which such men as these exert, so
+    much the wider must be the range taken by the writer over the
+    field of history and theology and philosophy if he wishes
+    adequately to delineate the action of their lives. The private
+    history of S. Thomas of Aquin could be conveniently written in
+    fifty pages, whilst his full biography would certainly occupy many
+    thousand pages.” (Pp. iii., iv.)
+
+
+The view which is thus sketched out is a large one. We have said that the
+author presents not merely his hero, but his hero’s surroundings. But, in
+studying his mind and his work, he does not content himself with making a
+vivid background of the thirteenth century. One century is the child of
+another, and mind is educated by mind. The past is the seed of the future,
+and no time can be understood without understanding the times that gave it
+birth. This is especially true of the times when history accumulates most
+rapidly, and of minds to whom it is given to fashion history as it is
+made. Prior Vaughan finds the story of S. Thomas’ intellectual work
+commencing far back in the work of those men whom he calls the “columnal
+fathers” of the church. He therefore takes his reader back to primitive
+ages—to the desert, the laura, the early conflicts of God’s servants with
+paganism, with heresy, and with worldliness. He sets before him S.
+Anthony, in the majesty of his single‐hearted union with Christ; S.
+Athanasius, worthy disciple of such a master, unsurpassed in the great
+opportunities of his life and the strength with which he rose to meet
+them; S. Basil, the monk that fought the world, and overcame it; S.
+Gregory Theologus, the _vates sacer_ of the fourth century, who sang in
+verse and in rhythmical prose the song of the consubstantial Son of God.
+He introduces us to S. Augustine, to S. Ambrose, to S. Gregory the Great,
+and points out how essential a feature, in the greatness of S. Thomas, is
+the way in which he has reproduced all that was eternal and “catholic” in
+the thoughts of the men whom God has set up to be the pillars of the
+doctrine of his church. With other saints, it would, perhaps, be
+superfluous to trace their connection with the fathers; with the author of
+the _Summa_, it is indispensable.
+
+
+    “The Columnal Fathers and the Angelical were in completest
+    harmony; they were knit together by the monastic principle. The
+    intellectual hinges of the Universal Church (speaking humanly)
+    have been monastic‐men—that is to say, men who, through an intense
+    cross‐worship and a keen perception of the beautiful, threw up all
+    for Christ; and through
+
+    ‘The ingrained instinct of old reverence,
+    The holy habit of obedience,’
+
+    loved, labored, suffered for him, and died into his arms.
+
+    “For the one thread which pierces through all, and maintains a
+    real communication between the Angelical and the heroes of the
+    classic age—which creates a brotherhood between S. Thomas of the
+    thirteenth century and the great athletes in the second and the
+    third—which makes the ‘Sun of the Church’ illuminate the ‘Pillar
+    of the World,’ and so reciprocally—that is to say, which renders
+    S. Thomas and S. Anthony one in spirit and in principle—was this,
+    that their beings were transformed into a supernatural activity,
+    through an intense and personal love of their Redeemer.
+
+    “This was the one special lesson which the Angelical drew from the
+    wilderness and the fathers, which came to him through S. Benedict,
+    indeed, but rather as a principle of _quies_ than of exertion. In
+    the desert athletes, and those who followed them, he found that
+    principle operative, and almost military in its chivalrous
+    readiness to combat and spill blood in defence of truth. It lent
+    to him what it exhibits in them also—breadth of view, largeness,
+    moral freedom, stubborn courage, generosity of heart, expansion of
+    mind, and an electric light of intellect, which bear about them a
+    touch of the Eastern world. How could the Angelical read Anthony’s
+    life, or follow Athanasius in his exiles, or see Basil so
+    heroically rigid in his defence of right, or hear, in imagination,
+    Gregory Theologus pouring out a stream of polished eloquence,
+    without being impressed by truth’s grace and music; how could he
+    watch S. Chrysostom, all on fire with his love of God and with his
+    discriminating sympathy for men, or think of the ascetic Jerome,
+    battling single‐handed in the wilderness, or perusing his
+    Scripture in the cave; how could he dwell in spirit with S.
+    Ambrose or S. Gregory the Great, or follow the career of the
+    passionate, emotional, splendid S. Augustine, without expanding in
+    heart and mind towards all that is best and greatest—all that is
+    most noble and most fair in the majestic character of God’s
+    tenderly‐cherished saints?
+
+    “Had he not known them so intimately, great as he was, his mind
+    would have been comparatively cramped, his character most probably
+    would have been less imperial in its mould, and there would have
+    been less of that oriental mightiness about his intellectual
+    creations, which now reminds one of those vast monuments of other
+    days, which still are the marvel of travellers in the East, and
+    the despair of modern engineers.” (II., pp. 523‐5.)
+
+
+A great portion of the second volume is taken up with the exposition in
+detail of these thoughts and ideas. We do not think that any one who has
+thoroughly seized the author’s point of view will be sorry that so much
+space is given to the lives and characters of men who are not the
+immediate subject of the book. The truth is, that the full _significance_
+of S. Thomas of Aquin has been very much overlooked in modern times. The
+non‐Catholic theory has always been that he was a voluminous “scholastic,”
+more acute than most of his sort, perhaps, but mediæval, hair‐splitting,
+and unprofitable. The Catholic theory has done him greater justice; but
+even the Catholic schools have too much forgotten S. Thomas. There is an
+interesting passage in one of Lacordaire’s letters, in which he tells the
+Abbé Drioux, who has done so much for S. Thomas in France, how he read the
+Angelical every day, and yet how long it had been before he had come to
+know him! And then he speaks with some depreciation of that “Positive”
+theology which has pretended to take the place of the scholastic form and
+discipline. The great preacher was familiar with the spiritual wants of
+the world in their widest aspect, and he no sooner came to know S. Thomas
+of Aquin than he saw that he was face to face with the mind that has said
+more truth about God and man, and said it better, than any one man who has
+ever lived; and he has said it so well, because he has not said it out of
+his own consciousness, but first saturated himself with the living truth
+of the immortal fathers, and then reproduced in his own way what God had
+thus himself imparted to the world.
+
+The influence which S. Thomas owed to the study and meditation of the
+great fathers was surpassed—or rather, we ought to say, most powerfully
+shown—by the impressions made upon his heart, even more than his mind, by
+his early bringing up. Every one knows that the Angel of the Schools, who
+was of the noblest blood of Italy, spent his early years in the great
+arch‐monastery of Monte Casino. Prior Vaughan has no hesitation in making
+the assertion that Thomas of Aquin never lost what he acquired from the
+monks of S. Benedict during those seven childish years that he spent with
+them in the cloisters of the great abbey. He was never a professed
+Benedictine, although he would, in the natural course, have become one
+without making any explicit profession, had not the troubles of the times
+forced the monks to flee from the abbey. But the Benedictine or monastic
+spirit, the principle of _quies_, as our author calls it, with the vivid
+appreciation of the kingship of Christ, Thomas took away with him when he
+went forth and carried with him to the work he had to do. The new
+mendicant orders that had recently been founded were schools of activity,
+aggressive, moving hither and thither, pitching their tents in great
+towns, and lifting their voices in universities. Their saints were to be
+fitted for the regeneration of a new phase of the world. But in the saints
+themselves it was only an outward change. The essential spirit remained
+the same. That spirit had been the heirloom of the old monastic orders,
+and it could never be out of date. In the men who were to do the greatest
+things in the new life of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, the old
+spirit of the cloister must be found strong and deep. In the man who above
+all was to stand forth as the sum and crown of the middle age, that
+contemplative, immovable, far‐seeing realization of “the person of Christ”
+must exist as heroically as in Anthony of the Desert or Benedict of the
+Mountain. And it was S. Thomas’ Benedictine training that contributed much
+to make him such a man.
+
+
+    “The monks thought much, but talked little; thus the monastic
+    system encouraged meditation, rather than intellectual
+    tournaments; reserve rather than display, deep humility rather
+    than dialectical skill. The Benedictines did not aim so much at
+    unrestrained companionship of free discussion as at self control;
+    not so much at secular‐minded fantasy as at much prayer and sharp
+    penance, till self was conquered, and the grace of God reigned,
+    and giants walked the earth. Self‐mastery, springing from the
+    basis of a supernatural life, moulded the heart to sanctity, and
+    imparted to the intellect an accuracy of vision which is an act of
+    nature directed and purified by grace. Theodore, Aldhelm, Bede,
+    Boniface, Alcuin, Dunstan, Wilfrid, Stephen, Bernard, Anselm,
+    these names are suggestive of this influence of the monastic
+    system.” (I., p. 26.)
+
+
+It is one of the aims of the book to bring out the view that the prince of
+scholastics and the king of dialecticians was a man of the purest and
+deepest “monasticism.” But he was not destined to be as an Anselm, a
+Bernard, or a Hugh of S. Victor.
+
+The Saint was sent to Naples for the prosecution of his studies, and
+whilst there he asked for and received the habit of S. Dominic. The author
+gives a brilliant sketch of Naples as it was under the sway of Frederick
+II. He then devotes a whole chapter to a “study” of the new orders of S.
+Francis and S. Dominic, for the purpose of bringing out vividly before the
+reader the new world that was springing up and the new race of men that
+the church was calling forth to deal with it. We have no space to quote
+from this chapter, but, even taken apart from its connection with S.
+Thomas, it is full of interest and life.
+
+Thus was Thomas of Aquin prepared and equipped; prepared by the great
+fathers and by S. Benedict, equipped in the armor of the Order of
+intellectual chivalry. And what was the work before him? Who were his
+enemies, his friends, his neighbors, his assistants? In answer to these
+questions we have the chapters on “Abelard, or Rationalism and
+Irreverence”; on “S. Bernard, or Authority and Reverence”; on the “Schools
+of S. Victor”; on the “Arabian and the Jewish Influence in Europe”; on
+“William of S. Amour”; on “Paris and its University”; and on “Albert the
+Great.” Some of these chapters relate, as will be seen, to men who were
+not contemporaries of S. Thomas. But if Abelard, and S. Bernard, and
+William of Champeaux had passed away in the flesh, their influence or
+their views still lived on when Thomas wrote. And we see the full
+significance of these chapters on the great schools of thought, orthodox
+and heterodox, when we arrive at the second volume, and find the author
+showing in detail how the Angel of the Schools, in some part or other of
+his voluminous writings, met and refuted every form of prevalent error,
+and, whilst majestically laying down principles for all ages, never forgot
+to clear up the difficulties of his own time. The rationalism of Abelard,
+the emanation doctrines that Arabian subtlety had elaborated out of the
+reminiscences of the old Gnosticism, the errors of the Greek schismatics,
+the perversity of the Jews, are all encountered by his never‐resting pen,
+either in some one of his numerous _Opuscula_, varying in length from an
+essay to an octavo volume, or else in one or other of his two great
+_Sums_, or perhaps in more places than one, the refutation being the more
+complete as the writing becomes more mature. As for the two greatest and
+most prominent of his enterprises—the Christianizing of Aristotle and the
+formation of a complete _Sum_ of theology—it was to be expected that Prior
+Vaughan should fully enlarge upon them. The chapters on “S. Thomas and
+Aristotle,” and “S. Thomas and Reason,” in the second volume, form a good
+introduction to the study of the Angelic Doctor, and at the same time give
+the enquiring mind some notion of how S. Thomas has performed one of the
+greatest feats that genius ever accomplished—the successful and consistent
+“conversion” of the greatest, the most original, and the most precise of
+heathen philosophers into a hewer of wood and carrier of water for the
+faith.
+
+We would gladly dwell on the three chapters at the end of Vol. I., in
+which the writer, in reviewing the writings of the Saint in defence and
+exaltation of monasticism, gives a useful and spirited history of the
+whole of that exciting contest which took its beginning in William of S.
+Amour’s book called _Perils of the Last Times_. It seems really impossible
+to say how much the religious state, humanly speaking, owes to the man who
+wrote the book _Against Those who attack the Service of God and Religion_,
+and that _On the Perfection of the Spiritual Life_.
+
+Passing now from the more remote surroundings of the hero of the story to
+the immediate scene of the greatest portion of his labors, we venture to
+believe that one of the most popular parts of this work of Prior Vaughan’s
+will be his animated description of the university system of the
+thirteenth century, and of the University of Paris in particular. He has
+spared no pains in getting at correct details and putting them
+artistically together. M. Franklin’s splendid and comparatively unknown
+labors on mediæval Paris have supplied him with matter that will be found
+nowhere else. Paris is the natural type of the great mediæval university.
+More central and accessible than Oxford, safer than Bologna, freer than
+Naples, and founded on a wide and grand basis, the University of Paris
+soon grew into a formidable assemblage of men who, whilst ostensibly
+votaries of science, were not unprovided with excitable spirits and rough
+hands. Students gathered, rich and poor, great doctors taught, munificent
+founders, like Robert of Sorbon, bestowed their money or their influence,
+the monks of all orders gathered round silently, and to some extent
+distrustfully, from Citeaux, from Cluny, even from the Grande Chartreuse,
+with the Benedictines of S. Germain, the Premonstratensians—their church
+was where now stands the _Café de la Rotonde_—and the Augustinians. As for
+the Dominicans and Franciscans, they, as may be supposed, were early on
+the spot, to teach quite as much as to learn. The following is a sketch of
+the men who flocked to the great university—at least of one considerable
+class:
+
+
+    “There were starving, friendless lads, with their unkempt heads
+    and their tattered suits, who walked the streets, hungering for
+    bread, and famishing for knowledge, and hankering after a sight of
+    some of those great doctors, of whom they had heard so much when
+    far away in the woods of Germany or the fields of France. Some
+    were so poor that they could not afford to follow a course of
+    theology. We read of one poor fellow on his death‐bed, having
+    nothing else, giving his shoes and stockings to a companion to
+    procure a Mass for his soul. Some were only too glad to carry holy
+    water to private houses, _selon la coutume Gallicane_, with the
+    hope of receiving some small remuneration. Some were destitute of
+    necessary clothing. One tunic sometimes served for three, who took
+    it in turns—two went to bed, whilst the third dressed himself and
+    hurried off to school. Some spent all their scanty means in buying
+    parchments, and wasted their strength, through half the night,
+    poring over crabbed manuscript, or in puzzling out that jargon
+    which contained the wisdom of the wisest of the Greeks. Whole
+    nights some would remain awake on their hard pallets, in those
+    unhealthy cells, trying to work out some problem proposed by the
+    professor in the schools. But there were rich as well as poor at
+    Paris. There was Langton, like others, famous for his opulence,
+    who taught, and then became Canon of Notre Dame; and Thomas à
+    Becket, who, as a youth, came here to seek the charm of gay
+    society.” (I., p. 354.)
+
+
+Amid all the noise, turmoil, and disputes of the huge colony of students,
+numbering more thousands than Oxford or Cambridge at this day can show
+hundreds, the great Dominican convent of S. James was a grand and famous
+centre of light and work. S. Dominic was not long before he settled in
+Paris. At first the friars lived in a mean hired lodging, apparently on
+the Island of Notre Dame. But soon their reputation for poverty and
+learning attracted the notice of influential benefactors, and they had a
+house of their own. It was dedicated to S. James the Apostle, and quickly
+became not only a great monastery but a famous school. The Dominican
+Order, divinely founded for a want of the time, soon began to show in
+front of the progress of the age, and to lead instead of following. It was
+here, in S. James, that Alanus de Insulis and Vincent of Beauvois wrote
+histories and commentaries; it was here that Albert the Great and Thomas
+Aquinas lectured and wrote; and the crowd of lesser names that are
+mentioned on its rolls about this time, less distinguished but still
+distinguished, would take long to enumerate. It was for S. James that S.
+Dominic himself had framed a body of rules. These rules are most striking,
+as given in the pages of Prior Vaughan. They show how a saint and monastic
+legislator feels the “form and pressure” of the times, and how he provides
+for a new feature in monasticism. To read these rules, one feels tempted
+to say that the Dominicans sacrificed everything to give their men a
+first‐rate course of studies. But we must remember the midnight vigil and
+the perpetual absence and the long silence. Still, the cloisters of S.
+James were different enough from those of Monte Casino. There was a great
+hall at S. James’, where professors taught and whither students thronged
+to hear—how different from the remote cloister of Jarrow, where Venerable
+Bede taught his younger brethren for so many years on the quiet flats
+between the Wear and the Tyne! The cells knew the light of the midnight
+lamp, the cloisters resounded with disputation, the young students of the
+Order were men of few books—a Bible, a copy of the _Historia_ of Petrus
+Comestor and of the _Sentences_ of Peter Lombard, was all their private
+library. But half the day was spent face to face with a professor and with
+each other, and the want of books was not much felt. And what an education
+it must have been to listen to and take down the _Summa contra Gentiles_
+of the Angel of the Schools! As we have said, the whole of these two
+chapters is instinct with the liveliest description, and we cannot do
+better than recommend readers to go to it and judge for themselves.
+
+We must reserve what we have not yet touched upon, viz., the personal life
+of the Saint himself, for another notice. It must not be supposed that
+Prior Vaughan passes over the person of S. Thomas in his anxiety to show
+us what sort of a world he lived in. It will soon be seen, on making some
+slight acquaintance with the book, that the strictly biographical portion
+is in reality most successful; the story is well told, and, like all
+stories of sanctity and supernatural heroism, goes straight to the heart.
+
+Without saying that Prior Vaughan’s two volumes partake of the nature of
+the perfect, we frankly say we do not intend to find faults in it. We
+welcome it, and it deserves to be welcomed by every Catholic that can read
+it. There are, of course, defects and a few errors here and there; but the
+book lays down no false principles, takes no dangerous views, and
+patronizes no pernicious mistakes. On the other hand, it deals with a wide
+theme in a large way. In language which, if at times too copious, is
+nevertheless frequently eloquent and always easy and fluent, the writer
+raises the life of a saint into a picture of a world‐epoch. He has labored
+very hard at his authorities and sources, and when the book gets into use
+many students, we are sure, will thank him for his copious references and
+notes. His imagination is of a high order, and his picture‐loving power is
+seen in the way in which he sketches with an epithet, puts together the
+elements that he finds up and down the old authors, and shakes the dust
+and the mildew from valuable bits of ancient chronicle, so that they look
+bright again. The Hon. John L. Motley is in the front rank of modern
+historians, and to compare any writer with him is to give praise that one
+must think much before giving; but if we wished to indicate the _genre_ of
+Prior Vaughan’s style—its pictorial power, its realism, and its tone of
+earnest conviction—we should mention the name of the historian of the
+Netherlands. The two writers are very unlike in their convictions; and Mr.
+Motley has, no doubt, a perfection and finish of art which few writers can
+approach. But still Prior Vaughan is quite fit to be named in the same
+sentence. And a book which has cost so many hours of thought and labor,
+which aims so high, which is so really the work of a man with views and
+with a power to express himself, and which deals with a subject that can
+never lose its interest, but one which, if we do not mistake, is as yet
+only at the beginning of a grand revival, is a book to be welcomed, to be
+read, and to be thankful for.
+
+
+
+
+The Progressionists.
+
+
+From The German Of Conrad Von Bolanden.
+
+
+
+Chapter V.
+
+
+Gerlach whispered something to the banker. Holt pressed his pocket‐
+handkerchief to the wound.
+
+“Please yourself!” said the banker loudly in a business tone. Seraphin
+again approached the beaten man.
+
+“Will you please, my good man, to accompany us?”
+
+“What for, sir?”
+
+“Because I would like to do something towards healing up your wound; I
+mean the wound in there.”
+
+Holt stood motionless before the stranger and looked at him.
+
+“I thank you, sir; there is no remedy for me; I am doomed!”
+
+“Still, I will assist you. Follow me.”
+
+“Who are you, sir, if I may ask the question?”
+
+“I am a man whom Providence seems to have chosen to rescue the prey from
+the jaws of a usurer. Come along with us, and fear nothing.”
+
+“Very well, I will go in the name of God! I do not precisely know your
+object, and you are a stranger to me. But your countenance looks innocent
+and kind, therefore I will go with you.”
+
+They passed through alleys and streets.
+
+“Do you often visit that tavern?” inquired Seraphin.
+
+“Not six times in a year,” answered Holt. “Sometimes of a Sunday I drink
+half a glass of wine, that’s all. I am poor, and have to be saving. I
+would not have gone to the tavern to‐day but that I wanted to get rid of
+my feelings of misery.”
+
+“I overheard your story,” rejoined Seraphin. “Shund’s treatment of you was
+inhuman. He behaved towards you like a trickish devil.”
+
+“That he did! And I am ruined together with my family,” replied the poor
+man dejectedly.
+
+“Take my advice, and never abuse Shund. You know how respectable he has
+suddenly got to be, how many influential friends he has. You can easily
+perceive that one cannot say anything unfavorable of such a man without
+great risk, no matter were it true ten times over.”
+
+“I am not given to disputing,” replied Holt. “But it stirred the bile
+within me to hear him extolled, and it broke out. Oh! I have learned to
+suffer in silence. I haven’t time to think of other matters. After God, my
+business and my family were my only care. I attended to my occupation
+faithfully and quietly as long as I had any to attend to, but now I
+haven’t any to take care of. O God! it is hard. It will bring me to the
+grave.”
+
+“You are a land cultivator?”
+
+“Yes, sir.”
+
+“Shund intends to have you sold out?”
+
+“Yes; immediately after the election he intends to complete my ruin.”
+
+“How much money would you need in order with industry to get along?”
+
+“A great deal of money, a great deal—at least a thousand florins. I have
+given him a mortgage for a thousand florins on my house and what was left
+to me. A thousand florins would suffice to help me out of trouble. I might
+save my little cottage, my two cows, and a field. I might then plough and
+sow for other people. I could get along and subsist honestly. But as I
+told you, nothing less than a thousand florins would do; and where am I to
+get so much money? You see there is no hope for me, no help for me. I am
+doomed!”
+
+“The mortgaged property is considerable,” said Gerlach. “A house, even
+though a small one, moreover, a field, a barn, a garden, all these
+together are surely worth a much higher price. Could you not borrow a
+thousand florins on it and pay off the usurer?”
+
+“No, sir. Nobody would be willing to lend me that amount of money upon
+property mortgaged to a man like Shund. Besides, my little property is out
+of town, and who wants to go there? I, for my part, of course, like no
+spot as much, for it is the house my father built, and I was born and
+brought up there.”
+
+The man lapsed into silence, and walked at Seraphin’s side like one
+weighed down by a heavy load. The delicate sympathy of the young man
+enabled him to guess what was passing in the breast of the man under the
+load. He knew that Holt was recalling his childhood passed under the
+paternal roof; that little spot of home was hallowed for him by events
+connected with his mother, his father, his brothers and sisters, or with
+other objects more trifling, which, however, remained fresh and bright in
+memory, like balmy days of spring.
+
+From this consecrated spot he was to be exiled, driven out with wife and
+children, through the inhumanity and despicable cunning of an usurer. The
+man heaved a deep sigh, and Gerlach, watching him sidewise, noticed his
+lips were compressed, and that large tears rolled down his weather‐browned
+cheeks. The tender heart of the young man was deeply affected at this
+sight, and the millionaire for once rejoiced in the consciousness of
+possessing the might of money.
+
+They halted before the Palais Greifmann. Holt noticed with surprise how
+the man in blouse drew from his waistcoat pocket a small instrument
+resembling a toothpick, and with it opened a door near the carriage gate.
+Had not every shadow of suspicion been driven from Holt’s mind by
+Seraphin’s appearance, he would surely have believed that he had fallen
+into the company of burglars, who entrapped him to aid in breaking into
+this palace.
+
+Reluctantly, after repeated encouragement from Gerlach, he crossed the
+threshold of the stately mansion. He had not quite passed the door when he
+took off his cap, stared at the costly furniture of the hall through which
+they were passing, and was reminded of St. Peter’s thought as the angel
+was rescuing him from the clutches of Herod. Holt imagined he saw a
+vision. The man who had unlocked the door disappeared. Seraphin entered an
+apartment followed by Shund’s victim.
+
+“Do you know where you are?” inquired the millionaire.
+
+“Yes, sir, in the house of Mr. Greifmann the banker.”
+
+“And you are somewhat surprised, are you not?”
+
+“I am so much astonished, sir, that I have several times pinched my arms
+and legs, for it all seems to me like a dream.”
+
+Seraphin smiled and laid aside his cap. Holt scanned the noble features of
+the young man more minutely, his handsome face, his stately bearing, and
+concluded the man in the blouse must be some distinguished gentleman.
+
+“Take courage,” said the noble‐looking young man in a kindly tone. “You
+shall be assisted. I am convinced that you are an honest, industrious man,
+brought to the verge of ruin through no fault of your own. Nor do I blame
+you for inadvertently falling into the nets of the usurer, for I believe
+your honest nature never suspected that there could exist so fiendish a
+monster as the one that lives in the soul of an usurer.”
+
+“You may rely upon it, sir. If I had had the slightest suspicion of such a
+thing, Shund never would have got me into his clutches.”
+
+“I am convinced of it. You are partially the victim of your own good
+nature, and partially the prey of the wild beast Shund. Now listen to me:
+Suppose somebody were to give you a thousand florins, and to say: ‘Holt,
+take this money, ’tis yours. Be industrious, get along, be a prudent
+housekeeper, serve God to the end of your days, and in future beware of
+usurers’—suppose somebody were to address you in this way, what would you
+do?”
+
+“Supposing the case, sir, although it is not possible, but supposing the
+case, what would I do? I would do precisely what that person would have
+told me, and a great deal more. I would work day and night. Every day, at
+evening prayer, I would get on my knees with my wife and children, and
+invoke God’s protection on that person. I would do that, sir; but, as I
+said, the case is impossible.”
+
+“Nevertheless, suppose it did happen,” explained Seraphin in a preliminary
+way. “Give me your hand that you will fulfil the promise you have just
+given.”
+
+For a moment Seraphin’s hand lay in a callous, iron palm, which pressed
+his soft fingers in an uncomfortable but well‐meant grasp.
+
+“Well, now follow me,” said Gerlach.
+
+He led the way; Holt followed with an unsteady step like a drunken man.
+They presented themselves before the banker’s counter. The latter was
+standing behind the trellis of his desk, and on a table lay ten rolls of
+money.
+
+“You have just now by word and hand confirmed a promise,” said Gerlach,
+turning to the countryman, “which cannot be appreciated in money, for that
+promise comprises almost all the duties of the father of a family. But to
+make the fulfilment of the promise possible, a thousand florins are
+needed. Here lies the money. Accept it from me as a gift, and be happy.”
+
+Holt did not stir. He looked from the money at Gerlach, was motionless and
+rigid, until, at last, the paralyzing surprise began to resolve itself
+into a spasmodic quivering of the lips, and then into a mighty flood of
+tears. Seizing Seraphin’s hands, he kissed them with an emotion that
+convulsed his whole being.
+
+“That will do now,” said the millionaire, “take the money, and go home.”
+
+“My God! I cannot find utterance,” said Holt, stammering forth the words
+with difficulty. “Good heaven! is it possible? Is it true? I am still
+thinking ’tis only a dream.”
+
+“Downright reality, my man!” said the banker. “Stop crying; save your
+tears for a more fitting occasion. Put the rolls in your pocket, and go
+home.”
+
+Greifmann’s coldness was effective in sobering down the man intoxicated
+with joy.
+
+“May I ask, sir, what your name is, that I may at least know to whom I owe
+my rescue?”
+
+“Seraphin is my name.”
+
+“Your name sounds like an angel’s, and you are an angel to me. I am not
+acquainted with you, but God knows you, and he will requite you according
+to your deeds.”
+
+Gerlach nodded gravely. The banker was impatient and murmured
+discontentedly. Holt carefully pocketed the rolls of money, made an
+inclination of gratitude to Gerlach, and went out. He passed slowly
+through the hall. The porter opened the door. Holt stood still before him.
+
+“I ask your pardon, but do you know Mr. Seraphin?” asked he.
+
+“Why shouldn’t I know a gentleman that has been our guest for the last two
+weeks?”
+
+“You must pardon my presumption, Mr. Porter. Will Mr. Seraphin remain here
+much longer?”
+
+“He will remain another week for certain.”
+
+“I am very much obliged to you,” said Holt, passing into the street and
+hurrying away.
+
+“Your intended has a queer way of applying his money,” said the banker to
+his sister the next morning. And he reported to her the story of
+Seraphin’s munificence. “I do not exactly like this sort of kindness, for
+it oversteps all bounds, and undoubtedly results from religious
+enthusiasm.”
+
+“That, too, can be cured,” replied Louise confidently. “I will make him
+understand that eternity restores nothing, that consequently it is safer
+and more prudent to exact interest from the present.”
+
+“’Tis true, the situation of that fellow Holt was a pitiable one, and Hans
+Shund’s treatment of him was a masterpiece of speculation. He had stripped
+the fellow completely. The stupid Holt had for years been laboring for the
+cunning Shund, who continued drawing his meshes more and more tightly
+about him. Like a huge spider, he leisurely sucked out the life of the fly
+he had entrapped.”
+
+“Your hostler says there was light in Seraphin’s room long after midnight.
+I wonder what hindered him from sleeping?”
+
+“That is not hard to divine. In all probability he was composing a
+sentimental ditty to his much adored,” answered Carl teasingly. “Midnight
+is said to be a propitious time for occupations of that sort.”
+
+“Do be quiet, you tease! But I too was thinking that he must have been
+engaged in writing. May be he was making a memorandum of yesterday’s
+experience in his journal.”
+
+“May be he was. At all events, the impressions made on him were very
+strong.”
+
+“But I do not like your venture; it may turn out disastrous.”
+
+“How can it, my most learned sister?”
+
+“You know Seraphin’s position,” explained she. “He has been reared in the
+rigor of sectarian credulity. The spirit of modern civilization being thus
+abruptly placed before his one‐sided judgment without previous preparation
+may alarm, nay, may even disgust him. And when once he will have perceived
+that the brother is a partisan of the horrible monster, is it probable
+that he will feel favorably disposed towards the sister whose views
+harmonize with those of her brother?”
+
+“I have done nothing to justify him in setting me down for a partisan. I
+maintain strict neutrality. My purpose is to accustom the weakling to the
+atmosphere of enlightenment which is fatal to all religious phantasms.
+Have no fear of his growing cold towards you,” proceeded he in his
+customary tone of irony. “Your ever victorious power holds him spell‐bound
+in the magic circle of your enchantment. Besides, Louise,” continued he,
+frowning, “I do not think I could tolerate a brother‐in‐law steeped over
+head and ears in prejudices. You yourself might find it highly
+uncomfortable to live with a husband of this kind.”
+
+“Uncomfortable! No, I would not. I would find it exciting, for it would
+become my task to train and cultivate an abnormal specimen of the male
+gender.”
+
+“Very praiseworthy, sister! And if I now endeavor by means of living
+illustrations to familiarize your intended with the nature of modern
+intellectual enlightenment, I am merely preparing the way for your future
+labors.”
+
+
+
+Chapter VI. Masters and Slaves.
+
+
+Under the much despised discipline of religious requirements, the child
+Seraphin had grown up to boyhood spotless in morals, and then had
+developed himself into a young man of great firmness of character, whose
+faith was as unshaken as the correctness of his behavior was constant.
+
+The bloom of his cheeks, the innocent brightness of his eye, the suavity
+of his disposition, were the natural results of the training which his
+heart had received. No foul passion had ever disturbed the serenity of his
+soul. When under the smiling sky of a spring morning he took his ride over
+the extensive possessions of his father, his interior accorded perfectly
+with the peace and loveliness of the sights and sounds of blooming nature
+around him. On earth, however, no spring, be it ever so beautiful, is
+entirely safe from storms. Evil spirits lie in waiting in the air, dark
+powers threaten destruction to all blossoms and all incipient life. And
+the more inevitable is the dread might of those lurking spirits, that in
+every blossom of living plant lies concealed a germ of ruin, sleeps a
+treacherous passion—even in the heart of the innocent Seraphin.
+
+The strategic arts of the beautiful young lady received no small degree of
+additional power from the genuine effort made by her to please the stately
+double millionaire. In a short time she was to such an extent successful
+that one day Carl rallied her in the following humorous strain: “Your
+intended is sitting in the arbor singing a most dismal song! You will have
+to allow him a little more line, Louise, else you run the risk of
+unsettling his brain. Moreover, I cannot be expected to instruct a man in
+the mysteries of progress, if he sees, feels, and thinks nothing but
+Louise.”
+
+The banker had not uttered an exaggeration. It sometimes happens that a
+first love bursts forth with an impetuosity so uncontrollable, that, for a
+time, every other domain of the intellectual and moral nature of a young
+man is, as it were, submerged under a mighty flood. This temporary
+inundation of passion cannot, of course, maintain its high tide in
+presence of calm experience, and the sunshine of more ripened knowledge
+soon dries up its waters. But Seraphin possessed only the scanty
+experience of a young man, and his knowledge of the world was also very
+limited. Hence, in his case, the stream rose alarmingly high, but it did
+not reach an overflow, for the hand of a pious mother had thrown up in the
+heart of the child a living dike strong enough to resist the greatest
+violence of the swell. The height and solidity of the dike increased with
+the growth of the child; it was a bulwark of defence for the man, who
+stood secure against humiliating defeats behind the adamantine wall of
+religious principles—yet only so long as he sought protection behind this
+bulwark. Faith uttered a serious warning against an unconditional
+surrender of himself to the object of his attachment. For he could not put
+to rest some misgivings raised in his mind by the strange and, to him,
+inexplicable attitude which Louise assumed upon the highest questions of
+human existence. The uninitiated youth had no suspicion of the existence
+of that most disgusting product of modern enlightenment, the _emancipated_
+female. Had he discovered in Louise the emancipated woman in all the
+ugliness of her real nature, he would have conceived unutterable loathing
+for such a monstrosity. And yet he could not but feel that between himself
+and Louise there yawned an abyss, there existed an essential repulsion,
+which, at times, gave rise within him to considerable uneasiness.
+
+To obtain a solution of the enigma of this antipathy, the young gentleman
+concluded to trust entirely to the results of his observations, which,
+however, were far from being definitive; for his reason was imposed upon
+by his feelings, and, from day to day, the charms of the beautiful woman
+were steadily progressing in throwing a seductive spell over his judgment.
+
+The banker’s daughter possessed a high degree of culture; she was a
+perfect mistress of the tactics employed on the field of coquetry; her
+tact was exquisite; and she understood thoroughly how to take advantage of
+a kindly disposition and of the tenderness inspired by passion. How was
+the eye of Seraphin, strengthened neither by knowledge nor by experience,
+to detect the true worth of what lay hidden beneath this fascinating
+delusion?
+
+Here again his religious training came to the rescue of the inexperienced
+youth, by furnishing him with standards safe and unfalsified, by which to
+weigh and come to a conclusion.
+
+Louise’s indifference to practices of piety annoyed him. She never
+attended divine service, not even on Sundays. He never saw her with a
+prayer‐book, nor was a single picture illustrative of a moral subject to
+be found hung up in her apartment. Her conversation, at all times, ran
+upon commonplaces of everyday concern, such as the toilet, theatre,
+society. He noticed that whenever he ventured to launch matter of a more
+serious import upon the current of conversation, it immediately became
+constrained and soon ceased to flow. Louise appeared to his heart at the
+same time so fascinating and yet so peculiar, so seductive and yet so
+repulsive, that the contradictions of her being caused him to feel quite
+unhappy.
+
+He was again sitting in his room thinking about her. In the interview he
+had just had with her, the young lady had exerted such admirable powers of
+womanly charms that the poor young man had had a great deal of trouble to
+maintain his self‐possession. Her ringing, mischievous laugh was still
+sounding in his ears, and the brightness of her sparkling eyes was still
+lighting up his memory. And the unsuspecting youth had no Solomon at his
+side to repeat to him: “My son, can a man hide fire in his bosom, and his
+garments not burn? Or can he walk upon hot coals, and his feet not be
+burnt?... She entangleth him with many words, and she draweth him away
+with the flattery of her lips. Immediately he followeth her as an ox led
+to be a victim, and as a lamb playing the wanton, and not knowing that he
+is drawn like a fool to bonds, till the arrow pierce his liver. As if a
+bird should make haste to the snare, and knoweth not that his life is in
+danger. Now, therefore, my son, hear me, and attend to the words of my
+mouth. Let not thy mind be drawn away in her ways: neither be thou
+deceived with her paths. For she hath cast down many wounded, and the
+strongest have been slain by her. Her house is the way to hell, reaching
+even to the inner chambers of death.”(3)
+
+For Seraphin, however, no Solomon was at hand who might give him counsel.
+Sustained by his virtue and by his faith alone, he struggled against the
+temptress, not precisely of the kind referred to by Solomon, but still a
+dangerous one from the ranks of progress.
+
+Greifmann had notified him that the general assembly election was to be
+held that day, that Mayor Hans Shund would certainly be returned as a
+delegate, and that he intended to call for Gerlach, and go out to watch
+the progress of the election.
+
+Seraphin felt rather indifferent respecting the election; but he would
+have considered himself under weighty obligation to the brother for an
+explanation of the peculiar behavior of the sister at which he was so
+greatly perplexed.
+
+Carl himself he had for a while regarded as an enigma. Now, however, he
+believed that he had reached a correct conclusion concerning the brother.
+It appeared to him that the principal characteristic of Carl’s disposition
+was to treat every subject, except what strictly pertained to business, in
+a spirit of levity. To the faults of others Carl was always ready to
+accord a praiseworthy degree of indulgence, he never uttered harsh words
+in a tone of bitterness, and when he pronounced censure, his reproof was
+invariably clothed in some form of pleasantry. In general, he behaved like
+a man not having time to occupy himself seriously with any subject that
+did not lie within the particular sphere of his occupation. Even their
+wager he managed like a matter of business, although the landowner could
+not but take umbrage at the banker’s ready and natural way of dealing with
+men whose want of principle he himself abominated. Greifmann seemed good‐
+natured, minute, and cautious in business, and in all other things
+exceedingly liberal and full of levity. Such was the judgment arrived at
+by Seraphin, inexperienced and little inclined to fault‐finding as he was,
+respecting a gentleman who stood at the summit of modern culture, who had
+skill in elegantly cloaking great faults and foibles, and whose sole
+religion consisted in the accumulation of papers and coins of arbitrary
+value.
+
+Gerlach’s servant entered, and disturbed his meditation.
+
+“There is a man here with a family who begs hard to be allowed to speak
+with you.”
+
+“A man with a family!” repeated the millionaire, astonished. “I know
+nobody round here, and have no desire to form acquaintances.”
+
+“The man will not be denied. He says his name is Holt, and that he has
+something to say to you.”
+
+“Ah, yes!” exclaimed Seraphin, with a smile that revealed a pleasant
+surprise. “Send the man and those who are with him in to me.”
+
+Closing a diary, in which he was recording circumstantially the
+experiences of his present visit, he awaited the visitors. A loud knock
+from a weighty fist reminded him of a pair of callous hands, then Holt,
+followed by his wife and children, presented himself before his
+benefactor. They all made a small courtesy, even the flaxen‐headed little
+children, and the bright, healthy babe in the arms of the mother met his
+gaze with the smile of an angel. The dark spirits that were hovering
+around him, torturing and tempting, instantly vanished, and he became
+serene and unconstrained whilst conversing with these simple people.
+
+“You must excuse us, Mr. Seraphin,” began Holt. “This is my wife, and
+these are seven of my children. There is one more; her name is Mechtild.
+She had to stay at home and mind the house. She will pay you an extra
+visit, and present her thanks. We have called that you might become
+acquainted with the family whom you have rescued, and that we might thank
+you with all our hearts.”
+
+After this speech, the father gave a signal, whereupon the little ones
+gathered around the amiable young man, made their courtesies, and kissed
+his hands.
+
+“May God bless you, Mr. Seraphin!” first spoke a half‐grown girl.
+
+“We greet you, dear Seraphin!” said another, five years old.
+
+“We pray for you every day, Mr. Seraphin,” said the next in succession.
+
+“We are thankful to you from our hearts, Mr. Seraphin,” spoke a small lad,
+in a tone of deep earnestness.
+
+And thus did every child deliver its little address. It was touching to
+witness the noble dignity of the children, which may, at times, be found
+beautifully investing their innocence. Gerlach was moved. He looked down
+upon the little ones around him with an expression of affectionate
+thankfulness. Holt’s lips also quivered, and bright tears of happiness
+streamed from the eyes of the mother.
+
+“I am obliged to you, my little friends, for your greetings and for your
+prayers,” spoke the millionaire. “You are well brought up. Continue always
+to be good children, such as you now are; have the fear of God, and honor
+your parents.”
+
+“Mr. Seraphin,” said Holt, drawing a paper from his pocket, “here is the
+note that I have redeemed with the money you gave me. I wanted to show it
+to you, so that you might know for certain that the money had been applied
+to the proper purpose.”
+
+Gerlach affected to take an interest in the paper, and read over the
+receipt.
+
+“But there is one thing, Mr. Seraphin,” continued Holt, “that grieves me.
+And that is, that there is not anything better than mere words with which
+I can testify my gratitude to you. I would like ever so much to do
+something for you—to do something for you worth speaking of. Do you know,
+Mr. Seraphin, I would be willing to shed the last drop of my blood for
+you?”
+
+“Never mind that, Holt! It is ample recompense for me to know that I have
+helped a worthy man out of trouble. You can now, Mrs. Holt, set to work
+with renewed courage. But,” added he archly, “you will have to watch your
+husband that he may not again fall into the clutches of beasts of prey
+like Shund.”
+
+“He has had to pay dearly for his experience, Mr. Seraphin. I used often
+to say to him: ‘Michael, don’t trust Shund. Shund talks too much, he is
+too sweet altogether, he has some wicked design upon us—don’t trust him.’
+But, you see, Mr. Seraphin, my husband thinks that all people are as
+upright as he is himself, and he believed that Shund really meant to deal
+fairly as he pretended. But Michael’s wits are sharpened now, and he will
+not in future be so ready to believe every man upon his word. Nor will he,
+hereafter, borrow one single penny, and he will never again undertake to
+buy anything unless he has the money in hand to pay for it.”
+
+“In what street do you live?” inquired Gerlach.
+
+“Near the turnpike road, Mr. Seraphin. Do you see that knoll?” He pointed
+through the window in a direction unobstructed by the trees of the garden.
+“Do you see that dense shade‐tree, and yon white‐washed wall behind the
+tree? That is our walnut‐tree—my grandfather planted it. And the white
+wall is the wall of our house.”
+
+“I have passed there twice—the road leads to the beech grove,” said the
+millionaire. “I remarked the little cottage, and was much pleased with its
+air of neatness. It struck me, too, that the barn is larger than the
+dwelling, which is a creditable sign for a farmer. Near the front entrance
+there is a carefully cultivated flower garden, in which I particularly
+admired the roses, and further off from the road lies an apple orchard.”
+
+“All that belongs to us. That is what you have rescued and made a present
+of to us,” replied the land cultivator joyfully. “Everybody stops to view
+the roses; they belong to our daughter Mechtild.”
+
+“The soil is good and deep, and must bring splendid crops of wheat. I,
+too, am a farmer, and understand something about such matters. But it
+appeared to me as though the soil were of a cold nature. You should use
+lime upon it pretty freely.”
+
+In this manner he spent some time conversing with these good and simple
+people. Before dismissing them, he made a present to every one of the
+children of a shining dollar, having previously overcome Holt’s protest
+against this new instance of generosity.
+
+Old and young then courtesied once more, and Gerlach was left to himself
+in a mood differing greatly from that in which the visitors had found him.
+
+He had been conversing with good and happy people, and his soul revelled
+in the consciousness of having been the originator of their happiness.
+
+Suddenly Greifmann’s appearance in the room put to flight the bright
+spirits that hovered about him, and the sunshine that had been lighting up
+the apartment was obscured by dark shadows as of a heavy mass of clouds.
+
+“What sort of a horde was that?” asked he.
+
+“They were Holt and his family. The gratitude of these simple people was
+touching. The innocent little ones gave me an ovation of which a prince
+might be envious, for the courts of princes are never graced by a
+naturalness at once so sincere and so beautiful. It is an intense
+happiness for me to have assured the livelihood of ten human beings with
+so paltry a gift.”
+
+“A mere matter of taste, my most sympathetic friend!” rejoined the banker
+with indifference. “You are not made of the proper stuff to be a business
+man. Your feelings would easily tempt you into very unbusinesslike
+transactions. But you must come with me! The hubbub of the election is
+astir through all the streets and thoroughfares. I am going out to
+discharge my duties as a citizen, and I want you to accompany me.”
+
+“I have no inclination to see any more of this disgusting turmoil,”
+replied Gerlach.
+
+“Inclination or disinclination is out of the question when interest
+demands it,” insisted the banker. “You must profit by the opportunity
+which you now have of enriching your knowledge of men and things, or
+rather of correcting it; for heretofore your manner of viewing things has
+been mere ideal enthusiasm. Come with me, my good fellow!”
+
+Seraphin followed with interior reluctance. Greifmann went on to impart to
+him the following information:
+
+“During the past night, there have sprung up, as if out of the earth, a
+most formidable host, ready to do battle against the uniformly victorious
+army of progress—men thoroughly armed and accoutred, real crusaders. A
+bloody struggle is imminent. Try and make of your heart a sort of monitor
+covered with plates of iron, so that you may not be overpowered by the
+horrifying spectacle of the election affray. I am not joking at all! True
+as gospel, what I tell you! If you do not want to be stifled by
+indignation at sight of the fiercest kind of terrorism, of the most
+revolting tyranny, you will have to lay aside, at least for to‐day, every
+feeling of humanity.”
+
+Gerlach perceived a degree of seriousness in the bubbling current of
+Greifmann’s levity.
+
+“Who is the enemy that presumes to stand in the way of progress?” enquired
+he.
+
+“The ultramontanes! Listen to what I have to tell you. This morning
+Schwefel came in to get a check cashed. With surprise I observed that the
+manufacturer’s soul was not in business. ‘How are things going?’ asked I
+when we had got through.
+
+“ ‘I feel like a man,’ exclaimed he, ‘that has just seen a horrible
+monster! Would you believe it, those accursed ultramontanes have been
+secretly meddling in the election. They have mustered a number of votes,
+and have even gone so far as to have a yellow ticket printed. Their yellow
+placards were to be seen this morning stuck up at every street corner—of
+course they were immediately torn down.’
+
+“ ‘And are you provoked at that, Mr. Schwefel! You certainly are not going
+to deny the poor ultramontanes the liberty of existing, or, at least, the
+liberty of voting for whom they please?’
+
+“ ‘Yes, I am, I am! That must not be tolerated,’ cried he wildly. ‘The
+black brood are hatching dark schemes, they are conspiring against
+civilization, and would fain wrest from us the trophies won by progress.
+It is high time to apply the axe to the root of the upas‐tree. Our duty is
+to disinfect thoroughly, to banish the absurdities of religious dogma from
+our schools. The black spawn will have to be rendered harmless: we must
+kill them politically.’
+
+“ ‘Very well,’ said I. ‘Just make negroes of them. Now that in America the
+slaves are emancipated, Europe would perhaps do well to take her turn at
+the slave‐trade.’ But the fellow would not take my joke. He made
+threatening gesticulations, his eyes gleamed like hot coals, and he
+muttered words of a belligerent import.
+
+“ ‘The ultramontane rabble are to hold a meeting at the “Key of Heaven,” ’
+reported he. ‘There the stupid victims of credulity are to be harangued by
+several of their best talkers. The black tide is afterwards to diffuse
+itself through the various wards where the voting is to take place. But
+let the priest‐ridden slaves come, they will have other memoranda to carry
+home with them beside their yellow rags of tickets.’
+
+“You perceive, friend Seraphin, that the progress men mean mischief. We
+may expect to witness scenes of violence.”
+
+“That is unjustifiable brutality on the part of the progressionists,”
+declared Gerlach indignantly. “Are not the ultramontanes entitled to vote
+and to receive votes? Are they not free citizens? Do they not enjoy the
+same privileges as others? It is a disgrace and an outrage thus to
+tyrannize over men who are their brothers, sons of Germania, their common
+mother.”
+
+“Granted! Violence is disgraceful. The intention of progress, however, is
+not quite as bad as you think it. Being convinced of its own
+infallibility, it cannot help feeling indignant at the unbelief of
+ultramontanism, which continues deaf to the saving truths of the
+progressionist gospel. Hence a holy zeal for making converts urges
+progress so irresistibly that it would fain force wanderers into the path
+of salvation by violence. This is simply human, and should not be regarded
+as unpardonable. In the self‐same spirit did my namesake Charles the Great
+butcher the Saxons because the besotted heathens presumed to entertain
+convictions differing from his own. And those who were not butchered had
+to see their sacred groves cut down, their altars demolished, their time‐
+honored laws changed, and had to resign themselves to following the ways
+which he thought fit to have opened through the land of the Saxons. You
+cannot fail to perceive that Charles the Great was a member of the school
+of progress.”
+
+“But your comparison is defective,” opposed the millionaire. “Charles
+subdued a wild and blood‐thirsty horde who made it a practice to set upon
+and butcher peaceful neighbors. Charles was the protector of the realm,
+and the Saxons were forced to bend under the weight of his powerful arm.
+If Charles, however, did violence to the consciences of his vanquished
+enemies, and converted them to Christianity with the sword and mace, then
+Charles himself is not to be excused, for moral freedom is expressly
+proclaimed by the spirit of Christianity.”
+
+“There is no doubt but that the Saxons were blundering fools for rousing
+the lion by making inroads into Charles’ domain. The ultramontanes, are,
+however, in a similar situation. They have attacked the giant Progress,
+and have themselves to blame for the consequences.”
+
+“The ultramontanes have attacked nobody,” maintained Gerlach. “They are
+merely asserting their own rights, and are not putting restrictions on the
+rights of other people. But progress will concede neither rights nor
+freedom to others. It is a disgusting egotist, an unscrupulous tyrant,
+that tries to build up his own brutal authority on the ruins of the rights
+of others.”
+
+“Still, it would have been far more prudent on the part of the
+ultramontanes to keep quiet, seeing that their inferiority of numbers
+cannot alter the situation. The indisputable rights of the ascendency are
+in our days with the sceptre and crown of progress.”
+
+“A brave man never counts the foe,” cried Gerlach. “He stands to his
+convictions, and behaves manfully in the struggle.”
+
+“Well said!” applauded the banker. “And since progress also is forced by
+the opposition of principles to man itself for the contest, it will
+naturally beat up all its forces in defence of its conviction. Here we are
+at the ‘Key of Heaven,’ where the ultramontanes are holding their meeting.
+Let us go in, for the proverb says, _Audiatur et altera pars_—the other
+side should also get a hearing.”
+
+They drew near to a lengthy old building. Over the doorway was a pair of
+crossed keys hewn out of stone, and gilt, informing the stranger that it
+was the hostelry of the “Key of Heaven,” where, since the days of hoar
+antiquity, hospitality was dispensed to pilgrims and travellers. The
+principal hall of the house contained a gathering of about three hundred
+men. They were attentively listening to the words of a speaker who was
+warmly advocating the principles of his party. The speaker stood behind a
+desk which was placed upon a platform at the far end of the hall.
+
+Seraphin cast a glance over the assembly. He received the painful
+impression of a hopeless minority. Barely forty votes would the
+ultramontanes be able to send to each of the wards. To compensate for
+numbers, intelligence and faith were represented in the meeting. Elegant
+gentlemen with intellectual countenances sat or stood in the company of
+respectable tradesmen, and the long black coats of the clergy were not few
+in number. On a table lay two packages of yellow tickets to be distributed
+among the members of the assembly. At the same table sat the chairman, a
+commissary of police named Parteiling, whose business it was to watch the
+proceedings, and several other gentlemen.
+
+“Compared with the colossal preponderance of progress, our influence is
+insignificant, and, compared with the masses of our opponents our
+numerical strength is still less encouraging,” said the speaker. “If in
+connection with this disheartening fact you take into consideration the
+pressure which progress has it in its power to exert on the various
+relations of life through numerous auxiliary means, if you remember that
+our opponents can dismiss from employment all such as dare uphold views
+differing from their own, it becomes clear that no ordinary amount of
+courage is required to entertain and proclaim convictions hostile to
+progress.”
+
+Seraphin thought of Spitzkopf’s mode of electioneering, and of the
+terrible threats made to the “wild men,” and concluded the incredible
+statement was lamentably correct.
+
+“Viewing things in this light,” proceeded the orator, “I congratulate the
+present assembly upon its unusual degree of pluck, for courage is required
+to go into battle with a clear knowledge of the overwhelming strength of
+the enemy. We have rallied round the banner of our convictions
+notwithstanding that the numbers of the enemy make victory hopeless. We
+are determined to cast our votes in support of religion and morality in
+defiance of the scorn, blasphemy, and violence which the well‐known
+terrorism of progress will not fail to employ in order to frighten us from
+the exercise of our privilege as citizens. We must be prepared, gentlemen,
+to hear a multitude of sarcastic remarks and coarse witticisms, both in
+the streets and at the polls. I adjure you to maintain the deportment
+alone worthy of our cause. A gentleman never replies to the aggressions of
+rudeness, and should you wish to take the conduct of our opponents in gay
+good‐humor, just try, gentlemen, to fancy that you are being treated to
+some elegant exhibition of the refinement and liberal culture of the
+times.”
+
+Loud bursts of hilarity now and then relieved the seriousness of the
+meeting. Even Greifmann would clap applause and cry, “Bravo!”
+
+“Let us stand united to a man, prepared against all the wiles of
+intimidation and corruption, undismayed by the onset of the enemy. The
+struggle is grave beyond expression. For you are acquainted with the aims
+and purposes of the liberals. Progress would like to sweep away all the
+religious heritages that our fathers held sacred. Education is to be
+violently wrested from under the influence of the church; the church
+herself is to be enslaved and strangled in the thrall of the liberal
+state. I am aware that our opponents pretend to respect religion—but the
+religion of would‐be progress is infidelity. Divine revelation, of which
+the church is the faithful guardian, is rejected with scorn by liberalism.
+Look at the tone of the press and the style of the literature of the day.
+You have only to notice the derision and fierceness with which the press
+daily assails the mysteries and dogmas of religion, the Sovereign Pontiff,
+the clergy, religious orders, the ultramontanes, and you cannot long
+remain in the dark concerning the aim and object of progress. Christ or
+Antichrist is the watchword of the day, gentlemen! Hence the imperative
+duty for us to be active at the elections; for the legislature has the
+presumption to wish to dictate in matters belonging exclusively to the
+jurisdiction of the church. We are threatened with school laws the purpose
+of which is to unchristianize our children, to estrange them from the
+spirit of religion. No man having the sentiment of religion can remain
+indifferent in presence of this danger, for it means nothing less than the
+defection from Christianity of the masses of the coming generation.
+
+“Gentlemen, there is a reproach being uttered just now by the
+progressionist press, which, far from repelling, I would feel proud to
+deserve. A priest should have said, so goes the report, that it is a
+mortal sin to elect a progressionist to the chamber of deputies. Some of
+the writers of our press have met this reproach by simply denying that a
+priest ever expressed himself in those terms. But, gentlemen, let us take
+for granted that a priest did actually say that it is a mortal sin to
+elect a progressionist to the chamber of deputies, is there anything
+opposed to morality in such a declaration?
+
+“By no means, if you remember that it is to be presumed the progressionist
+will use his vote in the assembly to oppose religion. Mortal sin,
+gentlemen, is any wilful transgression of God’s law in grave matters. Now
+I put it to you: Does he gravely transgress the law of God who controverts
+what God has revealed, who would exclude God and all holy subjects from
+the schools, who would rob the church of her independence, and make of her
+a mere state machine unfit for the fulfilment of her high mission? There
+is not one of you but is ready to declare: ‘Yes, such an one transgresses
+grievously the law of God.’ This answer at the same time solves the other
+question, whether it is a mortal sin to put arms in the hands of an enemy
+of religion that he may use them against faith and morality. Would that
+all men of Christian sentiment seriously adverted to this connection of
+things and acted accordingly, the baneful sway of the pernicious spirit
+that governs the age would soon be at an end; for I have confidence in the
+sound sense and moral rectitude of the German people. Heathenism is
+repugnant to the deeply religious nature of our nation; the German people
+do not wish to dethrone God, nor are they ready to bow the knee before the
+empty idol of a soulless enlightenment.”
+
+Here the speaker was interrupted by a tumult. A band of factorymen,
+yelling and laughing, rushed into the hall to disturb the meeting. All
+eyes were immediately turned upon the rioters. In every countenance
+indignation could be seen kindling at this outrage of the liberals. The
+commissary of police alone sat motionless as a statue. The progressionist
+rioters elbowed their way into the crowd, and, when the excitement caused
+by this strategic movement had subsided, the speaker resumed his
+discourse.
+
+“For a number of years back our conduct has been misrepresented and
+calumniated. They call us men of no nationality, and pretend that we get
+our orders from Rome. This reproach does honor neither to the intelligence
+nor to the judgment of our opponents. Whence dates the division of Germany
+into discordant factions? When began the present faint and languishing
+condition of our fatherland? From the moment when it separated from Rome.
+So long as Germany continued united in the bond of the same holy faith,
+and the voice of the head of the church was hearkened to by every member
+of her population, her sovereigns held the golden apple, the symbol of
+universal empire. Our nation was then the mightiest, the proudest, the
+most glorious upon earth. The church who speaks through the Sovereign
+Pontiff had civilized the fierce sons of Germany, had conjured the hatred
+and feuds of hostile tribes, had united the interests and energies of our
+people in one holy faith, and had ennobled and enriched German genius
+through the spirit of religion. The church had formed out of the chaos of
+barbarism the Holy Roman Empire of the German nation—that gigantic and
+wonderful organization the like of which the world will never see again.
+But the church has long since been deprived of the leadership in German
+affairs, and what in consequence is now the condition of our fatherland?
+It is divided into discordant factions, it is an ailing trunk, with many
+members, but without a head.
+
+“It is rather amusing that the ultramontanes should be charged with
+receiving orders from Rome, for the voice of the Father of Christianity
+has not been heard for many years back in the council of state.”
+
+“Hurrah for the Syllabus!” cried Spitzkopf, who was at the head of the
+rioters. “Hurrah for the Syllabus!” echoed his gang, yelling and stamping
+wildly.
+
+The ultramontanes were aroused, eyes glared fiercely, and fists were
+clenched ready to make a summary clearing of the hall. But no scuffle
+ensued; the ultramontanes maintained a dignified bearing. The speaker
+calmly remained in his place, and when the tumult had ceased he again went
+on with his discourse.
+
+“Such only,” said he, “take offence at the Syllabus as know nothing about
+it. There is not a word in the Syllabus opposed to political liberty or
+the most untrammelled self‐government of the German people. But it is
+opposed to the fiendish terrorism of infidelity. The Syllabus condemns the
+diabolical principles by which the foundations of the Christian state are
+sapped and a most disastrous tyranny over conscience is proclaimed.”
+
+“Hallo! listen to that,” cried one of the liberals, and the yelling was
+renewed, louder, longer, and more furious than before.
+
+The chairman rang his bell. The revellers relapsed into silence.
+
+“Ours is not a public meeting, but a mere private gathering,” explained
+the chairman. “None but men of Christian principles have been invited. If
+others have intruded violently, I request them to leave the room, or, at
+least, to refrain from conduct unbecoming men of good‐breeding.”
+
+Spitzkopf laughed aloud, his comrades yelled and stamped.
+
+“Let us go!” said Greifmann to Gerlach in an angry tone.
+
+“Let us stay!” rejoined the latter with excitement. “The affair is
+becoming interesting. I want to see how this will end.”
+
+The banker noticed Gerlach’s suppressed indignation; he observed it in the
+fire of his eyes and the expression of unutterable contempt that had
+spread over his features, and he began to consider the situation as
+alarming. He had not expected this exhibition of brutal impertinence. In
+his estimation an infringement of propriety like the one he had just
+witnessed was a far more heinous transgression than the grossest
+violations in the sphere of morals. He judged of Gerlach’s impressions by
+this standard of appreciation, and feared the behavior of the
+progressionist mob would produce an effect in the young man’s mind far
+from favorable to the cause which they represented. He execrated the
+disturbance of the liberals, and took Seraphin’s arm to lead him away.
+
+“Come away, I beg of you! I cannot imagine what interest the rudeness of
+that uncultivated horde can have for you.”
+
+“Do not scorn them, for they are honestly earning their pay,” rejoined
+Gerlach.
+
+“What do you mean?”
+
+“Those fellows are whistling, bawling, stamping, and yelling in the employ
+of progress. You are trying to give me an insight into the nature of
+modern civilization: could there be a better opportunity than this?”
+
+“There you make a mistake, my dear fellow! Enlightened progress is never
+rude.”
+
+To Be Continued.
+
+
+
+
+Gavazzi Versus The See Of S. Peter.
+
+
+By a Protestant Doctor of Philosophy.
+
+
+
+Introductory Note.
+
+
+The topic of this article has already been fully and satisfactorily
+treated in THE CATHOLIC WORLD. It is well, however, to adopt, in handling
+the truth, Voltaire’s maxim in regard to falsehood, and to keep
+continually repeating those truths which are frequently denied. Not only
+the mountebank Gavazzi, but others more respectable than he is, keep on
+reasserting the denial of S. Peter’s Roman Episcopate, notwithstanding the
+evidence which has been over and over again presented in proof of it by
+Protestant as well as Catholic writers. We, therefore, willingly give
+admission to the present article, which, we may as well state, has been
+printed from the author’s MS. copy, without any alteration.—ED. C. W.
+
+                  ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐
+
+At our examination in the diocese of the Protestant Episcopal Church in
+which we took holy orders, the question of S. Peter’s being at Rome was
+debated with some warmth by the clerical examiners and the bishop. We had
+at that time just passed our majority, and, while our reading had been
+pretty full, we had not touched the subject of this article, for it was
+indeed comparatively new to us. We remember well the remark of our bishop,
+whose opinion on theological questions we held in veneration. He was
+prominent on the bench of bishops as one of the most learned of our
+prelates, and he had wielded his pen in defence of Anglican Church
+principles with great reputation to himself among Episcopalians,
+particularly the High Church school of religious thought. At the period to
+which we refer, he gave it as his opinion that it was extremely doubtful
+that S. Peter ever visited Rome, and that he was the first bishop of its
+See was beyond the province of historical proof. Previous to this date in
+our studies, we would as lief have questioned the fact of the existence of
+Rome itself as that of S. Peter’s residence there, and his occupancy of
+that metropolitan see. We had reached this conclusion by no investigation:
+it was, rather, one of those traditional questions which fix themselves in
+the mind without much thought in either direction. The fact, as we
+supposed, had never been doubted. To hear for the first time a denial of
+its truth, and that, too, from our ecclesiastical superior, made an
+impression upon our mind which led us to investigate the subject as soon
+as time and opportunity were afforded us. From that day to this, we have
+heard the same theory advanced by Protestant clergymen of every shade of
+denominational opinion, and in the minds of many it has lodged itself as
+one of those mooted questions which baffle historical proof.
+
+About twenty years ago, an Italian known as “Father Gavazzi” visited the
+United States. His crusade against the Church of Rome during that visit is
+familiar to all. Of its merits or the motives which prompted it we do not
+propose to speak, as it is foreign to the subject to which the interest of
+the reader is invited. Again the same Alessandro Gavazzi, as
+“Commissioner” of what he denominates the “Free Christian Church of
+Italy,” is lecturing to audiences in our principal cities, for the purpose
+of securing subscriptions for “evangelization” and for the “Biblical
+College in Rome.” What these terms may mean we do not know, and of them we
+have no disposition to speak. In the month of June last, “Father Gavazzi”
+was advertised to lecture under the auspices of the Young Men’s Christian
+Association in the city in which we reside. Among others, who had no
+interest perhaps in the especial work in which he is engaged, we attended
+his lecture. From a report of the lecture in the issue of a daily paper of
+the following morning we make the quotation which forms the text, upon
+which we propose to place before the reader some historical proofs for the
+belief that S. Peter was at Rome.
+
+“Father Gavazzi” said: “A discussion was proposed in Rome as to whether S.
+Peter was ever there or not. The Pope favored, insisted upon it, and in
+two days his chosen champions retired defeated from the contest. That is
+something. The Bible is entirely silent on this subject. But the priests
+say that is merely negative proof. The silence of S. Luke is, however,
+positive proof that S. Peter was never there. The discussion of this
+subject, once prohibited in Rome, is now talked of freely in all public
+places. It was his delight to fight the Pope. Pius IX. was no more the
+successor of S. Peter than he was the successor of the emperor of China.
+_S. Peter was never in Rome to be succeeded by anybody._”
+
+Modern investigation at best has done little to clear up the difficulties
+connected with the geographical history of the Apostle Peter. That he was
+at Rome, and suffered martyrdom in that city, is the general belief of the
+fathers. And it was not until the dawn of the Reformation that the
+apostle’s journey to that city, and his martyrdom there, became even a
+subject of doubt. So great was the anxiety of some to disprove the Primacy
+of the Roman See that scholarly men lent themselves to the repetition of
+myths and traditions which had no foundation in fact, and later writers,
+biased by early education and ecclesiastical connection, have even
+introduced into historical literature mythical stories, the germs of which
+run through the popular mythology of ancient and modern times. If, they
+argue, it can be proved that S. Peter was never at Rome, then we at once
+overturn the pretensions of the Papacy; or, again, if we can demonstrate
+that there is a break in the chain of succession of its bishops from S.
+Peter, the belief in the doctrine of an apostolic succession is clearly
+disproved, and the idea of a line of bishops reaching back through the
+long period of the _Mores Catholici_, or _Ages of Faith_, only a senseless
+forgery which originated with some monk the abbot of whose monastery was
+perhaps the first to give it form after he had ascended the chair of
+Peter. Mosheim, a respectable writer in the Protestant world, blinded by a
+singular prejudice which led him at times to forget the critical duties of
+the historian, is one among the few German scholars who has tarnished the
+pages of his _Ecclesiastical History_ by giving credence to the fabulous
+story of Pope Joan. “Between Leo IV., who died 855, and Benedict III.,”
+says he, “a woman who concealed her sex and assumed the name of John, it
+is said, opened her way to the pontifical throne by her learning and
+genius, and governed the church for a time. She is commonly called the
+Papess Joan. During five subsequent centuries the witnesses to this
+extraordinary event are without number; _nor did any one prior to the
+Reformation by Luther regard the thing as either incredible or disgraceful
+to the church_.” The earliest writer from whom any information relating to
+the fable of Pope Joan is derived is Marianus Scotus, a monk of S. Martin
+of Cologne, who died A.D. 1086. He left a chronicle which has received
+many additions by later writers, and among those interpolations the
+students of mythical lore regard the passage which refers to this story.
+Platina, who wrote the _Lives of the Popes_ anterior to the time of Martin
+Luther, relates the legend, and, with more of the critical acumen than
+Mosheim, adds: “These things which I relate are popular reports, but
+derived from uncertain and obscure authors, which I have therefore
+inserted briefly and baldly, lest I should seem to omit obstinately and
+pertinaciously what most people assert.” The legend of Pope Joan has been
+so thoroughly exposed that no controversialist of discrimination thinks of
+reviving it as an argument against the succession of the Bishops of Rome.
+Now and then it may be related to an ignorant crowd by an anti‐popery
+mountebank of our cities during times of religious excitement, but it is
+never heard from the lips of an educated Protestant. We are inclined to
+think, however, that the class of minds that seeks to throw doubt upon S.
+Peter’s residence at Rome in order to subvert the Primacy of the Apostolic
+See would not hesitate, in view of the evidence from early ecclesiastical
+writers, to introduce again this Papess Joan to their unlearned readers.
+
+Turning, then, to the proofs of the subject of our paper, we take as the
+motto for our investigation of this and all kindred ecclesiastical
+questions the golden words of Tertullian: “Id esse verum, quodcunque
+primum; id esse adulterum quodcunque posterius.”(4) Or that petition of a
+great Anglican divine: “Grant, O Lord! that, in reading thy Holy Word, I
+may never prefer my private sentiments before those of the church in the
+purely ancient times of Christianity.”(5)
+
+The earliest testimony is borne by S. Ignatius. He was closely connected
+with the apostles, both as a hearer of their teachings and sharer of the
+extraordinary mysteries of their faith.(6) S. John was his Christian
+Gamaliel, at whose feet he was taught the doctrines of Christianity, which
+prepared him not only to wear the mitre of Antioch, the most cultivated
+metropolis of the East, but also to receive the brighter crown of a
+martyr’s agonizing death. Full of years, the follower of the beloved
+disciple was hurried to Rome, to seal with his blood the truth of the
+religion of Christ. On his journey to the pagan capital, he was permitted
+to tarry for a season at Smyrna, to visit, for the last time, S. Polycarp,
+the aged bishop of that city. Here, in view of the dreadful death that
+awaited him in the Roman amphitheatre, and in communion with the revered
+fellow‐laborer of his life, he wrote his four epistles. From the one to
+the Romans we quote the following evidence: “I do not command you as S.
+Peter and S. Paul did; they were apostles of Jesus Christ, and I am a mere
+nothing” (the least).(7) “What can be more clear,” says the Anglican
+expositor of the Creed, Bishop Pearson, “from these words than that this
+most holy martyr was of opinion that Peter, no less than Paul, preached
+and suffered at Rome?”
+
+Eusebius relates, upon the authority of Papias and S. Clement of
+Alexandria, that “S. Mark wrote his gospel at the request of S. Peter’s
+hearers in Rome,” and he further adds that “S. Peter mentions S. Mark in
+his first epistle, written from Rome, which he figuratively calls
+Babylon.”(8)
+
+S. Dionysius, Bishop of Corinth, in his epistle addressed to the Romans,
+affirms that S. Peter and S. Paul preached the Gospel in Corinth and in
+Rome, and suffered martyrdom about the same time in the latter city.(9)
+
+S. Irenæus, Bishop of Lyons, who was born at Smyrna, though of Greek
+extraction, had been the disciple of S. Polycarp, Pothinus, and Papias,
+from whose lips he had heard many anecdotes of the apostles and their
+immediate followers. He was alike eminent both as a scholar in the
+learning of the times and as a controversialist of no mean repute. The
+part he bore against the Gnostic and other heresies rendered his name
+illustrious, not only within the limits of his episcopal jurisdiction, but
+wherever the claims of Christianity had been presented. The wonderful
+aptness with which he interwove Scripture and scriptural phraseology into
+his style, not altogether unpolished, is perhaps unequalled in patristic
+theology. Residing in a city whose language and intellectual
+characteristics differed from those of his native country, his writings
+are essentially foreign, and, with few exceptions, were lost at an early
+period. In the fragments which remain we find an unequivocal testimony in
+behalf of the subject under discussion. His language is: “S. Peter and S.
+Paul preached the Gospel in Rome, and laid the foundation of the
+church.”(10)
+
+Caius, a learned Roman presbyter, and, as some suppose, bishop, arguing
+against Proclus, the chief champion of Montanism at Rome, says that he can
+“show the trophies of the apostles.” “For if you will go,” he continues,
+“to the Vatican, or to the Ostian Road, you will find the trophies of
+those who have laid the foundation of this church.”(11)
+
+Origen, a man of encyclopædic learning, who had been carefully nurtured by
+Christian parents, and who was imbued with the hardy, stern culture of the
+Greek literature, at the early age of eighteen became the leader of the
+Alexandrine school of Christian philosophy. He proved no unworthy
+successor of the logical Clement. Certainly no name stands higher in the
+catechetical school than that of the iron‐souled Origen (ἀδαμάντινος). The
+eloquent teachings of this youthful master nerved many a Christian soul to
+endure with fortitude the fiery trials of martyrdom, and even comforted
+the bleeding heart of Leonides, his father, who became a victim of the
+unrelenting persecutions of Severus. From Origen we learn “that S. Peter,
+after having preached through Pontus, Galatia, Bithynia, Cappadocia, and
+Asia, to the Jews that were scattered abroad, went at last to Rome, where
+he was crucified.” “These things,” says Eusebius, “are related by Origen
+in the third book of his Τῶν εἰς τὴν Γένεσιν ἐξηγητικῶν.”(12)
+
+Tertullian by birth was a heathen and Carthaginian. He was the son of a
+centurion, and had been educated in all the varied learning of Greece and
+Rome. Skilled as a rhetorician and advocate in Rome, he brought, on his
+conversion to Christianity, the accomplishments of a highly cultivated
+intellect, but a sombre and irritable temper. The natural lawlessness of a
+mind guided by a passionate and stubborn disposition led him gradually to
+renounce the truths which the light of a higher intelligence had revealed,
+until at last he was anathematized for his Montanistic teachings. His
+writings are an invaluable addition to the Punic‐Latin theology, and a
+repository from which we receive great information concerning the polemic
+questions which at that period harassed the Christian church. Upon the
+subject of our article he writes as follows: “Let them, then, give us the
+origin of their churches; let them unfold the series of their bishops,
+coming down in succession from the beginning, so that the first bishop was
+appointed and preceded by any of the apostles, or apostolic men, who,
+nevertheless, preserved in communion with the apostles, had an ordainer
+and predecessor. For in this way the apostolic churches exhibit their
+origin; thus the Church of Smyrna relates that Polycarp was placed there
+by John, as the Church of Rome also relates that Clement was ordained by
+Peter.”(13)
+
+Again: “If thou be adjacent to Italy, there thou hast Rome, whose
+authority is near at hand to us. How happy is this church, to which the
+apostles poured forth their whole doctrine with their blood! where Peter
+is assimilated to our Lord; where Paul is crowned with a death like that
+of John.”(14)
+
+And again: “Let us see with what milk the Corinthians were fed by Paul;
+according to what rule the Galatians were reformed; what laws were to the
+Philippians, Thessalonians, Ephesians; what also the Romans sound in our
+ears, to whom Peter and Paul left the Gospel sealed with their blood.”(15)
+
+To this list of witnesses we might add the testimony of the fathers and
+ecclesiastical writers who have flourished in different ages of the
+church, but we now propose to briefly survey the opinions of some of the
+most noted Protestant commentators.
+
+The First Epistle of S. Peter is said by the apostle to have been written
+from Babylon, but whether it be Babylon in Chaldea, Babylon in Egypt,
+Jerusalem, or Rome, has given rise to much speculation.(16) Our Lord
+foretold the manner of St. Peter’s death,(17) and an event of such
+importance would naturally have awakened more than ordinary interest.
+Seven cities claimed the honor of Homer’s birth,(18) but no other place
+than Rome ever assumed to itself the glory of the apostle’s martyrdom.
+Controversies arose concerning the time of celebrating Easter, the baptism
+of heretics, and questions of a like nature, yet none disputed the place
+in which S. Peter was martyred. It is highly improbable that S. Peter ever
+visited either Babylon in Egypt or Babylon in Chaldea. Certainly no fact
+of history nor even possibility of conjecture furnishes the least
+warrantable presumption of either opinion. The great burden of proof
+points toward Rome. Like Babylon, pagan Rome was idolatrous. Like Babylon,
+it persecuted the church of God. Like Babylon, the glory of its pagan
+temple and fane had departed. In many manuscripts this epistle is dated
+from Rome.
+
+Calvin, who little regarded the authority of the fathers, when, in the
+presumption of his self‐opinionated orthodoxy, he said: “All the ancients
+were driven into error,”(19) yet from evidence the most patent he believed
+that S. Peter suffered martyrdom at Rome. His language is: “Propter
+scriptorum consensum non pugno quin illic mortuus fuerit.”(20)
+
+“On the meaning of the word Babylon,” says Grotius, one of the most
+celebrated of the Calvinistic school, “ancient and modern interpreters
+disagree. The ancients understand it of Rome, and that Peter was there no
+true Christian ever doubted; the moderns understand it of Babylon in
+Chaldea. I adhere to the ancients.”(21)
+
+Rosenmüller, of whom an able American critic has said, “He is almost
+everywhere a local investigator,”(22) has left his testimony in the same
+language as Grotius: “Veteres Romam interpretantur.”
+
+Dr. Campbell very reluctantly yielded, by the force of evidence, to the
+same opinion when he wrote: “I am inclined to think that S. Peter’s
+martyrdom must have been at Rome, both because it is agreeable to the
+unanimous voice of antiquity, and because the sufferings of so great an
+apostle could not fail to be of such notoriety in the church as to
+preclude the possibility of an imposition in regard to the place.”(23)
+
+“From a careful examination of the evidence adduced,” says the learned
+Horne, “for the literal meaning of the word Babylon, and of the evidence
+for its figurative or mystical application to Rome, we think that the
+_latter_ was intended.”(24)
+
+We commend to “Father Gavazzi,” and to the Rev. Doctors Sunderland and
+Newman of Washington, who are ever ready to throw down the gauntlet when
+an argument is made to prove that S. Peter was at Rome, the language of
+the logical and laborious Macknight, who clearly expresses our own view,
+and whose diligence, learning, and moderation were so fully appreciated by
+Bishop Tomline: “It is not for our honor nor for our interest, either as
+Christians or Protestants, to deny the truth of events ascertained by
+early and well‐attested tradition. If any make an ill use of such facts,
+we are not accountable for it. We are not, from a dread of such abuses, to
+overthrow the credit of all history, the consequences of which would be
+fatal.”(25)
+
+
+
+
+Number Thirteen. An Episode Of The Commune.
+
+
+Mlle. de Lemaque and her sister Mme. de Chanoir lived at No. 13 Rue
+Royale. They were the daughters of a military man whose fortune when he
+married consisted in his sword, nothing else; and of a noble Demoiselle de
+Cambatte, whose wedding portion, according to the good old French fashion,
+was precisely the same as her husband’s, minus the sword. But over and
+above this joint capital the young people had a good stock of hope and
+courage, and an inexhaustible fund of love; they had therefore as good a
+chance of getting on as other young folk who start in life under the same
+pecuniary disadvantages. M. de Lemaque, moreover, had friends in high
+place who looked kindly on him, and promised him countenance and
+protection, and there was no reason, as far as he and his wife could see,
+why he should not in due time clutch that legendary baton which Napoleon
+declared every French soldier carries in his knapsack. Nor, indeed,
+looking at things from a retrospective point of view, was there any
+reason, that we can see, why he should not have died a marshal of France,
+except that he died too soon. The young soldier was in a fair way of
+climbing to the topmost rung of the military ladder; but just as he had
+got his foot on the third rung, Death stepped down and met him, and he
+climbed no further. His wife followed him into the grave three years
+later. They left two daughters, Félicité and Aline, the only fruits of
+their short and happy union. The orphans were educated at the Legion of
+Honor, and then sent adrift on the wide, wide world, to battle with its
+winds and waves, to sink or swim as best they could. They swam. Perhaps I
+ought rather say they floated. The eldest, Félicité, was married from S.
+Denis to an old general, who, after a reasonably short time, had the
+delicacy to betake himself to a better world, leaving his gay wife a widow
+at the head of an income of £40 a year. Aline might have married under
+similar circumstances, but, after turning it over in her mind, she came to
+the conclusion that, all things considered, since it was a choice of
+evils, and that she must earn her bread in some way, she preferred earning
+it and eating it independently as a single woman. This gave rise to the
+only quarrel the sisters had had in their lives. Félicité resented the
+disgrace that Aline was going to put on the family name by degenerating
+into a giver of private lessons, when she might have secured forty pounds
+a year for ever by a few years’ dutiful attendance on a brave man who had
+fought his country’s battles.
+
+“Well, if you can find me a warrior of ninety,” said the younger sister, a
+month before she left S. Denis, “I’m not sure that he might not persuade
+me; but I never will capitulate under ninety; I couldn’t trust a man under
+that; they live for ever when they marry between sixty and eighty, and
+there are no tyrants like them; now, I would do my duty as a kind wife for
+a year or so, but I’ve no notion of taking a situation as nurse for
+fifteen or twenty years, and that’s what one gets by marrying a young man
+of seventy or thereabouts.”
+
+Félicité urged her own case as a proof to the contrary. Général de Chanoir
+was only sixty‐eight when she married him, and he retired at seventy.
+Aline maintained, however, that this was the one exception necessary to
+prove the rule to the present generation, and as no eligible _parti_ of
+fourscore and ten presented itself before she left school, she held to her
+resolve, and started at once as a teacher.
+
+The sisters took an apartment together, if two rooms, a cabinet de
+toilette, and a cooking‐range in a dark passage, dignified by the name of
+kitchen, can be called an apartment, and for six years they lived very
+happily.
+
+Mme. de Chanoir was small and fair, and very distinguished‐looking. She
+had never known a day’s illness in her life, but she was a hypochondriac.
+She believed herself afflicted with a spine disease, which necessitated
+reclining all day long on the sofa in a Louis Quinze dressing‐gown and a
+Dubarry cap.
+
+Aline was tall and dark, not exactly pretty, but indescribably piquant.
+Without being delicate, her health was far less robust than her sister’s;
+but she was blessed with indomitable spirits and a fund of energy that
+carried her through a variety of aches and pains, and often bore her
+successfully through her round of daily work when another would have given
+in.
+
+The domestic establishment of the sisters consisted in a charwoman, who
+rejoiced in the name of Mme. Cléry. She was a type of a class almost
+extinct in Paris now; a dainty little cook, clean as a sixpence, honest as
+the sun, orderly as a clock, a capital servant in every way. She came
+twice a day to No. 13, two hours in the morning and three hours in the
+afternoon, and the sisters paid her twenty francs a month. She might have
+struck for more wages, and rather than let her go they would have managed
+to raise them; but Mme. Cléry was born before strikes came into fashion,
+it was quite impossible to say how long before; her age was incalculable;
+her youth belonged to that class of facts spoken of as beyond the memory
+of the oldest man in the district. Aline used to look at her sometimes,
+and wonder if she really could have been born, and if she meant to die
+like other people; the crisp, wiry old woman looked the sort of person
+never to have either a beginning or an end; they had had her now for eight
+years—at least Mme. de Chanoir had—and there was not the shadow of a
+change in her. Her gowns were like herself, they never wore out, neither
+did her caps—high Normandy caps, with flaps extended like a wind‐mill in
+repose, stiff, white, and uncompromising. Everything about her was
+antiquated. She had a religious regard for antiquity in every shape, and a
+proportionate contempt for modernism; but, of all earthly things, what her
+soul loved most was an old name, and what it most despised a new one. She
+used to say that if she chose to cook the _rotis_ of a parvenu she might
+make double the money, and it was true; but she could not bend her spirit
+to it; she liked her dry bread and herbs better from a good family than a
+stalled ox from upstarts. She was as faithful as a dog to her two
+mistresses, and consequently lorded over them like a step‐mother,
+perpetually bullying and scolding, and bewailing her own infatuation in
+staying with them while she might be turning a fatter pullet on her own
+spit at home than the miserable _coquille_ at No. 13 ever held a fire to.
+Why had she not the sense to take the situation that M. X——, the _agent de
+change_, across the street, had offered her again and again? The _femme de
+ménage_ was, in fact, as odious and exasperating as the most devoted old
+servant who ever nursed a family from the cradle to the grave. But let any
+one else dare so much as cast a disrespectful glance at either of her
+victims! She shook her fist at the _concierge’s_ wife one day for
+venturing to call Mme. de Chanoir Mme. de Chanoir _tout court_, instead of
+Mme. la Générale de Chanoir, to a flunky who came with a note, and she
+boxed the _concierge’s_ ears for speaking of Aline as “l’Institutrice.” As
+Mme. la Générale’s sofa was drawn across the window that looked into the
+court, she happened to be an eye‐witness to the two incidents, and heard
+every word that was said. This accidental disclosure of Mme. Cléry’s
+regard for the family dignity before outsiders covered a multitude of sins
+in the eyes of both the sisters. Indeed, Mme. de Chanoir came at last, by
+force of habit, almost to enjoy being bullied by the old soul. “_Cela nous
+pose, ma chère_,” she would remark complacently, when the wind from the
+kitchen blew due north, and Aline threatened to mutiny.
+
+Aline never could have endured it if she had been as constantly tried as
+her easy‐going sister was; but, lucky for all parties, she went out
+immediately after breakfast, and seldom came in till late in the
+afternoon, when the old beldame was busy getting ready the dinner.
+
+It was a momentous life they led, the two young women, but, on the whole,
+it was a happy one. Mme. de Chanoir, seeing how bravely her sister carried
+the burden she had taken up, grew reconciled to it in time. They had a
+pleasant little society, too; friends who had known them from their
+childhood, some rich and in good positions, others struggling like
+themselves in a narrow cage and under difficult circumstances; but one and
+all liked the sisters, and brought a little contingent of sunshine to
+their lives. As to Aline, she had sunshine enough in herself to light up
+the whole Rue Royale. Every lesson she gave, every incident of the day, no
+matter how trivial, fell across her path like a sunbeam; she had a knack
+of looking at things from a sunny focus that shot out rays on every object
+that came within its radius, and of extracting amusement or interest from
+the most commonplace things and people; even her own vexations she had
+turned into ridicule. Her position of governess was a fountain of fun to
+her. When another would have drawn gall from a snub, and smarted and been
+miserable under a slight, Aline de Lemaque saw a comic side to the
+circumstance, and would dress it up in a fashion that diverted herself and
+her friends for a week. Moreover, the young lady was something of a
+philosopher.
+
+“You never find out human nature till you come to earn your own bread—I
+mean, women don’t,” she used to say to Mme. de Chanoir. “If I were the
+mother of a family of daughters, and wanted to teach them life, I’d make
+every one of them, no matter how big their _dots_ were, begin by running
+after the _cachet_. Nobody who hasn’t tried it would believe what a castle
+of truth it is to one—a mirror that shows up character to the life, a sort
+of moral photography. It is often as good as a play to me to watch the
+change that comes over people when, after talking to them, and making
+myself pass for a very agreeable person, I suddenly announce the fact that
+I give lessons. Their whole countenance changes, not that they look on me
+straightway with contempt. Oh! dear no. Many good Christians, people of
+the ’help yourself and God will help you’ sect, conceive, on the contrary,
+a great respect for me; but I become metamorphosed on the spot. I am not
+what they took me for, they took me for a lady, and all the time I was a
+governess! They did not think the less of me, but they can’t help feeling
+that they have been taken in; that, in fact, I’m an altogether different
+variety from themselves, and it is very odd they did not recognize it at
+first sight. But these are the least exciting experiences. The great fun
+is when I get hold of an out‐and‐out worldly individual, man or woman, but
+a woman is best, and let them go on till they have thoroughly committed
+themselves, made themselves gushingly agreeable to me, perhaps gone the
+length of asking, in a significant manner, if I live in their
+neighborhood; then comes the crisis. I smile my gladdest, and say,
+‘Monsieur, or Madame, I give lessons!’ _Changement de décoration à vue
+d’œil, ma chère._ It’s just as if I _lancéd_ an _obus_ into the middle of
+the company, only it rebounds on me and hits nobody else; the eyebrows of
+the company go up, the corners of its mouth go down, and it bows to me as
+I sit on the ruins of my respectability, shattered to pieces by my own
+_obus_.”
+
+“I can’t understand how you can laugh at it. If I were in your place, I
+should have died of vexation and wounded pride long ago,” said Mme. de
+Chanoir, one day, as Aline related in high glee an obus episode that she
+had had that morning; “but I really believe you have no feeling.”
+
+“Well, whatever I have, I keep out of the reach of vulgar impertinence. I
+should be very sorry to make my feelings a target for insolence and bad
+breeding,” replied Aline pertly. This was the simple truth. Her feelings
+were out of the reach of such petty shafts; they were cased in
+cheerfulness and common sense, and a nobler sort of pride than that in
+which Mme. de Chanoir considered her sister wanting. If, however, the obus
+was frequently fatal to Mlle. de Lemaque’s social standing, on the other
+hand it occasionally did her good service; but of this later. Its present
+character was that of an explosive bomb which she carried in her pocket,
+and _lancéd_ with infinite gusto on every available opportunity.
+
+On Saturday evening the sisters were “at home.” These little soirées were
+the great event of their quiet lives. All the episodes and anecdotes of
+the week were treasured up for that evening, when the intimes came to see
+them and converse and sip a glass of cold _eau sucrée_ in summer, and a
+cup of hot ditto in winter (but then it was called tea) by the light of a
+small lamp with a green shade. There was no attempt at entertainment or
+finery of any kind, except that Mme. Cléry, instead of going home as soon
+as the dinner things were washed up, stayed to open the door. It was a
+remnant of the sort of society that used to exist in French families some
+thirty years ago, when conversation was cultivated as the primary
+accomplishment of men and women, and when they met regularly to exercise
+themselves in the difficult and delightful art. It was not reserved to the
+well‐born exclusively to talk well and brilliantly in those days, when the
+most coveted encomium that could be passed on any one was, “He talks
+well.” All classes vied for it; every circle had its centre of
+conversation. The _fauteuil de l’aïeule_ and the salon of the _femme
+d’esprit_, each had its audience, attended as assiduously, and perhaps
+enjoyed quite as much, as the vaudevilles and ambigus that have since
+drawn away the bourgeois from the one and the man of fashion from the
+other. Besides its usual habitués for conversation, every circle had one
+habitué who was looked upon as the friend of the family, and tacitly took
+precedence of all the others. The friend of the family at No. 13 was a
+certain professor of the Sorbonne named M. Dalibouze. He was somewhere on
+the sunny side of fifty, a bald, pompous little man who wore spectacles,
+took snuff, and laid down the law; very prosy and very estimable, a model
+professor. He had never married, but it was the dream of his life to
+marry. He had meditated on marriage for the last thirty years, and of
+course knew more about it than any man who had been married double that
+time. He was never so eloquent or so emphatic as when dilating on the joys
+and duties of domestic life; no matter how tired he was with study and
+scientific researches, how disappointed in the result of some cherished
+literary scheme, he brightened up the moment marriage came on the tapis.
+This hobby of the professor’s was a great amusement to Mme. de Chanoir,
+who delighted to see him jump into the saddle and ride off at a canter
+while she lay languidly working at her tapestry, patting him on the back
+every now and then, by a word of encouragement, or signifying her assent
+merely by a smile or a nod. Sometimes she would take him to task seriously
+about putting his theories into practice and getting himself a wife,
+assuring him that it was quite wicked of him not to marry when he was so
+richly endowed with all the qualities necessary to make a model husband.
+
+“Ah! madame, if I thought I were capable of making a young woman happy!”
+M. Dalibouze would exclaim with a sigh; “but at my age! No, I have let my
+chance go by.”
+
+“How, sir, at your age!” the générale would protest. “Why, it is the very
+flower of manhood, the moment of all others for a man to marry. You have
+outlived the delusions of youth and none of its vigor; you have crossed
+the Rubicon that separates folly from wisdom, and you have left nothing on
+the other side of the bridge but the silly chimera of boyhood. Believe me,
+the woman whom you would select would never wish to see you a day
+younger.”
+
+And M. Dalibouze would caress his chin, and observe thoughtfully: “Do you
+think so, madame?” Upon which Mme. de Chanoir would pour another vial of
+oil and honey on the learned head of the professor, till the wonder was
+that it did not turn on his shoulders.
+
+Aline had no sympathy with his rhapsodies or his jeremiads; they bored her
+to extinction, and sometimes it was all she could do not to tell him so;
+but she disapproved of his being made a joke of, and testified against it
+very decidedly when Félicité, in a spirit of mischief, led him up to a
+more than usually ridiculous culmination. It was not fair, she said, to
+make a greater fool of the good little man than he made of himself, and
+instead of encouraging him to talk such nonsense one ought to laugh him
+out of it, and try and cure him of his silly conceit.
+
+“I don’t see it at all in that light,” Mme. de Chanoir would answer. “In
+the first place, if I laughed at him, or rather if I let him see that I
+did, he would never forgive me, and, as I have a great regard for him, I
+should be sorry to lose his friendship; and in the next place, it’s a
+great amusement to me to see him swallow my little doses of flattery so
+complacently, and I have no scruple in dosing him, because nothing that I
+or any one else could say could possibly add one grain to his self‐
+conceit, so one may as well turn it to account for a little
+entertainment.”
+
+It was partly this system of flattery, which Aline resented on principle,
+that induced her occasionally to snub the professor, and partly the fact
+that she had reason to suspect his dreams of married bliss centred upon
+herself. In fact, she knew it. He had never told her so outright, for the
+simple reason that, whenever he drew near that crisis, Aline cut him short
+in such a peremptory manner that it cowed him for weeks, but nevertheless
+she knew in her heart of hearts that she reigned supreme over M.
+Dalibouze’s. She would not have married him, no, not if he could have
+crowned her queen of the Sorbonne and the Collége de France, but the fact
+of his being her slave and aspiring to be her master constituted a claim
+on her regard which a true‐hearted woman seldom disowns.
+
+Félicité would have favored his suit if there had been the ghost of a
+chance for him, but she knew there was not.
+
+Mme. Cléry looked coldly on it. Needless to say, neither M. Dalibouze nor
+his cruel‐hearted lady‐love had ever made a confidante of the _femme de
+ménage_; but she often remarked to her mistresses when they ventured an
+opinion on anything connected with her special department, “Je ne suis pas
+née d’hier,” an assertion which, strange to say, even the rebellious Aline
+had never attempted to gainsay. Mme. Cléry was not, indeed, born
+yesterday, moreover she was a Frenchwoman, and a particularly wide‐awake
+one, and from the first evening that she saw Aline sugaring M. Dalibouze’s
+tea, dropping in lump after lump in that reckless way, while the little
+man held his cup and beamed at her through his spectacles as if he meant
+to stand there for ever simpering, “Merci encore!”—it occurred to Mme.
+Cléry when she saw this that there was more in it than tea‐making. Of
+course it was natural and proper that a young woman, especially an orphan,
+should think of getting married, but it was right and proper that her
+friends should think of it too, and see that she married the proper
+person. Now, on the face of it, M. Dalibouze could not be the proper
+person. Nevertheless, Mme. Cléry waited till the suspicion that M.
+Dalibouze had settled it in his own mind that he was that man took the
+shape of a conviction before she considered it her duty to interfere.
+
+By interfering Mme. Cléry meant going _aux renseignements_. Nobody ever
+got true _renseignements_, especially when there was a marriage in
+question, except people like her; ladies and gentlemen never get behind
+the scenes with each other, or, if they do, they never tell what they see
+there. They are very sweet and smiling when they meet in the salon, and
+nobody guesses that madame has rated her _femme de chambre_ for not
+putting the flowers in her hair exactly to her fancy, or that monsieur has
+flung a boot at his valet for giving him his shaving‐water too hot or too
+cold. If you want the truth, you must get it by the back‐stairs. This was
+Mme. Cléry’s belief, and, acting upon it, she went to M. Dalibouze’s
+_concierge_ in the Rue Jean Beauvais to consult him confidentially about
+his _locataire_.
+
+The first thing to be ascertained before entering on such secondary
+details as character, conduct, etc., was whether or not the professor was
+of a good enough family to be entertained at all as a husband for Mlle. de
+Lemaque. On this _sine qua non_ question the _concierge_ could
+unfortunately throw no light. The professor had a multitude of friends,
+all respectable people, many of them _décorés_, who drove to the door in
+spruce _coupés_, but of his family Pipelet knew nothing; of his personal
+respectability there was no doubt whatever; he was the kindest of men, a
+very pearl of tenants, always in before midnight, and gave forty francs to
+Pipelet on New Year’s day, not to count sundry other little bonuses on
+minor _fêtes_ during the year. But so long as her mind was in darkness on
+the main point, all this was no better than sounding brass in the ears of
+Mme. Cléry.
+
+“Has he, or has he not, the _particule_?” she demanded, cutting Pipelet
+short in the middle of his panegyric.
+
+“The _particule_?” repeated Pipelet. “What’s that?”
+
+“The _particule nobiliaire_,” explained Mme. Cléry, with a touch of
+contempt. “There is some question of a marriage between him and one of my
+ladies; but, if M. Dalibouze hasn’t got the _particule_, it’s no use
+thinking of it.”
+
+“Madame,” said Pipelet, assuming a meditative air—he was completely at sea
+as to what this essential piece of property might be, but did not like to
+own his ignorance—“I’m not a man to set up for knowing more of my tenant’s
+business than I do, and M. Dalibouze has never opened himself to me about
+how or where his money was placed; but I could give you the name of his
+agent, if I thought it would not compromise me.”
+
+“I’m not a woman to compromise any one that showed me confidence,” said
+Mme. Cléry, tightening her lips, and bobbing her flaps at Pipelet; “but
+you need not give me the name of his agent. What sort of a figure should I
+make at his agent’s! Give me his own name. How does he spell it?”
+
+“Spell it!” echoed Pipelet.
+
+“A big _D_ or a little _d_?” said Mme. Cléry.
+
+“Why, a big _D_, of course! Who ever spelt their name with a little one?”
+retorted Pipelet.
+
+“Ah!...” Mme. Cléry smiled a smile of serene pity on the benighted
+ignoramus, and then observed coolly: “I suspected it! I’m not easy to
+deceive in that sort of things. I was not born yesterday. Good‐morning, M.
+le Concierge.” She moved towards the door.
+
+“Stop!” cried Pipelet, seizing his berette as if a ray of light had shot
+through his skull—“stop! Now that I think of it, it’s a little _d_. I have
+not a doubt but it’s a little _d_. I noticed it only yesterday on a letter
+that came for monsieur, and I said to myself: ‘Let us see!’ I said. ‘What
+a queer fancy for a man of distinction like M. le Professeur to spell his
+name with a little _d_!’ Là! if I didn’t say those words to myself no
+later than yesterday!”
+
+Mme. Cléry was dubious. Unluckily there was no letter in M. Dalibouze’s
+box at that moment, which would have settled the point at issue, so she
+had nothing for it but to go home, and turn it in her mind what was to be
+done next. After all, it was a great responsibility on her. The old soul
+considered herself in the light of a protector to the two young women, one
+a cripple on the broad of her back, and the other a light‐hearted creature
+who believed everything and everybody. It was her place to look after them
+as far as she could. That afternoon, when Mme. Cléry went to No. 13, after
+her fruitless expedition to the Rue Jean Beauvais, she took a letter in to
+Mme. de Chanoir. She had never seen, or, at any rate, never noticed, the
+writing before, but as she handed the envelope to her mistress it flashed
+upon her that it was from M. Dalibouze, and that it bore on the subject of
+her morning’s peregrination.
+
+She seized a feather‐broom that hung by the fireplace, and began
+vigorously threatening the clock and the candlesticks, as an excuse for
+staying in the room, and watching Mme. de Chanoir in the looking‐glass
+while she read the letter. The old woman was an irascible enemy to dust;
+they were used to see her at the most inopportune times pounce on the
+feather‐broom and begin whipping about her to the right and left, so Mme.
+de Chanoir took no notice of this sudden castigation of the chimney‐piece
+at four o’clock in the afternoon. She read her note, and then, tossing it
+into the basket beside her, resumed her tapestry as if nothing had
+occurred to divert her thoughts from roses and Berlin wool.
+
+“Mme. la Générale, pardon and excuse,” said Mme. Cléry, deliberately
+hanging the feather‐broom on its nail, and going up to the foot of the
+générale’s sofa. “I have it on my mind to ask something of madame.”
+
+“Ask it, my good Mme. Cléry.”
+
+“Does Mme. la Générale think of marrying Mlle. Aline?”
+
+Mme. de Chanoir opened her eyes, and stared for a moment in mild surprise
+at her charwoman, then a smile broke over her face, and she said:
+
+“You are thinking that you would not like to come to me if I were alone?”
+
+“I was not thinking of that, madame,” replied Mme. Cléry, in a tone of
+ceremony that was not habitual, and which would have boded no good (Mme.
+Cléry was never so respectful as when she was going to be particularly
+disagreeable), except that she looked very meek, and, Félicité thought,
+rather affectionately at her as their eyes met.
+
+“Well,” said Mme. de Chanoir, “I suppose we must marry her some day; I
+ought, perhaps, to occupy myself about it more actively than I do; but
+there’s time enough to think about it yet; mademoiselle is in no hurry.”
+
+“Dame!” said Mme. Cléry testily, “when a demoiselle has become an old
+maid, there is not so much time to lose! Pardon and excuse, Mme. la
+Générale, but I thought, I don’t know why, that that letter had something
+to do with it?”
+
+“This letter! What could have put that into your head?”
+
+Mme. de Chanoir took up the note to see if the envelope had anything about
+it which warranted this romantic suspicion, but it was an ordinary
+envelope, with no trace of anything more peculiar than the post‐mark.
+
+“As I have told Mme. la Générale before,” said Mme. Cléry, shaking her
+head significantly, “I was not born yesterday”—she emphasized the _not_ as
+if Mme. de Chanoir had denied that fact and challenged her to swear to it
+on the Bible—“and I don’t carry my eyes in my pocket; and when a
+demoiselle heaps lumps of sugar into a gentleman’s cup till it’s as thick
+as honey for a spoon to stand in, and a shame to see the substance of the
+family wasted in such a way, and she never grudging it a bit, but looking
+as if it would be fun to her to turn the sugar‐bowl upside down over it—I
+say, when I see that sort of thing, I’m not femme Cléry if there isn’t
+something in it.”
+
+Félicité felt inclined to laugh, but she restrained herself, and observed
+interrogatively:
+
+“Well, Mme. Cléry, suppose there is?”
+
+This extravagance of sugar on M. Dalibouze was an old grievance of Mme.
+Cléry’s. In fact, it had been her only one against the professor, till she
+grew to look upon him as the possible husband of Mlle. Aline, and then the
+question of his having or not having the _particule_ assumed such alarming
+importance in her mind that it magnified all minor defects, and she
+believed him capable of every misdemeanor under the sun.
+
+“Mme. la Générale,” she replied, “one does not marry every day; one ought
+to think seriously about it; Mlle. Aline has not experience; she is _vive_
+and light‐hearted; she is a person to be taken in by outward appearances;
+such things as learning, good principles, and _esprit_ would blind her to
+serious shortcomings; it is the duty of Mme. la Générale to prevent such a
+mistake in time.”
+
+“What sort of shortcomings are you afraid of in M. Dalibouze, Mme. Cléry?”
+inquired Mme. de Chanoir, dropping her tapestry, and looking with awakened
+curiosity at the old woman.
+
+“Let us begin with a first principle, Mme. la Générale,” observed Mme.
+Cléry, demurely slapping the palm of her left hand. “Mlle. Aline is _née_;
+the father and mother of mamzelle were both of an excellent family; it is
+consequently of the first necessity that her husband should be so, too;
+the first thing, therefore, to be considered in a suitor is his name. Now,
+has M. Dalibouze the _particule_, or has he not?”
+
+It was a very great effort for Mme. de Chanoir to keep her countenance
+under this charge and deliver with which the old woman solemnly closed her
+speech, and then stood awaiting the effect on her listener; still, such is
+the weakness of human nature, the générale in her inmost heart was
+flattered by it; it was pleasant to be looked up to as belonging to a race
+above the common herd, to be recognized in spite of her poverty, even by a
+_femme de ménage_, as superior to the wealthy parvenus whose fathers and
+mothers were not of a good family.
+
+“My good Mme. Cléry,” she said after a moment’s reflection, “you, like
+ourselves, were brought up with very different ideas from those that
+people hold nowadays. Nobody cares a straw to‐day who a man’s father was,
+or whether he had the _particule_ or not; all that they care about is that
+he should be well educated, and well conducted, and well off; and, my
+dear, one must go with the times, one must give in to the force of public
+opinion around one. Customs change with the times. I would, of course,
+much rather have a brother‐in‐law of our own rank than one cleverer and
+richer who was not; but what would you have? One cannot have everything.
+It is not pleasant for me to see Mlle. de Lemaque earning her own bread,
+running about the streets like a milliner’s apprentice at all hours of the
+day. I would overlook something to see her married to a kind, honorable
+man who would keep her in comfort and independence.”
+
+“_Bonté divine!_” exclaimed Mme. Cléry, with a look of deep distress and
+consternation, “madame would then actually marry mamzelle to a _bourgeois
+sans particule_? For madame admits that M. Dalibouze has not the
+_particule_, that he spells his name with a big _D_?”
+
+“Alas! he does,” confessed the générale; “but he comes, nevertheless, of a
+good old Normandy stock, Mme. Cléry; his great‐grandfather was _procureur
+du roi_ under—”
+
+“Tut! tut!” interrupted Mme. Cléry; “his great‐grandfather may have been
+what he liked; if he wasn’t a gentleman, he has no business marrying his
+great grandson to a de Lemaque. No, madame; I am a poor woman, but I know
+better than that. Mamzelle’s father would turn in his grave if he saw her
+married to a man who spelt his name with a big _D_.”
+
+The conversation was interrupted by a ring at the door. It was Aline. She
+came back earlier than usual, because one of her pupils was ill and had
+not been able to take her lesson. The young girl was flushed and excited,
+and flung herself into an arm‐chair the moment she entered, and burst into
+tears. Mme. de Chanoir sat up in alarm, fearing she was ill, and suggested
+a cup of _tisane_.
+
+“Oh! ’tis nothing. I’m an idiot to mind it or let such impertinence vex
+me,” she said, when the first outburst had passed off and relieved her.
+
+“_Mon Dieu!_ but what vexes mamzelle?” inquired Mme. Cléry anxiously.
+
+“A horrid man that followed me the length of the street, and made some
+impudent speech, and asked me where I lived,” sobbed Aline.
+
+“Is it possible!” exclaimed the old woman, aghast, and clasping her hands.
+“Well, mamzelle does astonish me! I thought young men knew better nowadays
+than to go on with that sort of tricks; fifty years ago they used to. I
+remember how I was followed and spoken to every time I went to church or
+to market; it was a persecution; but now I come and go and nobody minds
+me. To think of their daring to speak to mamzelle!”
+
+“That’s what one must expect when one walks about alone at your age, _ma
+pauvre_ Aline,” said the générale, rather sharply, with a significant look
+at Mme. Cléry which that good lady understood, and resented by compressing
+her lips and bobbing her flaps, as much as to say, “One has a principle or
+one has not”—principle being in this instance synonymous with _particule_.
+
+Things remained _in statu quo_ after this for some years. Mme. de Chanoir
+did not enlighten her sister on the subject of the conference with Mme.
+Cléry, but she worked as far as she could in favor of the luckless suitor
+who spelt his name with a capital _D_. It was of no use, however. Aline
+continued to snub him so pertinaciously and persistently that Mme. de
+Chanoir at last gave up his cause as hopeless, and the professor himself,
+when he saw this, his solitary stronghold, surrender, thought it best to
+raise the siege with a good grace, and make a friendly truce with the
+victor. He frankly withdrew from the field of suitors, and took up his
+position as a friend of the family. This once done, he accepted its
+responsibilities and prerogatives, and held himself on the _qui vive_ to
+render any service in his power to Mme. de Chanoir; he kept her
+_concierge_ in order, and brought bonbons and flowers to No. 13 on every
+possible occasion. He knew Aline was passionately fond of the latter, and
+he was careful to keep the flower stand that stood in the pier of the
+little salon freshly supplied with her favorite plants, and the vases
+filled with her favorite flowers. He never dared to offer her a present,
+but under cover of offering them to the générale he kept her informed
+about every new book which was likely to interest her. Finally, Frenchman‐
+like, having abandoned the hope of marrying her himself, he set to work to
+find some more fortunate suitor. This was _par excellence_ the duty of a
+friend of the family, and M. Dalibouze was fully alive to its importance.
+The disinterested zeal he displayed in the discharge of it would have been
+comical if the spirit of genuine self‐sacrifice which animated him had not
+touched it with pathos. One by one every eligible _parti_ in the range of
+his acquaintance was led up for inspection to No. 13. Mme. de Chanoir
+entered complacently into the presentations; they amused her, and she
+tried to persuade herself that, sooner or later, something would come of
+them; but she knew Aline too well ever to let her into the secret of the
+professor’s matrimonial manœuvres. The result would have been to furnish
+Mlle. de Lemaque with an _obus_ opportunity and nothing more.
+
+But do what she would, the générale could never cheat Mme. Cléry. The old
+woman detected a _prétendant_ as a cat does a mouse. It was an instinct
+with her. There was no putting her off the scent. She never said a word to
+Mme. de Chanoir, but she had a most aggravating way of making her
+understand tacitly that she knew all about it—that, in fact, she was not
+born yesterday. This was her system, whenever M. Dalibouze brought a
+_parti_ to tea in the evening. Mme. Cléry was seized next day with a
+furious dusting fit, and when the générale testified against the feathers
+that kept flying out of the broom, Mme. Cléry would observe, in a
+significant way:
+
+“Mme. la Générale, that makes an impression when one sees a salon well
+dusted; that proves that the servant is capable—that she attends to her
+work. Madame does not think of those things, but strangers do.”
+
+It became at length a sort of cabalistic ceremony with the old woman;
+intelligible only to Mme. de Chanoir. If Aline came in when the fit was on
+her, and ventured to expostulate, and ask what she was doing with the
+duster at that time of day, Mme. Cléry would remark stiffly: “Mamzelle
+Aline, I am dusting.” Aline came at last to believe that it was a modified
+phase of S. Vitus’ dance, and that for want of anything better the old
+beldame vented her nerves on imaginary dust which she pursued in holes and
+corners with her feathery weapon.
+
+This went on till Mlle. de Lemaque was six‐and‐twenty. She was still a
+bright, brave creature, working hard, accepting the privations and toil of
+her life in a spirit of sunshiny courage. But the sun was no longer always
+shining. There were days now when he drew behind a cloud—when toil pressed
+like a burden, and she beat her wings against it, and hated the cage that
+cooped her in; and she longed not so much for rest or happiness as for
+freedom—for a larger scope and higher aims, and wider, fuller sympathies.
+When these cloudy days came around, Aline felt the void of her life with
+an intensity that amounted at times to anguish; she felt it all the more
+keenly because she could not speak of it. Mme. de Chanoir would not have
+understood it. The sisters were sincerely attached to each other, but
+there was little sympathy of character between them, and on many points
+they were as little acquainted with each other as the neighbors on the
+next street. They knew this, and agreed sensibly to keep clear of certain
+subjects on which they could never meet except to disagree. The younger
+sister, therefore, when the sky was overcast, and when her spirits
+flagged, never tried to lean upon the older, but worked against the enemy
+in silence, denying herself the luxury of complaint. If her looks betrayed
+her, as was sometimes the case, and prompted Mme. de Chanoir to inquire if
+there was anything the matter beyond the never‐ending annoyance of life in
+general, Aline’s assurance that there was not was invariably followed by
+the remark: “_Ma sœur_, I wish you were married.” To which Aline as
+invariably replied: “I am happier as I am, Félicité.” It was true, or at
+any rate Mlle. de Lemaque thought it was. Under all her surface
+indifference she carried a true woman’s heart. She had dreamt her dreams
+of happiness, of tender fireside joys, and the dream was so fair and
+beautiful that for years it filled her life like a reality, and when she
+discovered, or fancied she did, that it was all too beautiful to be
+anything but a dream, that the hero of her young imagination would never
+cross her path in the form of a mortal husband, Aline accepted the
+discovery with a sigh, but without repining, and laid aside all thought of
+marriage as a guest that was not for her. As to the marriages that she saw
+every day around her, she would no more have bound herself in one of them
+than she would have sold herself to an Eastern pasha. Marriage was a very
+different thing in her eyes from what it was in Mme. de Chanoir’s. There
+was no point on which the sisters were more asunder than on this, and
+Aline understood it so well that she avoided touching on it except in
+jest. Whenever the subject was introduced, she drew a mask of frivolity
+over her real feelings to avoid bringing down the générale’s ridicule on
+what she would stigmatize as preposterous sentimentality.
+
+M. Dalibouze alone guessed something of this under‐current of deep feeling
+in the young girl’s character. With the subtle instinct of affection he
+penetrated the disguise in which she wrapped herself, but, with a delicacy
+that she scarcely gave him credit for, he never let her see that he did.
+Sometimes, indeed, when one of those fits of _tristesse_ was upon her, and
+she was striving to dissemble it by increased cheerfulness towards
+everybody, and sauciness towards him, the professor would adapt the
+conversation to the tone of her thoughts with a skill and apropos that
+surprised her. Once in particular Aline was startled by the way in which
+he betrayed either a singularly close observation of her character, or a
+still more singular sympathy with its moods and sufferings. It was on a
+Saturday evening, the little circle was gathered round the fire, and the
+conversation fell upon poetry and the mission of poets amongst common men.
+Aline declared that it was the grandest of all missions; that, after the
+prophet and priest, the poet did more for the moral well‐being, the
+spiritual redemption of his fellows than any other missionary, whether
+philosopher, artist, or patriot; he combined them all, in fact, if he
+wished it. If he was a patriot, he could serve his country better than a
+soldier, by singing her wrongs and her glories, and firing the souls of
+her sons, and making all mankind vibrate to the touch of pain, or joy, or
+passionate revenge, while he sat quietly by his own hearth; she quoted
+Moore and Krazinski, and other patriot bards who living had ruled their
+people, and sent down their name a legacy of glory to unborn generations,
+till warmed by her subject she grew almost eloquent, and broke off in an
+impulsive cry of admiration and envy: “Oh! what a glorious privilege to be
+a poet, to be even a man with the power of doing something, of living a
+noble life, instead of being a weak, good‐for‐nothing woman!”
+
+The little ring of listeners heard her with pleasure, and thought she must
+have a very keen appreciation of the beauties of the poets to speak of
+them so well and so fervently. But M. Dalibouze saw more in it than this.
+He saw an under‐tone of impatience, of disappointment, of longing to go
+and do likewise, to spread her wings and fly, to wield a wand that had
+power to make others spread their wings; there was a spirit’s war‐cry in
+it, a rebel’s impotent cry against the narrow, inexorable bondage of her
+life.
+
+“Yes,” said the professor, “it is a grand mission, I grant you, but it is
+not such a rare one as you make it out, Mlle. Aline. There are more poets
+in the world than those who write poetry; few of us have the gift of being
+poets in language, but we may all be poets in action if we will; we may
+live out our lives in poems.”
+
+“If we had the fashioning of our lives, no doubt we might,” asserted Aline
+ironically; “but they are most of them so shabby that I defy Homer himself
+to manufacture an epic or an idyl out of them.”
+
+“You are mistaken. There is no life too shabby to be a poem,” said M.
+Dalibouze; “it is true, we can’t fashion our lives as you say, but we can
+color them, we can harmonize them; but we must begin by believing this,
+and by getting our elements under command; we must sort them and arrange
+them, just as Mme. la Générale is doing with the shreds and silks for the
+tapestry, and then go on patiently working out the pattern leaf by leaf;
+by‐and‐by when the web gets tangled as it is sure to do with the best
+workers, instead of pulling angrily at it, or cutting it with the sharp
+scissors of revolt, we must call up a soft breeze from the land of souls
+where the spirit of the true poet dwells, and bid it blow over it, and
+then let us listen, and we shall hear the spirit‐wind draw tones of music
+out of our tangled web, like the breeze sweeping the strings of an Æolian
+harp. It is our own fault, or perhaps oftener our own misfortune, if our
+lives look shabby to us; we consider them piecemeal instead of looking at
+them as a whole.”
+
+“But how can we look at them as a whole?” said Aline. “We don’t even know
+that they ever will develop into a whole. How many of us remain on the
+easel a sort of washed‐in sketch to the end? It seems to me we are pretty
+much like apples in an orchard; some drop off in the flower, some when
+they are grown to little green balls, hard and sour and good for nothing;
+it is only a little of the tree that comes to maturity.”
+
+“And is there not abundance of poetry in every phase of the apple’s life,
+no matter when it falls?” said M. Dalibouze. “How many poems has the
+blight of the starry blossom given birth to? And the little green ball,
+who will count the odes that the school‐boy has sung to it, not in good
+hexameters perhaps, but in sound, heart poetry, full of zest and the gusto
+of youth, when all bitters are sweet? O mon Dieu! when I think of the days
+when a bright‐green apple was like honey in my mouth, I could be a poet
+myself! No _paté de foie gras_ ever tasted half so sweet as that forbidden
+fruit of my school‐days!”
+
+“Good for the forbidden fruit!” said Aline, amused at the professor’s
+sentiment over the reminiscence; “but that is only one view of the
+question: if the apples could speak, they would give us another.”
+
+“Would they?” said M. Dalibouze. “I’m not sure of that. If the apples
+discuss the point at all, believe me, they are agreed that whatever
+befalls them is the very best thing that could. We have no evidence of any
+created thing, vegetable, mineral, or animal, grumbling at its lot; that
+is reserved to man, discontent is man’s prerogative, he quarrels with
+himself, with his destiny, his neighbors, everything by turns. If we could
+but do like the apples, blossom, and grow, and fall, early or late, just
+as the wind and the gardener wished, we should be happy. Fancy an apple
+quarrelling with the sun in spring for not warming him as he does in
+August! It would be no more preposterous than it is for men to quarrel
+with their circumstances. The fruit of our lives have their seasons like
+the fruit of our gardens; the winter and snows and the sharp winds are
+just as necessary to both as the fire of the summer heat; all growth is
+gradual, and we must accept the process through which we are brought to
+maturity, just as the apples do. It is not the same for all of us; some
+are ripened under the warm vibrating sun, others resist it, and, like
+certain winter fruit, require the cold twilight days to mellow them. But
+it matters little what the process is, it is sure to be the right one if
+we wait for it and accept it.”
+
+“I wonder what stage of it I am in at the present moment,” said Aline. “I
+can’t say the sun has had much to do with it; the winds and the rain have
+been the busiest agents in my garden so far.”
+
+“Patience, mademoiselle!” said M. Dalibouze. “The sun will come in his own
+good time.”
+
+“You answer for that?”
+
+“I do.”
+
+Aline looked him straight in the face as she put the question like a
+challenge, and M. Dalibouze met the saucy bright eyes with a grave glance
+that had more of tenderness in it than she had ever seen there before. It
+flashed upon her for a moment that the sun might come to her through a
+less worthy medium than this kind, faithful, honorable man, and that she
+had been mayhap a fool to her own happiness in shutting the gate on him so
+contemptuously.
+
+Perhaps the professor read the thought on her face, for he said in a
+penetrated tone, and fixing his eyes upon her:
+
+“The true sun of life is marriage.”
+
+It was an unfortunate remark. Aline tossed back her head, and burst out
+laughing. The spell that had held her for an instant was broken.
+
+“A day will come when some one will tell you so, and you will not laugh,
+Mlle. Aline,” said M. Dalibouze humbly, and hiding his discomfiture under
+a smile.
+
+This was the only time within the last two years that he had betrayed
+himself into any expression of latent hope with regard to Mlle. de
+Lemaque, and it had no sooner escaped him than he regretted it. The
+following Saturday, by way of atonement, he brought up a most desirable
+_parti_ for inspection, and next day Mme. Cléry was seized with the
+inevitable dusting fit. Nothing, however, came of it.
+
+Things went on without any noticeable change at No. 13 till September,
+1870, when Paris was declared in a state of siege. The sisters were not
+among those lucky ones who wavered for a time between going and staying,
+between the desire to put themselves in safe‐keeping, and the temptation
+of living through the _blocus_ and boasting of it for the rest of their
+days. There was no choice for them but to stay. Aline, as usual, made the
+best of it; she must stay, so she settled it in her mind that she liked to
+stay; that it would be a wonderful experience to live through the most
+exciting episode that could have broken up the stagnant monotony of their
+lives, and that, in fact, it was rather an enjoyable prospect than the
+reverse.
+
+Mme. Cléry was commissioned to lay in as ample a store of provisions as
+their purse would allow. The good woman did the best she could with her
+means, and the little group encouraged each other to face the coming
+events like patriotic citizens, cheerfully and bravely. Of the magnitude
+of those events, or their own probable share in their national calamities,
+they had a very vague notion.
+
+“The situation,” M. Dalibouze assured them, “was critical, but by no means
+desperate. On the contrary, France, instead of being at the mercy of her
+enemies, was now on the eve of crushing them, of obtaining one of those
+astonishing victories which make ordinary history pale. It was the
+incommensurable superiority of the French arms that had brought her to
+this pass; that had driven Prussia mad with rage and envy, and roused her
+to defiance. Infatuated Prussia! she would mourn over her folly once and
+for ever. She would find that Paris was not alone the Greece of
+civilization and the arts and sciences, but that she was the most
+impregnable fortress that ever defied the batteries of a foe. Europe had
+deserted Paris, after betraying France to her enemies; now the day of
+reckoning was at hand; Europe would reap the fruits of her base jealousy,
+and witness the triumph of the capital of the world!”
+
+This was M. Dalibouze’s firm opinion, and he gave it in public and private
+to any one who cared to hear it. When Mme. de Chanoir asked if he meant to
+remain in Paris through the siege, the professor was so shocked by the
+implied affront to his patriotism that he had to control himself before he
+could trust himself to answer her.
+
+“_Comment_, Mme. la Générale! You think so meanly of me as to suppose I
+would abandon my country at such a crisis! Is it a time to fly when the
+enemy is at our gates, and when the nation expects every man to stand
+forth and defend her, and scatter those miserable eaters of sauerkraut to
+the winds!”
+
+And straightway acting up to this noble patriotic credo, M. Dalibouze had
+himself measured for a National Guard uniform. No sooner had he endorsed
+it than he rushed off to Nadar’s and had himself photographed. He counted
+the hours till the proofs came home, and then, bursting with satisfaction,
+he set out to No. 13.
+
+“It is unbecoming,” he said, shrugging his shoulders as he presented his
+carte de visite to the générale, “_mais que voulez‐vous?_ A man must
+sacrifice everything to his country; what is personal appearance that it
+could weigh in the balance against duty! Bah! I could get myself up as a
+punchinello, and perch all day on the top of Mont Valérien, if it could
+scare away one of those despicable brigands from the walls of the
+capital!”
+
+“You are wrong in saying it is unbecoming, M. Dalibouze,” protested the
+générale, attentively scanning the portrait, where the military costume
+was set off by a semi‐heroic military _pose_, “I think the dress suits you
+admirably.”
+
+“You are too indulgent, madame,” said the professor. “You see your friends
+through the eyes of friendship; but, in truth, it was purely from an
+historical point of view that I made the little sacrifice of personal
+feeling; the portrait will be interesting as a souvenir some day when we,
+the actors in this great drama, have passed away.”
+
+But time went on, and the prophetic triumphs of M. Dalibouze were not
+realized; the eaters of sauerkraut held their ground, and provisions began
+to grow scarce at No. 13. The purse of the sisters, never a large one, was
+now seriously diminished, Aline’s contribution to the common fund having
+ceased altogether with the beginning of the siege. Her old pupils had
+left, and there was no chance of finding any new ones at such a time as
+this. No one had money to spend on lessons, or leisure to learn; the study
+that absorbed everybody was how to realize food or fuel out of impossible
+elements. Every one was suffering, in a more or less degree, from the
+miseries imposed by the state of _blocus_; but one would have fancied the
+presence of death in so many shapes, by fire without, by cold and famine
+within, would have detached them generally from life, and made them
+forgetful of the wants of the body and absorbed them in sublimer cares.
+But it was not so. After the first shock of hearing the cannon at the
+gates close to them, they got used to it. Later, when the bombardment
+came, there was another momentary panic, but it calmed down, and they got
+used to that too. Shells could apparently fall all round without killing
+them. So they turned all their thoughts to the cherishing and comfort of
+their poor afflicted bodies. It must have been sad, and sometimes grimly
+comical, to watch the singular phases of human nature developed by the
+_blocus_. One of the oddest and most frequent was the change it wrought in
+people with regard to their food. People who had been ascetically
+indifferent to it before, and never thought of their meals till they sat
+down to table, grew monomaniac on the point, and could think and speak of
+nothing else. Meals were talked of, in fact, from what we can gather, more
+than politics, the Prussians, or the probable issue of the siege, or any
+of the gigantic problems that were being worked out both inside and
+outside the besieged city. Intelligent men and women discussed by the
+hour, with gravity and gusto, the best way of preparing cats and dogs,
+rats and mice, and all the abominations that necessity had substituted for
+food. Poor human nature was fermenting under the process like wine in the
+vat, and all its dregs came uppermost: selfishness, callousness to the
+sufferings of others, ingratitude, all the pitiable meanness of a man,
+boiled up to the surface and showed him a sorry figure to behold. But
+other nobler things came to the surface too. There were innumerable silent
+dramas, soul‐poems going on in unlikely places, making no noise beyond
+their quiet sphere, but travelling high and sounding loud behind the
+curtain of gray sky that shrouded the winter sun of Paris. The cannon
+shook her ramparts, and the shells flashed like lurid furies through the
+midnight darkness; but far above the din and the darkness and the death‐
+cries rose the low sweet music of many a brave heart’s sacrifice; the
+stronger giving up his share to the weaker, the son hoarding his scanty
+rations against the day of still scantier supplies, when there would be
+scarcely food enough to support the weakened frame of an aged father or
+mother, talking big about the impossibility of surrender, and lightly
+about the price of resistance. There were mothers in Paris, too, and
+wherever mothers are there is sure to be found self‐sacrifice in its
+loveliest, divinest form. How many of them toiled and sweated, aye, and
+begged, subduing all pride to love for the little ones, who ate their fill
+and knew nothing of the cruel tooth that was gnawing the bread‐winner’s
+vitals!
+
+We who heard the thunder of the artillery and the blasting shout of the
+mitrailleuse, we did not hear these things, but other ears did, and not a
+note of the sweet music was lost, angels were hearkening for them, and as
+they rose above the dark discord, like crystal bells tolling in the storm
+wind, the white‐winged messengers caught them on golden lyres and wafted
+them on to paradise.
+
+To Be Continued.
+
+
+
+
+On A Picture Of S. Mary Bearing Doves To Sacrifice.
+
+
+    My eyes climb slowly up, as by a stair,
+      To seek a picture on my chamber wall—
+    A picture of the Mother of our Lord,
+      Hung where the latest twilight shadows fall.
+
+    My lifted eyes behold a childlike face,
+      Under a veil of woman’s holiest thought,
+    O’ershadowed by the mystery of grace,
+      And mystery of mercy—God hath wrought.
+
+    Down through the dim old temple, moving slow,
+      Her drooping lids scarce lifted from the ground,
+    As if she faintly heard the distant flow
+      Of far‐off seas of grief she could not sound.
+
+    I think archangels would not count it sin
+      If, underneath the veil that hides her eyes,
+    They, seeing all things, saw the soul within
+      Held more of mother‐love than sacrifice.
+
+    She walks erect, the virgin undefiled,
+      Back from her throat the loose robe falls apart,
+    And e’en as she would clasp her royal Child,
+      She holds the dovelets to her tender heart.
+
+    No white wing trembles ’neath her pitying palm,
+      No feather flutters in this last warm nest,
+    And thus she bears them on—while solemn psalm
+      Wakes dim, prophetic stirrings in her breast.
+
+    Sweet Hebrew mother! many a woman shares,
+      Thy crucifixion of her hopes and loves,
+    And in her arms to death unshrinking bears
+      Her precious things—even her turtle‐doves.
+
+    But often, ere the temple’s marble floor
+      Has ceased the echo of her parting feet,
+    Her gifts prove worthless—thine is ever more
+      The gift of gifts—transcendent and complete.
+
+    We mothers, too, have treasures all our own,
+      And, one by one, oft see them sacrificed:
+    Thou, Blessed among women—thou alone
+      Hast held within thine arms the dear Child‐Christ.
+
+    Therefore, mine eyes mount up, as by a stair,
+      To seek the picture on my chamber wall;
+    Therefore my soul climbs oft the steeps of prayer,
+      To rest where shadows of thy Son’s cross fall.
+
+
+
+
+Centres Of Thought In The Past. First Article. The Monasteries.
+
+
+It seems very ambitious to try and present to the reader a sketch of
+anything so vast as the field of research pointed out by the above title,
+and, indeed, far from aiming at this, we will set forth by saying, once
+for all, that our attempts will be nothing more than passing views,
+isolated specimens of that immense whole which, under the names of
+education, progress, development, scholasticism, and _renaissance_, forms
+the intellectual “stock in trade” of every modern system of knowledge.
+
+The “past” is divided into two distinct eras—the monastic and the
+scholastic. In the earlier era, the centres of thought were the
+Benedictine and the Columbanian monasteries; in the second era,
+intellectual life gathered its strength in the universities, under the
+guidance of the church, typified by the Mendicant Orders. The first era
+may be said to have lasted from the fifth century to the eleventh, and to
+have reached its apogee in the seventh and eighth. The second reached from
+the eleventh century to the sixteenth, and attained its highest glory in
+the prolific and gifted thirteenth century. Each had its representative
+centre _par excellence_, its representative men, philosophy, and religious
+development. Prior Vaughan, in his recent masterpiece, the _Life of S.
+Thomas of Aquin_, expresses this idea in many ways. “From the sixth to the
+thirteenth century,” he says, “the education of Europe was Benedictine.
+Monks in their cells ... were planting the mustard‐seed of future European
+intellectual growth.” Further on he says: “Plato represents rest;
+Aristotle, inquisitiveness. The former is synthetical; the latter,
+analytical. _Quies_ is monastic, inquisitiveness is dialectical.” Thus,
+Plato is the representative master of the earlier era; S. Benedict and his
+incomparable rule, its representative religious outgrowth; the study of
+the Scriptures, the Fathers, and the liberal arts, its representative
+system of education. We do not hear of many “commentaries” in those days,
+nor of curious schedules of questions, such as, “Did the little hands of
+the Boy Jesus create the stars?”(26) On the other hand, elegant Latinity
+was taught, and the Scriptures were multiplied by thousands of costly and
+laborious transcriptions. The first era was eminently conservative. Its
+very schools were physically representative; “the solitary abbey, hidden
+away amongst the hills, with its psalmody, and manual work, and unexciting
+study.”(27) In the scholastic era, things were reversed. “Latinity grew
+barbarous, and many far graver disorders arose out of the daring and undue
+exercise of reason. Yet intellectual progress was being made in spite of
+the decay of letters.... In the extraordinary intellectual revolution
+which marked the opening of the thirteenth century, the study of
+_thoughts_ was substituted for the study of _words_.”(28) Here the
+representative exponent was Aristotle; the religious developments, the
+Crusades and the Mendicant Orders; and the personal outgrowth of the
+clashes of the two systems—that of the old immovable dogmatic church, and
+that of irreverence and rationalism—S. Bernard, S. Dominic, S. Thomas of
+Aquin, on the one hand, and Peter Abelard and William de Saint Amour, on
+the other. Here, again, we find the _locale_ analogous to the spirit of
+the age. Cities were now the centres of knowledge; noisy streets, with
+ominous names, such as the “Rue Coupegueule,”(29) in Paris, so named from
+the frequent murders committed there during university brawls, take the
+place of the silent cloister and long stone corridors of the abbey;
+physical disorder typifies the moral confusion of the day; and Paris the
+chaotic stands in the room of Monte Casino, S. Gall, or English Jarrow.
+Then followed the “Renaissance,” that “revival of practical paganism.”(30)
+“The saints and fathers of the church gradually disappeared from the
+schools, and society, instead of being permeated, as in former times, with
+an atmosphere of faith, was now redolent of heathenism.”(31) Petrarch and
+Boccaccio were the representatives of this refined (if we must use the
+word in its ordinary sensual meaning) infidelity; Plato was the god of the
+new Olympus, but unrecognizable from the Plato embodied in the Fathers and
+Benedictine _littérateurs_, for, practically speaking, polite life had now
+become Epicurean; while as for the religious development of the times,
+since it could no longer be representative, it became apostolic.
+Savonarola and S. Francis Xavier are names that stand out in the moral
+darkness of that era, and the latter suggests the only new creation in the
+church from that day to our own. Christian education had been Benedictine,
+then Dominican; it now became Jesuit. The world knew its old enemy in the
+new dress, and ever since has warred against it with diabolical foresight
+and unwearied venom. Of this last phase of the past, which is so like the
+present that we have classed it apart, we do not purpose to speak, but
+will confine ourselves to those older and grander, though hardly less
+troublous times known as the middle ages.
+
+The first two centres of Christianity and patristic learning outside Rome
+were Alexandria and Constantinople. The latter soon fell away into schism,
+and thence into that barbarism which the vigorous Western races were at
+that very same time casting off through the influence of the church that
+Byzantium had rejected. From Alexandria we may date the beginnings of our
+own systems of learning. The end of the second century already found the
+Christian schools of that city famous, and the converted Stoic Pantænus
+spoken of as one of “transcendent powers.” Clement of Alexandria, Origen,
+Hippolytus, Bishop of Porto, were teachers in those schools, and the _Acts
+of the Martyrs_ tell us that Catharine, the learned virgin‐martyr, was an
+Alexandrian. Hippolytus was a famous astronomer and arithmetician. Clement
+used poetry, philosophy, science, eloquence, and even satire, in the
+interests of religion. Origen became the master of S. Gregory Thaumaturgus
+and his brother Athenodorus. “It was now recognized that Christians were
+men who could think and reason with other men, ... and of whom a
+university city need not be ashamed. Christians were expected to teach and
+study the liberal arts, profane literature, philosophy, and the Biblical
+languages, ... and all the time the business of the school went on,
+_persecution_ raged with _small intermission_.”(32) Prior Vaughan says
+that “Faith took her seat with her Greek profile and simple majesty in
+Alexandria, and withstood, as one gifted with a divine power, two subtle
+and dangerous enemies—heathen philosophy and heretical theology—and, by
+means of Clement and of Origen, proved to passion and misbelief that a new
+and strange _intellectual_ influence had been brought into the world.”(33)
+Antioch and Constantinople claimed the world’s attention later on, and the
+Thebaid teemed with equal treasures of learning and of holiness. S. John
+Chrysostom exhorts Christian parents, in 376, “to entrust the education of
+their sons to the solitaries, to those _men of the mountain_ whose lessons
+he himself had received.”(34)
+
+When the glories of the patristic age were waning, and the East seemed to
+fail the church, through whose influence alone she had become famous,
+there arose in the West, among the half‐barbarous races of Goths, Franks,
+Celts, and Teutons, other champions of monasticism and pioneers of
+learning. The raw material of Christian Europe was being moulded into the
+heroic form it bore during mediæval times by poet, philosopher, and
+legislator‐monks.
+
+Of these monastic centres, Lerins is perhaps the oldest. Founded in 410,
+on an island of the Mediterranean near the coast of France, it became
+“another Thebaid, a celebrated school of theology and Christian
+philosophy, a citadel inaccessible to the works of barbarism, and an
+asylum for literature and science which had fled from Italy on the
+invasion of the Goths.”(35) All France sought its bishops from this holy
+and learned isle. Among its great scholars was Vincent of Lerins, the
+first controversialist of his time, and the originator of the celebrated
+formula: _Quod semper, quod ubique, quod ab omnibus creditum est_. We may
+be pardoned for extending our notice of him, since the words he uses on
+the progress of the church are so singularly appropriate to our own times
+and problems. Having established the unchangeableness of Catholic
+doctrine, he goes on to say: “Shall there, then, be no progress in the
+church of Christ? There shall be progress, and even great progress, ...
+but it will be _progress_ and _not change_. With the growth of ages there
+must necessarily be a growth of intelligence, of wisdom, and of knowledge,
+for each man as for all the church. But the religion of souls must imitate
+the progress of the human form, which, in developing and growing in years,
+never ceases to be the same in the maturity of age as in the flower of
+youth.”(36) Had the monk of Lerins foreknown the aberrations of the doctor
+of Munich, he could not have better refuted the latest heresy of our own
+day. S. Lupus of Troyes, who arrested Attila at the gates of his episcopal
+city, and successfully combated the Pelagian heresy in England; S.
+Cesarius of Arles, who was successively persecuted and finally reinstated
+by two barbarian kings, and who gave his sister Cesaria a rule for her
+nuns which was adopted by Queen Radegundes for her immense monastery of
+Poictiers; Salvian, whose eloquence was likened to that of S. Augustine,
+were all monks of Lerins. S. Cesarius has well epitomized the training of
+this great and holy school when he says: “It is she who nourishes those
+illustrious monks who are sent into all provinces of Gaul as bishops. When
+they arrive, they are children; when they go out, they are fathers. She
+receives them as recruits, she sends them forth kings.”(37) As late as
+1537, we find on the list of the commission appointed by Pope Paul III. to
+draw up the preliminaries of the Council of Trent, and especially to point
+out and correct the abuses of secular training and paganized art, the name
+of Gregory Cortese, Abbot of Lerins.(38) But we must hasten on to other
+foundations of a reputation and influence as world‐wide as that of the
+Mediterranean Abbey.
+
+In 580, there was a famous school at Seville, where all the arts and
+sciences were taught by learned masters, presided over by S. Leander, the
+bishop of the diocese. Then S. Ildefonso, of Toledo, a scholar of Seville,
+founded a great school at Toledo itself (where the famous councils took
+place later on), which, together with Seville, made “Spain the
+intellectual light of the Christian world in the seventh century.”(39)
+
+From the South let us turn to the fruitful land where monks supplied the
+place of martyrs, and where the faith, planted by Patrick, grew so
+marvellously into absolute power within the short space of a century.
+Armagh, Bangor, Clonard, are names that at once recall the palmy days of
+sacred learning. “Within a century after the death of S. Patrick,” says
+Bishop Nicholson, “the Irish seminaries had so increased that most parts
+of Europe sent their children to be educated there, and drew thence their
+bishops and teachers.”(40) “By the ninth century, Armagh could boast of
+7,000 students.”(41) “Clonard,” says Usher, “issued forth a stream of
+saints and doctors like the Greek warriors from the wooden horse.”(42) The
+Irish communities, Montalembert tells us in his brilliant language,
+“entered into rivalry with the great monastic schools of Gaul. They
+explained Ovid there; they copied Virgil; they devoted themselves
+especially to Greek literature; they drew back from no inquiry, from no
+discussion; they gloried in placing boldness on a level with faith.” The
+young Luan answered the Abbot of Bangor, who warned him against the
+dangers of too engrossing a study of the liberal arts: “If I have the
+knowledge of God, I shall never offend God, for they who disobey him are
+they who know him not.”
+
+The Irish were as adventurous as they were learned, and Montalembert bears
+witness to the national propensity in the following graceful language:
+“This monastic nation became the missionary nation _par excellence_. The
+Irish missionaries covered the land and seas of the West. Unwearied
+navigators, they landed on the most desert islands; they overflowed the
+continent with their successive immigrations. They saw in incessant
+visions a world known and unknown to be conquered for Christ.” And the
+author of _Christian Schools and Scholars_ reminds us of the beautiful
+legend of S. Brendan, the founder of the great school of Clonfert in
+Connaught, the school‐fellow of Columba, and the pupil of Finian at
+Clonard, who is declared to have set sail in search of the Land of
+Promise, and during his seven years’ journey to have “discovered a vast
+tract of land, lying far to the west of Ireland, where he beheld wonderful
+birds and trees of unknown foliage, which gave forth perfumes of
+extraordinary sweetness.” Whatever fiction is mingled with this marvellous
+narrative, it is difficult not to admit that it must have had some
+foundation of truth, and the poetic legend which was perfectly familiar to
+Columbus is said to have furnished him with one motive for believing in
+the existence of a western continent. Later on we shall find Albertus
+Magnus foreshadowing the same belief in his writings. Two of the Irish
+missionaries deserve especial notice—Columba, the Apostle of Caledonia,
+and Columbanus, the founder of Luxeuil in Burgundy. The former, with his
+stronghold of Iona, which “came to be looked upon as the chief seat of
+learning, not only in Britain, but in the whole Western world,”(43) is
+familiar to all readers of Montalembert’s great monastic poem, and to that
+other public who have had access to the Duke of Argyll’s recent work on
+the rock‐bound metropolis of Christian Britain. We are told that the most
+scrupulous exactitude was required in the Scriptorium of Iona, and that
+Columba himself, a skilful penman, wrote out the famous _Book of Kells_
+with his own hand. It is now preserved in the library of Trinity College,
+Dublin. The monks of Iona studied and taught the classics, the mechanical
+arts, law, history, and physic. They transferred to their new home all the
+learning of Armagh and Clonard. Painful journeys in search of books or of
+the oral teaching of some renowned master were nothing in their eyes; they
+listened to lectures on the Greek and Latin fathers, hung entranced over
+Homer and Virgil, and were skilled in calculating eclipses and other
+natural phenomena. They astonished the world with their arithmetical
+knowledge and linguistic erudition, and their keen logic and love of
+syllogism are spoken of by S. Benedict of Anian in the ninth century.(44)
+Art was equally cultivated, but this, strictly speaking, is outside our
+present subject. As an example of Columba’s liberal spirit and devotion to
+the best interests of literature, we may remark his defence of the bards
+at the Assembly of Drumceitt. Poets, historians, law‐givers, and
+genealogists, the bards represented all the learning of a past age and
+system; and if their arrogance now and then overstepped the bounds of
+courtesy, and even sometimes the restraints of law, in the main their
+institute was heroic and praiseworthy. Columba argued against their
+opponent, a prince of the Nialls of the South, Aedh, that “care must be
+taken not to pull up the good corn with the tares, and that the general
+exile of the poets would be the death of a venerable antiquity, and that
+of a poetry which was dear to the country and useful to those who knew how
+to employ it.” His eloquence saved the bardic institute, and the poets in
+their gratitude composed a famous song in his praise, which became
+celebrated in Irish literature under the name of _Ambhra_, or _Praise of
+S. Columbkill_.(45)
+
+Columbanus, a monk of Bangor, was destined to found an Irish colony of
+even greater fame and longer duration than Iona. Luxeuil, founded in 590,
+at the foot of the Vosges in Burgundy, soon counted among its sons many
+hundred votaries of learning. Montalembert says of it that “no monastery
+of the West had yet shone with so much lustre or attracted so many
+disciples”. It became another Lerins, a nursery of bishops for the
+Frankish and Burgundian cities, a notable seat of secular knowledge, and,
+above all, a school of saints. Indeed, among the meagre, skeleton‐like
+details that come down to us of these giant abodes of a supernatural race
+of men, we find ourselves perforce repeating over and over the same
+formula of commendation. What more could one say but that each of these
+monastic centres was a school of saints? And yet how much variety in that
+sameness! How much that even we can see, and distinguish, and mentally
+dissect! We see some soaring spirit, whose burning love is never content
+with renunciation, but ever seeks, with holy restlessness, some deeper
+solitude in which to pray and meditate, like the Bavarian monk Sturm, the
+pupil and companion of S. Boniface, and the founder of the world‐renowned
+Abbey of Fulda; or, again, some great thinker like Alcuin of York, whose
+touching love for his own land and city makes us feel with pardonable
+pride how near akin is our own weak human nature to that of even the giant
+men of old; or spirits like the gentle Cuthbert of Lindisfarne, the
+traditions of whose unwearied moderation and “inestimable gift of kindness
+and light‐heartedness,” as well as his “intense and active sympathy for
+those human sorrows which in all ages are the same,” are all the more
+precious to us that they are also mingled with tales of his wondrous
+horsemanship, athletic frame, and simple enjoyment of legitimate sports.
+The same author we have just quoted, Montalembert, says that the
+description of his childhood reads like that of a little Anglo‐Saxon of
+our own day, a scholar of Eton or Harrow. So that, when one after another
+we read of Gaulish, Celtic, and Teutonic abbeys that were intellectual
+capitals and centres of far‐reaching and all‐embracing knowledge, we must
+always remember that these words, grown trite at last from frequent use,
+have as varied a meaning as the collective name of Milky Way, which stands
+for countless worlds of unknown stars.
+
+As Christianity spread in the early part of the middle ages, these
+monastic centres were multiplied like the posterity of Abraham, Isaac, and
+Jacob. Lindisfarne, the Iona of the eastern coast of England, soon
+rivalled her Scottish predecessor, and retained much the same impress of
+Celtic learning, while Melrose served as a supplementary school and
+novitiate. The Teutonic element now began to make itself felt. Caedmon,
+the Saxon cowherd, transformed into a poet and a monk by a direct call
+from God, sang the creation in strains “which,” says Montalembert, “may
+still be admired even beside the immortal poem of the author of _Paradise
+Lost_.” Wilfrid, the S. Thomas à Becket of the seventh century, vigorously
+planted Roman traditions and customs in the Saxon monastery of Ripon, and
+perpetuated the name of S. Peter in his other magnificent foundation of
+Peterborough, the poetic “Home among the Meadows,” or Medehamstede.(46)
+Theodore, the Greek metropolitan of England, in 673 introduced into the
+Anglo‐Saxon schools “an intellectual and literary development as worthy of
+the admiration as of the gratitude of posterity; the study of the two
+classic tongues (Greek and Latin) chiefly flourished under his care....
+Monasteries, thus transformed into homes of scientific study, could not
+but spread a taste and respect for intellectual life, not only among the
+clergy, but also among their lay‐protectors, the friends and neighbors of
+each community.”(47)
+
+Benedict Biscop, the contemporary of the chivalrous Wilfrid of York, is
+eminently a representative of Anglo‐Saxon cultivation. Montalembert puts
+his name in the “monastic constellation of the seventh century” for
+intelligence, art, and science. He it was who undertook a journey to Rome
+(which place he had visited many times before on other errands) solely to
+procure books; and it must be borne in mind that this journey was then
+twice as long and a hundred times more dangerous than a journey from
+London to Australia is now. After having founded the Abbey of Wearmouth,
+at the mouth of the Wear, Benedict set forth again, bringing masons and
+glass‐makers from Gaul to teach the Anglo‐Saxons some notions of solid and
+ornamental architecture. He was a passionate book‐collector, and wished
+each of his monasteries to have a great library, which he considered
+indispensable to the discipline, instruction, and good organization of the
+community. Originally a monk at Lerins, whither he had gone after giving
+up a knightly and seignorial career in his own country, he naturally drank
+in that thirst for learning which, in the earlier middle ages, seems to
+have been almost inseparable from holiness. Jarrow, the sister monastery
+to Wearmouth, situated near it by the mouth of the Tyne, was even yet more
+famous as a school of hallowed knowledge, and has become endeared to the
+hearts of all Englishmen as the home of the Venerable Bede. His is a
+figure which, even in the foreign annals of the church, stands pre‐eminent
+among ecclesiastical writers, and one in whom the Anglo‐Saxon character is
+thoroughly and beautifully revealed. Calm and steadfast self‐possession,
+that beautiful attribute of the followers of the “Prince of Peace,” is the
+key‐note to the writings of the historian‐monk of Jarrow. The first
+glimpse we have of him is as the solitary companion of the new‐made abbot,
+Ceolfrid, chanting the divine office at the age of seven; his voice choked
+with sobs as he thought of the elder brethren, all of whom a grievous
+pestilence had carried off. But though the choir had gone to join in the
+hymns of the New Jerusalem, the canonical hours were nevertheless kept up
+by the sorrowing abbot and the child‐chorister until new brethren came to
+take the place of the old ones. Bede was never idle; he says himself that
+“he was always his own secretary, and dictated, composed, and copied all
+himself.” His great history was the means of bringing him into contact
+with the best men of his day. “The details he gives on this subject show
+that a constant communication was kept up between the principal centres of
+religious life, and that an amount of intellectual activity as surprising
+as it is admirable—when the difficulty of communication and the internal
+wars which ravaged England are taken into account—existed among their
+inhabitants.”(48) Bede’s political foresight seems to have been of no mean
+order, and the grave advice he administers to bishops on ecclesiastical
+abuses shows at once his practical common sense and fearlessness of
+character. He also condemns the too sweeping grants of land, exemptions
+from taxes, and privileges offered to monastic houses, and gives the
+wisest reasons for his strictures. “The nations of Catholic Europe envied
+England the possession of so great a doctor, the first among the offspring
+of barbarous races who had won a place among the doctors of the church,
+... and his illustrious successor Alcuin, speaking to the community of
+Jarrow which Bede had made famous, bears witness to his celebrity in these
+words: ‘Stir up, then, the minds of your sleepers by his example; study
+his works, and you will be able to draw from them the secret of eternal
+beauty.’ ”(49)
+
+Malmesbury was another Anglo‐Saxon centre of thought, and the memory of S.
+Aldhelm long gave it that “powerful and popular existence which lasted far
+into the middle ages.”(50) The cathedral school of York, “which rose into
+celebrity just as Bede was withdrawn from the scene of his useful
+labors,”(51) produced one of the greatest of English scholars, and one
+instrumental in carrying knowledge acquired among monks to the warrior
+court of a foreign prince. Charlemagne and his Palatine schools of Aix‐la‐
+Chapelle would have been shorn of half their glory had it not been for the
+Englishman Alcuin. But it was not without a pang that the home‐loving
+master left the school he had almost formed, and which he cherished as the
+product of his first efforts, and undertook to foster the same
+institutions in a strange land. These schools, in which enthusiastic
+French writers love to trace the germ of the mighty University of Paris,
+seem to have possessed a system of equality very creditable both to their
+master and their imperial patron. Later on, when the wearied _magister_ at
+last wrested from Charlemagne the permission to retire into some
+monastery, since he had failed in obtaining leave to return and die at
+York, it was only to found another school that he occupied his leisure. S.
+Martin’s at Tours now became as famous as the Palatine at Aix‐la‐Chapelle.
+“He applied himself to his new duties with unabated energy, and by his own
+teaching raised the school of Tours to a renown which was shared by none
+of its contemporaries. In the hall of studies, a distinct place was set
+apart for the copyists, who were exhorted by certain verses of their
+master, set up in a conspicuous place, _to mind their stops and not to
+leave out letters_.”(52) Here, then, is another of those pleasant little
+details which creates a fellow‐feeling between the human nature of to‐day
+and that of past ages. The description of his life from which we have
+drawn this sketch closes thus: “In short, his active mind, thoroughly
+Anglo‐Saxon in its temper, worked on to the end; laboring at a sublime end
+by homely practical details. One sees he is of the same race with Bede,
+who wrote and dictated to the last hour of his life, and, when his work
+was finished, calmly closed his book and died.”(53)
+
+We have already named Fulda, the glorious monastic centre where the monk
+Sturm established the Benedictine rule in 744, and where, before his
+death, 400 monks sang daily the praises of God, and good scholars were
+trained to intellectual warfare in the name of faith. In 802, “mindful of
+its great origin, it was one of the first to enter heartily into the
+revival of letters instituted by Charlemagne,” and sent the monks Hatto
+and Rabanus to study under Alcuin. We find a most graphic description of
+the daily routine of this great school in _Christian Schools and
+Scholars_. It so well illustrates the common life of the middle ages that
+we do not hesitate to give it at some length: “The German nobles gladly
+entrusted their sons to Rabanus’ care, and he taught them with wonderful
+gentleness and patience. At his lectures every one was trained to write
+equally well in prose or verse on any subject placed before him, and was
+afterwards taken through a course of rhetoric, logic, and natural
+philosophy.... The school of Fulda had inherited the fullest share of the
+Anglo‐Saxon spirit, and exhibited the same spectacle of intellectual
+activity which we have already seen working in the foundations of S.
+Benedict Biscop. Every variety of useful occupation was embraced by the
+monks.... Within doors the visitor might have beheld a huge range of
+workshops, in which cunning hands were kept constantly busy on every
+description of useful and ornamental work in wood, stone, and metal....
+Passing on to the interior of the building, the stranger would have been
+introduced to the scriptorium, over the door of which was an inscription
+warning the copyists to abstain from idle words, to be diligent in copying
+good books, _and to take care not to alter the text by careless mistakes_.
+Not far from the scriptorium was the interior school ... where our
+visitor, were he from the more civilized South, might well have stood in
+mute surprise in the midst of these fancied barbarians, whom he would have
+found engaged in pursuits not unworthy of the schools of Rome. The monk
+Probus is perhaps lecturing on Virgil or Cicero, and that with such hearty
+enthusiasm that his brother‐professors accuse him in good‐natured jesting
+of ranking them with the saints. Elsewhere disputations are being carried
+on over the _Categories_ of Aristotle, and an attentive ear will discover
+that the controversy which made such a noise in the twelfth century, and
+divided the philosophers of Europe into the rival sects of Nominalists and
+Realists, is perfectly well understood at Fulda, though it does not seem
+to have disturbed the peace of the school. To your delight, if you be not
+altogether wedded to the study of the dead languages, you may find some
+engaged on the uncouth language of their fatherland, and, looking over
+their shoulders, you may smile to see the barbarous words which they are
+cataloguing in their glossaries, _words, nevertheless, destined to
+reappear centuries hence in the most philosophic literature of Europe_....
+It may be added that the school of Fulda would have been found ordered
+with admirable discipline. Twelve of the best professors were chosen, and
+formed a council of elders or doctors, presided over by one who bore the
+title of principal, and who assigned to each one the lectures he was to
+deliver to the pupils. In the midst of this world of intellectual life and
+labor, Rabanus continued for some years to train the first minds of
+Germany, and reckoned among his pupils the most celebrated men of the
+age.... For the rest, he was an enemy to anything like narrowness of
+intellectual training. His own works in prose and verse embraced a large
+variety of subjects, ... and he is commonly reputed the author of the
+_Veni Creator_.”(54)
+
+One of his pupils, the monk Otfried of Weissembourg, entered with singular
+ardor into the study of the Tudesque or native dialect. Inspired by
+Rabanus, who himself devoted much attention to this subject, and
+encouraged by a “certain noble lady named Judith,” Otfried undertook to
+translate into his native tongue the most remarkable Gospel passages
+relating to Our Lord’s life. His verses speedily became familiar to the
+people, and by degrees took the place of those pagan songs of their
+forefathers, by which much of the leaven of heathenism yet remained in the
+minds of the peasantry, associated as it was with all the touching
+prestige of nationalism and the honest pride they felt in their ancestors’
+prowess.
+
+Rabanus, while master of the Fulda school, had much to suffer from the
+eccentricities of his abbot, Ratgar, who, afflicted with the _building
+mania_, actually forced his monks to interrupt their studies, and even
+shorten their prayers, to take up the trowel and the hod and hasten on his
+new erections. Here we have the other side of the daily life of the middle
+ages, and a more ludicrous scene can hardly be imagined than the enforced
+labor of the scholar‐monks, their rueful countenances showing their
+despair at the unpleasant task, yet their unflinching principle of
+obedience towering above their disgust, and compelling them to work in
+silence till relieved by the Emperor Louis himself. The new abbot,
+installed in Ratgar’s place by a commission empowered to look into the
+latter’s unheard‐of abuse of his authority, was a saint as well as a
+scholar, and “healed the wounds which a long course of ill‐treatment had
+opened in the community.” Rabanus himself succeeded him, and resigned the
+mastership of the school to his favorite assistant, Candidus.
+
+Passing over many abbeys whose merits it were too long a story to
+enumerate, we come to S. Gall, the great Helvetian centre of thought.
+Originally it was founded by Gall, the disciple of Columbanus, and in the
+reign of King Pepin changed the Columbanian for the Benedictine rule.
+Already, in its early beginnings, it was a home of art, and Tutilo’s works
+in gold, copper, and brass were famous throughout the Germanic world. The
+mills, the forge, the workshops of all sorts, the cloisters for the monks,
+the buildings for the students, the immense tracts of arable land, the
+reclaimed forests, the fleet of busy little boats on the great Lake of
+Constance, all told of a stirring centre of human life. And while art,
+science, philosophy, agriculture, and mechanical industry were all at work
+in the townlike abbey, “you will hear these fine classical scholars
+preaching plain truths, in barbarous idioms, to the rude race of the
+mountains, who, before the monks came among them, sacrificed to the evil
+one, and worshipped stocks and stones.”(55) “S. Gall was almost as much a
+place of resort as Rome or Athens, at least to the learned world of the
+ninth century. Her schools were a kind of _university_, frequented by men
+of all nations, who came hither to fit themselves for _all professions_.
+S. Gall was larger and freer, and made more of the arts and sciences;
+indeed, so far as regards its studies, it had a better claim to the title
+of _university_ than any single institution which can be named as existing
+before the time of Philip Augustus.(56) You would have found here not
+monks alone, but courtiers, soldiers, and the sons of kings. All
+diligently applied themselves to the cultivation of the Tudesque dialect,
+and to its grammatical formation, so as to render it capable of producing
+a literature of its own.”(57) The monks were in correspondence with all
+the learned monastic houses of France and Italy, and the transfer of a
+codex, a Livy, or a Virgil from one to the other occasioned as much
+diplomacy, interest, and excitement as a commercial treaty or the
+discovery of new gold fields would in our day. S. Gall had its Greek
+scholars, too, and seems to have fostered among its copyists a love for
+“fine editions,” such as would do honor to an English or Russian
+bibliomaniac of to‐day. They made their own parchment from the hides of
+the wild animals of their mountains, and employed many hands on each
+precious manuscript. The costly binding was likewise all home‐made, and
+many a jewelled missal must have come from the hand of the artist‐monk
+Tutilo. Music was a specialty of S. Gall, if one may say so in an age when
+music was so much a part of education that alone of all the arts it was
+included in the _quadrivium_, or higher instruction of the mediæval
+schools. Romanus of S. Gall it was who first named the musical notes by
+the letters of the alphabet, a system which is universal in Germany, and
+very commonly followed in England to this day.
+
+We should multiply names _ad infinitum_ were we to allow ourselves to roam
+further over that field of history so falsely called the dark ages.
+Einsiedeln, Paderborn, Magdeburg, Utrecht, are but a few of the many
+equally deserving of notice, the latter being, we are told, “a
+_fashionable_ place of education for the sons of German princes” in the
+tenth century. Before we go on to the second stage of the learning of the
+past—the era of the universities—we cannot help looking back to the little
+Saxon island where, in 882, Alfred devoted one‐fourth of his revenue to
+the restoration of the Oxford schools and obtained from Pope Martin II. a
+brief constituting them what may be fairly called a university. This was
+at a time when learning was at a low ebb, and the invasions of the Danes
+were endangering the cause of letters—a cause so intimately wrapped up in
+that of the great monasteries. Glastonbury, the ruined home of so much
+wisdom, science, and philosophy, was destined under S. Dunstan to retake
+her place among the schools. A great revival was initiated by him, a
+reform among the clergy vigorously enforced, episcopal seminaries
+reopened, and monastic schools once more brought to their ancient place in
+the vanguard of civilization. Ethelwold, Dunstan’s disciple, was zealous
+for the study of sacred learning, and “loved teaching for its own sake. A
+new race of scholars sprang up in the restored cloisters, some of whom
+were not unworthy to be ranked with the disciples of Bede and Alcuin.”(58)
+At Glastonbury, like as at Fulda, the native tongue was cultivated,
+harmonized, and rendered capable of being ranked no longer as a dialect,
+but as the characteristic language of an eminently masterful people.
+Croyland, also, a ruined centre of intellectual life, rose again from its
+ashes; new monks and scholars reared its walls and filled its schools, and
+the Danish horrors were soon forgotten in the thoughtful kindness of the
+new abbot, Turketul, the nephew of Alfred, who, as we read, from a warrior
+and a courtier, a minister of state, and a royal prince, became a gentle
+monk and the rewarder of his little pupils. “Turketul took the greatest
+interest in the success of the school, visiting it daily, inspecting the
+tasks of each child, and taking with him a servant who carried raisins,
+figs, and nuts, or more often apples and pears, and such like little
+gifts, that the boys might be encouraged to be diligent, not with words
+only or blows, but rather by the hope of reward.” Such is the sweet,
+homely picture given us by the historian Ingulph of one of the greatest of
+schools in its early monastic beginnings. We have left ourselves so little
+space that even the metropolis of the Benedictines, the glorious and
+world‐renowned Monte Casino, can find but a scant notice in these pages.
+If Subiaco was the spiritual birthplace of _the_ order _par excellence_,
+Monte Casino was its intellectual cradle. There the rule was written
+which, by some mysterious fate, was destined to absorb and supersede that
+of the widespread Columbanians; there were the missionary principles first
+established which led to the conversion of the Anglo‐Saxon race; there the
+school of _quies_ and reverence first planted which made this wonderful
+monastery “the most powerful and celebrated in the Catholic universe.”(59)
+It was likened to Sinai by Pope Victor III., the successor of Hildebrand,
+in bold and simple verses, full of divine exultation and Christian pride:
+it has been defended and protected by an English and Protestant
+scholar,(60) the minister of a nation whose civilization once flowed from
+its bosom, and whose learning was fostered in its early “scriptoria.” It
+has outlasted many of its own offspring, and still stands undecayed in its
+moral sublimity, fruitful yet in saints and scholars, the mother‐house of
+an order whose origin stretches beyond Benedict far into the desert of
+Paul and Anthony, Jerome and Hilarion.
+
+And now that we are forced, reluctantly enough, to let fall the veil over
+that teeming life of the mediæval cloister, the fruitful nursery of every
+later intellectual development, shall we tell the reader what has most
+struck us throughout the short sketch we have been able to give of these
+centres of thought? Does not their history sound like some “monkish
+chronicle”? How is it that all the most “celebrated men of their time”
+(the phrase so often repeated in these annals) are monks, and so many not
+only monks, but saints? How is it that we come upon so many instances of
+these great scholars taking their turn at the mill, the forge, and the
+bake‐house, and that these details sound neither sordid nor vulgar, as
+they might of modern and secular _littérateurs_? It was the monastic
+principle, the Christ‐principle, as Prior Vaughan calls it in his _Life of
+S. Thomas of Aquin_—the principle of faith, obedience, purity, adoration,
+and reverence. “The monks had a world of their own.... Whilst the
+barbarians were laying all things in ruins, they, heedless alike of fame
+or profit, were patiently laying the foundations of European civilization.
+They were forming the languages of Schiller, of Bacon, and of Bossuet;
+they were creating arts which modern skill in vain endeavors to imitate;
+they were preserving the codices of ancient learning, and embalming the
+world ‘lying in wickedness’ with the sweet odor of their manifold
+virtues.”(61) Not only were they men who “wrote and spoke much, and, by
+their _masculine genius_ and _young and fresh inspiration_, prevented the
+new Christian world from falling back from its first advances, either by
+literature or politics, under the yoke of exhausted paganism”;(62) not
+only were they men of progress even while essentially conservative, men of
+the future even while their studies were all of the past, but, “in
+opposing poverty, chastity, and obedience, the three great bases of
+monastic life, to the orgies of wealth, debauchery, and pride, they
+created at once a contrast and a remedy.”(63) Prior Vaughan, in his
+brilliant lifelike picture of mediævalism, _S. Thomas of Aquin_,
+perpetually refers to the ruling principle of monasticism: “To omit
+mention of the Benedictine principle would be to manifest great ignorance
+of the action of the highest form of truth upon mankind. The mastership of
+authority and reverence, springing out of the school of _quies_, did not
+cease to exert a considerable influence even after the dominant power of
+the monastic body had nearly disappeared.”(64) Elsewhere we read: “There
+was nothing of the sophist or logician in those sweet and venerable
+countenances, the unruffled beauty of which is so often dwelt upon by
+their biographers.... One of the marks of the age is the absence of the
+disputatious spirit, which, if it diminishes their rank (that of the
+monastic thinkers) in the world of letters, forms the charm of their
+characters as men. The real spirit of the age was one of reverence for
+tradition.”(65)
+
+The foresight of the monk‐teachers of the earlier middle ages is no less
+remarkable than their holiness. Everywhere they fostered the native idiom,
+and labored to reduce it to an intelligible grammar. The national and
+patriotic feeling thus awakened in the centres of learning must needs have
+endeared them to, and more closely linked them with, the intellectual
+progress of the people they instructed. A modern author observes that
+“Bede’s words are evidence that the establishment of the Teutonic nations
+on the ruins of the Roman Empire did not _barbarize_ knowledge. He
+collected and taught more natural truths than any Roman writer had yet
+accomplished, and his works display an advance, not a retrogression, in
+science.” Indeed, natural science seems to have been from the first a
+peculiarly monastic pursuit. The great names of Bede, Gerbert, Albertus
+Magnus, and Roger Bacon are as a mighty chain from century to century,
+leading up to the discoveries of Galileo, Newton, Arago, and Humboldt;
+while in S. Brendan we have a bold precursor of Columbus.
+
+The monasteries were so entirely the sole centres of civilization that
+numberless towns owe their origin to them. Scholars came for instruction,
+and remained for edification; grateful patients settled near the heaven‐
+taught physicians who had cured them; peasants clustered round the abbeys
+for protection, and thus grew towns and villages without number in
+Germany, Switzerland, France, England, and Italy. Even America bears to‐
+day, in the name of one of her oldest English settlements, and a
+hereditary representative of intellect—Boston—a memento of the old
+intellectual supremacy of monasticism. S. Botolph, an Anglo‐Saxon hermit,
+left his monastery, and settled in a hut on one of the plains of
+Lincolnshire. Scholars gathered around him, and, despite his
+remonstrances, set up other huts around his, and the Benedictine monastery
+of Icanhoe was founded. As time went on, a village sprang up and became a
+town, and was called Botolphstown. The name was afterwards corrupted and
+cut down into Boston, and from Boston it was that the founders of New
+England set sail on their journey to Holland, their first stage on their
+way to the New World.
+
+In old times, then, monasteries created towns; now, alas, it is towns that
+necessitate monasteries. We have now to plant the monastic school in the
+midst of the teeming emporiums of trade and vice, where thousands toil
+harder for a bare crust and a hard board than the monks of old toiled for
+the kingdom of heaven. It is not to listen to a learned or holy man that
+settlements are made nowadays, but to dig oil‐wells or work coal and iron
+mines. Modern towns are made by traders, eager to be beforehand with their
+competitors, and the journalist and the liquor‐seller are the first
+_citizens_ of the new town. _Quies_ is relegated to the region of romance;
+it is unpractical, it “does not pay”; learning itself, if it succeeds in
+getting a footing in the centres of commerce, partakes of the commercial
+spirit, and is rather to be called “cramming” than knowledge, and, as to
+the moral result of the contrast between the Benedictine principle of the
+early ages and the principle of hurry, of contention, of money‐worship
+current in our days, let the annals of modern crime be called upon to
+witness.
+
+
+
+
+Versailles.
+
+
+What an apotheosis of royalty the name evokes! Versailles and Louis
+Quatorze. As if by the stroke of the enchanter’s wand, there starts up
+before us a long procession of heroes and poets and statesmen and wits and
+fair women, a galaxy of glory and beauty revolving around one central
+figure as satellites round their sun. We lose sight of all the dark spots
+upon the disc in contemplating the blaze of brightness that emanates from
+it. We forget the iniquitous follies of the Grand Monarque, and remember
+nothing but the splendors of his reign, its unparalleled monarchical
+triumph; we see him through a mist of proud achievements in war and peace,
+excellence in every branch of science and industry, fine arts and letters,
+all that dazzled his contemporaries still dazzles us, and even at this
+distance his faults and follies are, if not quite eclipsed, softened and
+modified in the daze of a fictitious light. The group of illustrious men
+who surround his throne magnify rather than diminish the individuality of
+the man, lending a false halo to him, as if their genius were a thing of
+his creation, an effect rather than a cause of his ascendency. How far, in
+truth, Louis may have tended to create by his personal influence, his
+kindly patronage and keen discrimination, that wonderful assemblage of
+talent in every grade which will remain for ever associated with his name,
+it would be difficult to determine, but, judging from the extraordinary
+influx of genius which signalized his reign, and the corresponding dearth
+of it in the succeeding ones, we are tempted to believe that he at least
+possessed in an almost supernatural degree the gift, so precious to a
+king, of divining genius wherever it did exist, and of calling it forth
+from its hiding‐places, however dismal or remote, to the light of success
+and fame. But for the discriminating admiration of Louis, which fanned the
+poetic fire of the timid and sensitive Racine and stimulated the wit of
+the obscure and humble Molière, we should assuredly have missed some of
+the noblest efforts of both those poets. Louis was prodigal of his smiles
+to rising talent, for he knew that to it the sunshine of encouragement is
+as beneficent as the sun’s warmth to the earth in spring‐time.
+
+But we are beginning at the end. Versailles is identified to us chiefly if
+not solely with Louis Quatorze and his age; but it was not so from the
+beginning. Once upon a time it was a marshy swamp, unhealthy and
+uncultivated; and, if we deny Louis the faculty of creating men of genius,
+we cannot refuse him that of having evolved an Eden from a wilderness.
+There is little indeed in the history of this early period to compensate
+the reader for keeping him waiting while we review it, still it is better
+to cast our glance back a little, not very far, a century or so, to see
+what were the antecedents of the site of one of the grandest historic
+monuments of France.
+
+In the year 1561, Martial de Loménie was seigneur of Versailles, and was
+frequently honored by the visits of Henri de Navarre, who went out to hunt
+the stag in his subject’s swampy wilderness. De Loménie sold it to Albert
+de Gondy, Maréchal de Retz, who in his turn was honored by the presence of
+his sovereign, Louis XIII., there. Louis was in the habit of indulging his
+favorite pastime at Versailles, but, beyond placing his land and his game
+at the disposal of the king, the maréchal seems to have shown scant
+hospitality to the royal hunter. Saint‐Simon tells us that during these
+excursions Louis usually slept in a windmill or in a dingy inn, whose only
+customers were the wagoners who journeyed across that out‐of‐the‐way
+place. Of the two lodgings he inclines to think the windmill was the most
+comfortable. Louis probably found neither quarters very luxurious, for in
+1627 he purchased a piece of ground which had been in the Soisy family
+since the fourteenth century, and built himself a hunting‐lodge on the
+ruins of an old manor‐house there, to the great discomfiture of a large
+colony of owls who had made themselves at home in the moss‐grown ruin.
+Bassompierre deplores the vandalism which swept away the venerable shelter
+of the owls, and declares that after all the lodge was but a sorry
+improvement on the windmill, being “too shabby a dwelling for even a plain
+_gentilhomme_ to take conceit in.” Such as it was, it satisfied the king,
+and remained untouched till it was swallowed up in the great palace which
+was to embody all the glories of the ensuing reign. When Louis Quatorze
+conceived the design of building Versailles, he confided the execution of
+his vast idea to Mansard, laying down, however, as a primary condition
+that the shabby little hunting‐lodge of the late king should be preserved,
+and comprised in the new structure. Mansard declared that this was
+impossible, to which Louis, with true kingly logic, replied coolly:
+_Raison de plus_.(66) No argument of artistic beauty or common sense could
+move him from his resolution, or induce him to sanction the demolition of
+the quaint little building that his father had raised. Rather than be
+guilty of such an unfilial act, he said he would give up the notion of his
+new palace altogether. Mansard had nothing for it but to give way, and
+pledge himself that the ugly red‐brick lodge should stand somehow and
+somewhere in the magnificent pile that was already reared in his
+imagination. The only concession he obtained was that it should be
+concealed, if this were possible. Mansard swore he would make it possible,
+and he kept his word. The lodge of Louis XIII. was swallowed up in the
+elaborate stone‐work of that part of the palace facing the Avenue de
+Paris, and remains to this day an enduring if not a very sensible proof of
+the filial respect of Louis XIV. This was the one solitary impediment that
+Louis threw in the architect’s way; in everything else he gave him _carte
+blanche_, power unlimited, and all but unlimited wealth to work out his
+fantastic and superb conception. Simultaneously with this mighty fabric
+another work of almost equal magnitude had to be undertaken; this was the
+planting of the park and the gardens. The country for miles around the
+site of the palace was a swamp abounding with reptiles, and reeking with
+vapors of so deadly a character that the men employed in draining it died
+like flies of a malaria that raged like a pestilence for months together.
+They refused after a time to continue the work, though enormous wages were
+offered, and it was found necessary at last, under pain of abandoning it,
+to press men into the service as for the army in time of war. No accurate
+statistics are extant as to the number of victims who perished in the
+execution of this royal freak; but the most authentic opinions of the time
+put it at the astounding figure of _twenty thousand_. So much for the good
+old times of the _ancien régime_, that we are apt to invest with a sort of
+pathetic prestige. What were the lives of so many _vilains_(67) and the
+tears and hunger of innumerable _vilaines_, widows and orphans of the dead
+men, in comparison to the supreme pleasure of the king and the
+accomplishment of his omnipotent will? The death‐sweat of these human
+cattle rained upon the swamp, and in due time it was’ made wholesome,
+purified as so many foul spots upon the earth are by the sweat of toil and
+sorrow, and fitted to grow flowers and green trees that would diffuse
+their fragrance and spread pleasant shade where corruption and barrenness
+had dwelt.
+
+Le Notre, that prince of gardeners, may be truly said to have created the
+pleasure‐grounds of Versailles; nature had thrown many obstacles in his
+way, she thwarted him at every step, but her obstinate resistance only
+stimulated his genius to loftier flights and his indomitable energy to
+stronger efforts. He conquered in the end. Never was conquest more fully
+appreciated than Le Notre’s by his royal master. Louis not only rewarded
+him with more than princely liberality, but admitted him to his personal
+intimacy, treating the plebeian artist with an affectionate familiarity
+that he never extended to the high and mighty courtiers who looked on in
+envy and admiration. Le Notre was too little of a courtier himself to
+value adequately the honor of the king’s condescension, but he loved the
+man, and took no pains to conceal it; there was an expansive _bonhomie_, a
+native simplicity in his character, that, contrasting as it did with the
+artificial atmosphere of the court, charmed Louis, and he would listen
+with delight to the honest fellow’s garrulity while he related, with naïve
+satisfaction, the tale of his early struggles and the difficult and hardy
+triumphs of his talent and perseverance. Versailles was, of course, to be
+the crowning achievement of his life, and nothing could exceed the
+diligence and ardor that he brought to bear on it. He besought the king
+not to inspect the works while they were in the progressive stage, but to
+wait, once he had seen the disposition of the ground, till they were
+advanced to a certain point. Louis humored him by consenting, though
+greatly against his inclination. He kept his word faithfully in spite of
+all temptations of curiosity and impatience; contenting himself with
+questioning Le Notre, at stated times, as to how things were getting on,
+but never once, in his frequent and regular visits of inspection to the
+palace, did he set foot within the forbidden precincts. The day came at
+last when his forbearance was to be rewarded. Le Notre invited him to
+enter the closed doors. Louis came, and found that the reality far
+outstripped his most sanguine expectations; he was in raptures with all he
+beheld, and declared himself abundantly rewarded for his patience. Le
+Notre, no less enchanted than the king, walked on beside his chair, doing
+the honors of the gardens and the park, and listening with a swelling
+heart to the exclamations of delight that greeted every fresh view that
+opened in the landscape. It seemed, indeed, as if a whole army of fairies
+had been at work to bring such a paradise out of chaos; long rows of
+stately full‐grown trees, brought from a distance and transplanted into
+the arid soil, had taken root and were flourishing as in their native
+earth; winding paths intersected majestic avenues, and led the visitor,
+unexpectedly, to richly planted groves, where marble fauns hid coyly, as
+if frightened to be caught by the sunlight in their unveiled beauty; all
+the elves in fairyland, all the gods in Olympia, were here congregated,
+now astray in the green tangle of the wood, now standing in majestic
+groups, or peeping singly through an opening in the foliage as if they
+were playing hide‐and‐seek; water‐nymphs, dashing the soft spray round
+their naked limbs, started unexpectedly from nooks and corners, cooling
+the air that was heavy with the scent of flowers; the rush of the cascade
+answered the laughing ripple of the fountain; from bower to bower there
+came a concert of water‐music, such as no mortal ear had ever heard
+before; it was, indeed, a sight to set before a king, and the gardener
+might well rejoice who had worked these wonders in the desert.
+
+Le Notre had been all this time trotting briskly by the king’s rolling‐
+chair. When they had gone over the enchanted region, Louis said: “You are
+tired, my friend; get up here beside me, and let us go over it all once
+more.”
+
+And Le Notre, without more ado, jumped up beside the king, and they began
+it all over again, as the children say of their favorite stories. He
+explained to Louis how he nearly despaired of ever getting that birch‐
+grove right, owing to a bed of rock that would not be dislodged to make
+room for it; now and then he would catch the king by the sleeve, and bid
+him shut his eyes and not open them till they came to a certain point,
+when he would cry _Voilà!_—demeaning himself altogether like a true child
+of nature, and enjoying thoroughly the sympathy of the companion who, for
+the time being, a common delight made kindred with him. Suddenly, however,
+it seems to have dawned upon him that he was riding side by side with the
+king of France. He rubbed his hands, and exclaimed with childlike glee:
+“What a proud day this is in my life!” And then, as the tears came
+unchecked into his honest eyes, he added: “And if my good old father could
+but see me, what a happy one it would be!”
+
+Louis, entering into the son’s emotion, made him talk on about his old
+father, and listened with profound interest to the story of their humble
+life in common. He wanted to give Le Notre letters‐patent of nobility, and
+so raise all his family to the rank of _gentilshommes_, but the offer was
+gratefully declined; it would have been a temptation to most men, but it
+was not to Le Notre; he had no ambitions of a worldly cast; his sole
+aspirations were those of a man of genius, and he preferred retaining the
+name of his father and ennobling it by a higher title than it was in the
+power of kings to bestow.
+
+As soon as the palace and the grounds were finished, Louis came and took
+up his abode at Versailles. Then began that series of fêtes and pageants
+that makes the annals of that time read like the description of a long
+carnival. One of the most gorgeous of these fêtes was a sort of
+_carrousel_, given in 1664, when no less than five hundred guests were
+conveyed to Versailles in the king’s suite and at his expense—no small
+matter in the days when railways were unknown, and carriages drawn by six
+or eight horses were the only mode of travelling for persons of rank. The
+king played the part of “Roger” in the _carrousel_, and came riding on a
+white charger, magnificently caparisoned, all the court diamonds being
+given up to the adornment of rider and steed; he advanced at the head of a
+cavalcade of two hundred knights, after which came a golden chariot,
+called the “Chariot of the Sun,” and filled with shepherds and many
+mythological personages; the three queens, namely, the queen‐dowager Anne
+d’Autriche, the reigning queen, and the Queen of England, widow of Charles
+I., surrounded by three hundred ladies of the rank and beauty of France,
+assisted at the entrance of the tournament, while a vast concourse of
+enthusiastic spectators added by their presence to the enlivenment of the
+scene. At night “four thousand huge torches” illuminated the gardens; the
+supper was spread by nymphs and fauns, while Pan and Diana, “advancing on
+a moving mountain,” came down to preside over the festive board. Not the
+least noteworthy episode of the entertainment, which lasted seven days,
+was the representation of Molière’s _Princesse d’Elide_ and the first
+three acts of _Tartuffe_, played now for the first time. The earlier fêtes
+at Versailles were marked by the presence of the greatest and fairest
+names that illustrated the reign of Louis Quatorze, so fertile throughout
+in celebrities.
+
+Foremost in the gay and brilliant throng stands the figure of the one
+woman whom Louis ever really loved, the pale and pensive Louise de la
+Vallière, she who was in reality the goddess of this gorgeous temple, but
+who, in the words of Mme. de Sévigné, “hid herself in the grass like a
+violet,” and whose modesty and humility in the midst of her erring
+triumphs drew from all hearts the pardon she never wrung from her own
+uncompromising conscience.
+
+All the glories of France flocked to Versailles as to a shrine where they
+did homage and were glorified in turn. At every step we meet the majestic
+figure of the Grand Monarque. See him at the top of the great stair,
+calling out to the Grand Condé, who toils painfully up the marble steps,
+bending under the weight of years and the fatigues of war: “Take your
+time, cousin; you are too heavily laden with laurels to walk fast; we can
+wait for you.” Not a room, or a terrace, or a gallery but has a witness to
+bring forth of the king’s courtesy or the king’s magnificence. There is
+the _cabinet du roi_, where he used to work at the affairs of state with
+his ministers, not one of whom worked as hard as the king himself. His
+ministers were not his tools nevertheless; despotic as he was, Louis let
+them hold their own against him, and when they had justice on their side
+he could yield gracefully to the opposition and respect the courage that
+prompted it. Witness the scene between him and his Chancellor Voisin,
+which took place in this same _cabinet du roi_. One of the most
+disreputable men of that not very reputable court, by dint of intrigue,
+obtained from Louis a promise of _lettres de grâce_. Next day, when the
+chancellor came in to his usual work, the king desired him to affix the
+great seals to the document, which was ready prepared. Voisin looked over
+it first conscientiously as was his custom, and then flatly refused to
+obey the king’s command, denouncing the grant of the _lettres de grâce_ to
+such a man as an abuse of the royal privilege. Louis replied that his word
+was pledged, and it was too late now to discuss the unworthiness of the
+subject; he put forward his hand, and, seeing that Voisin did not move, he
+took the seals himself and affixed them to the deed. The chancellor looked
+on in silence, but, when Louis handed him back the badge of office, he
+drew away his hand, and said haughtily: “They are polluted; I will never
+take them back.”
+
+“What a man!” exclaimed Louis, with a glance of frank admiration at his
+sturdy minister, and he flung the deed into the fire.
+
+Voisin quietly took up the seals, and went on with his work as if nothing
+had occurred to interrupt it.
+
+It was in the _cabinet du roi_ that Louis took leave of the Duc d’Anjou,
+on the eve of his departure for Spain, with those memorable words:
+“Partez, mon fils, il n’y a plus de Pyrénées!”(68)
+
+But it is in the _Salle du Trône_ that the Grand Monarque appears to us in
+his most congenial attitude; here we see him in his true element, playing
+the king as the world never saw it played before, and assuredly never will
+again; here all the potentates of the earth came and greeted him
+spontaneously as _le roi_, as if he were the only real king, and they his
+vassals, or, at least, his humble imitators. One day we see the ambassador
+of the Dey of Algiers presenting in his name “a little present of twelve
+Arab steeds, and humbly praying that the mighty majesty of France would
+deign to accept them, seeing that King Solomon himself had accepted the
+leg of the grasshopper tendered to him by the ant.”
+
+On another occasion, we see the stately Doge of Genoa advancing to pay his
+court; Louis questions him concerning the behavior of the courtiers to
+him, and the doge replies: “Truly, if the King of France steals away the
+liberty of our hearts, his courtiers take care to restore it.” The king
+suspects the reply to be provoked by some discourtesy on the part of his
+_entourage_, and, having investigated the matter and found that Louvois
+and De Croissy had demeaned themselves with unseemly hauteur to the
+sensitive stranger, he severely rebuked them in the presence of the whole
+court.
+
+It was here, no doubt, seated on his golden throne, that Louis received
+the chief of Châteaubriand’s tale, and astonished him by the splendor of
+his state, and sent the noble savage back to his home in the far West to
+relate to the awe‐stricken children of the forest the wonders of the great
+French chief “whose superb wigwam he had beheld.”
+
+The _Salle du Sacre_ is less exclusive in its associations, the presence
+of the _grand roi_ being thrown into the shade by the subsequent military
+glory of the _grande armée_. David has covered the walls with the chief
+events of Napoleon’s career, beginning with the first consulship, and
+continuing through the triumphal march of the Empire. When the first
+series of these immense pictures was shown to Napoleon, he, startled by
+their magnitude, of which he was probably a better judge than of their
+talent, turned to the painter, and exclaimed: “Now I must build a palace
+to lodge them!”
+
+The _Salle des Amiraux_, which, as its name indicates, is consecrated to
+the memory of the naval heroes of France, was formerly the room of the
+Dauphin, son of Louis XIV. So little is known of this prince beyond the
+fact that he was the direct antithesis of his father in habits and
+character, that the following anecdote may be found interesting as
+connected with him:
+
+The dauphin, like most princes of his time, was passionately fond of the
+chase. On one occasion he set out on a hunting expedition accompanied by a
+large party, and towards nightfall he and one of his equerries got
+separated from the rest, and found themselves astray in a dense wood,
+where they wandered for some hours without meeting any signs of human
+habitation. They came at last upon a small cottage, which, from its
+isolated position and shabby appearance, he set down as most likely a
+rendezvous of robbers, that part of the country being much frequented by
+these worthies. They were well armed, however, and determined to risk the
+barbarous hospitality of the thieves rather than pass the night amidst the
+snakes and other uncomfortable inmates of the woods. They knocked at the
+door, first meekly, then more peremptorily, and at last furiously; getting
+no answer, they resolved to break open the house, and began hammering away
+vigorously with the but‐end of their guns at the shaky old door. At this
+crisis a window opened somewhere, and a voice, that quavered with fright,
+besought the burglars to go away, as they would find nothing in so poor a
+lodging to repay their trouble. Summoned to say whom it belonged to, the
+voice replied that it was that of the _curé_ of the neighboring hamlet,
+whereupon the huntsmen begged him to come down and spare them further
+trouble by opening the door himself. After much expostulation the host
+obeyed, and then his guests desired him to serve the best he had for their
+supper; there was no use protesting with visitors who had such formidable
+arguments on their shoulders and glistening in their belts, so the curé
+obeyed with the best grace he could. There was nothing substantial in the
+larder, he declared, but a leg of mutton, which the gentlemen were welcome
+to if they would undertake to cook it and let him go back to his bed. This
+they agreed to, with great good‐humor and many courteous thanks, and the
+old priest, after showing them where to find food and shelter for their
+horses, wished them a good appetite and betook himself to his couch,
+marvelling much at the sudden gentleness and courtesy of these singular
+burglars who had made their entry in so boisterous and uncivil a manner.
+The burglars, meantime, did full justice to his hospitality and their own
+cooking, and, having supped heartily, flung themselves at full length on
+the floor, and were soon sound asleep—sounder, no doubt, than their host,
+whose slumbers, if he slept at all, were most likely disturbed by visions
+of highwaymen arresting and murdering the king’s subjects or throttling
+honest folk in their beds, and such like unrefreshing dreams. The good man
+was up betimes, and while the hunters were still fast asleep he slipt out
+to seek some breakfast for them. Meantime the hunt, which had been in
+pursuit of the prince all night, perceived the little wreath of smoke that
+curled up from the curé’s chimney on the clear morning air, and at once
+made for the point whence it proceeded, sounding the horn as it
+approached. The prince and his companions started to their feet at the
+first note of the welcome signal, rushed to their horses, and were in the
+saddle and far out of sight before their host returned from his foraging
+expedition. Great was his surprise to find the birds had flown, but he was
+glad to be rid of them, and on such easy terms, for they had carried off
+nothing—the house was just as he had left it. It was not a thing to boast
+of, having harbored a couple of highwaymen for a night, though they had
+behaved so considerately to him—the curé, therefore, kept the adventure to
+himself. But he had not heard the last of it. The next day a messenger
+came in hot haste from Versailles with a summons for him to appear without
+further delay before the king. Terrified out of his five wits, and knowing
+full well what had brought this judgment upon him, the worthy old priest
+took up his stick and asked no questions, but forthwith made his way to
+the palace. He was conducted at once to the Salle du Trône, where Louis,
+surrounded by the rank and blood of France, was seated as for some solemn
+ceremonial on his chair of state. He bent a stern gaze on the curé, and in
+accents that made the culprit’s soul shake within him, demanded how it
+came to pass that a man of his holy calling made his house a rendezvous
+for midnight robbers who prowled about the country, disturbing honest
+subjects and breaking the king’s laws. The curé fell upon his knees, and
+humbly confessing cowardly concealment of a fact that he was in conscience
+bound to have denounced at once to the nearest magistrate, pleaded,
+nevertheless, that the bearing of those malefactors was so noble and their
+manners so courteous that he had doubts as to whether they were indeed
+such and not rather two knights of his majesty’s court; whereupon Louis
+bade the malefactors come forward, and, introducing them by name to the
+bewildered curé, enjoined him to be less cautious another time in opening
+his doors to benighted gentlemen.
+
+“And in payment of the leg of mutton which my son was so unmannerly as to
+confiscate on you,” continued the king, “I name you Grand Prieur, with the
+revenues and privileges attached to the office.” This was assuredly the
+highest price that ever a leg of mutton fetched.
+
+The _chambre â coucher de la reine_(69) plays a distinct part of its own
+in the annals of Versailles. We forget its first occupant, the gentle,
+long‐suffering Marie Thérèse, of whom, on hearing of her death, Louis
+Quatorze exclaimed: “This is the first sorrow she ever caused me!” we
+forget the longer‐suffering wife of Louis Quinze, the charitable Marie
+Leczinska, surnamed by the people “the good queen”; we lose sight of all
+the august figures who pass before us in the retrospect of this royal
+chamber, and see only Marie Antoinette, the haughty sovereign, the heroic
+mother and devoted wife, who has made it all her own. We see her, woke out
+of her sleep, and the cries of the mob menacing the palace in the dead of
+the night, and flying hardly dressed from the _chambre de la reine_ to
+take refuge in the dauphin’s apartment, while the faithful guards dispute
+with their lives the entrance of her own to the mad multitude that have
+now broken in like a destroying torrent and are close upon the threshold.
+The walls seem still to echo the cry of those two brave guards as they
+fell: “Save the queen! Save the queen!” The great tragedy that was to
+change the whole destinies of France may be said to have begun on this
+terrible night of the 6th of October.
+
+The _chambre à coucher du roi_(70) is, on the other hand, filled with
+Louis Quatorze to the exclusion of all other memories. Here was performed
+that solemn comedy in which the warriors and statesmen of the day took
+their part so gravely: the _lever_ and _coucher de roi_. When we read the
+minute details given in the chronicles of the time of the ceremonial gone
+through by his courtiers every time the king got in and out of bed, it is
+a severe tax on our credulity to believe that the _dramatis personæ_ who
+played the farce so seriously were not fools or grinning idiots, but sane
+and sober men whose lineage was second only in blue‐blooded antiquity to
+that of Cæsar himself, men of talent, men of genius, heroes who fought
+their country’s battles and deemed it no derogation to come from the field
+of glory and fight for the honor of handing the king his stockings or his
+pantaloons. This proud _noblesse_ whom Richelieu could not conquer by the
+sword or subdue by tortures and imprisonment, lay down at the feet of
+Louis, and, it is hardly a figure of speech to say, licked them. They
+appear to have looked upon him, not as a mortal like themselves, however
+elevated above them in rank and power, but as a god, a being altogether
+apart from them in species. One is tempted to believe that both they and
+he must occasionally have been possessed with some vague notion that it
+was so; there is no other way of accounting for the servile worship which
+they tendered as a duty, and which he accepted as a due. Truly that famous
+“_L’état c’est moi!_”(71) sounds more of a god than a man; and that other
+utterance of Louis, _Messieurs, j’ai failli attendre!_(72) addressed to
+the proudest nobility in Europe, who were barely in their places when the
+flourish of trumpets announced the king’s entrance, is scarcely less
+grotesque in its superhuman pride.
+
+This great and little _coucher_ which was surrounded by so much prestige
+in the court of France was somewhat ridiculed by contemporary sovereigns,
+for the honor of humanity be it said; their admiration for Louis did not
+go the length of viewing the august ceremonial otherwise than in the light
+of a bore or a joke. When Frederick the Great heard from his ambassador an
+account of the first _grand lever_ at which he assisted at Versailles, he
+burst into an uncontrollable fit of laughter, and exclaimed: “Well, if I
+were king of France, I would certainly hire some small king to go through
+all that for me!”
+
+Considering how eagerly his courtiers contended for the honor of dressing
+the king’s person, one would have fancied the privilege of making his bed
+would have been proportionately coveted, and held second only to the honor
+of holding his majesty’s boots; but, such is the inconsistency of human
+beings, this was not the case. The courtiers probably felt that a line
+should be drawn somewhere, so they drew it here; they would not perform
+this menial office for the Grand Monarque, and the distinction of turning
+his mattresses and spreading his quilt devolved on valets of a lower
+grade. Among this inferior herd was one named Molière, a youth whom his
+comrades laughed at and treated as a sort of crazy creature who was always
+in the moon. One day when it happened to be his turn to spread the royal
+sheets, the poet Belloc overheard them chaffing him and refusing to help
+him in his work. He went up to Molière, and said: “Monsieur de Molière,
+will you do me the honor of allowing me to help you to make the king’s
+bed?” and Molière granted the request. The incident came to the king’s ear
+and led to his noticing the eccentric valet. A little later, and we see
+him standing behind the valet’s chair in this same room, where his
+majesty’s dinner was sometimes served, and waiting upon him, while the
+courtiers who had refused to sit at table with Molière stood round,
+looking on in “mute consternation at the strange spectacle,” Saint‐Simon
+tells us, who owns naïvely to sharing their consternation.
+
+“Since none of my courtiers will admit Monsieur de Molière to their
+table,” said Louis, “I must needs set him down at mine, and show them that
+I count it an honor for the King of France to wait upon so great a man.”
+
+Here, in this bed that Belloc and Molière had made together, Louis
+Quatorze died. From under the crimson and gold canopy which had witnessed
+the eternal _levers_ and _couchers_, Louis rebuked the violent grief of
+two young pages who stood within the balustrade, that sanctum sanctorum
+which none under a prince of the blood or a high chancellor dare pass at
+any other time; they were weeping bitterly. “What!” exclaimed the king,
+“did ye, then, think I was immortal?” There was a time when he himself
+seemed to have thought so; but viewed by that vivid light that breaks
+through the mists of death, things wore a different aspect in his eyes;
+and the adulation which would fain have treated him as immortal, and which
+was during life as the breath of his nostrils to Louis, showed now as the
+empty bubble that it was.
+
+No one ever again slept in the bed which had been honored by the last sigh
+of the Grand Monarque; the room remained henceforth unoccupied, and, with
+the exception of the pictures which have been removed, is still just as he
+left it. Louis carried his favorite pictures about with him wherever he
+went. “David,” by Domenichino, his best beloved of them all, is now to be
+seen at the Louvre; otherwise little has been altered in the _chambre du
+roi_; the bed and the _ruelle_ are in their old place, also the table, on
+which a cold collation was laid every night in case of the king’s awaking
+and feeling hungry; this precautionary little meal was called the _en
+cas_; and the name with the habit, which had given rise to it, is still
+perpetuated in many old‐fashioned French families. Louis Quinze, from some
+superstitious feeling, could never bring himself to sleep in the death‐
+chamber of his illustrious great‐grandfather; he took possession of what
+was then the _salle de billiard_, a noble room opening into the _œil‐de‐
+bœuf_ (bull’s eye), so called from its having an _œil‐de‐bœuf_ over the
+large window at the north end. In an alcove in this billiard hall, Louis
+XV. died. The adjoining _œil‐de‐bœuf_ was filled with the courtiers, who
+dare not venture within the polluted atmosphere of the royal chamber, but
+stood outside it, consulting together in “guilty whispers” as to what they
+ought to do; dreading on one hand the reward of their cowardice if the
+king should recover, and fearing on the other to fly too soon with their
+servile congratulations to his successor. In the great court below another
+crowd was assembled, watching in breathless silence for the signal which
+was to proclaim the king’s death. What a spectacle it was!—what a lesson
+for a king! The flatterers who yesterday had been his slaves, pandering to
+his vices, and helping to make him the abject creature that he was,
+abandoned him now that he was struggling with grim Death, and, all
+absorbed in selfish cares for their own interest, in speculations of the
+favor of the new king, they had no pity in their hearts for the master who
+could pay them no more. It came at last, the signal; the small flame of a
+candle was seen flickering through the darkness, and then held up at the
+window of the _œil‐de‐bœuf_. “Suddenly there was a noise,” says the
+historian of that ghastly scene, “like a roll of thunder, it was the
+courtiers rushing from the antechamber of the dead king to greet his
+successor.” Only his daughters had been brave enough to stand by the
+bedside of the dying man, and, now that he was gone, there was not one in
+all that multitude who could be induced to perform the last office of
+mercy towards his poor remains. It was imperative, nevertheless, that the
+body should be embalmed, and this appalling task devolved upon Andouillé,
+the late king’s surgeon. The Duc de Villequier went up to him and reminded
+him of it; he knew that the operation must insure certain death to the
+operator, but that was not his concern.
+
+“It is your duty, monsieur,” said the duke; and he was coolly turning away
+when Andouillé stopped him. “Yes,” he replied, “it is my duty, and it is
+yours to hold the head.” De Villequier had forgotten this; he made no
+answer, but left the room, and nothing more was said about the embalmment.
+The body was hustled into a coffin, and smuggled rather than conveyed in
+the dead of the night to S. Denis, a few menials accompanying the King of
+France to his last resting‐place. The spirit of French loyalty may be said
+to have been buried with Louis Quinze; “the divinity that doth hedge a
+king” was that night laid low in France, wrapped in the shroud that
+covered the unutterable mass of corruption consigned like a dog to the
+ready‐made grave in S. Denis. _Le roi_ could never again be to the nation
+what he had been heretofore. _Le roi est mort, vive le roi!_(73) ceased to
+be the watchword of its fealty; _le roi_, that being invested not merely
+with supreme authority, but with a sort of vague personal sacredness that
+has no parallel in modern loyalty, died with Louis Quinze, never to be
+resuscitated. The miserable death of the libertine prince, fit ending to
+an ignoble life, came upon his people in the light of a divine judgment,
+swift and awful, and dealt the last blow at that prestige which had for
+generations been the bulwark of king‐worship and shaded with its
+mysterious reverence the iniquities of the throne. No man suffers alone
+for his sins, but how much more truly may this be said of kings! Who could
+measure the depth of the gulf that Louis XV. had dug through his long
+reign for those who were to come after him, and realize the consequences
+of his evil deeds to future generations of Frenchmen? There is no greater
+fallacy than to attribute to an age the responsibility of its own
+destinies; none probably ever saw the beginning and end of its own
+history, for good or evil, but less than any other can the period of the
+Revolution be said to have witnessed this unity. We must look much further
+back to trace the rising of the red flood that inundated France in ’93. It
+was the insane extravagance of Louis XIV.’s reign and the official
+depravity of the succeeding one that sowed the harvest that was to be
+reaped in fire by the innocent victims of a corruption which for a whole
+century had been seething as in the caldron of the Prophet’s vision, till
+it boiled over in the mad frenzy of the Revolution, and swallowed up not
+only the monarch, but the soul and reason of France, in a deluge of
+exasperated hate and suicidal revenge. Louis Seize, the martyred king who
+was to expiate the follies and crimes of his predecessors, next passes
+before us along the galleries of Versailles. There is an interval of
+peace, a short halcyon time of pastorals and idyls, we see Marie
+Antoinette playing at shepherdess in Arcadia, we hear Trianon ringing with
+the music of her light‐hearted laughter, we see her choosing a friend,(74)
+and braving the jealous anger that makes a crime of her friendship though
+it be wise, and rebukes her mirth though it be innocent; but the queen
+turns a deaf ear to all warning sounds and shuts her eyes to the gathering
+clouds. Imprudent Marie Antoinette! Ill‐adapted wife of timid, hesitating,
+magnanimous Louis Seize, the Bourbon of whom it was written with truth:
+
+
+    “Louis ne sut qu’aimer et pardonner,
+    S’il avait su punir, il aurait su regner.”(75)
+
+
+He loved and forgave to the end, but he never learned to punish. Warnings
+were not wanting, but he would not heed them. See him standing in the
+embrasure of the window of that _cabinet du roi_ whence Louis Quatorze
+ruled the kings and peoples of Europe; a new power has arisen; it is the
+people’s turn to rule the king, his brow is clouded, his lip trembles, not
+with fear—that base emotion never stirred the soul of Louis Seize—but with
+anguish, perplexity, doubts in himself that amounted to despair. He
+listens to the murmurs of the crowd down below; and to De Brézé, who
+repeats, in tremulous accents, Mirabeau’s message of tremendous import:
+“Go tell the king that the will of the people has brought us here, and
+nothing but the force of bayonets shall drive us hence!” That force he
+knew full well would never be appealed to; it was not the people who
+should be driven hence, it was they who would drive the king. Presently we
+see the ponderous state coach jolting slowly down the Avenue de Paris, the
+first stage of the royal martyrs towards the guillotine; the mob, in a
+frenzy of drunken triumph, jostled it from side to side, pressing rudely
+through the windows to stare at their victims, and insulting them by
+thrusting the red cap into their faces, and shouting as they go: “The
+baker and the bakeress! now we have caught them, and the people shall have
+bread!” This journey dates a new era in the annals of Versailles, it is
+the death‐knell of the pleasant days of royalty; there are to be no more
+_fêtes pastorales_ at Trianon, no more merry children of France careering
+over the flowery terraces, making the sombre alleys bright and the gay
+flowers brighter with the sweet melody of child laughter; all this is
+gone, and passed like a dream. “The old order of things has vanished,
+making place for the new.” Soon we shall see the palace of Louis Quatorze
+stripped of its costly furniture, invaded by the rabble, and pillaged from
+garret to cellar. The Convention will deem it right to utilize the
+“foregoing abode of the tyrants” by turning it into a hospital; they will
+transport the invalids to Versailles, but the rheumatic old heroes will
+find the apartments of the Grand Monarque too grand to be comfortable,
+they will complain of their pains and aches being aggravated by the
+draughts, and beg to be taken back to their homely quarters, and the
+Convention, in its benevolence, will accede to the request.
+
+Louis XVIII. was anxious to fix his residence at Versailles, and went the
+length of spending six millions of francs on repairing the façade, which
+had been sadly battered by the Revolution, but he found that the expense
+of refurnishing the palace would have been too much for the exhausted
+finances of France; so he gave up the idea.
+
+Louis Philippe restored it to its ancient splendor, but not for his own
+use; he made it over to the nation as a museum, where they might go and
+enjoy themselves, and see all the glories of their country commemorated.
+Many of the victories of the _grande armée_ were painted to his order to
+complete the series already decorating the walls. Versailles has retained
+ever since this national character. Under the Second Empire it was used
+occasionally for fêtes given to foreign princes; the most magnificent of
+these was the one prepared for the Queen of England when she visited
+Napoleon III. after his marriage.
+
+France has undergone many strange vicissitudes, and her palaces have
+harbored many unlikely guests; but among the strangest on record none can
+assuredly compete with the recent experiences of Versailles. If the spirit
+of Louis XIV. be permitted sometimes to haunt the scene of his earthly
+pride, what must his feelings have been during the last two years! What
+did he feel on beholding the halls which had echoed to his conquering step
+held by the victorious soldiers of Germany, and vacated by them to make
+way for the President of the French Republic? But this crowning enormity
+stopped short at the threat. The _chambre du roi_ was indeed placed at the
+disposal of the President, but whether it was that he shrank from the
+profanation, or feared the vast proportions of the great king’s palace, as
+likely to prove too large a frame for the representative of a republic, he
+declined taking up his abode there. Versailles continues still to be the
+resort of the people and of travellers from all parts of the world.
+
+
+
+
+Father Isaac Jogues, S.J.
+
+
+Father Isaac Jogues, the first of the missionaries to bear the cross into
+the interior of our country, and the first to shed his blood on its soil
+for the faith of Christ, was a native of Orleans, France. He was born on
+the 10th of January, 1607, of a family distinguished alike for their
+virtues and their worth. In the bosom of this pious family the young Isaac
+was reared up, surrounded by all the profound and pleasing practices of
+Catholic devotion. Lessons of religion and letters were imparted together,
+and the scholar from his earliest youth proved himself remarkably apt at
+both. As soon as he was old enough, he was sent, to his own great joy, to
+the college at Orleans, then recently established by the Jesuit Fathers,
+under whose instruction he made rapid progress in his studies. The virtues
+of his character so ingratiated him with his companions at college, that
+no thought of jealousy ever entered their hearts at the eminence he
+enjoyed as a student.
+
+As the close of his collegiate course drew near, he began, more seriously
+than ever, to meditate on the greatest act of one’s life—the selection of
+a vocation. It was his extraordinary devotion to the Passion of Our Lord
+that settled this question for him. The cathedral church of his native
+city was dedicated to the Holy Cross, and there from his tenderest years
+he gazed daily upon that sacred symbol of the Passion and Redemption
+glittering from the spires of the temple, and it became the object of his
+warmest affection.
+
+
+    “O lovely tree whose branches wore
+    The royal purple of his gore!
+    Oh! may aloft thy branches shoot,
+    And fill all nations with thy fruit!”
+
+
+Impelled by this devotion, he retired into himself in order to discover
+his vocation, and heard within his soul the voice of Heaven calling him to
+the Society of Jesus. Having applied for admission into the Society, and
+being received with alacrity by the superior, he entered upon his
+novitiate in October, 1624. To complete his studies he next went to the
+celebrated college of La Flèche, where he passed his examination in
+philosophy at the end of three years with great distinction. Then, in
+obedience to the discipline of his order, the young Jesuit went to teach
+in the college at Rouen, and for four years instructed the youth of that
+city in the elements of the Latin language, in the principles of religion
+and the practice of piety. So fruitful were his labors in this regard that
+his scholars were ever distinguished for the solidity and constancy of
+their virtues, and many of them became companions of their saintly
+preceptor in the Society of Jesus.
+
+We now find him winning laurels in the flowery path of literature. It was,
+at the period of which we speak, the custom at the Jesuit colleges to test
+the qualifications of the teachers, by requiring them, at the opening of
+the year, to deliver an oration or poem, or read a lecture of their own
+production, in public. Simply in obedience to this rule, and without any
+desire of his own to gain distinction, the gifted Jogues participated in
+these exercises, and on one occasion produced a poem of rare excellence.
+But his heart was too thoroughly pre‐engaged to covet the laurels of
+literary fame. He was intent on winning another crown—the glorious crown
+of martyrdom. Yet so obedient was the young scholastic to the will of his
+superior and to the spirit of his institute, that he, who only desired for
+himself the wigwam and council fires of the roving tribes of the Western
+wilds, went out with as much labor and zeal to acquire all the
+accomplishments of learning as though a professor’s chair in Europe was to
+be the field of his ambition. He was next sent to Paris, where he began
+his course of divinity at the college of Clermont.
+
+He applied himself to these studies with the greatest zeal, since they
+constituted the last probation and delay preceding his elevation to the
+sacred ministry, and the realization of his fondest hope—a foreign
+mission. He seems not to have discovered his future plans to his family,
+to whom he was, however, most tenderly attached. Writing to them in April,
+1635, on receiving their complaint at his not having joined them in one of
+their family festivals, he says: “The prayers which I offer up, as well
+afar off as near you, are the most affectionate marks I can give of my
+interest in you all.”
+
+When the time for the reception of holy orders drew near, he prepared
+himself by a spiritual retreat, and was ordained in February, 1636. His
+family, who were extremely devoted to him, were not present at his
+ordination; but his fond mother obtained from his superior a promise that
+he might say his first Mass in his native city. He accordingly went to
+Orleans, and offered up the holy sacrifice for the first time in the
+church of the Holy Cross. Then, tearing himself away from his mother and
+sisters, never to see them again, he went to Rouen, and entered upon what
+is called the second novitiate in the Society of Jesus. But a fleet was
+soon ready to sail from Dieppe for Canada, and the young missionary must
+hasten to his chosen field of labor and love.
+
+He was accompanied on the voyage by the Jesuit Fathers Garnier and
+Chatelain, and by M. de Chanflour, afterwards governor at Three Rivers.
+The vessel in which they sailed being leaky, the pumps were kept in
+constant motion, and the labor thus imposed upon the crew gave rise to a
+mutiny, which Father Jogues alone was able to quell. M. de Chanflour ever
+afterwards, in speaking of the voyage, attributed his safety to the
+influence of Father Jogues’ prayers with God, and of his persuasion with
+the men.
+
+After words of pious affection and encouragement which this exemplary son
+knew well how to address to that excellent mother, he proceeds in one of
+his letters addressed to her:
+
+“I write this more than three thousand miles away from you, and I may
+perhaps this year be sent to a nation called the Huron, distant nearly a
+thousand miles more from here. It shows great dispositions for embracing
+the faith. It matters not where we are, provided we are ever in the arms
+of Providence and in his holy grace. This I beg for you and all our family
+daily at the altar.”
+
+By his short stay at Miscou he missed the Indian flotilla, and Fathers
+Garnier and Chatelain embarked without him; but, some canoes having come
+in later, the Indians, when about to return, asked, as if reproachfully,
+why there was no black‐gown to be carried by them. Father Jogues, being
+then at Three Rivers, was summoned to embark, and at once joyfully entered
+the canoes.
+
+We would gladly reproduce, did our space allow, a letter addressed to his
+mother, under date June 5, 1637, giving an account of this voyage. Suffice
+it to say that in nineteen days he accomplished what usually took twenty‐
+five or thirty; joining Fathers Garnier and Chatelain, who had preceded
+him but a month, and three other missionaries who had been five or six
+years in the country.
+
+Supported by his zeal, he accomplished his arduous and laborious passage,
+but no sooner arrived at Ihonitiria than his exhausted nature sank under a
+dreadful malady, which for more than a month threatened to terminate his
+existence. With four others he lay during all this time in a cabin,
+without medicines or food, except such food as was an aggravation to the
+disease. By the middle of October Father Jogues was so far recovered as to
+be able to take the ordinary food of the country, the sagamity.
+
+In November he set out from Ihonitiria to join Father Brebeuf at the great
+town of Ossossané, where for a time they were companions on earth who were
+destined to be companions in heaven, in the enjoyment of the glorious
+crown of martyrdom. Sickness was raging over the land, and the
+missionaries hastened from town to town, and from cabin to cabin,
+baptizing the dying infants, and such of the adults as were willing to
+receive the words of eternal life. They even extended their visits to the
+neighboring Nipissings, who had been terribly afflicted with the
+prevailing maladies. The poor Indians, in most cases, would not listen to
+the voice of the fathers, because they could not promise, as their own
+sorcerers pretended, to cure their bodily afflictions. The horrid orgies
+of the medicine‐men were consequently in great requisition, and one of
+them, a little deformed creature, offered his services to one of the
+fathers in his sickness.
+
+There was another medicine‐man, Tehoronhaegnon, who filled the land with
+dances and orgies of the most wicked and revolting character. The
+missionaries labored to banish these abominations from the country, and to
+introduce in their place the pure and holy rites of the Christian
+religion. Unacquainted with their language, Father Jogues labored under
+the greatest disadvantages, but by zealous and persevering application he
+was soon able to make himself well understood; and in a few years he was
+master of the Huron, the key‐tongue to so many others. Remaining at
+Ossossané as his place of residence, he was incessant in his visits and
+ministrations in the cabins of the people, preaching the faith to all, and
+at the same time rapidly acquiring their language. Late in 1637 he
+returned to labor in the same way at Ihonitiria. On the ruin of this town
+and its mission, he went again to join his superior, Father Brebeuf, at
+Teananstayae.
+
+In 1639, Father Jogues accompanied Father Garnier in his expedition to
+plant the cross among the mountains of the Petuns, or Tobacco Indians.
+They twice visited the Petun village of Ehwae, which they dedicated to SS.
+Peter and Paul. But their noble efforts were in vain; every door was
+closed against them, and menaces assailed them on every side; even the
+women reproached their husbands for not killing them, and the children
+pursued them through the streets. The sachems gave a feast to the young
+warriors in order to induce them to destroy the missionaries; but the
+providence of God saved his servants from the impending blow.
+
+In the next year, Father Jogues was stationed with Father Francis Duperon
+at the new residence at S. Mary’s. Four towns partook of their care, and
+these they piously dedicated to S. Ann, S. John, S. Denis, and S. Louis.
+Obliged to select the worst season of the year for their labor, because
+then only were the neophytes drawn together, their time was incessantly
+occupied in conveying to the untaught natives the faith and its
+consolations. Next year Father Jogues was stationed permanently at St.
+Mary’s. Here the fathers established a hospice, where the wayfarer was
+ever sure to find refreshment and relief for the body as well as the soul.
+To this sacred spot in the wilderness came Indians from distant villages
+to receive instruction in the faith, some to be baptized, some to prepare
+for the reception of Holy Communion, some to be trained in the duties of
+catechists, and others, like Joseph Chihatenhwa, to make a spiritual
+retreat.
+
+But now a new enterprise for the Gospel drew Father Jogues away from St.
+Mary’s. This was to plant the cross in the region now comprising the state
+of Michigan. The missionaries knew that beyond the Huron Lake another vast
+expanse of water lay which never yet had been visited by them. The strait
+which connected the two lakes had formerly been known by the name of
+Gaston, and was supposed to have been once visited by Nicholet, but no
+intercourse ever subsisted between the French and the tribes of those
+regions. In the summer of 1641, numerous delegations from all the nations
+and tribes, scattered over a great expanse of country, were attracted to
+the “Feast of the Dead,” now to be given by the Algonquins.
+
+Thus, on the present occasion, the numerous branches of the vast Algonquin
+family were brought in contact with the Jesuit missionaries and the
+Christian Hurons, and the latter spread far and near in this vast assembly
+the fame of the black‐gown chiefs. In the general interchange of presents,
+the missionaries presented to the strangers “the wampum of the faith.” The
+Panoitigoueieuhak, or Sauteux, as the French called them, a tribe
+inhabiting the small strip near the Falls of St. Mary, were particularly
+friendly and earnest, and invited the black‐gowns to come and bring the
+faith to their cabins as they had done for the Hurons. Father Raymbault
+and Father Jogues were named by the superior to visit this new and distant
+vineyard. Launching their canoes in the latter part of September at St.
+Mary’s, they glided over the little river Wye, and were soon on the broad,
+clear bosom of the great “Fresh‐Water Sea.” For seventeen days their frail
+canoes glided through the multitude of little islands that stud the water
+from the Huron promontory. They reached without accident the strait where
+Superior empties its waters into the lower lakes, and then they
+encountered Indians assembled to the number of two thousand. From these
+they learned of innumerable wild and warlike tribes stretching far to the
+west and south. Here, too, their eager ears were feasted with tidings of a
+mighty river rolling towards the south till it met the sea, whose shores
+were lined with numberless tribes and nations. Planting the cross at Sault
+St. Mary’s, the two fathers turned it hopefully and prophetically towards
+this great mysterious river, whose vast and teeming valley they thus took
+possession of in the name of the Prince of Peace. Having opened the way to
+this immense mission‐field by their visit, the two missionaries encouraged
+the Sauteux with the prospect of a future permanent mission, and, amidst
+the regrets of their new friends, again launched their canoes and returned
+to their mission‐house at St. Mary’s. “Thus,” says Bancroft, “did the
+religious zeal of the French bear the cross to the banks of the St. Mary
+and the confines of Lake Superior, and look wistfully towards the homes of
+the Sioux in the Valley of the Mississippi, five years before the New
+England Eliot had addressed the tribes of Indians that dwelt within six
+miles of Boston Harbor.”
+
+At St. Mary’s, Father Jogues remained constantly employed at the hospice
+with Father Duperon in instructing and preparing the Indians for the
+reception of the faith. One hundred and twenty were baptized during the
+winter, and among these was the famous warrior, Ahasistari, a chief of the
+town of St. Joseph’s.
+
+This brave and chivalrous chief had been for some time receiving
+instruction in the faith, and he now came forward to ask for baptism. The
+fathers at first put him off, in order that he might become still better
+instructed; but his entreaties were so earnest, and his appreciation of
+the Christian truths so intelligent, that it was deemed no longer
+necessary or proper to postpone the boon. He accordingly received the
+sacrament on Holy Saturday, 1642.
+
+It has been seen how, at Orleans, the ardent novice of the Society of
+Jesus was passionately devoted to the cross, the memento of our Saviour’s
+Passion. Like S. Peter, his heart was still for ever enamored with the
+sacred humanity of his divine Master. Thus his devotion to the Blessed
+Sacrament was intense, and the Real Presence, the greatest of blessings,
+made the wilderness of America a paradise to Father Jogues. Father Buteux
+says of him that he was “a soul glued to the Blessed Sacrament.” His
+prayers, meditations, office, examens of conscience—in fine, all his
+devotions—were performed in the little chapel before the Holy Eucharist.
+Neither heat, nor cold, nor the swarms of mosquitoes, with which the
+chapel was infested, could induce him to forego the society of his
+Saviour. No wonder he was attracted thither; for it was in the little
+chapel that he was not unfrequently favored with heavenly visitations. It
+was there, too, that he breathed that heroic prayer, whose only petition
+was that he might be allowed to bear a portion of his Saviour’s cross. His
+prayer was heard—a warning voice fortified his soul for the approaching
+conflict.
+
+The necessities of the Huron missionaries had now arrived at the point of
+extreme distress. They were reduced to procure the wine for the altar from
+the wild grape; at last, flour to make the sacred host was wanting for the
+holy sacrifice, and the missionaries themselves were in want of clothes
+and other necessaries of life. The perilous passage through various
+intervening hostile tribes to procure relief from Quebec for the pressing
+demands of the mission must now be undertaken by some one, and Father
+Jerome Lalemant, the superior, selected Father Jogues for the task, which,
+however, at the same time, he permitted him to accept or decline. His
+immediate preparation to depart showed that he did not hesitate about
+accepting. To his great joy, the faithful and noble chief, Eustace
+Ahasistari, came forward, and offered to become his escort and guide. A
+flotilla of four canoes, bearing the missionary, the Christian chief, four
+Frenchmen, and eighteen Hurons, started from St. Mary’s on the 13th of
+June. The voyagers had to endure the usual portages at the rapids, and
+other hardships of such trips; but, by the exercise of great care and
+vigilance, they reached Quebec without harm from the savages. The faithful
+messenger, besides procuring books, vestments, and sacred vessels, had all
+things in readiness by the last day in July, the feast of S. Ignatius. He
+stopped to celebrate the feast of the great founder of his order, in which
+his companions united by approaching the sacraments in solemn preparation
+for their perilous return. The flotilla, now increased to twelve canoes,
+started from Three Rivers on the 1st day of August, and at first made slow
+progress against the impetuous current of the St. Lawrence. They spent the
+night on a small island in Lake St. Peter, twelve leagues from Three
+Rivers, and on the second morning they had not proceeded far when they
+discovered suspicious footprints on the adjacent shore. Nerved by the
+dauntless courage of Ahasistari, they pushed on, and had not advanced a
+league when suddenly a volley from a Mohawk ambush riddled their bark
+canoes. Panic‐struck, the Hurons, whose canoes were near the shore, fled
+in all directions. Only fourteen rallied round the gallant Ahasistari, who
+had now to oppose a force of twice his numbers. The Mohawks, armed with
+fire‐arms, and reinforced from the other shore, overpowered the Hurons,
+who broke and fled. Father Jogues, ever mindful of his sacred calling, in
+the heat of the attack calmly stopped to take up water for the baptism of
+his pilot, who was the only unbaptized Indian in his canoe. Seeing himself
+almost alone, he made to the shore; but he did not attempt to escape,
+which he might easily have done. “Could I,” he says, “a minister of
+Christ, forsake the dying, the wounded, the captive?” Advancing to the
+guard of the prisoners, he asked to be made a captive with them, and their
+companion in danger and in death. Well might the Mohawk guard, at the
+sight of such heroism, have been scarcely able to believe his senses! Well
+might the historian exclaim, “When did a Jesuit missionary seek to save
+his own life, at what he believed to be the risk of a soul?”(76) Father
+Jogues at once began his offices of mercy among his fellow‐captives. He
+encouraged and confessed his faithful companion, the good René Goupil; he
+instructed and baptized the Hurons, and as, one after another, they were
+brought in prisoners, the priest of God rushed to meet and embrace them,
+and to unite them to the fold of Christ.
+
+In the meantime, Ahasistari, having got beyond the reach of his pursuers,
+looked round for Ondessonk. Finding that the black‐gown was not there, the
+noble chief relinquished his freedom that he might share in the captivity
+of the father, whom he had promised never to abandon. While Father Jogues
+was engaged in ministering to the prisoners, the voice of Ahasistari
+struck upon his astonished ears. “I made a vow to thee that I would share
+thy fortunes, whether death or life. Brother, here I am to keep my vow.”
+Also a young Frenchman, one of those _donnés_ who accompanied and aided
+the missionaries, returned to join the prisoners with the same exalted
+motive; and, as Father Jogues tenderly embraced him, all bleeding and
+mangled as he was, the savages could not restrain their fury. Rushing upon
+the father, they beat him with their fists and clubs till he fell
+senseless to the ground. Then, seizing his hands, they tore out most of
+his nails with their teeth, and inflicted upon him the exquisite torture
+of crunching his fingers, especially the two forefingers. But these
+tortures were only the first outbursts of savage rage and cruelty, the
+forerunners of more cruel ones in reserve.
+
+The time consumed in collecting the prisoners, dividing the booty, and
+preparing for retreat enabled Father Jogues to complete the instruction
+and baptism of the remaining prisoners.
+
+On Lake Champlain, another Mohawk war‐fleet met the flotilla, and, drawing
+up on an island, the newcomers prepared to receive their countrymen and
+the prisoners. They erected a scaffold on the highest point of land for
+the prisoners; then offering thanks to the sun as the genius of war, they
+lined the shore, and welcomed the conquering fleet with a salute of
+firearms. The number of savages on the new flotilla was about two hundred,
+and, as their native superstition taught them that their success in war
+would be proportioned to their cruelty to the prisoners, sad indeed was
+the fate of the latter. Father Jogues closed the line of prisoners as they
+marched up to the scaffold, and so terrific was the shower of blows that
+assailed him that he fell exhausted to the ground: “God alone,” he
+exclaims—“God alone, for whose love and glory it is sweet to suffer, can
+tell what cruelties they wreaked upon me then.” Unable to proceed, he was
+dragged to the scaffold, when, on reviving, he suffered the ordeal of fire
+and steel. His closing wounds were reopened, his remaining nails were torn
+from their sockets, and the bones forced through the crushed fingers.
+Twice one of his tormentors rushed to cut off his nose—a certain prelude
+of death to follow—and was twice restrained by some invisible, some
+providential power. Falling repeatedly to the ground, the blazing brands
+and burning calumets forced him to rise. Thus tortured and fainting, the
+paternal eyes of Jogues still possessed tears of tenderest sympathy to
+shed for the sufferings of his fellow‐captive, Ahasistari, who, amidst his
+own sufferings, cried aloud in praise of the father’s courage and love of
+his children. The night was spent without food, and in the morning the
+voyage was resumed. While passing over the lake, again they met a Mohawk
+fleet, and again the victorious Mohawks must honor their countrymen by
+fresh tortures of the prisoners. On the next day, the ninth of the
+captivity, the flotilla reached the extremity of the lake, where the
+entire party landed. The prisoners, weakened and suffering with wounds and
+hunger, were now loaded with all the luggage, and, in this plight, forced
+to commence a four days’ journey by land. Some berries, gathered on the
+wayside, constituted their only food, and the exhausted father narrowly
+escaped being drowned in crossing the first river. On the eve of the
+Assumption of the Blessed Virgin, they reached the river near the Mohawk
+village. Here again the captives became the objects of cruel tortures for
+the amusement of the crowds swarming from the settlement to see them. “And
+as he ran the gauntlet, Jogues comforted himself with a vision of the
+glory of the Queen of Heaven,”(77) for it was the eve of her glorious
+Assumption into Heaven. Some Hurons, who met them at the river, exclaimed
+in compassion, “Frenchmen, you are dead!” Before going up to the village,
+Father Jogues was again cruelly beaten with clubs and sticks, especially
+on the head, which by its baldness excited the derision of the savages.
+Two remaining finger‐nails, which had escaped their impatient cruelty
+before, were now torn out with the roots. “Conscious that, if we withdrew
+ourselves from the number of the scourged, we withdrew from that of the
+children of God, we cheerfully presented ourselves,” were the words of the
+martyr himself, relating how he advanced to receive new tortures.
+
+The line of march was formed for the village, Father Jogues closing as
+before the procession. Again the scaffold was erected, again the heroic
+band ran the gauntlet in marching to the scaffold hill, and the signal for
+the tortures to begin was given by a chief, who struck each captive three
+times on the back with a club. An old man approached Father Jogues, and
+compelled an aged captive woman to sever his left thumb from his hand with
+a dull knife. Long and various were the tortures which Father Jogues and
+his companions now endured, and though exhausted from the loss of blood,
+he consoled them in their sufferings. As night approached, the prisoners
+were tied to stakes driven in the ground, and thus exposed to the
+maltreatment of the children, who threw burning coals upon them, “which
+hissed and burned in the writhing flesh, till they were extinguished
+there.”(78)
+
+On the following day the prisoners were led forth half naked through the
+broiling sun, to be exhibited and tortured in all the Mohawk towns. At the
+second village the same tortures were endured as at the first. On entering
+the last town the heart of Father Jogues was melted at the sight of a
+fresh band of Huron prisoners just brought in. Forgetting his own
+captivity and sufferings, he approached the captives with every expression
+of sympathy and kindness: he could not release their bodies from bondage;
+but he offered to their immortal souls the freedom of the Gospel. There
+was no water at hand with which to baptize these devoted captives; when,
+lo! the dews of heaven were supplied. An Indian at that anxious moment
+passed by with Indian corn, and threw a stalk at the father’s feet. As the
+freshly cut plant passed through the sunlight, dew‐drops upon the blades
+were revealed to the eager eyes of the missionary, who, gathering the
+precious drops into his hands, baptized two Hurons on the spot. A little
+brook they afterwards crossed supplied the saving water for the others.
+
+In this town, also, the tortures were repeated with many horrid additions.
+Father Jogues, ever tender and sympathetic for the sufferings of his
+converts, was compelled to look on, and see the fingers of one of his
+Hurons nearly sawed off with a rough shell, and then violently torn off
+with the sinews uncut. Father Jogues and his companion René Goupil were
+led to a cabin and ordered to sing. Availing themselves of the command,
+they devoutly chanted the Psalms of David. They were burned in several
+parts of their bodies. Then two poles were erected in the air, in the form
+of a cross, and Father Jogues was tied to it by cords of twisted bark,
+thus throwing the whole weight of his body upon his wounded and lacerated
+arms. He asked to be released in mercy, in order that he might prepare for
+death, which he thought would result from his tortures, but this was
+refused him. Begging pardon of God for having made such a request, he had
+already resigned himself to the mercies of heaven, when suddenly an Indian
+in the crowd, touched with compassion, rushed forward and cut the cords
+that bound him to the cross. During the night he was again tied to a stake
+driven in the ground, and his sufferings were prolonged without relief
+till morning. On the following day the prisoners were carried back to the
+second town they had entered. Here the council decided to spare the lives
+of the French for the present, and to put the Hurons to death.
+
+Father Jogues and René Goupil lingered in suffering, and almost at the
+point of death, for three weeks, at Gandawagué, now Caughnawaga, in New
+York. The Mohawks had concluded to send them back when convenient to Three
+Rivers. In the meantime, the Dutch settlers in New Netherland, who were
+allies of the Mohawks, heard that their Iroquois neighbors and friends had
+taken some European prisoners. These generous Dutch, headed by their
+minister, the worthy Dominie Megapolensis, took the matter in hand, and
+raised six hundred guilders for the ransom of the French prisoners.
+Accordingly Arendt Curler set out with this sum, accompanied by two
+burghers from Rensselaerswyck, now Albany, for the Mohawk castles. The
+treaty between the Dutch and the Mohawks was renewed, but neither money
+nor diplomacy could move the chiefs to deliver up the prisoners, whose
+importance they began now to perceive from the effort made for their
+release. All that the Dutch could obtain was a promise to send them back
+to Three Rivers.
+
+Afterwards, divisions arose among the savages as to what disposition
+should be made of Father Jogues and René. In the meantime their lives were
+suspended upon the capricious humors and passions of the cruel Mohawks.
+The master of the cabin on seeing this ordered a young brave to put René
+to death; that order was afterwards obeyed.
+
+After the death of René, Father Jogues remained among the Mohawks, the
+sole object of their barbarous cruelty and superstitious hatred. Amidst
+the countless sufferings he endured, his consolation consisted in prayer
+and visits of religion to the Huron prisoners. In his poverty he was rich
+in the possession of a volume containing one of the Epistles of S. Paul,
+and an indulgenced picture of S. Bruno. These, his only possessions, he
+carried always about his person.
+
+In the fall, he was obliged to accompany the tribe as a slave on a grand
+hunt, and then for two months inconceivable hardships and labors were his
+constant lot. When the chase was unproductive, he was accused as the demon
+of their ill success. When sacrifice was offered to the god Aireskoi, he
+refused to eat any of the food of the idolatrous sacrifice, and was
+thereupon repulsed and avoided as polluted and polluting; and every door
+was closed against him, food was denied him, and a shelter refused. After
+performing the menial and oppressive labors which they imposed upon him,
+he retired at night to his little oratory, with its roof of bark and floor
+of snow, to commune with his Heavenly Father, his only friend; even to
+that sacred spot, the arrows, clubs, and once the tomahawk, of his
+persecutors followed him. He was finally sent back to the village, loaded
+with venison, over a frozen country, thirty leagues in extent, and almost
+perished of cold on the way. But even such a journey possessed its
+consolations; for on the way, by an act of heroism, he saved an Indian
+woman and her infant from drowning, and, as the infant was on the point of
+expiring from its exposure and injuries, he poured the waters of
+regeneration on its head, and saved another soul for heaven.
+
+On arriving at the village, he was ordered to return over the same road to
+the hunting‐ground, but his repeated falls on the ice compelled him to
+abandon the journey and return to the village, to endure equal torments
+there. Obliged to become the nurse of one of the most inveterate of his
+enemies, who was lying devoured by a loathsome disease, the good Samaritan
+entered upon his task as a work of love, and for an entire month bestowed
+the most tender care and sympathetic attention upon his patient. In the
+spring of 1643, he was compelled to accompany a fishing party to a lake
+four days’ journey off, when he suffered over again the cruelties of the
+recent hunt. On the lake shore, as on the hunting‐grounds, his cross and
+little oratory of fir branches were his only consolations. His mode of
+life in these wildernesses is thus described by Bancroft: “On a hill apart
+he carved a long cross on a tree, and there, in the solitude, meditated
+the imitation of Christ, and soothed his grief by reflecting that he
+alone, in that vast region, adored the true God of earth and heaven.
+Roaming through the stately forests of the Mohawk Valley, he wrote the
+name of Jesus on the bark of trees, graved the cross, and entered into
+possession of these countries in the name of God—often lifting up his
+voice in a solitary chant.”
+
+Repeatedly during this period was the murderous tomahawk suspended over
+his head; and twice was he selected to be sacrificed to the manes of some
+Indian warrior who had gone on the hunt and had not returned. But his life
+was in the hands of an invisible Protector. A generous Indian matron
+adopted him as her son, in the place of her own son she had just lost; and
+now, when he mingled with the Mohawks as their brother, he spoke to them
+of God, heaven, eternity, and hell. Though he convinced them that his
+words were true, they were too much wedded to their idols to yield to the
+grace of conversion. On one occasion he was led out to be sacrificed to
+the manes of the braves who had gone on a war party, and, not having
+returned, were supposed to be lost; but before the ceremony proceeded too
+far, the warriors returned just in time to save his life. They brought
+with them some Abnaki prisoners whom they destined for the stake. Father
+Jogues secured the services of an interpreter, instructed them in the
+faith, and succeeded in converting several of them, whom he baptized at
+Easter.
+
+It was shortly after this that Father Jogues was compelled to witness the
+horrid spectacle of human sacrifice offered to the demon Aireskoi. How
+wonderful are the ways of divine Providence! for it was in the midst of
+this act, the lowest point in the scale of human degradation and of insult
+to God, that a human soul is regenerated by one of the Christian
+sacraments, and that soul is the victim itself of the superstitious rite.
+A woman was chosen for the victim, and was tied to the stake. The savages
+formed a line, and as they approached the stake each one did his share in
+burning, cutting, or otherwise torturing the unhappy victim. Father Jogues
+had previously instructed the woman. He took no part, of course, in this
+awful and wicked sacrifice, but he availed himself of an opportunity to
+press forward in the crowd, and as the victim bowed to receive the
+sacrament from his hands, the missionary poured the baptismal waters on
+her head, in the midst of the raging flames of the heathen sacrifice.
+
+An effort was now made by his friends in Canada to secure the release of
+Father Jogues. Some braves of the Sokoki tribe, living on the Connecticut,
+had been captured by the Algonquins, and were now led forth for torture.
+The French governor procured their liberation, committed them to the care
+of the hospital nuns, and, after their wounds were healed, sent them back
+to their own country, with a request that they would induce their tribe to
+send an embassy to their allies the Mohawks to intercede for the relief of
+Father Jogues. The embassy was accordingly sent, the Mohawks lit their
+council fires, the Sokoki presents were accepted, but the main question
+was parried, and finally the old promise to send him back to Three Rivers
+was the only result. Perceiving now more than ever the dignity and
+importance of their prisoner, the Mohawks led him forth in triumph to show
+their allies that even the powerful French nation was tributary to the
+Iroquois. This cruel journey, two hundred and fifty miles long, was over a
+rugged and barren country, and many were the sufferings our missionary had
+to endure. Yet this journey was not without its peculiar consolations to
+Father Jogues. On one occasion he baptized five dying infants; and as he
+passed through the cabins in search of souls, he heard the voice of a
+former benefactor, the Indian who had so generously cut loose the cords
+that bound him to the cross of logs hoisted in the air in the village of
+Tinniontiogen, crying to him from his bed of misery and death. Father
+Jogues embraced his benefactor with a burst of gratitude and sympathy.
+Unable to reward him with worldly goods or temporal relief, the father
+instructed him in the truths of eternal life, bestowed upon the willing
+convert the treasure of the faith, and shortly before his death sealed all
+with the sacrament of baptism.
+
+After his return to the village he was rushed upon one day by an
+infuriated savage, whose club laid him almost lifeless on the ground.
+Every day he was thus exposed to some imminent peril. His life was
+suspended upon the merest chance or savage caprice or passion. The good
+old woman who had adopted him, and whom he called his aunt, was his only
+friend in that vast region. She advised him to make his escape, but he
+believed it to be the will of God that he should remain there.
+
+In August, 1643, he had to accompany a portion of the tribe on a hunting
+and fishing party, during which he visited for the second time the Dutch
+at Rensselaerswyck, the present city of Albany. The inhabitants again made
+a generous effort to secure the liberation of Father Jogues, but their
+appeal to the savage Mohawk was in vain. It was here, too, amid the
+dangers and distractions that encompassed him at Rensselaerswyck, that he
+produced that beautiful monument of taste and learning, as well as of
+apostolic zeal and love, the relation of his captivity and sufferings to
+his superior, which has been so greatly admired for its pure and classic
+Latin. In this letter, he says: “I have baptized seventy since my
+captivity, children, and youth, and old men of five different tongues and
+nations, that men of every tribe, and tongue, and nation, might stand in
+the presence of the Lamb.”
+
+While engaged in helping the Iroquois to stretch their nets for fish, he
+heard of more Huron prisoners brought to the village, two of whom had
+already expired at the stake unbaptized. Obtaining the permission of his
+good aunt who had adopted him, he at once dropped the fish‐nets, and
+returned to the village in order that he might set his net for human
+souls. On his way to the village he passed through Rensselaerswyck. Van
+Curler insisted on his making his escape by flight, since certain death
+awaited him at the village, and offered a shelter and a passage on board
+of a ship destined first for Virginia and then for Bordeaux or Rochelle.
+It has already been related that Father Jogues had resolved to regard the
+Mohawk as his mission, he therefore hesitated to accept the generous offer
+of the Dutch, though inevitable death would soon remove him from that
+chosen field. But Van Curler and the minister of the settlement, John
+Megapolensis, pressed their appeal with such powerful arguments that the
+missionary promised to consider it, and asked one night for prayer and
+consultation with his soul and with God. After fervent supplication for
+the aid of heaven in deciding the matter with impartiality, and after much
+reflection, Father Jogues, knowing that if he returned to the village
+death would soon remove him from it, and convinced that his return to
+France or Canada would prove the only means of founding a regular mission
+in the Mohawk, resolved to attempt his escape, and went in the morning to
+announce his resolution to Van Curler and Megapolensis. They then arranged
+together the plan of escape. Returning to the custody of his guards, he
+accompanied them to their quarters. When they all retired at night to
+their barn to rest, the Iroquois slept around the father, in order to
+secure him closely within, while without the premises were guarded by
+ferocious watch‐dogs. In his first attempt early in the night, the dogs
+rushed upon him and tore his leg dreadfully with their teeth, and he was
+obliged to return into the barn. Towards daybreak a second attempt was
+more successful; the dogs were silenced; the prisoner quietly escaped over
+the fence, and ran limping and suffering with his lacerated limb fully a
+mile to the river where the ship lay. But here he found the bark sent by
+Van Curler for his escape lying high and dry and immovable on the beach,
+and the vessel was not within hailing distance. In these straitened
+circumstances, he had recourse to prayer. In making another effort to move
+the bark he seemed to be gifted with renewed strength, and soon the boat
+was afloat, and thus he succeeded alone in reaching the vessel. He was
+immediately concealed in the bottom of the hold, and a heavy box was
+placed over the hatch. In the filth of this narrow and unventilated place
+he remained two days and nights, suffering extremely from his wound, from
+hunger and the noisome air.
+
+Father Jogues was then carried into the settlement to remain until all was
+quiet and it was time to embark. He was confided to the care of a man who
+permitted him to be thrust into a miserable loft, where he remained six
+weeks crouched behind a hogshead as his only shelter, with scarcely food
+sufficient to keep him alive, enduring every discomfort, and exposed to
+detection and recapture by the Iroquois or Mohawks, who incessantly
+haunted the house.
+
+After six weeks thus spent, Father Jogues, accompanied by the minister,
+Dominie Megapolensis, took the first boat for New Amsterdam, as the city
+of New York was then called. The voyage lasted six weeks, during which
+Father Jogues became a great favorite with all on board. As they passed a
+little island in their route, the crew named it in honor of Father Jogues
+amid the discharge of cannon, and the Calvinist minister honored the
+Jesuit by contributing a bottle of wine to the festivities of the
+occasion. After an agreeable voyage, they arrived at New Amsterdam. The
+germ of the present monster city consisted then of a little fort
+garrisoned with sixty men, a governor’s house, a church, and the houses of
+four or five hundred men scattered over and around the entire Island of
+Manhattan. There were many different sects and nations represented there.
+The director‐general told Father Jogues that there were eighteen different
+languages spoken on the island. The Jesuit was enthusiastically received
+at New Amsterdam, for the people turned out in crowds to greet him. One of
+them, a Polish Lutheran, when he saw the mangled hands of Father Jogues,
+ran and threw himself at his feet to kiss his wounded hands, exclaiming,
+“O martyr of Christ! O martyr!” So practical, however, were the notions of
+the old Dutch inhabitants of the city about such matters, that they asked
+the missionary how much the company of New France would pay him for all he
+had suffered! Father Jogues made a vigilant search in New Amsterdam for
+Catholics. He found two: one, a Portuguese woman, with whom he could not
+converse, showed that she still clung to her faith by the pious pictures
+which were hanging round her room; the other, an Irishman, trading from
+Virginia, who availed himself of the father’s presence to go to his
+confession. It was from the latter that he learned that the English
+Jesuits had been driven from Maryland by the Puritan rulers of that
+colony, and had taken refuge in Virginia.
+
+He remained there three months altogether in the old Dutch colony.
+Receiving commendatory letters from William Kieft, the governor of New
+Netherland, he sailed from the majestic harbor of New Amsterdam on the 5th
+of November, 1643. The little vessel possessed no comforts or
+accommodations. The father’s only bed was a coil of rope on deck, where he
+received severe drenchings from the waves breaking over him. A furious
+storm drove the vessel in on the English coast, near Falmouth, which was
+then in possession of the king’s party: two parliamentary cruisers pursued
+the Dutch vessel, but she escaped and anchored at the wharf. The storm‐
+beaten crew went ashore to enjoy themselves, leaving only Father Jogues
+and another person on board, when the vessel was boarded by robbers, who
+pointed a pistol at the missionary’s throat and robbed him of his hat and
+coat. He appealed to a Frenchman, the master of a collier at the wharf,
+for relief, who took him on board his boat, gave him a sailor’s hat and
+coat, all his own poverty could spare, and a passage to France. In this
+plight, this celebrated missionary, whose fame filled all France, landed
+on his native shore on Christmas morning, at a point between Brest and St.
+Pol de Leon.
+
+He borrowed a more decent hat and cloak from a peasant near the shore, and
+hastened to the nearest chapel, to make his thanksgiving and unite in the
+glorious solemnity of Christmas. As it was early he had the consolation of
+approaching the tribunal of penance, and of receiving the Holy Eucharist,
+for the first time in sixteen months. The touching story of his captivity
+and sufferings among the savages subdued their hearts and drew floods of
+sympathizing tears from the peasants whose hospitality he shared. They
+offered him all they had to forward him on his journey. A good merchant of
+Rennes, then passing on his way, heard the thrilling incidents he related,
+and saw his mangled hands: touched with compassion, he took the missionary
+under his care, and paid his expenses to Rennes, where he arrived on the
+eve of the Epiphany. He went to the college of his order in that city, and
+as soon as it was known that he was from Canada, all the members of the
+community gathered round him to ask him if he knew Father Jogues, and
+whether he was yet alive and in captivity. He then disclosed his name, and
+showed the marks of his sufferings; all then pressed forward to embrace
+their saintly brother, and kiss his glorious wounds.
+
+He reposed for a few days at the college at Rennes, and then pushed on
+towards Paris, to place himself again at the disposal of his superior,
+humbly and modestly intimating a desire, however, to be sent back to his
+mission in America. His fame had long preceded him, and, when he arrived
+at the capital, the faithful pressed forward in crowds to venerate him and
+kiss his wounds. The pious queen‐mother coveted the same happiness, and
+he, whom we saw so recently the captive and slave of brutal savages, is
+now honored at the court of the first capital of Christendom. But the
+humility of Father Jogues took alarm at the honors paid to him. Throwing
+himself at his superior’s feet, he entreated that he might be sent back to
+the wilderness from which he had just escaped. The superior consented; but
+an obstacle here presented itself. So great were the injuries inflicted
+upon his hands by the Mohawks that he was canonically disqualified from
+offering up the holy sacrifice of the Mass. Application for the proper
+dispensation was made to the Sovereign Pontiff, upon a statement of the
+facts. Innocent XI. was moved by the recital, and, with an inspired
+energy, exclaimed, “_Indignum esse Christi martyrem, Christi non bibere
+sanguinem_”—“It were unjust that a martyr of Christ should not drink the
+blood of Christ!” Pronounced by the Vicar of Christ on earth to be a
+martyr, though living, he now goes to seek a double martyrdom in death. In
+the spring he started for Rochelle, and F. Ducreux, the historian of
+Canada, sought the honor of accompanying him thither.
+
+He embarked from Rochelle for Canada, where he arrived on the 16th May,
+1644. He found the Iroquois war still raging with unabated fury, and the
+colony of New France reduced to the verge of ruin. When his brethren in
+Canada heard and saw how cruelly Father Jogues had been treated in the
+Mohawk, and that his timely flight alone had saved his life, they felt the
+saddest apprehensions about the fate of Father Bressani, who had also
+fallen into the hands of the Iroquois. Finding it impossible to return to
+Lake Huron, Father Jogues joined Father Buteux in the duties of the holy
+ministry at the new town of Montreal, to which its founders gave the name
+of the City of Mary, in consecrating it to the Mother of God. It was
+during their sojourn together that the superior endeavored to draw from
+Father Jogues, by entreaty, and even by command, the circumstances of his
+sufferings in captivity; but his humility and modesty were so great that
+it was with the greatest difficulty that anything concerning himself could
+be drawn from him. In this spirit he avoided all the honors that were
+pressed upon him. After his return to Canada, he was so desirous of being
+unknown and unhonored that he ceased signing his name, and even his
+letters which he addressed to his superior after his return to Canada are
+without signatures.
+
+Some Mohawk prisoners, kindly treated by the Governor of Canada and
+released, returned to their country, and disposed the Mohawks to make
+peace. A solemn deputation of their chiefs came to Three Rivers, and were
+received on the 12th of July, 1645, with great ceremony and pomp. Father
+Jogues was present, though unseen by the deputies; so was Father Bressani,
+who, having passed the ordeal of a most cruel captivity among the Mohawks,
+had been ransomed by the Dutch of New York, sent to France, and had now,
+like Father Jogues, returned to New France to suffer again. When all was
+silent, the orator of the deputies arose, and opened the session with the
+usual march and chants. He explained, as he proceeded to deliver the
+presents, the meaning of each. Belt after belt of wampum was thrown at the
+governor’s feet, until at last he held forth one in his hand, beautifully
+decorated with the shell‐work of the Mohawk Valley. “This,” he exclaimed,
+“is for the two black‐gowns. We wished to bring them both back; but we
+have not been able to accomplish our design. One escaped from our hands in
+spite of us, and the other absolutely desired to be given up to the Dutch.
+We yielded to his desire. We regret not their being free, but our
+ignorance of their fate. Perhaps even now that I name them they are
+victims of cruel enemies or swallowed up in the waves. The Mohawk never
+intended to put them to death.”
+
+The French had little faith in the sincerity of the Mohawk, yet they
+wanted peace. The past was forgiven, the missionaries buried the
+remembrance of their wrongs with the hatchet of the Mohawk, and peace was
+concluded. The deputies returned to their castles to get the sachems to
+ratify the peace, and Father Jogues to Montreal to prepare himself for the
+terrible ordeal which he foresaw a Mohawk mission would open to him. His
+preparation consisted in prayer, meditations, and other spiritual
+exercises. The peace was ratified; the Indians asked for missionaries; the
+French resolved to open a mission among them, and Father Jogues was
+selected for the perilous enterprise. When he received the letter of his
+superior informing him of his selection, Father Jogues joyfully accepted
+the appointment, and prepared at once to depart. His letter in reply to
+the superior contains these heroic words: “Yes, father, I will all that
+God wills, and I will it at the peril of a thousand lives. Oh! how I
+should regret the loss of so glorious an occasion, when it depends but
+upon me that some souls may be saved. I hope that his goodness, which did
+not forsake me in the hour of need, will aid me yet. He and I are able yet
+to overcome all the difficulties which can oppose our project.”
+
+On arriving at Three Rivers, he ascertained that he and the Sieur Bourdon
+were to go to the Mohawk castle, in the first instance, merely as
+ambassadors, to make sure of the peace. They departed on this dangerous
+embassy on the 16th of May, 1646, and during their absence public prayers,
+offered for their return, testified the fears felt for their safety. As
+they were about to start, an Algonquin thus addressed Father Jogues:
+“There is nothing more repulsive at first than this doctrine, that seems
+to annihilate all that man holds dearest, and as your long gown preaches
+it as much as your lips, you would do better to go at first in a short
+one.” Thereupon the prudent ambassador parted for the time with the habit
+of his order, and substituted a more diplomatic costume.
+
+They were accompanied by four Mohawks and two Algonquins. After ascending
+the Sorel, and gliding through the beautiful islands of Lake Champlain,
+they arrived at the portage leading to the Lake Andiatarocté on the 29th
+of May, which was the eve of Corpus Christi. Here Father Jogues paused,
+and named the lake Saint Sacrament; but by a less Christian taste that
+beautiful name, given in honor of the King of kings, has since yielded to
+one given in honor of one of the kings of earth.(79) They suffered greatly
+for food on the way, but obtained a supply of provisions at Ossarane, a
+fishing station on the Hudson, supposed to be Saratoga. Then, gliding down
+the Hudson, they came to Fort Orange, where Father Jogues again, in the
+most earnest and sincere terms, expressed his deep gratitude to his
+liberators, the Dutch, whose outlay in his behalf he had already
+reimbursed to them from Europe. Not satisfied with expressing his thanks,
+Father Jogues endeavored to bestow upon his friend, Dominie Megapolensis,
+the greatest of possible returns—the true faith. He wrote from this place
+a letter to the minister, in which he used every argument that his well‐
+stored mind or the unbounded charity of his heart could suggest to reclaim
+him to the bosom of that ancient church which his fathers had so
+unfortunately left.
+
+After a short repose at Albany, they proceeded to the Mohawk, and arrived
+at the nearest town on the 7th of June. A general assembly of the chiefs
+was called to ratify the peace, and crowds came from all sides; some
+through curiosity to see, and others with a desire to honor, the untiring
+and self‐sacrificing Ondessonk. Father Jogues made a speech appropriate to
+the occasion and the purposes of his visits, which the assembled chiefs
+heard with great enthusiasm; presents were exchanged, and peace was
+finally and absolutely ratified. The Wolf family in particular, being that
+in which Father Jogues had been adopted, exclaimed, “The French shall
+always find among us friendly hearts and an open cabin, and thou,
+Ondessonk, shalt always have a mat to lie on and fire to keep thee warm.”
+Father Jogues endeavored to impress favorably the representatives of other
+tribes who were there by presents and friendly words. Then remembering his
+sacred character as a minister of God, he visited and consoled the Huron
+captives, especially the sick and dying; he heard the confessions of some,
+and baptized several expiring infants. Before departing Father Jogues
+desired to leave behind his box containing articles most necessary for the
+mission, which he was soon to return and commence among them; the Mohawks,
+however, dreading some evil from the box, objected at first, but the
+father opened it, and showed them all it contained, and finally, as he
+supposed, overcame their superstitious fears, and the box was left behind
+among them.
+
+The ambassadors and their suite set out on their return, on the 16th of
+June, bearing their baggage on their backs. They also constructed their
+own canoes at Lake Superior, and, having crossed the lake in safety,
+arrived at Three Rivers, after a passage of thirteen days, on the feast of
+SS. Peter and Paul, to the infinite joy and relief of all their friends.
+
+On the 28th day of September, Father Jogues was on his way to the Mohawk,
+accompanied by Lalande, a young Frenchman from Dieppe, an Iroquois of
+Huron birth, and some other Hurons. As they advanced, tidings of war on
+the part of the Mohawks became more frequent, and the Indian escorts began
+to desert. They passed Lake Champlain in safety, and had advanced within
+two days’ journey of the Mohawk when a war‐party, marching on Fort
+Richelieu, came upon them. The savages rushed upon them, stripped Father
+Jogues and Lalande of their effects, bound them as prisoners, and turning
+back led them to the village of Gandawagué,(80) the scene of Father
+Jogues’ first captivity and sufferings. Here they were received with a
+shower of blows, amid loud cries for their heads, that they might be set
+up on the palisades.
+
+Towards evening, on the 18th of October, some of the savages of the Bear
+family came and invited Father Jogues to sup in their cabin. Scarcely had
+the shadow of the black‐gown darkened the entrance of their lodge, when a
+concealed arm struck a well‐aimed blow with the murderous tomahawk, and
+the Christian martyr fell lifeless to the ground. The generous Kiotsaeton,
+who had just arrived as a deputy of a council called to decide on his
+case, rushed to save him, but the blade had done its work, and now spent
+its remaining force by inflicting a deep wound in the arm of that noble
+chief. The head of Father Jogues was severed from his body, and raised
+upon the palisade. The next day the faithful Lalande, and a no less
+faithful Huron, shared the same fate.
+
+Father Jogues was in his fortieth year when he received the fatal stroke.
+When the tidings of his death arrived, every tongue in Canada and in
+France was zealous in the recital of his many virtues, and in praise of
+his glorious death. His zeal for the faith, his courage in danger, his
+humility, his love of prayer and suffering, his devotion to the cross,
+were conspicuous among the many exalted virtues that adorned his life and
+death. While his brethren lamented the loss the missions had sustained,
+they envied him the crown he had won. “We could not,” says Father
+Ragueneau, “bring ourselves to offer for Father Jogues the prayers for the
+dead. We offered up the adorable sacrifice, indeed, but it was in
+thanksgiving for the favors which he had received from God. The laity and
+the religious houses here partook our sentiments as to this happy death,
+and more are found to invoke his memory than there are to pray for his
+repose.”
+
+
+
+
+Doña Ramona.
+
+
+From The Spanish.
+
+In an empire whose name history has failed to record, there lived in a
+miserable stable a poor laborer and his wife. Juan and Ramona were their
+names, though Juan was better known by the nickname “Under present
+circumstances,” which they gave him because in season or out of season
+that phrase was continually dropping from his lips. Juan and Ramona were
+so wretchedly poor that they would have had no roof to cover them unless a
+laborer of the province of Micomican had taken pity upon them, and given
+them a hut to live in, which in other days had served as a stable, and was
+now his property.
+
+“We are badly enough off in a stable,” said Juan: “but we ought to conform
+ourselves with our lot, since under present circumstances God, though he
+was God, lived in a stable when he made himself man.”
+
+“You are right,” replied Ramona.
+
+So both worked away, if not happy, at least resigned—Juan in going out day
+after day to gain his daily reward of a couple of small pieces of money,
+and Ramona in taking care of the house, if house be a proper term to apply
+to a stable.
+
+The emperor was very fond of living in the country, and had many palaces
+of different kinds in the province of Micomican. One day Juan was working
+in a kitchen garden near the road, when far away he saw the carriage of
+the emperor coming at a rate almost equal to that of a soul that the devil
+was trying to carry off.
+
+“I’ll bet you,” said Juan, “that the horses have escaped from his majesty,
+and some misfortune is going to happen! It would be a great pity, for
+under present circumstances an emperor is worth an empire.”
+
+Juan was not mistaken. The emperor’s horses had escaped, and the emperor
+was yelling:
+
+“God take pity on me! I’m going to break my neck over one of those
+precipices! Isn’t there a son of a gun to save me? To whoever throws
+himself at the head of these confounded horses, I’ll give whatever he
+asks, though it be the very shirt on my back.”
+
+But no one dared throw himself at the horses’ heads; for they tore along
+at such a furious rate that to rush at them was to rush into eternity.
+
+Juan, enraged at the cowardice of the other workmen, and moved by his love
+for the emperor as well as his natural propensity to do good without
+looking at the person to whom he did it, threw himself at the horses’
+heads, and succeeded in stopping the coach, to the admiration of the
+emperor himself, who at that moment would not have given a brass farthing
+for his life.
+
+“Ask whatever you like,” said the emperor to him, “for everything appears
+to me small as a recompense to the man who has rendered me so signal a
+service.”
+
+“Sire!” said Juan to him, “I, under present circumstances, am a poor day
+laborer, and the day that I don’t gain a couple of _pesetas_ my wife and I
+have to fast. So, if your majesty will only assure me my day’s labor
+whether it rains or whether it is fine weather, my wife and I will sing
+our lives away in happiness, for we are people content with very little.”
+
+“That’s pretty clear. Well, go along, it’s granted. The day that you have
+nothing to do anywhere else, go to one of my palaces, whichever you like,
+and occupy yourself there in whatever way you please.”
+
+“Thank you, sire!”
+
+“What! No; no reason for thanks, man. That is a mere nothing.”
+
+The emperor went on his road happy enough, and Juan went on his, thinking
+of the great joy he was about to give his wife when he returned home at
+night, and told her that he had his day’s work secured for the rest of his
+life whether it rained or was fine weather.
+
+In fact, his wife was greatly rejoiced when he carried her the good news.
+They supped, and went to bed in peace and in the grace of God, and Juan
+slept like one of the blessed; but Ramona passed the whole night turning
+about in the bed like one who has some trouble or desire that will not let
+him sleep.
+
+“Do you know what I have been thinking the whole night long, Juan?” said
+Ramona, the following morning.
+
+“What?”
+
+“That yesterday you were a fool to ask so little from the emperor.”
+
+“Indeed! What more had I to ask?”
+
+“That he would give us a little house to live in, something more suitable
+and decent than this wretched stable.”
+
+“You are right, woman; but now there is no help for it.”
+
+“Perhaps there may be.”
+
+“How?”
+
+“Look here; go and see the emperor, and ask him.”
+
+“Yes; now is the time to go on such an errand!”
+
+“Go you shall, and quickly, too!”
+
+“But, woman, don’t get angry. My goodness! what a temper you have! Well,
+well; I will go, and God grant his majesty does not send me off with a
+flea in my ear, although, under present circumstances, he is a very open‐
+hearted, outspoken gentleman.”
+
+Well, Juan set out for the palace of the emperor; and the emperor granted
+him an audience immediately on his arrival.
+
+“Hallo, Juan!” said his majesty. “What brings you this way, man?”
+
+“Sire!” replied Juan, twirling and twirling the hat which he held in his
+hand, “my wife, under present circumstances, is as good as gold; but, you
+see, the stable that we live in is gone to rack and ruin, and we wish to
+get it out of our sight. So she said to me this morning: ‘If your majesty,
+who is so kind, would only give us a little house, something better than
+the one we have, who dare sneeze at us then?’ ”
+
+“Does your wife want nothing more than that? Well, it’s granted. This very
+moment I will give orders that they place the little white house at her
+disposal. Go into the dining‐room, and take a mouthful and a drop of
+something; and, instead of going afterwards to the stable, go to the
+little white house, and there you will find your wife already installed.”
+
+Juan returned thanks to the emperor for his latest kindness, and, passing
+on to the dining‐room, filled himself with ham and wine.
+
+Our friend commenced his journey home, and, when he arrived at the white
+house, his wife rushed out to receive him with tears of joy.
+
+And indeed it was very natural for poor Ramona to find herself so merry,
+for the little white house was a perfect jewel. It occupied the summit of
+a gentle acclivity, whence the whole beauty of the plain was spread out
+before it. A large Muscatel vine covered the whole of the porch, and
+beneath it there were seats and little plots of pinks and roses. The
+apartments of the house were a little drawing‐room, very white, and clean,
+and pretty, with its chairs, its cupboard, and its looking‐glass; an
+alcove with its bed, so soft and clean and beautiful that the emperor
+himself might have slept in it; a little kitchen with all its
+requirements, among which were included the utensils, which shone like
+gold; and a little bewitching dining‐room, with four chairs, a table, and
+a sideboard. To the dining‐room there was a fairy entrance, adorned
+without by an arc of flowers, and through this entrance you passed into a
+garden, where there were fruits, and flowers, and vegetables, and a small
+army of chickens clucked; and every egg they laid was as big as Juan’s
+fist.
+
+When night came on, Juan and Ramona took their supper like a couple of
+princes in their little dining‐room, and soon after laid them down in
+their beautiful bed. They both slept well, particularly Juan, who stirred
+neither hand nor foot the whole night through.
+
+Ramona began to find fault the very next day, and Juan noticed that every
+night her sleep was more disturbed.
+
+“Woman, what the devil is the matter with you, that all night long you are
+twisting like a reel?” asked Juan, one morning. “Why, there are no fleas
+here as there were in the stable.”
+
+“Fleas hinder my sleep very little.”
+
+“Well, then, what hinders it, woman?”
+
+“What hinders it? Your stupidity in asking the emperor so little hinders
+it.”
+
+“In the name of the Father, and of the Son!... And you still think it
+little that I have asked, and he granted us?”
+
+“Yes, indeed I do. This little house is so small that one can scarcely
+turn in it; and if to‐morrow or some other day we have children, what
+shall we do with them in a hut like this?”
+
+“Say what you like about it, there is no help for it now.”
+
+“Perhaps there may be.”
+
+“And how, I should like to know?”
+
+“Going back and seeing his majesty, and telling him to give us a larger
+house, of course.”
+
+“Go to Jericho, woman. You don’t catch me going on an errand of that
+kind!”
+
+“Well, go you shall, then; or we’ll see who is master here.”
+
+“But, wife, don’t you see that my very face would drop from me with
+shame?”
+
+“Now, that’s enough of talk on the matter. All you have to do is, run
+along to the palace as fast as you can, if you care to have a quiet time
+of it.”
+
+“Well, well; since you wish it, I’ll go.”
+
+Juan, who did not possess an ounce of will of his own—a thing which is the
+greatest misfortune that can befall a husband who is not blessed with such
+a wife as God ordained for him—set out once more on his road towards the
+palace of the emperor.
+
+“Indeed,” said he to himself, with more fear than shame, “it is very
+possible he will send me down‐stairs head foremost, because it is only
+natural that this abuse of his good‐nature will prove too much, even for
+him. And it will serve me right for my unfortunate weakness of character.”
+
+Juan’s fears were not realized. So soon as he sought an audience with his
+majesty it was granted, and the emperor asked him, with a smiling face:
+
+“How goes it at the little white house?”
+
+“Not badly, sire!”
+
+“And your wife, how does she find herself there?”
+
+“Not badly, sire, but your majesty knows what the women are. Give ’em an
+inch, they’ll take an ell. My wife, under present circumstances, hasn’t a
+flaw in her; but she says that, if to‐morrow or the day after we have
+youngsters, we shall all be crowded there like bees in a bottle.”
+
+“You are right. So she wants, of course, a house a little larger?”
+
+“You’ve just hit it, sire!”
+
+“Well, turn into the dining‐room till they give you a snack of something;
+and, instead of returning to the white house, go to the Azure Palace,
+where you will find your wife installed with the attendance befitting
+those who live in a palace.”
+
+Juan returned the emperor thanks for his great goodness, and, after
+stuffing himself till he looked like a ball in the dining‐room, off he
+set, as happy as could be, to the Azure Palace, which was one of those
+that the emperor had in that district.
+
+The Azure Palace was neither very large nor furnished with great wealth;
+but it was very beautiful and adorned with becoming elegance. A servant in
+livery received Juan at the door and conducted him to the apartment of the
+lady. The lady was Ramona, whom her maid had just finished dressing in one
+of the beautiful robes which she found in her new dwelling. Juan could do
+nothing but open his mouth and stare in amazement at seeing his wife in
+such majestic attire.
+
+Juan and Ramona feared they would go mad when they found themselves lords
+of a palace, well fitted, elegant, and waited on by four servants: namely,
+a coachman, a footman, a maid, and a cook.
+
+“Take off that clown’s dress,” said Ramona to Juan. “Aren’t you ashamed to
+show yourself in such a trim before our own servants?”
+
+“This is a new start,” said Juan, astonished at the sally of his wife. “So
+I, who, under present circumstances, have passed all my life in digging
+the earth, and things even worse than that, must feel ashamed of the
+clothes I have worn all my life long!”
+
+“But, you stupid head,” replied Ramona, “if you have costume corresponding
+to your rank, why didn’t you put it on?”
+
+“My rank!... Come, this woman’s head is turned.”
+
+“Juan, go to your apartment and change your things, and don’t try my
+patience so much, for you know already that my temper will not stand too
+great a trial.”
+
+“Well, there’s no need to put yourself out, woman. Here I’m going now,”
+said Juan, turning to the room from which he saw Ramona come out.
+
+“Blockhead!” said she, catching hold of him and showing him another room,
+“this apartment is mine, and that is yours.”
+
+“Hallo! this is another surprise. So my wife’s room is not mine also?”
+
+“No; that is only among common folk; but in people of our rank no.”
+
+Juan gave up the dispute, and, entering the room which she had pointed out
+as his, found therein a wardrobe with a quantity of fine changes befitting
+a gentleman, and came out again transformed into a milord.
+
+There passed fifteen days since Juan and Ramona came to live in the Azure
+Palace, and Ramona grew day by day more captious, and slept less and less
+every night.
+
+“What the deuce ails you? One would think the ants were at you,” said Juan
+to her, one morning.
+
+“What ails me is that I have the biggest fool for a husband that ever ate
+bread.”
+
+“Hey for the sweet tempers! So you are not yet content with the sweet
+little fig that your husband gathered for you?”
+
+“No, sir, I am not. One must be a dolt like you to content herself with
+what we have, when we might have much more only for the asking.”
+
+“But, woman alive, have you lost your senses? Can the emperor grant us
+more than he has granted us, or do we need more to make us happy?”
+
+“Yes, he can give us more, and we need it.”
+
+“Explain yourself, and the devil take the explanation, for you’re going to
+drive me mad with your ambition.”
+
+“Explain myself! I’ll explain myself, and very clearly, too; for, thank
+God, there are no hairs on my tongue to prevent me speaking to anybody,
+even to the emperor himself. To make you happy, all that is wanting is
+what common folk want—a good table where you may stuff yourself with
+turkey all the day long; but for us who have higher aims, we want
+something more than chunks of meat and wine that would make an ox dance a
+hornpipe. You can swell yourself out and look big when you walk out here,
+and hear them calling you Don Juan; but as for me, I could eat myself with
+rage when they call me Doña Ramona.”
+
+“Well, and isn’t it better for them to call us that than Juan and Ramona,
+as they used to call us before? What more do you want, woman?”
+
+“I want them to call me lady marchioness.”
+
+“Have you lost your ears, Ramona? Now I tell you, and tell you again, that
+that wicked ambition of yours has deprived you of your senses.”
+
+“Look here, Juan, you and I are not going into disputes and obstinacy. You
+know me well enough already, or if you don’t you ought to, to be certain
+that it doesn’t take long for my nose to itch. I want to be no less than
+the Marchioness of Radishe and the Countess of Cabbidge, who at every turn
+fill their mouths with their grand titles, and, when they meet one, don’t
+seem to have time to say with their drawling affectation, ‘Adios, Doña
+Ramona.’ Now, since the emperor has told you, when you saved his life,
+that you might ask him even for the shirt that he had on his back, go and
+see him, and ask him to make us Marquises.”
+
+“Go and ask him if he has a head on his shoulders, why don’t you say? But
+there’s enough about it. Even in fun I don’t like to hear such nonsense.”
+
+“Juan, don’t provoke me; take care that I don’t send you with a flea in
+your ear.”
+
+“But, woman alive, however much of your husband’s breeches you may wear,
+could you even imagine that I was going to agree to this new start of
+yours?”
+
+“I bet you, you will agree.”
+
+“I tell you I am not going again to see the emperor.”
+
+“Go you shall, though you have to go on your head.”
+
+“But, wife, don’t be a fool—”
+
+“Come, come; less talk, and run along.”
+
+“Well, I’m going, then, since you are so anxious about it. The saints
+protect me, if I don’t deserve to be shot for this chicken‐hearted
+weakness of character!”
+
+Juan took the road to the court, and solicited a new audience with the
+emperor. Though he took it for certain that his majesty would send him to
+Old Nick if he did not throw him to him over the balcony, he found that
+his majesty was very ready to grant him an audience.
+
+“Sire, your majesty will pardon so many impertinences—” he stammered out,
+full of shame, when he drew near the emperor.
+
+“Why, man, don’t be ashamed and a fool,” interrupted his majesty kindly.
+“Well, how goes it in the Azure Palace?”
+
+“Beautifully, sire.”
+
+“And how is that little rib of yours, eh?”
+
+“Who—she? Oh! very well, under present circumstances.”
+
+“And content with her lot? Is it not so?”
+
+“Well, as for that, sire! Well, your majesty knows what the women are.
+Their mouths are like a certain place I wouldn’t mention before your
+majesty, always open, and there’s no getting at the bottom of it.”
+
+“Well, and what does the good Doña Ramona ask now?”
+
+“What, sire? But there—one is ashamed to say it.”
+
+“Go on, man; out with it, and don’t be bashful. To the man that saved my
+life I’d give anything, even the crown I wear.”
+
+“Well, then, sire! She wants to be a marchioness.”
+
+“A marchioness! Is that all? Then from this instant she is the Marchioness
+of Marville.”
+
+“Thank you, sire.”
+
+“Keep the thanks for your wife; and look into the dining‐room to see if
+there is anything to lay hands on. And when you go back you will find your
+wife already installed in the palace belonging to her title, for the Azure
+Palace is not good enough for marquises.”
+
+Juan passed into the dining‐room, and, after running the danger of
+bursting, he made his way for the palace of Marville. The palace of
+Marville was not such a very great wonder as its name might lead one to
+believe; but, for all that, one might very well pass his life in it!
+
+A crowd of footmen and porters received Juan at the gates of the palace,
+addressing him as my lord marquis; and Juan, for all his modesty, could
+not but feel a little inflated with such a reception and such a title.
+
+But there was nothing to hold the pride of his wife (though one might be
+as big as the bell of Toledo, under which one day there sat down seven
+tailors and a shoemaker) at hearing herself called by her maids lady
+marchioness here, and lady marchioness there.
+
+“Well, so you are at last content, wife?” said Juan to her.
+
+“Yes, of course, I am. And indeed it was very provoking to hear one’s self
+called Doña Ramona, short like, as though one were only the wife of the
+apothecary or the surgeon. You see the truth of what I have said; if one
+has only to open her mouth in order to be a marchioness, why shouldn’t
+she? Now you see that his majesty did not eat you for asking such a
+reasonable thing.”
+
+“Well, do you know, now, that it cost me something to ask it of him?”
+
+“Ah! get out of that; men are good for nothing.”
+
+“But it gave me more courage when his majesty said to me: ‘Don’t be
+bashful, man; for to the man that saved my life I’d give even the crown I
+wear.’ ”
+
+“Whew! so he said that to you?”
+
+“As sure as I’m here.”
+
+“Then why didn’t you ask him more?”
+
+“There we are again! What more had I to ask?”
+
+“You are right; for, as somebody said, ‘there are more days than long
+sausages,’ and
+
+
+    ‘A horse and a friend
+    No work can spend.’ ”
+
+
+On the following day the Marquis and Marchioness of Marville took a turn
+in their grandest coach, and it was a sight to see how they rolled along,
+at every hour in the day, all around those parts, the very wheels seeming
+to say envy! envy! to the Marchioness of Radishe and the Countess of
+Cabbidge. Some little trouble took place on account of the actions and
+complaints of the country folk, who prevented them from passing in their
+coach over this and that road, or by this and that property. But the
+marchioness quite forgot all these annoyances when, for example, at
+meeting the wife of the apothecary or surgeon, she said to them from her
+coach wherein she reclined in all her glory, “Adios, Doña Fulana,” and the
+other answered her, trotting along on foot, “Good‐by, my lady
+marchioness.”
+
+After some time the marquis thought he noticed that his wife was not
+perfectly happy, because he found her every day more capricious, and she
+never slept quietly.
+
+One morning, when the day was already advanced, the marquis slept away
+like a dormouse, and the marchioness, who had passed a more restless and
+sleepless night than ever, lay awake at his side impatiently waiting for
+him to awake.
+
+“S. Swithin! what a sleeper!” exclaimed the marchioness; and, no longer
+able to restrain her impatience, she gave her husband a tremendous pinch,
+and said, “Wake up, brute.”
+
+“Oh! ten thousand d——!” yelled the marquis.
+
+“Are you not ashamed to sleep so much?”
+
+“Ashamed! of something so natural? More ashamed should the one be who does
+not sleep, for sleeplessness bespeaks an unquiet conscience. What the
+devil is the matter with you that you have not ceased the whole night from
+turning and twisting about?”
+
+“Yes, indeed, if one only had a soul as broad‐shouldered as you.”
+
+“I don’t understand you, woman.”
+
+“Well, then, you shall understand me, blockhead though you are. Now, tell
+me, Juan, an emperor is greater than a king?”
+
+“Why shouldn’t he be?”
+
+“That is to say, that emperors can make kings?”
+
+“I think so. For instance, suppose his majesty the emperor wished to say
+to us, ‘Ha, my good friends the Marquis and Marchioness of Marville, I
+convert the province of Micomican, which belongs to me, into a kingdom,
+and I make you the monarchs of my new kingdom,’ I believe nobody could
+hinder it.”
+
+“Very well, then; I wish his majesty to say and do this at your petition.”
+
+The very house seemed to fall atop of Juan at hearing this from his wife;
+but this latest caprice of Ramona was so absurd that he had courage to
+hope in its all being a joke.
+
+“Don’t you think his majesty would give the person a nice slap in the face
+who was so impudent and barefaced as to go to him with such a petition as
+this?” he said.
+
+“If you go, he will not; since he has said that he cannot deny even his
+crown to the man who saved his life. So go along, ducky, hurry and see his
+majesty.”
+
+“But you mean this?”
+
+“Why shouldn’t I mean it? I have a nice temper for jokes! I want to be
+queen, in order to let those little folks know their proper places, who
+pass their lives in digging the earth and eating potatoes, and have the
+impudence to dare face gentlefolk who condescend to pass wherever they
+please.”
+
+“Well, well, now it’s clear that you have lost your wits altogether!”
+
+“What you are going to lose, since you have no wits, is your teeth, with a
+slap in the face, if you don’t make haste and hurry off to the court.”
+
+“I’d lose my head before I’d commit such an absurdity. There. I’ve given
+way enough already.”
+
+“Indeed! Then from this day forward know that you have no longer a wife.
+This is my room, and you shall never set foot in it again, nor I in
+yours.”
+
+“But, woman!”
+
+“No, no; remember we are strangers to each other.”
+
+“Come, don’t be obstinate, my own Ramonita.”
+
+“Don’t I tell you, sir, that all is over between us?”
+
+“Now, look here, pigeon.”
+
+“Stop your prate!”
+
+“The dev—! Well, come, you shall be satisfied; I will go and see his
+majesty, and tell him that you want to be queen, though I know he will
+shoot me on the spot.”
+
+Ramona bestowed a caress on her husband in reward for his consent, and our
+good Juan made his way to the court cursing his own foolish weakness of
+character.
+
+Contrary to his expectations, the emperor hastened to grant him an
+audience, and received him with the accustomed smile.
+
+“Well, marquis, what is it?” he asked.
+
+“What ought it to be, sire? A fresh impertinence.”
+
+“Come, out with it man, and don’t be bashful. Something concerning the
+marchioness, eh?”
+
+“You’ve hit it again, sire. These foolish women are never content.”
+
+“Well, what does yours want?”
+
+“Nothing, sire. She says, would it please your majesty to make her queen?”
+
+“Queen! nothing more than that? Well, she is queen already, then. Now, go
+into the dining‐room, and see if there is anything there you can destroy;
+and, instead of returning to the palace of Marville, go to the palace of
+the Crown, where you will find your wife installed as becomes the Queen of
+Micomican.”
+
+Juan outdid himself in thanks and courtesies, and, after treating himself
+in the dining‐rooms right royally, made his way home. On his arrival at
+the palace of the Crown, a salvo of artillery announced his coming. The
+troops were drawn up around the palace, where he entered to the sound of
+the Royal March, and amid the _vivas_ of the people, who became mad in the
+presence of the husband of their new sovereign.
+
+Her Majesty, the Queen Doña Ramona the First, was holding a levée at the
+moment when her august spouse arrived at the palace, and he, seating
+himself by her side, gave also his royal hand to kiss; but it was so dirty
+that as many as kissed it hurried out of the chamber spitting. To be king,
+it is necessary to keep the hands very clean.
+
+The King and Queen of Micomican amused themselves mightily during the
+first weeks of their reign: so that all was feasting and rejoicing in
+celebration of their happy coming to the throne. But so soon as the
+festival passed, the Queen Doña Ramona began to grow sad and weary.
+
+The king summoned the chief physician of the court, and held a deep
+consultation with him.
+
+“Man alive,” said he to him, “I have summoned you in order to see what the
+devil you have to say to me touching the sorrow and evil state in which I
+have noticed my august spouse to be for some time past. She is always
+turning and twisting about in her bed, so that she neither sleeps herself
+nor lets me sleep, and the worst part of it is, that every day she is
+sadder, and everything irritates and exasperates her.”
+
+“Well, sire, in the first place, we must please her in everything and by
+everything.”
+
+“I agree with you there, man; but there are things beyond human power. If
+it rains, she is put out because it rains; if it blows, she is put out
+because it blows; if we are in the winter, she is put out because the
+spring has not come, and her mind is so turned that she cries out: ‘I
+command it not to rain,’ ‘I command it not to blow,’ ‘I command the spring
+to come at once.’ Now, you see that it is only by being God one can secure
+obedience of orders like these. Well, then, to what the deuce do you
+attribute these whims of my august spouse?”
+
+“Sire, it is very possible that they may presage a happy event.”
+
+“Ah, ah! I take you. Well, to be sure, and I never thought of such a
+thing. And wouldn’t it be a joy to me and to my august spouse to find
+ourselves with a direct successor? For, if not, there is no use in
+deluding ourselves: the day that we close our eyes, in comes civil war,
+and the kingdom is gone to Old Nick.”
+
+So the Queen Doña Ramona remained watching to see what would happen. But
+months and months passed, and the queen grew every day sadder and more
+capricious.
+
+One day the king decided on interrogating very seriously the queen
+herself, to see if he might draw from her the secret of her sadness and
+capriciousness.
+
+“Well, let us know, now, what the deuce is the matter with you,” he said,
+“that you neither sleep nor let me sleep, and remain for ever like the
+thorn of S. Lucy.”
+
+“I am very unhappy,” answered the queen, beginning to weep like a
+Magdalen.
+
+“You unhappy?—you who lived in a stable as empty and bare as that which
+Our Lord lived in when he became man, and under present circumstances you
+find yourself the somebody of somebodies, a queen clean and complete? What
+the deuce do you want?”
+
+“It is true, I am a queen. But I die of sadness when from the throne I
+look back and see nothing of what other queens see.”
+
+“Well, and what do other queens see?”
+
+“For instance, the Queen of Spain sees a series of great and glorious
+kings, named Recaredo, Pelayo, San Fernando, Alonso the Wise, Isabel the
+Catholic, Ferdinand the Catholic, Charles V., Philip II., Charles III.—and
+those kings had blood of hers, and seated themselves on the throne, and
+loved and made great the people that she loves and makes great.”
+
+“You are right, wife. But you wish to do what is impossible, and that God
+alone can do.”
+
+“Well, then, those impossibilities are the very things that tease and
+exasperate me. What is the use of being a queen, if even in the most just
+desires one sees herself constrained, and unable to realize them? It is a
+fine afternoon, for instance, and I begin to get ready to go out for a
+walk in the palace gardens, but a wretched little cloud appears in the
+sky, as though to say to one, ‘Don’t get ready!’ And when one wishes to go
+out, that insolent cloud begins to pour down water, and one is obliged to
+remain at home, disgusted and fretting. What I want is to have power
+enough to prevent a miserable little cloud from laughing at me.”
+
+“But, woman, don’t I tell you that this power God alone can have?”
+
+“Then I want to be God.”
+
+Juan made the sign of the cross on himself, filled with shame and horror
+at hearing his wife give utterance to such a thing, whose head was
+undoubtedly turned by the demon of ambition. But he did not wish to
+exasperate the poor crazed being with lessons which, had she been in her
+right senses, she would have deserved.
+
+“But don’t you know, child,” he said to her with sweetness, “that the
+fulfilment of that desire is as impossible as it is foolish? The emperor
+has granted us whatever we have asked, but what you want now he cannot
+grant.”
+
+“Still, I want you to go and see him, and say so to him; for perhaps
+between him and the Pope they will be able to manage it.”
+
+“But if there is and never can be more than one God, how can you be made
+God?”
+
+“I have always heard say that God can do everything. If the emperor
+consults with the Pope, and the Pope has recourse to God, then you’ll see
+if God, who can do everything, will disappoint them both.”
+
+“But if God cannot?”
+
+“Hold your tongue, Jew, and don’t say such awful things. God can do
+everything.”
+
+Juan thought it would be more prudent to abstain from contradicting his
+wife any further. So he retired and summoned the chief physician of the
+court, in order to lay before him the new and extraordinary phase which
+the moral malady of the queen displayed. The physician said that in his
+long professional career he had met with cases of mental aberration even
+more extraordinary than that of the queen; and insisted that, far from
+contradicting the august invalid, they should comply with her every wish
+as far as it was humanly possible.
+
+The king returned soon after to the chamber of his august spouse, who the
+moment she saw him became a perfect wasp.
+
+“How, sire?” she exclaimed. “So you are the first to disobey my orders?”
+
+“How disobey?”
+
+“Yes, sire! Did I not tell you that I want you to go and see the emperor,
+and implore him to place himself in communication with the Pope in order
+to see whether between them they could so manage that I might be God?”
+
+“Yes, you told me so, but—”
+
+“There are no buts for me. How is it that you are not already on the road
+to comply with my orders? Now, none of your nice little jokes with me, if
+you please—you, who are no more than the husband of the queen—and, if you
+ruffle my feathers, I’ll send you off to be hanged as soon as look at
+you.”
+
+“Come, child, don’t be angry, you shall be obeyed instantly.”
+
+“Remember, none of your pranks, now! And listen: go and tell that health‐
+killer whom you seem to have made one of your council, that if you don’t
+go to see the emperor, and perform in every point the commission which I
+charge you with, he shall serve you as partner in your dance in the air.”
+
+The king withdrew; and when he reported to the chief physician what his
+wife had just said to him, the physician insisted more than ever on the
+necessity of pleasing the august invalid in everything.
+
+So the king set out on his journey to the imperial court. The extravagant
+and impious nature of his mission disturbed him greatly; but the
+consideration gave him comfort that he was no longer a Juan nobody, as on
+other occasions when he had made the same journey, but a monarch about to
+consult with another monarch. The only thing that weighed at all on his
+mind was the question of etiquette.
+
+“I don’t know,” said he, “for the life of me what shoes to tread in when I
+address the emperor. I have heard it said that all we sovereigns call each
+other cousins, though not a bit of cousinship exists between us: but how
+do I know, if I call the emperor cousin, that he may not give me a blow
+that would send all the teeth down my throat?” Occupied with such
+thoughts, he arrived at the imperial court, and the emperor hastened to
+receive him when he had scarcely set foot in the palace.
+
+“How is her majesty, Queen Doña Ramona?” asked the emperor kindly.
+
+“Bad enough, under present circumstances.”
+
+“Man, that is the worst news yet! And what ails her?”
+
+“What the devil do I know? The evil one alone understands these women. If
+your majesty could only guess the commission she has given me—”
+
+“Hallo, hallo! Well, let us hear it.”
+
+“She says—but pshaw! One is ashamed to say it. She says to see if your
+majesty could consult with the Pope, and between you manage to make her
+God.”
+
+“Eh! That is a greater request. Make her God, eh!”
+
+“Your majesty sees already that it is a piece of madness; for a woman
+can’t complain of the small advance in her career who to‐day is a queen,
+and not a year ago lived in a stable. A stable is a disgrace to nobody,
+sure enough; for, after all, Our Lord, though he was God, lived in one
+when he made himself man.”
+
+“So the good Doña Ramona wishes to be God, eh!”
+
+“You’ve hit it, your majesty.”
+
+“Well, we will please her as far as we are able. Let your majesty step
+into the dining‐room and drive the wolf from the door, and on returning
+you will find your wife, if not changed into God, changed into something
+which is like to him.”
+
+The royal consort turned into the dining‐room, but, do what he would, he
+could scarcely swallow a mouthful. Everything seemed to disagree with him,
+and the cause of it lay in his feeling within him a restlessness which
+seemed to forebode some misfortune. He made his way homewards, and on
+arriving at the palace of the crown he saw, with as great sorrow as
+dismay, that the palace was closed and deserted.
+
+“What has happened here?” he inquired of a passer‐by.
+
+“The emperor has put an end to the kingdom of Micomican, re‐establishing
+the ancient province, and re‐incorporating it with the empire.”
+
+Juan had neither courage nor strength to ask more. He wandered about for
+hours and hours like one demented without knowing whither, when suddenly
+he found himself at the door of the stable where he had lived with his
+wife, and on pushing open the door, which revolved on its hinges, he found
+his wife installed there once more. The only thing Godlike which the woman
+who had entertained the criminal ambition of becoming like to him,
+consisted in the similarity of her dwelling to the stable which God
+occupied when he became man.
+
+
+
+
+The Distaff.
+
+
+“In der guten alten Zeit wo die Königen Bertha spann.”
+
+“In the good old times when Queen Bertha span” is a thrifty proverb still
+current in France and some parts of Germany where the distaff is yet seen
+beneath the arm of the shepherdess, looking, as she tends her flock,
+precisely like S. Genevieve just stept out from her canvas, or that more
+modern saint of the hidden life, Germaine of Pibrac, who is always
+represented with her spindle and distaff. In the very same fields where S.
+Germaine watched her flocks and twirled her spindle in the old scriptural
+way, keeping her innocent heart all the while united to God, have we seen
+the young shepherdess clad in the picturesque scarlet or white capuchon of
+the country, which covers their heads and half veils their forms—guarding
+their sheep and spinning at the same time.
+
+And the same womanly implement is sometimes found in the hands of those of
+gentle birth in those old lands where so many still cling to the
+traditions of the past. We read of the now world‐famous Eugénie de Guérin
+that the same hand that wrote such charmingly naïve letters and journals
+did not disdain the spindle and the distaff. She writes thus in her
+journal: “I have begun my day by fitting myself up a distaff, very round,
+very firm, and very smart with its bow of ribbon. There, I am going to
+spin with a small spindle. One must vary work and amusements: tired of a
+stocking, I take up my needle and then my distaff. So time passes, and
+carries us away on its wings.” And again a day or two after: “I took my
+distaff by way of diversion, but all the while I was spinning, my mind
+spun and wound and turned its spindle at a fine rate. I was not at my
+distaff. The soul just sets that kind of mechanical work going and then
+leaves it.”
+
+This reminds us of Uhland’s verse:
+
+
+    “Long, long didactic poems
+      I spin with busy wheel,
+    The lengthened yarns of epic
+      Keep running off my reel:
+
+    “My wheel itself has a lyrical whirr,
+      My cat has a tragic mew,
+    While my spindle plays the comic parts
+      And does the dancing too.”
+
+
+Eugénie’s charming Arcadian life, passed in the primitive occupations of
+spinning, sewing, superintending the kitchen—even going, like Homer’s
+Nausicaa, to the margin of the stream to wash the linen in the running
+waters, and afterwards taking pleasure in spreading it all white on the
+green grass, or seeing it wave on the lines: all this, we say, without
+detracting from the poetry and grace of her nature, is enough to make us
+recall with a sigh the good old days when Queen Bertha span.
+
+And this queen was _Berthe au grand pied_, the mother of Charlemagne, who
+had one foot larger than the other, and hence her name:
+
+
+    “You are the beautiful Bertha, the spinner, queen of Helvetia,
+    She whose story I read at a stall in the streets of Southampton,
+    Who, as she rode on her palfrey o’er valley and meadow and
+                mountain,
+    Ever was spinning her thread from a distaff fixed to her saddle.
+    She was so thrifty and good, that her name passed into a proverb.”
+
+
+Whether this Queen of Helvetia is our Bertha with the great foot we know
+not. The name is found in many curious old legends like the German one of
+Frau Bertha, a kind of tutelar genius of spinners, with an immense foot
+and a long iron nose, which doubtless served as a spindle. And an old
+manuscript, long hidden in some obscure corner of a German monastery,
+tells how King Pepin, wishing to wed the fair Bertha of Brittany, sent his
+chief officers to bring her to his court. The steward, who had charge of
+the escort, was not without ambitious views respecting his own daughter.
+He ordered his servants to put Bertha to death on the way. But they,
+instead of killing her, left her in a forest. Not long after—O happy
+chance!—King Pepin, overtaken by night while hunting, awaited the dawn in
+a house where he was served by the most beautiful maid his eyes had ever
+beheld. Of course it was Bertha with her great foot, which, we may be
+sure, she gracefully concealed beneath her flowing garments. And so they
+were married. Old poems sing of her industry, and tell us she knew how to
+spin like the princesses of scriptural and Homeric days. She is
+represented, too, on old coins seated on a throne with a distaff in her
+hands. All writers speak of her as _Berthe au grand pied_, but as
+otherwise beautiful and skilful in wielding the earliest implement of
+feminine industry. We may safely imagine her as tapping the mighty
+Charlemagne, leader of peerless knights, while yet a boy, with her
+convenient distaff; for her ascendency over him was such that he always
+regarded her with great reverence, even after his elevation to power!
+
+And Bertha was not the only princess that laid her hand hold of the
+spindle. When the tomb of Jeanne de Bourbon, wife of Charles V. of France,
+was opened at St. Denis, among other things was found a distaff of gilded
+wood, but greatly decayed. And there is another in the Hôtel de Cluny,
+once used by some queen of France, we forget whom, on which is carven all
+the notable women of the Old Testament.
+
+So too the daughters of Edward the Elder of England, though carefully
+educated, were so celebrated for their achievements in spinning and
+weaving that the term spinster is said to be derived from them.
+
+And S. Walburga, the daughter of S. Richard, King of the Saxons, used to
+spin and weave among the royal and saintly maidens of Wimburn Minster. It
+was a common custom in those days. The distaff and the spindle were
+considered “the arms of every virtuous woman.”
+
+The ancients held the use of them as such an accomplishment that Minerva
+is said to have come down to earth to teach the Greek women how to spin.
+Venus herself did not disdain to take upon herself the semblance of a
+spinner of fair wool when she appeared to Helen.
+
+And spinning was as universal an acquirement among the Jewish as the
+Grecian women. They used to spin by moonlight on the housetops and, true
+to the instinct of their sex, kept so faithful an eye on their neighbors
+in the meanwhile that the ancient spinsters’ tongues were potent in the
+world of gossip. There is a tradition that S. Ann spun the virginal robes
+of her immaculate child in the pure beams of the chaste Dian.
+
+Of the valiant woman in the Book of Proverbs it is said: “Her fingers have
+taken hold of the spindle.” And in Exodus we read that “the skilful women
+gave such things as they spun, violet, purple, and scarlet, and fine linen
+and goats’ hair, all of their own accord,” for the tabernacle.
+
+We are told that the Jewish maidens who devoted themselves to the service
+of the temple were employed, among other things, in spinning the fine
+linen on their spindles of cedar, or ithel, a species of the oriental
+acacia, black as ebony and probably the same as the setim, or shittim
+wood, of the Holy Scriptures. According to tradition, the Blessed Virgin
+Mary, who passed her early days in the temple, participated and excelled
+in all the pursuits then carried on. The _Protevangelion_ of S. James the
+Less relates that, when a new veil was to be made for the temple of our
+Lord, the priests confided the work to seven virgins of the tribe of
+David. They cast lots to see “who should spin the gold thread, who the
+blue, who the scarlet, and who the true scarlet.” It fell to Mary’s lot to
+spin the purple. Leaving her work, one day, to draw water in her jar, the
+angel drew near with his _Ave Maria_.
+
+A distaff lies at Mary’s feet in Raphael’s “Annunciation,” and in many
+other celebrated paintings she is represented with one. In a “Riposa” by
+Albert Dürer she is depicted spinning from her distaff beside the Divine
+Babe who is sleeping in its cradle:
+
+
+    “Inter fila cantans orat
+    Blanda, veni somnuli.”
+
+
+S. Bonaventura tells us that several of the early sacred writers speak of
+our Blessed Lady’s industry in spinning and sewing for the support of her
+Son and S. Joseph in the land of Egypt. So reduced to poverty were they
+that, according to him, she went from house to house to obtain work,
+probably flax to spin as she sat watching the Holy Infant in the grove of
+sycamores of traditional renown. Her unrivalled skill in spinning the fine
+flax of Pelusium became a matter of tradition, and the name of _Virgin’s
+Thread_ has been given to that network of dazzling whiteness and almost
+vaporous texture that floats over the deep valleys in the damp mornings of
+autumn, says the Abbé Orsini.
+
+It is said the Church at Jerusalem preserved some of Mary’s spindles among
+its treasures, which were afterwards sent to the Empress Pulcheria, who
+placed them in one of the churches of Constantinople.
+
+Other nations, too, had their famous spinsters. Dante’s ancestor in
+Paradise, looking back to earth, tells him of a Florentine dame of an
+opulent family who,
+
+
+                “With her maidens drawing off
+    The tresses from the distaff, lectured them
+    Old tales of Troy, and Fiesole, and Rome.”
+
+
+And a Spanish writer of past times says, speaking of the model woman:
+“Behold this wife who purchases flax that she may spin with her maids. See
+her thus seated in the midst of her women.” Thus did Andromache spin among
+her attendants.
+
+So have we seen old nuns spinning in the cloisters of the remote provinces
+of France: the white wool on their distaffs diminishing slowly and calmly
+as their own even lives. They looked as if spinning out their own serene
+destinies. Such a happy destiny is not reserved for all whose thread is
+drawn out by Lachesis.
+
+
+    “Twist ye, twine ye! even so
+      Mingle shades of joy and woe,
+    Hope and fear, and peace and strife,
+      In the thread of human life.”
+
+
+At Rome there are two white lambs blessed on S. Agnes’ day (“S. Agnes and
+her lambs unshorn,” says Keats) in her church on the Nomentan road, and
+then they are placed in a convent till they are shorn, when their wool is
+spun by the sacred hands of the nuns. Of this the pallium is made—the
+distinctive mark of a metropolitan.
+
+I have called the distaff the earliest implement of feminine industry.
+Such is the old tradition. There is a pathetic miniature of the twelfth
+century depicting an angel giving Adam a spade and Eve a distaff previous
+to their expulsion from Paradise: and on the sarcophagus of Junius Bassus
+of the fourth century, Adam is represented with a sheaf of grain, for he
+was to till the earth, and Eve with a lamb whose fleece she was to spin.
+And we have our old English rhyme:
+
+
+    “When Adam delved and Eve span,
+    Where was then the gentleman?”
+
+
+And so faithfully was the tradition handed down that the distaff has
+always been regarded as a symbol of womanhood, which woman scorned to see
+even in the hands of a Hercules.
+
+In these days, when even our rustic belles are overloaded with
+accomplishments, the piano takes the place of “Hygeia’s harp” on which the
+fair maidens of the olden time loved to discourse fair music, like the
+gentle Evangeline of Acadie, seated at her father’s side,
+
+
+    “Spinning flax for the loom that stood in the corner behind her,”
+
+
+who, I fear, would be regarded in these days of improvement, at least in
+our country, with nearly as much horror as those other indefatigable
+spinners are by the good housewife:
+
+
+    “Weaving spiders, come not here;
+    Hence, you long‐legged spinners, hence!”
+
+
+What charming pictures some of us retain in our memories of our gray‐
+haired grandmothers of New England country life—delicately nurtured,
+too—sitting down in the afternoon by the huge fire‐place to spin flax on a
+little carved wheel! How many of us carefully preserve such a wheel in
+memory of those by‐gone days, when we loved to linger and watch the
+mysterious process, and look at the face that always was so kindly, and
+listen to the whirr whose music is now hushed for ever!
+
+But though spinning by hand will soon become one of the lost arts, there
+is one who will spin on till time shall be no more—one from whose distaff
+is drawn out the web of our lives—the star‐crowned Clotho:
+
+
+    “Spin, spin, Clotho, spin!
+      Lachesis, twist! and, Atropos, sever!
+    Life is short and beset by sin,
+      ’Tis only God endures for ever!”
+
+
+
+
+A Martyr’s Journey.
+
+
+From The French.
+
+In the Beaujolais, the country _par excellence_ of beautiful women and
+beautiful vines, a little village lies hidden among luxuriant arbors. Each
+house is clothed in green leaves, and the wine, though rare, is not so
+wonderful as the immense tuns that hold it. Yet Coigny, with its nectar,
+its beautiful sky, its coquettish habitations its robust sons and
+attractive daughters, had not a habitable church. Still it dreamed of one,
+and four worthy priests worked hard and hopefully for the realization of
+the dream. One of them climbed well his ladder of orders, and has since
+become Bishop of Coutances; and if, as it is said, the zeal, piety, and
+legitimate influence of four ecclesiastics will finish the Cathedral of
+Cologne, notwithstanding the devil’s theft of the plan, what might not be
+hoped for Coigny?
+
+So nothing more need be told than that, from amidst the lovely, smiling
+verdure of the little town, there sprang an exquisite white marble church,
+a temptation to pray in as well as to see, and the admiration of the
+entire province.
+
+Madame la Marquise de —— gave all her inimitable guipures to ornament the
+high altar, and Monsieur le Comte de ——, a great amateur in pictures,
+placed a true Mignard—a Madonna with a lovely smile—upon the walls, even
+before they dried.
+
+So each and all offered homage in the new house of God.
+
+Still the beautiful little church lacked a patron, a saint under whose
+invocation it might be placed, and the blessed one must be represented by
+his own venerable ashes, a relic of the past, a protection for the future.
+
+The village of Coigny, therefore, spared neither pains nor expense to be
+satisfied in this regard, and the Holy Father was applied to to select the
+patron. The dear old man replied favorably to the little town he could
+scarcely find on the map, and which was more noted for bearing the cross
+than ringing the bell; and a curious and grave ceremony took place.
+
+They opened the Roman Catacombs, and they descended into the vaults of the
+cemetery of S. Cyriac, and there they chose the mortal remains of a
+Christian martyr buried for many centuries.
+
+The stone that closed the cell bore a palm branch and the inscription,
+
+
+    Hilary At Rest,
+
+
+and indicated he had died for the faith in the early ages of Christianity.
+His bones and the size of his head denoted only the adolescent, scarcely
+more than a child; while the whole expressed the courage of the man united
+to the grace of the angel.
+
+The account from which this is taken adds, this young soldier of Christ
+was found sleeping peacefully at his post, extended on his granite bier,
+with his forehead cleft asunder, his neck cut open, of which the little
+bottle by his side held the precious blood. The figure of the young martyr
+had been covered with virgin wax, carefully enclosing the sacred bones,
+and, attired in silk and embroidery, he is holding the palm branch in his
+hand. The wounded head inclines as if bending to his murderers, his throat
+lies open in its deep sword‐wound, his hands and feet have bled, and the
+purple tide gushes from his wounds and trickles over his limbs; but his
+lips are shut with love, and his eyes are fixed, regarding with S. Stephen
+the heavens opening to receive him.
+
+So this child of eighteen hundred years ago, this soldier of the faith,
+taken from the Roman Catacombs, was sent by the Pope to Coigny.
+
+Can we not imagine his reception? Did not the village ring out its festal
+bells, and scatter flowers on his path, and with thousands of candles in
+the nave, and incense mounting far above the high altar, did not the
+little church welcome this contemporary of Nero, who had travelled
+surrounded by glorious palms in his own carriage over the line from Italy?
+
+He has come, and twenty priests bear him on their shoulders, and his final
+resting‐place is under the high altar.
+
+Coigny, the coquette, crowned by its green vine branches, bacchante‐like,
+the pious Coigny, has its martyr in the vaults of its own dear church, no
+more nor less than if it were a basilica.
+
+True, he was an almost forgotten saint, and anonymously canonized, but the
+Scriptures told us long ago, “God knows how to recompense his own.”
+
+
+
+
+Odd Stories: III. Peter The Powerful.
+
+
+Long and loud was the flourish of trumpets that greeted the day on which
+Philip the Mighty was born to his father’s dukedom; so rare was the
+promise of a babe. Need it be said that, nurtured under the eye of his
+stern sire, he grew in the strength of justice? To such a degree had he
+inherited the zeal of his ancestors, that while yet in his cradle he
+strangled a wretched nurse for stealing his spoon; whereat there was
+another flourish of trumpets. Subsequent reflections upon the loss of so
+useful a servant taught him to restrain the exercise of his just powers;
+and hence, when his tutors failed to instruct him within a given time in
+the arts, sciences, languages, and literatures, he merely broke their
+heads. We live to learn; and so it proved even to a prince as well endowed
+as Philip the Mighty. In these early acts we can see the foundations of
+that character which was afterwards so great a monument among men.
+
+During the famous period in which our prince served his sire in the
+administration of justice, the dungeons were never empty of thieves and
+wranglers, nor the axe long idle for want of miscreant heads. To a peasant
+who once stole an apple, he said, “How now, varlet, dost confess?”
+Answered the trembling churl: “Nay, most puissant lord, I stole not the
+fruit.” Then spoke Philip: “By my halidom, I’ll mend thine honesty”;
+whereupon the fellow was put on the rack till he broke a blood‐vessel,
+still not confessing, for it was death to steal an apple out of the duke’s
+garden. At night the peasant died in his bed of a hemorrhage, piously
+acknowledging in his last moments that he had committed the theft; whereat
+was another flourish of trumpets. Life is a great lesson, however, and it
+must not be supposed that our powerful hero could content himself with a
+few exploits at court when he felt that he had a mission to reform the
+world.
+
+Therefore it was that Philip the Mighty set out upon a knight’s errand to
+slay all the witches, devils, malefactors, giants, goblins, and monsters
+that came in his path. But one squire rode with him, bearing a golden
+trumpet, which, when Peter had done to death a sour‐faced hag who shrieked
+at him on the mountain‐side, he blew right merrily. Now, the old witch had
+asked the valiant knight for justice against her lord at court. Life is a
+science not to be mastered without blows; and Philip learned to slay and
+fear not in such stout earnest that soon he won the renown of being, as in
+fact he was called, the Champion Wrong‐killer of the age.
+
+When a foul, black‐hearted necromancer was tracked to his hiding‐place,
+what else should our good knight do but put him to the sword? When a five‐
+eyed dwarf was accused of deviltry, who else should carve him for the
+crows but our duke’s son? When a grim ogre, breathing death and fury,
+beset him whose arm was so mighty, when malefactors pestered the land,
+when monsters of all kind raged on every hand, who dealt them such
+lightning doom as the champion wrong‐killer? On every occasion did his
+trusty squire blow the trumpet of gold right lustily, to the wonder of
+lords and people. Now, it was whispered that the slain sorcerers had
+helped husbandmen and artisans with their strange inventions; that the
+malefactors were slaughtered outright for the crimes of their fellows;
+that the giants were amiable men, sometimes, but provoked beyond
+endurance; that dwarfs and witches were poor old people, seldom as bad as
+they seemed to be. Nevertheless, the real monsters of the land increased
+day by day, in spite of the champion killer’s sword and his squire’s
+golden trumpet.
+
+Weary with much slaughter of false knights and caitiff wretches and
+monsters, the paladin Philip resolved to undertake the deliverance of the
+poor from the oppressions of the rich. Filled with this noble idea, he
+slew a yeoman who was chastising his servant without mercy. Seeing a
+number of slaves at work, he set them all free by killing their master. He
+divided the estates of the rich among the poor. He distributed largesses
+among multitudes of the needy. He rescued honest damsels who were being
+carried away by villain lords. Alas! for an ingrate world. ’Twas rumored
+that the yeoman had left a widow and seven children to mourn him. The
+slaves became marauders; the poor quarrelled among themselves; the beggars
+got drunk; and some of the honest damsels lamented their fallen lords.
+Howbeit, the faithful squire blew his trumpet louder than ever.
+
+Meanwhile had our good knight grown religious, and burned men at the
+stake; but the more the fuel, the greater the flame. The more lances he
+shattered for honor’s sake, the more swords he blunted for justice’s sake;
+the more money he spent to give feasts to beggars, and the more land he
+parcelled among the poor, all the more honor, justice, bounty, estate,
+remained to be won and adjusted. His sharp judgments had, after all, won
+him nothing but the sound of his trumpet. He had killed the innocent and
+robbed the poor, when he intended to do otherwise, and, if he executed
+Heaven’s judgments, it was by a kind of mistake. One thing he had not
+slain—himself.
+
+All the while, he who had killed so many monsters was growing in bulk and
+stature out of all proportion. As his legs and arms increased their
+strength of muscle, his ears grew longer, and his eyes grew blinder. He
+scorned, nay, devoured the weak he once defended, and, at last, a monster
+himself, was killed by a conspiracy of those whose champion he once was.
+For Philip, though a champion wrong‐killer, was blind to his own wrong‐
+doing; and, though a reformer, never allowed people to reform themselves;
+so he destroyed the wheat with the chaff and killed the good with the bad.
+
+
+
+
+New Publications.
+
+
+    THE BOOK OF THE HOLY ROSARY. A Popular Doctrinal Exposition of its
+    Fifteen Mysteries, mainly Conveyed in Select Extracts from the
+    Fathers and Doctors of the Church. By the Rev. Henry Formby, of
+    the Third Order of St. Dominic. Embellished with thirty‐six full‐
+    page illustrations. New York: The Catholic Publication Society.
+    1872.
+
+
+The devotion of the Holy Rosary is one of the most beautiful which the
+Catholic Church proposes to her children, and is also probably the one
+which has been received by them everywhere, without distinction of
+nationality or class, with the most sincere delight. Catholics, it is
+true, are for the most part familiar with the general history and
+significance of this devotional practice, which in itself forms a
+compendium of popular theology. Most of the books, however, on this
+subject, with which we are acquainted, are intended to excite Christians
+to the frequent and devout use of this form of prayer, rather than to give
+them a full and clear understanding of its natural connection with the
+great and fundamental truths which form the basis of Christianity. The
+book of F. Formby is both doctrinal and devotional; all the more
+devotional because the piety which it inculcates is enlightened by true
+Christian science.
+
+The work is divided into three parts corresponding with the three groups
+of mysteries of which the Rosary is composed. The author prefaces each of
+these groups with an introduction, in which he carefully compares its
+mysteries with their corresponding types in the Old Testament. This
+comparison is again instituted in a more particular manner as each mystery
+in turn presents itself for elucidation.
+
+In treating of the different mysteries, he first quotes from Scripture
+those passages upon which they are formed, and then adduces the
+corresponding types from the Old Testament, still further illustrating the
+subject by apposite quotations and allusions taken from the classics of
+pagan literature. These are followed by extracts from the writings of the
+great Fathers and Doctors of the church, many of which will be new to the
+English reader. Thus each chapter of the book forms a comprehensive
+treatise, both doctrinal and devotional, of the particular mystery in the
+life of our divine Saviour or that of his Blessed Mother to which it is
+devoted.
+
+Without going out of his way, F. Formby by the simple exposition of the
+doctrine and practice of the church shows in the most conclusive manner
+how utterly groundless are the objections of Protestants to Catholic
+devotion to the Mother of Christ. We have not for a long time read a book
+with which we are so perfectly pleased as with this of F. Formby. The
+clergy especially will find in it a rich mine from which to draw
+instruction for the people. It may be read with profit, however, by all
+classes of persons, as the plain and simple style in which it is written
+does not raise it above the comprehension of even uneducated minds. The
+book is ornamented with thirty‐six full‐page woodcuts, unusually excellent
+both in design and execution; which, added to the attractions of clear
+typography and tasteful binding, make it a work of art as well as of
+religion.
+
+
+    HENRY PERREYVE. By A. Gratry, Prêtre de l’Oratoire, etc.
+    Translated by special permission. London: Rivingtons. 1872. (New
+    York: Sold by The Catholic Publication Society.)
+
+
+After a life of singular purity and great activity in the cause of truth,
+F. Gratry entered upon his rest on the 6th of February, 1872. His
+impulsive and ardent nature hurried him for a moment, towards the close of
+his life, into a controversy which, for a time, caused the greatest
+anxiety to his friends, and threatened to throw a cloud over an existence
+otherwise so brilliant and precious. His heart, however, always remained
+loyal to the church and to truth, and, when he was made aware of his
+error, he himself was the first to acknowledge it, and to do all in his
+power to atone for it. The writings of F. Gratry have always possessed for
+us a singular charm. He has in a high degree the gift of making his
+thoughts contagious. He throws the warmth and life of his whole heart into
+his writings; his words breathe and palpitate and affect one like the
+presence of a noble and high‐wrought nature. In Henry Perreyve he found a
+subject peculiarly fitted to call forth these qualities of his style. The
+history of the outer life of Henry Perreyve was uneventful and short.
+Designed by his parents for the bar, disposed by his own vigorous and
+impetuous nature to the military life, he was called of God to the
+priesthood. When he had once recognized the voice of God, he devoted to
+this high vocation all the energies of a most gifted and courageous
+nature. At an early age he developed remarkable talents both for writing
+and speaking. He possessed the divine gift of eloquence, and Lacordaire,
+who loved him more than any other man in the world, looked forward to the
+day when his own voice, having grown feeble by age, would be born again
+with redoubled strength and warmth on the lips of Henry Perreyve. Alas,
+that such hope should be delusive! He to whom Lacordaire wrote, “You live
+in my heart eternally as my son and my friend,” was destined soon to
+follow his great preceptor to the grave. He died in 1865, when but thirty‐
+four years old. The story of his life, as told by F. Gratry, is a poem
+full of the most exalted sentiment, and impressed with the highest form of
+beauty. “All who knew him,” says his biographer, “agree on this point,
+that the one characteristic which stamps his outward life and his inward
+soul is only to be expressed by that word Beauty. All the inward beauty
+wherewith courage, intelligence, devotion, and goodness can invest a soul,
+and all the outward expression of beauty with which such a soul can stamp
+the living man, were combined in him. Nature and grace had alike done
+their very best for him; he overflowed with their choicest gifts.” Whoever
+will read F. Gratry’s sketch will be persuaded that these words are not
+too strong. The life of Henry Perreyve is another confirmation of the
+truth that the ideal type of perfect manhood can be developed only in the
+Catholic Church. We especially recommend this book to the young men of our
+country. Even though it should not inspire them with the exalted ambition
+of consecrating their lives to God, it will at least teach them the
+transcendent beauty of Christian courage, of self‐devotion, of nobility of
+purpose.
+
+Henry Perreyve was most ardent in urging his friends to aspire to the
+priesthood. In this connection F. Gratry remarks: “Truly, I know no wiser
+enthusiasm than that which stimulates men to become laborers for God. We
+have too few priests; we have far too many soldiers. No man becomes a
+priest whether he will or no; but on all sides the strong hand of the
+powers that be constrains men to be soldiers whether they will or no. Why
+is the priest’s lot to be counted worse than the soldier’s? He who chooses
+the sacred toil of God’s harvest‐field for his life’s labor, chooses the
+better part. Surely his ambition is beyond all comparison the greatest,
+best and noblest: his work the most fruitful, the most necessary. That is
+but a sorry delusion by which the world would set the priesthood before
+men as in the shadow of death, and other careers as in a glow of light and
+glory.”
+
+
+    THE SPOKEN WORD; or, The Art of Extemporary Preaching: Its
+    Utility, its Danger, and its True Idea. With an easy and practical
+    Method for its Attainment. By Rev. Thomas J. Potter, Professor of
+    Sacred Eloquence in the Missionary College of All Hallows, Author
+    of “Sacred Eloquence,” etc., etc. Boston: P. Donahoe. 1872.
+
+
+One of the most favorable omens attending the great Catholic revival in
+the English‐speaking world is the appearance of works bearing upon the
+various duties of the sacred ministry. In the earlier days of struggle in
+England and America, the missionary priest entered upon a life of toil
+which gave but scant opportunity for adding to the fund of learning that
+served as its outfit. Hence, while the greatness of the Catholic
+champions, who entered the arena armed _cap‐a‐pie_ by a long and thorough
+training, was brought into striking relief, the depression of minds less
+trained and of less capacity among the clergy was marked by the absence of
+a native literature suited to their class.
+
+When a priest rarely had a day free from harassing labors, and was barely
+able to run into debt for the brick, beams, and shingles of a nondescript
+building wherein to assemble his flock, he certainly did well if, after
+reading his breviary and peeping into his moral theology, he kept himself
+informed of current events. Such circumstances of poverty were not
+favorable to literature or eloquence. Ecclesiastical art, with its
+intricate ceremonial and its peculiar music, was in a fair way to be lost;
+and the refinements of clerical education were rather sources of
+discouragement in the present than of bright anticipation for the future.
+
+But this phase, having in some measure passed away in England, has lost
+much of its gloom for us in America. Pastors have more time to prepare
+instructions for their people. Congregations by their magnitude and
+intelligence call forth the highest efforts of eloquence. The instincts of
+Catholic devotion require that God’s house should be made a house of
+prayer, and demand, for their satisfaction and increase, the sacristy and
+choir, which shall be “for a glory and a beauty.” Meanwhile, increasing
+wealth furnishes means for fulfilling the requirements of the Roman
+Ritual.
+
+The work which we notice is one of many signs of the times, and also one
+of a series of similar efforts by its earnest and experienced author. It
+is written in a clear and flowing style, slightly marred, however, by the
+frequent repetition of the adjective “expedite,” as qualifying the noun
+“knowledge,” and the perpetual recurrence of “a man who,” or “the man
+who.” The general effect is nevertheless pleasing, and the book itself
+ought to be read. The title contains a fair analysis of the work. It
+remains for us to say that the author is thorough in the treatment of his
+subject. His hints and warnings are useful to those accustomed to preach
+extempore; while his suggestions for the composition of sermons are
+entirely applicable to those who perfect their oratorical preparations
+before ascending the pulpit.
+
+The appearance of the book is also quite in its favor, and we might adduce
+it as a sign of the times in a department to which we have not yet
+alluded.
+
+
+    THE BELOVED DISCIPLE. By the Rev. Father Rawes, O.S.C. London:
+    Burns, Oates & Co. 1872. New York: Sold by The Catholic
+    Publication Society.
+
+
+This is a beautiful sketch of the life of “the disciple whom Jesus loved.”
+Father Rawes, in common with S. Jerome, S. Augustine, and S. Bernard, has
+a great and special devotion to the Evangelist S. John. This little book
+is well written and is eminently devotional and instructive.
+
+
+    UNAWARES. By the Author of “The Rose Garden.” Boston: Roberts
+    Bros. 1872.
+
+
+One experiences a sense of rest and refreshment in reading this
+unpretending volume. It is a narrative of French life, not at all after
+the sensational order, but beautifully wrought out, with enough of romance
+to sustain the interest and chain the attention of the reader, but not a
+line or word that one could wish unwritten. With a slight plot and few
+incidents, this pleasing story charms us with a delightfully artistic
+description of a quaint old town in France, where the grand cathedral
+stands, the central object of attraction—solemn, steadfast, ever
+varying—severe or tender, as the case may be—but always inconceivably
+peaceful.
+
+The characters, drawn with a skilful hand and admirably sustained, the
+chaste beauty of the language and style, with the gems of thought worthy
+of life‐long remembrance scattered throughout the volume, lead us to
+desire an acquaintance with other books this attractive author may have
+written.
+
+
+    THE VICAR’S DAUGHTER. By George MacDonald. Boston: Roberts Bros.
+    1872.
+
+
+If not to be sensational is a merit, this book certainly has that merit.
+The Introduction, which in most books is apt to be dull, and often is
+skipped by the reader who wishes to plunge _in medias res_, is here the
+spiciest part, the sugar‐coating of the pill—if it be not ill‐natured to
+call this work a pill. A very mild one it is, and the patient, if none the
+better, will certainly be none the worse for taking it. Its object seems
+to be to promulgate some Presbyterian ideas concerning the means to be
+used for elevating the spiritual condition of the poor. The London poor is
+the class considered, but the general rules laid down may be supposed good
+for all poor. Some very queer ideas are broached; among others, that it is
+better to give a workman a gold watch than a leg of mutton, because by so
+doing you will pay him a compliment for which he will be grateful, but
+that he should have nothing given him “which he ought to provide for
+himself—such as food, or clothing, or shelter.” There is a Miss Clare who
+is possessed by such a missionary spirit and love for the poor, that we
+cannot help wishing she might find her proper sphere by becoming a
+Catholic “Little Sister of the Poor,” or some other equally useful sister
+of charity. The church utilizes such women much more wisely than they
+manage to find the best way alone. There is a chapter of Miss Clare’s
+reading and discussing of the Gospel with some workmen, which, if not
+positively irreverent itself, will be very likely to make the reader, who
+has any sense of humor, feel so in spite of his better instincts.
+
+The Vicar’s daughter, Mrs. Percivale, is a very sprightly and well‐drawn
+character, whom we cannot help liking very much. She is the teller of the
+story, and in this Dr. MacDonald has shown much skill. It is in some parts
+so like a woman’s way of thinking and writing, that we can hardly believe
+it to be the work of a man, especially in Mrs. Percivale’s thoughts after
+the birth of her child. And in this the author approaches very nearly the
+Catholic ideal:
+
+
+    “I had read somewhere—and it clung to me although I did not
+    understand it—that it was in laying hold of the heart of his
+    Mother that Jesus laid his first hold of the world to redeem it;
+    and now at length I began to understand it. What a divine way of
+    saving us it was—to let her bear him, carry him in her bosom, wash
+    him and dress him and nurse him and sing him to sleep! ... Such a
+    love might well save a world in which were mothers enough.”
+
+
+But alas! he makes the vicar himself save his faith from shipwreck by
+marrying the woman he wants—a queer and new argument for the marriage of
+the clergy, to be able to _believe_ through such means. Not that this is
+intended by the author for any such argument; he being a Presbyterian,
+makes no question of the propriety and wisdom of the clergy marrying, but
+that a clergyman should be taught _belief_ by getting the woman of his
+choice _is_ “passing strange.” He also prefers giving his daughter to a
+sceptic rather than to a “thoroughly religious man,” for fear the latter
+might “_confirm her in doubt_.” To a Catholic, this seems a wonderful
+conclusion.
+
+The chapter called “Child Nonsense” is nonsense indeed, and much below
+“Mother Goose” in literary merit. We wonder it found a place in the
+volume, which contains much genuine wit and good writing.
+
+The illustrations to the book are clever, and the type and binding
+attractive.
+
+
+    AMBITION’S CONTEST; or, Faith and Intellect. By “Christine.”
+    Boston: P. Donahoe. 1872.
+
+
+We cannot, perhaps, give a better idea of the style and scope of this
+modest volume than by a quotation from the Preface: “It would be
+presumptuous to say that I have attempted this little work in order to aid
+in preventing these numerous wrecks of the soul; for where other and
+gifted pens, essaying so much and so well in this direction, still find it
+difficult to do all _they_ would, it would be folly to suppose that my
+crude effort could accomplish anything. Still it is an effort made for the
+purpose of accomplishing _some_ good, and written under the auspices of
+her who has never yet failed to assist the weak, the ever‐glorious and
+Blessed Virgin‐Mother of God, it may perhaps add a mite to that which is
+now being done for the proper training of our Catholic youth.”
+
+
+    GARDENING BY MYSELF. By Anna Warner. New York: A. D. F. Randolph.
+    1872.
+
+
+We cannot imagine a pleasanter way of studying horticulture than by
+adopting Miss Warner’s volume as a text‐book. We can overlook the little
+attempts at moralizing, after the evangelical fashion, as she goes along,
+in view of the dismal theological efforts made by her sister (if we
+mistake not) a few years since. We advise our lady readers who have space
+for cultivating flowers to consult this little manual, assured that the
+occupation of which it discourses, and its results, will bring them a
+large store of unalloyed enjoyment.
+
+THE CATHOLIC PUBLICATION SOCIETY has in press, and will publish early in
+November, _The Life and Times of Sixtus the Fifth_, by Baron Hubner.
+Translated from the original French by James F. Meline.
+
+
+
+
+
+THE CATHOLIC WORLD. VOL. XVI., NO. 92.—NOVEMBER, 1872.
+
+
+
+
+Centres Of Thought In The Past. Second Article. The Universities.
+
+
+The change from the monastic to the scholastic era was one of which we can
+hardly form an idea. As radical as that brought about in politics by the
+tempest of 1793, it was less sudden, and, though to the full as dangerous
+as the unhappy “Reformation,” it was fortunately shorn of its heretical
+perils by the vigorous and successful hand laid upon it by the church.
+Instead of producing an organized system of antagonism to revealed truth,
+which it seemed at one time on the very verge of doing, it became so
+thoroughly absorbed into the church’s system that to many minds
+“scholasticism” is synonymous with “bigotry.” Yet how opposite was the
+reality to the idea which it conveys to the modern mind! The real temper
+of the church, the temper which will be hers eternally in heaven, is the
+temper of Mary; the contemplative, monastic ideal of perfect peace. In the
+XIIIth century (we say the XIIIth typically, for the change was gradually
+working some time before, and only grew to its maturity in that age), a
+giant intellectual convulsion took place, and the church was rudely
+wakened out of her placid ecstasy, to find herself assailed by brilliant
+and popular fallacies, urged by men of dazzling talent and fearless powers
+of questioning. It was as if some holy monk, who from childhood to ripe
+old age had spent his life on his knees before the silent tabernacle of a
+huge and perfect abbey‐church, were suddenly to be startled into action by
+the rude attack of a sacrilegious band on the very altar at whose steps he
+had worshipped so long. See him spring to his feet, and with unexpected
+strength throw himself before the priceless treasure, quell by his eagle
+glance the bewildered assailers of his peace, and convert by his heaven‐
+dictated eloquence those very men into saints, those enemies into friends,
+those proud opponents into fellow‐watchers at the same hallowed shrine. So
+sprang the church to the defence of those doctrines which hitherto it had
+been mainly her duty to _guard_, and the struggle, distasteful as it must
+have been at first, nevertheless ended by producing a new harvest of
+saints, and increasing the human prestige as well as the spiritual armory
+of the church. The reader will no doubt be pleased to see what the writers
+already quoted have to say of this mighty intellectual revolution, and we
+gladly yield to them the field of description. “It will suffice to
+reconcile us to the temporary necessity of the change,” says the author of
+_Christian Schools and Scholars_, “that it was accepted by the church, and
+that she set her seal to the due and legitimate use of those studies which
+were to develop the human intellect to its full‐grown strength. Nay, more,
+she absorbed into herself an intellectual movement which, had she opposed
+it, would have been directed against her authority, and so to a great
+extent she neutralized its powers of mischief. The scholastic philosophy
+which, without her direction, would have expanded into an infidel
+rationalism, was woven into her theology itself, and made to do duty in
+her defence, and that wondrous spectacle was exhibited, so common in the
+history of the church, when the dark and threatening thunder‐cloud, which
+seemed about to send out its lightning‐bolts, only distils in fertilizing
+rain.” Speaking of S. Dominic, Prior Vaughan, in his _Life of S. Thomas of
+Aquin_, says: “He felt that a single man was but a drop in the ocean in
+the midst of such a vast and organized corruption. Man may be met by man,
+but a system only can oppose a system. A religious institution, combining
+the poverty of the first disciples of Christ with eloquence and learning,
+would alone stand a chance of success in working a regeneration.” He tells
+us further on that Albertus Magnus, the master of S. Thomas, saw that
+“Aristotle must be christianized, and that faith itself must be thrown
+into the form of a vast _scientific_ organism, through the application of
+christianized philosophy to the _dogmata_ of revealed religion.” The state
+of men’s minds is thus pithily described by the same author: “For,
+especially at this period, theory speedily resolved itself into practice;
+what to‐day was a speculation of the schools, to‐morrow became a fact; men
+lived quickly, thought quickly, and acted quickly in the days of William
+of Champeaux and Abelard.” Still, in summing up the character of those
+strange, contradictory times, so eminently “ages of faith” when contrasted
+with our day, yet ages of jarring contention when compared with the
+previous centuries, Prior Vaughan gives us the brighter side of the
+picture also: “Men were not startled in those days by the unusual deeds
+and privileges of chosen men. They took God’s word for granted. They
+believed what they saw; they did not pry and test and examine their souls.
+They got nearer the truth than we do. Their minds were not corroded by
+false science.” And in a footnote he adds, speaking of the great
+difference between heresy in the middle ages and heresy now: “In this (the
+reverence for authority) is seated the great distinction between the
+darkness of those days and the darkness of the present. Then, men fell
+away in detail, they denied this or that truth, or fanatically set up as
+teachers of novel doctrines, or were cruel, or superstitious, or fond of
+dress, or of excitement, or self‐display. But they held to the master‐
+principle of order and of salvation, they did not reject the authority of
+the teaching church, or presume to call in question the directive power
+and controlling office of the sovereign pontiff.”
+
+Now, let us at the outset anticipate one question our readers may very
+naturally ask themselves: Have we undertaken a sketch of the history of
+the church, or that of human thought and progress? The latter,
+undoubtedly. Then, how is it that “the church” runs through the whole,
+like the ground melody of the system? How is it that, even in the
+emancipating times on which we have now come, the doctors and masters of
+the schools are all monks and clerics, the theses chosen from Scripture
+texts, the disputes all turning on points of doctrine, and those, too,
+uncompromisingly of _Catholic_ doctrine? We can only answer that such are
+the facts; secular learning hardly existed, and what there was of it was
+so tinged with religion that it was hardly distinguishable from that of
+theologians. Take Dante, for instance, an accomplished scholar, a patriot,
+a politician, and a keen philosopher. Who would not think him a priest and
+a theologian, from the way he has cast his grand and unrivalled poem? It
+is a summary of Catholic doctrine and tradition, a poetical version of S.
+Thomas’ _Summa_, without some knowledge of which it is absolutely
+impossible to read the third part, the _Paradiso_, and _understand_ it. We
+cannot help it if we seem to be sketching ecclesiastical, while we are
+engaged on intellectual, history. Never before the “Reformation” were they
+divorced, and no better proof than this could be adduced of the
+essentially teaching mission of the church.
+
+The proximate cause of the greatness of the University of Paris may be
+traced through four or five generations of scholars up to our Saxon master
+Alcuin. His pupil Rabanus, the great Abbot of Fulda, formed Lupus of
+Ferrières in his own mould; he in turn instructed Henry of Auxerre, the
+_scholasticus_ or master of the Auxerre school, where he found Remigius,
+destined to become the re‐establisher of sacred studies at Rheims, the
+Canterbury of France. From Rheims this Remigius removed to Paris (in the
+Xth century), and from his time the schools of that city continued to
+increase in reputation and importance till they developed into the great
+university. He it was “who opened the first public school which we know
+with any certainty to have been established in Paris.”(81) The first
+rudiments of the laws governing the greatest corporate institution of
+scholastic times seem to have sprung from the very disorders occasioned by
+the immense numbers and pugnacious national characteristics of the rival
+students of all nations who flocked to Paris. In 1195, we find a certain
+John, Abbot of S. Alban’s, associated with the _body of elect
+masters_,(82) and the year previous Pope Celestine III. ruled that the
+students should be subject to ecclesiastical tribunals only, and should be
+exempt from all civic interference in their affairs on the part of the
+town authorities.(83) In 1200, the university is acknowledged by Philip
+Augustus as a corporate body, governed by a head who shall not be
+responsible for his acts to any civil tribunal whatsoever. And now begins
+in good earnest a system the like of which was never seen, and for
+brilliancy as for license will never be surpassed. It is like plunging
+into the seething cauldron of a “witches’ Sabbath” to read of the
+marvellous and feverish state of things in the Paris of the XIIIth
+century, and even of that of earlier days. For a vivid description of the
+turbulent city we can refer our readers to the recent work of the
+Benedictine, Prior Vaughan, and to the no less graphic pen of Victor Hugo
+in his _Notre Dame de Paris_. A grotesqueness wholly French pervades the
+latter work, but gives perhaps a truer picture of the reality than any
+less fastidious language could convey. In the Paris of old, as in our own
+day, things seem to have been inextricably mingled: the sage and the
+buffoon are elbowing each other in the streets; students who have come for
+fashion’s sake flaunt their vulgar splendor and their disgusting
+shamelessness in vice in the face of the poor scholar who sits attentive
+and eager on the _straw_‐covered floor of the lecture‐room; midnight
+orgies that seldom end in less than murder take place within a few feet of
+the oases of monastic life, where the canonical hours are still faithfully
+repeated and _the rule_ still silently kept up. Vanity and frivolity are
+there, and the arrogance of wealthy dunces. Witness the young man whose
+father sent him to Paris with an annual allowance of a hundred _livres_.
+“What does he do?” asks a chronicler of that time, Odofied. “Why, he has
+his books bound and ornamented with gold initials and strange monsters,
+and has a new pair of boots every Saturday.” This was at the time that
+pointed shoes were the “rage,” and the university even passed a decree
+against them as follies unbecoming a scholar.(84) “We read of starving,
+friendless lads with their unkempt heads and tattered suits, who walked
+the streets, hungering for bread and famishing for knowledge, and
+hankering after a sight of some of those famous doctors of whom they had
+heard so much when far away in the woods of Germany or the fields of
+France.”(85) Many had to share their miserable garments with their
+companions, and take it by turns to wear their _one_ tunic so as to make a
+decent appearance in the lecture‐hall, while the rest stayed at home.
+Others spent all they had on parchment, and were in need of oil for their
+lamps to study at nights. Long before the collegiate system became
+general, the lay‐students were huddled together in unhealthy tenements,
+over the shops of the burghers, with whom they had many an affray on the
+score of extortion and injustice. While the rich students employed their
+many servants and the tradesmen they patronized as instruments in their
+shameful intrigues, the poor scholars struggled on, some selling books at
+ruinously low prices, others absolutely begging their food in the streets
+or at the doors of the rich shopkeepers, while others again, more
+miserable because less determined, took refuge in the taverns, and drank
+away the little remains of vitality left in them, or as often were
+despatched in the unseemly brawls which tavern‐life was sure to foster.
+Then, as the brighter side of the picture, there were the monasteries,
+especially that of the Dominicans of S. James, where eager scholars
+studied in peace and order; the cloisters of Notre Dame, where venerable
+orthodoxy was long entrenched; the Sorbonne, destined to be for ages the
+most celebrated school of theology in Europe, and to hold its own long
+after the mediæval university had decayed. Disputed cases were sent to the
+Sorbonne for decision, popes took the advice of its doctors on important
+ecclesiastical matters, and its students possessed even greater personal
+immunities than their fellows of other colleges. Then, if we are to take
+the personal representatives of this wonderful university into account,
+what a forest of illustrious names starts up before our bewildered vision!
+In the XIth century, quite at the latter end, we are introduced to the
+gifted Abelard, who during the first half of the XIIth century gathered
+together all the stormy elements of the age, and centred upon himself the
+attention of the intellectual world. “He appears to have possessed,” says
+Prior Vaughan, “the special gift of rendering articulate the cravings of
+the age in which he lived.... One day he took into his hands Ezechiel the
+Prophet, and boasted that next morning he would deliver a lecture on the
+Prophecy. With bitter irony some of his companions implored him to take a
+_little_ longer time to prepare; he replied with disdain, ‘My road is not
+the road of custom, but the road of genius.’ He was true to his word, and
+mockery was speedily turned to amazement when his companions, overcome
+with his eloquence, followed him verse after verse as he unfolded the
+hidden sense of the obscurest of prophecies, with a facility of diction
+and clearness of exposition and a readiness of resource which subdued the
+mind and captivated the imagination.” Success was his idol, pride his
+natural temper. He thought no question above his understanding, no truth
+beyond his apprehension; he threw down the glove in the face of a system
+more for the sake of routing its exponent than of impugning its truth, and
+when all eyes were upon him, and the populace of Paris rushed madly out on
+its door‐steps and house‐tops to cheer him as he passed, his end was won
+and his dearest wish fulfilled. One by one all his opponents were
+silenced; from school to school he rose, till at last the chair of Notre
+Dame was his; his name eclipsed that of all the masters of Paris, and
+drove from men’s minds even the fame of the doctors of the church.... And
+then what was the climax? It is told in three words—Héloïse, Soissons, and
+Sens. True, there was a long interval between the two misfortunes
+represented by the first two names, and that galling one which at last
+proved his salvation at Sens, and during the interval his fame revived,
+and again at Paris, though at S. Geneviève and no longer at Notre Dame,
+his _prestige_ broke down all prejudice and his victorious career began
+afresh. Then see the last drama of his stormy, eventful life. He meets S.
+Bernard at Sens before a court of bishops, monks, and princes, his own
+disciples crowding triumphantly around him, a huge concourse of people
+heaving before him, he “the spokesman of thousands, from whose midst he
+would, as it were, advance and proclaim the creed of human reason.”(86)
+Opposed to him stands one whose cheeks are furrowed with tears, and who
+has made no preparation to meet the irrefragable dialectician, the prince
+of debate, but who, “though in appearance but an emaciated mystic from the
+solitude of his cell, would represent as many thousands more who saw
+beyond the range of human vision, and judged the highest natural gifts of
+God from the elevation of a life of faith.”(87) History gives us the
+thrilling _denouement_ in startlingly simple form. When summoned to
+defend, deny, or explain the heretical propositions drawn from his
+brilliant works, Abelard turns in sudden contempt from the august
+assembly, and answers thus: “I appeal to the Sovereign Pontiff.” But all
+felt that this was defeat, the blow had been struck, the heresy was dead.
+And the heretic? Let many who have tried to‐day to walk in the dizzy path
+his footsteps have marked out, strive rather to imitate the end of his
+life; let them follow him to the solitary Benedictine Abbey where his
+gentle friend Peter the Venerable led him like a little child, and where
+his earnest, passionate nature, that could do nothing by halves, soon
+transformed him into a saint. And let the world which knows him chiefly
+through his sin and early shame fix its eyes upon him as one who, having
+abdicated honors greater than those of the greatest throne, having
+sorrowed with more than David’s sorrow, and taught with more than
+Solomon’s wisdom, at last found peace and justification in a narrow cell
+and in his daily avocations of instructing a small and obscure community
+on “divine humility and the nothingness of human things.”(88) Among the
+other great names that stand out in the tumult of Paris as stars of
+learning and holiness are William of Champeaux, Abelard’s chief adversary,
+and the founder of that saintly school of S. Victor which gathered in one
+the spirit of the old cloisters with that of the new scholastic teachers,
+and led the way through its famous doctor‐saints, Hugh and Richard, to the
+final welding together of the new form of theology, the incomparable
+_Summa_ of S. Thomas. Then, too, we have the preacher Fulk of Neuilly, who
+became a scholar at a ripe age, and soon surpassed the young students
+whose aim was display rather than knowledge—the man who preached the fifth
+crusade at the tournament of Count Thibault de Champagne,(89) and was
+followed by such crowds that, to rid himself of them and their
+inconvenient homage (shown by cutting pieces out of his habit), he called
+out, “My habit is not blessed, but I will bless the cloak of yonder man,
+and you can take what you please.”(90) John of St. Quentin, also, a famous
+doctor, who, preaching on holy poverty and the vanity of all learning, all
+riches, and all honors, suddenly stops, descends the pulpit‐stairs, kneels
+at the feet of the astonished prior of the Dominicans, and will not rise
+before the latter has thrown around him his own black cloak and enrolled
+him in the army of that holy poverty he had just praised with so much
+zeal. Then Albert the Great, whose followers were so numerous that he had
+to leave the schools and speak in the open air, so that the square where
+he delivered his lectures was called _Place du maître Albert_, which name
+later on became corrupted into the form it still bears, Place Maubert.
+Albert brings before us the school of Cologne, inferior of course to the
+mighty university, but yet a centre, at least for Germany. There S. Thomas
+of Aquin first studied, and now and then astonished his undiscerning
+companions by the “bellowings of the great dumb Sicilian ox,” until he was
+finally sent to Paris, the scene of his matchless and altogether spiritual
+triumph. In him, the heir of the old Benedictine school of _quies_,
+sanctity worked that marvellous union of the old spirit and the new which
+ended by harmonizing the truths of the church with the clamoring
+aspirations of a new and venturesome age. But, inseparably connected
+though he be with the crisis of the XIIIth century, when passion was at
+its hottest, and the intoxication of world‐wide success made Paris reel
+like a drunken man, we feel nothing but peace in the life of the Angel of
+the Schools, the greatest scholar of the European university. A divine
+calm seems to curtain off his soul from the contentions in which his mind
+and body are engaged; his lessons seem rather to be given from a holy of
+holies than from a professor’s chair, and, while we see in him the
+greatest thinker of the age, we feel that above all he was its greatest
+saint. One might say of him, with all due reverence, that he was the only
+man of that turbulent and questioning day who had looked upon the face of
+God and lived. Beside him was his gentle friend, Bonaventure, of whom,
+though a professor also, we hear but little intellectually, but whom the
+highest authority on earth has sealed as a doctor of the church, a burning
+seraph of love.
+
+And here we must leave that greatest of centres, Paris, whose prosperity
+at that time seemed so unalterable, and take a glance, necessarily a
+cursory one, at the other continental universities. Bologna undoubtedly
+claims the first place. It was called the “Mater Studiorum” of Italy, and
+vied more successfully with Paris than any other of the universities. The
+great Countess Mathilda of Tuscany, the liberal patroness of learning and
+protectress of the Holy See, was connected with its foundation, and by the
+end of the XIth century it was celebrated as the first law school in
+Europe.(91) This characteristic it always retained, while in the XIIth
+century canon law began to be equally studied there. Connected with
+Bologna was the publication of the _Decretals of Gratian_, a summary of
+the decrees of the popes, of a hundred and fifty councils, of selections
+from various royal codes, and of extracts from the fathers and other
+ecclesiastical writers.(92) The few errors in this gigantic work have
+often served as a peg whereon to hang many calumnies against the church;
+but the whole scope of the undertaking, so bold in its conception, so
+lucid in its exposition—has it ever been sufficiently examined outside the
+church? And will the world be astonished to know who was its compiler and
+who spent twenty‐five years of his hidden life upon it? A simple
+Benedictine monk of Chiusi, of whom nothing is known but his immortal
+work.
+
+M. de Maistre has cleverly said, “_Grattez le Russe et vous trouverez le
+Tartare_,” and we might adapt the pithy saying thus: Raise but the
+thinnest crust of what we call civilization, and you will find beneath the
+solid structure, the immovable foundation of monasticism.
+
+In 1138, Frederic Barbarossa consulted the Bolognese doctors as to the
+framing of a code of laws for his Germano‐Italian Empire, and in return
+for their help gave them the _Habita_, or series of protective ordinances
+which raised the Italian university almost to the level of that of Paris.
+Alexander III., formerly a theologian in its schools, also favored
+Bologna, and a tide of scholars from all parts of Europe began to flow
+towards the Apennines. Among these we find S. Thomas of Canterbury, who,
+as we know, made such brave use of the legal science he acquired there.
+Bologna was the second centre of the Dominican Order, the teaching order
+of the church—the instrument raised up in the warm‐hearted but intemperate
+middle ages to guide aright those lava‐streams of misdirected enthusiasm
+which at one time threatened to rationalize or fanaticize the intellectual
+world. It is at Bologna that we read of the miracles of the gentle and
+bright S. Dominic, and of the angels that constantly followed him to do
+the bidding of him who through opposition and misunderstanding was always
+doing God’s bidding. Here, too, S. Thomas of Aquin came once, and, being
+unknown to the procurator of the convent, was required to carry the basket
+while his companion collected the friars’ daily pittance through the
+streets. A true monk, he gladly obeyed, and was pained and confused when
+some of the passers‐by told the procurator of the mistake he had made.
+
+Italy was fruitful in universities, for, to mention only prominent names,
+there were Padua, Pavia, Salerno, and Naples, besides Rome, where the
+tradition of learning, especially sacred learning, was never quite broken.
+Padua was an offshoot from Bologna, and became famous in the XIIIth
+century for its devotion to classic literature and the liberal arts. At
+the time of the “Renaissance” it had become, however, a notorious focus of
+atheism.(93) Salerno was a school of medicine, and Pavia a brilliant and
+wicked resort of every intellectual aberration. We remember reading an
+excellent description of its vices, its dangers, and its attractions, in
+the life of a Venetian, a poet and child of genius, the friend and
+librettist of Mozart, whose name we cannot, however, recall. Even in those
+days of moral decadence the picture seemed appalling, and at Pavia as at
+Paris, as at Oxford in old times and our own day, there appears to have
+been no lack of brainless young profligates whose college career was a
+disgrace to their early education, and must have been a remorse prepared
+for their more sober conscience in later life.
+
+The University of Naples, as we learn from Prior Vaughan, was the creation
+of Frederick II., the Sybarite emperor whose splendid barbaric physique
+knew how to make all Eastern luxury of body and Greek luxury of mind
+minister to his sovereign pleasure. The description of his harem, his
+kiosks, his palaces, his gardens at Naples, reads like a page from the
+_Arabian Nights_, and rival the impossible tales that are told of Bagdad’s
+lavish magnificence under the caliphs. Utterly pagan the university seems
+to have avowedly been. It had no being of its own, but was a royal
+appurtenance, as the other institutions of Frederick II. Learning was a
+luxury, and it behooved the emperor to have all luxuries at his feet.
+Students from all parts of his kingdom of Naples were compelled by
+arbitrary enactments to study nowhere else but in the exotic university;
+the professors were all paid from the public treasury, and among them,
+with characteristic pride and contemptuous eclecticism, the imperial
+patron had canonists, theologians, and monks. Astrology and the wildest
+theories were broached, Michael Scott, the pretended seer and alchemist,
+was conspicuous for his brilliant talents and pagan tendencies, the
+existence of the soul was freely questioned, materialism openly professed,
+and many _literati_ ostentatiously paraded their preference of the
+philosophy of Epicurus or Pythagoras over the religion of Jesus Christ. A
+secret society is also alluded to in a popular poem of the day, its
+express purpose being the _expunging of Christianity and the introducing
+of the exploded obscenities of paganism in its place_.(94) This reminds us
+of Disraeli’s _Lothair_, in which such prominence is given to a secret
+society called _Madre Natura_, framed for the identical purpose we have
+just mentioned. It is said to have existed ever since the time of Julian
+the Apostate, and always with the same intent. The materialistic theories
+of the artist Phœbus concerning the absolute necessity of “beauty worship”
+and the superiority of the Aryan over the Semitic races (or principles)
+are only modern echoes of this pestilential teaching of the deification of
+materialism. Whether Disraeli, descended from that high race whose history
+and laws are a standing protest, and have been for ages a bulwark, against
+the “concupiscence of the flesh,” believes in these theories, is more than
+we can tell; he has at any rate clothed them with suspiciously gratuitous
+beauty in his recent work, and has, moreover, tried to fix upon the Anglo‐
+Saxon race the stigma of practically adopting them as her own. The
+monastic history of the countrymen of Bede and Wilfrid tells a very
+different tale, and nevertheless does not omit to mention the love of
+sport and athletic exercises peculiar to Englishmen. How far, however, is
+the character of the young race‐riders(95) and fox‐hunters(96) of monastic
+England from that of the voluptuous Oriental and sensuous Greek!
+
+Germany, Poland, Bohemia, Spain, and Flanders likewise had their own
+centres, more local, however, than those of Italy, all of them under the
+new form of universities, and all more or less emancipated from the
+strictly monastic spirit of the older centres of learning. Vienna, Erfurt,
+Heidelberg, and Wittenberg were the foremost in Germany; Cracow was
+founded by a saint, the holy Hedwige of Poland; and Prague, which gave so
+much trouble and anxiety to the church in former times and hardly less in
+our own day, owes much of its glory to the holy women of the middle ages.
+Thus Dombrowka, a princess of Bohemia, married to a Polish chief, and
+Hedwige, the great queen and patron saint of Poland, established colleges
+there and endowed them liberally. Salamanca had a wider reputation, and
+fell heir to all the brilliant learning of the Arabian and Jewish schools,
+whose influence on Christian thought in the days of S. Thomas of Aquin had
+been so dangerous. All the scientific knowledge of the East thus became
+its natural property, while the intensely Catholic mind of the Spaniards
+held them aloof from what was poisonous in Eastern philosophy. And here
+let us stop to remark that Spain, ranked as it has always been among the
+Latin nations, nevertheless owes its first Christian traditions, and, no
+doubt, also its imperial notions of universal sway, to the vigorous Gothic
+races, mingled with the Frankish and Burgundian blood brought in by
+intermarriage with the Merovingian princes of France. There is something
+in Spanish history, in Spanish perseverance, we might almost say in
+Spanish toughness, that reveals the Visigoth, the man of the northern
+forests, with his indomitable energy and insatiable thirst for the sole
+rule of land and sea. Alcala, the creation of Cardinal Ximenes, and
+Coimbra, besides twenty‐four colleges dignified by the name of
+universities, make up the quota contributed by Spain to the intellectual
+progress of Europe. We wish we had more space and time to devote to them.
+
+Flanders, the home of art in the middle ages, and the model of dignified
+and successful civic government, was not fated to be behind‐hand in the
+world of letters. As early as 1360, a gay scholar of the University of
+Paris, and a native of Deventer, returned to his birthplace with the halo
+of success and worldly fame about him. After a few years of vain display,
+Gerard of Deventer suddenly, through the agency of a holy companion,
+became an altered and converted man. Having fitted himself for a spiritual
+career by a three years’ seclusion among the Carthusians, he returned to
+his native city and instituted a congregation of Canons Regular, whom he
+entrusted to a disciple of his, a former canon of Utrecht. He himself died
+soon after, but under his successor, Florentius, the school grew in
+importance and renown till, in 1393, a scholar entered its cloisters, by
+name Thomas Hammerlein, now known to the Christian world as Thomas à
+Kempis, the reputed author of _The Following of Christ_. His life is too
+entirely spiritual to be mentioned here, but of the institute in which he
+was reared the same rule will not apply. Although the aim of the Deventer
+school was to revive the old monastic ideal, and although its spirit seems
+forcibly to remind us of Bede and Rabanus of Fulda, still it gave forth
+scholars like the “Illustrious Nicholas of Cusa, the son of a poor
+fisherman, who won his doctor’s cap at Padua, and became renowned for his
+Greek, Hebrew, and mathematical learning.”(97) It is also told of the
+Deventer brethren that they “displayed extraordinary zeal in promoting the
+new art of printing, and that one of the earliest Flemish presses was set
+up in their college.”(98) The famous Erasmus passed his first years of
+study at Deventer in the latter end of the XVth century, and drew from his
+masters the prediction that he would “one day be the light of his age.”
+The later Flemish University of Louvain, founded in 1425, by Duke John of
+Brabant, was eminently an orthodox institution, and became, in the XVIth
+century, “one of the soundest nurseries of the faith,” as well as the
+chief seat of learning in Flanders. Even Erasmus owned in his letters that
+the schools of Louvain were considered second only to those of Paris.
+Here, as usual, the Dominicans were foremost in the breach, and enjoyed
+great privileges, while their influence made itself powerfully felt
+throughout the university. S. Thomas of Aquin was, of course, the
+recognized authority followed by the whole university in matters of
+theology.
+
+Ireland was not so fortunate during the scholastic as during the monastic
+era of intellectual development, but what benefits she had she owed them
+again to the same institution which had educated her sons in olden days.
+The first University of Dublin was founded in 1320, and had for its first
+master a Dominican friar. It soon decayed for want of funds and in
+consequence of the troubles of the times, but the Dominicans would not let
+learning perish, if they could help it. In 1428, a century later, they
+opened a free “high school” on Usher’s Island, where they taught
+_gratuitously_ all branches of knowledge, from grammar to theology, and
+admitted all students, lay and ecclesiastical. Between this college and
+their convent in the city they built a stone bridge, the only erection of
+such solid material known in Dublin for two centuries afterwards, and,
+says Mr. Wyse in a speech on Education delivered at Cork in 1844, “it is
+an interesting fact in the history of education in Ireland that the only
+stone bridge in the capital of the kingdom was built by one of the
+monastic orders as a communication between a convent and its college, a
+thoroughfare thrown across a dangerous river for teachers and scholars to
+frequent halls of learning where the whole range of the sciences of the
+day was taught gratuitously.”(99) A few years later, the four Mendicant
+orders, headed by the Dominicans, obtained from Pope Sixtus IV. a brief
+constituting their Dublin schools one university, with the same
+ecclesiastical rights and privileges enjoyed by the great University of
+Oxford, and this body corporate is mentioned as in active exercise of its
+powers just before the “Reformation.” It showed the general destruction
+brought by the apostasy of England on all monastic bodies, but such as it
+was it was the church’s creation, and a fitting successor to those centres
+of rare learning, the Columbanian monasteries of the VIIth and VIIIth
+centuries.
+
+The Scotch universities of Edinburgh, Glasgow, and Aberdeen have been
+purposely left out, as we have no records of them at hand; of the latter,
+the remains of which we happened to visit some years ago, it will suffice
+to say that it possesses a library, the germs of which are due to Catholic
+collectors, and still has some very fine specimens of illuminated
+manuscripts. The wood carvings of the choir stalls and screen, of Flemish
+workmanship, are very beautiful, and the collegiate chapel, still
+existing, bears marks of the harmony and symmetry natural to the grand
+worship it once typified.
+
+We have left Oxford to the last, since its history is perhaps almost
+unique. No university of its day can match it; its vitality has outlasted
+the “Reformation” itself, and its spirit and statutes remain to this
+moment as obstinately Catholic as in the days of Bacon and Duns Scotus.
+True, infidelity has not respected it, but no more did it respect the
+University of Paris in the XIIIth century, and far more vigorous than its
+great mediæval rival, Oxford still epitomizes the genius of a nation,
+while Paris has lost every vestige of its former academical sway. Its
+beginnings are lost in the ages of fable, for tradition asserts that long
+before Alfred there were schools and disputations there. The schools of
+Osney Abbey, and the Benedictine school in connection with Winchcomb
+Abbey, are among the earliest foundations, but as yet (in 1175) there were
+no buildings of any architectural pretensions. About that time a great
+fire destroyed the greater part of the city, and for a long while very
+little order prevailed among its motley inhabitants. Robert Pulleyn, an
+English scholar from Paris, who had set up a school in 1133 and in 1142,
+went to Rome, was made cardinal there, and obtained many ecclesiastical
+privileges for the Oxford scholars. Law already began to be studied in
+this century, but a historian of the time complains bitterly that “purity
+of speech had decayed, philosophy was neglected, and nothing but Parisian
+quirks prevailed. Had the monastic schools retained their ascendency,” he
+says, “polite letters would never have fallen into such neglect.”(100) In
+the XIIIth century there were 30,000 students at Oxford, though many among
+them were “a set of varlets who pretended to be scholars,” and passed
+their time in thieving and villany. The brawls of these said “varlets”
+were to the full as violent as those of the Rue Coupegueule, and much of
+the same kind of license disgraced Oxford as it did Paris. Nationality
+seems to have been a common pretext for fights, and S. George’s, S.
+Patrick’s, and S. David’s days were, instead of peaceful festivals, days
+of bloodshed and plunder. At last every demonstration on these days had to
+be forbidden under pain of excommunication. “Town and gown” fights too
+were frequent, and even _internecine_ battles took place among the
+scholars themselves over a false quantity in pronunciation or a disputed
+axiom in philosophy. The fare in those days seems to have been scanty;
+here for instance is a collegiate _menu_: “At ten of the clock they go to
+dinner, whereat they be content with a penny piece of beef among four,
+having a few pottage made of the broth of the said beef, with salt and
+oatmeal and nothing else.” When they went to bed, “they were fain to run
+up and down half an hour to get a heat on their feet,” and what the _beds_
+were may be surmised from the fact of the students lodging where they
+could, generally in lofts over the burghers’ shops, as at Paris.
+
+In the earlier part of the XIIIth century Cambridge was founded, and Peter
+of Blois, the continuator of Ingulphus, tells us that from this “little
+fountain (the first lectures given successively in the same barn, on
+various subjects, by three or four monks of Croyland) of Cottenham, the
+abbot’s manor near Cambridge, which has swelled to a great river, we now
+behold the whole city of God made glad, and teachers issuing from
+Cambridge, after the likeness of the Holy Paradise.” Cambridge seems to
+have cultivated the Anglo‐Saxon tongue, as Tavistock also did, a monastic
+school where the language was regularly taught “to assist the monks in
+deciphering their own ancient charters.”
+
+“Old Oxford” was not the imposing pile of ecclesiastical buildings its
+later representative is now. Osney and S. Frideswide stood like castles in
+its surrounding meadows, but the main body of the university consisted in
+straw‐thatched houses and timber schools. There were pilgrimage wells
+where, on Rogation Days, various blessings were invoked on the fruits of
+the earth, and these were called by our forefathers “Gospel places.” It
+was a sort of religious “Maying,” the students carrying poles adorned with
+flowers and singing the _Benedicite_. The streets bore singular
+names—“School Street,” “Logic Lane,” “Street of the Seven Deadly Sins.”
+Here is the “Schedesyerde,” where abode the sellers of parchment, the
+_schedes_ or sheets of which gave their name to the locality. The schools
+can be distinguished by pithy inscriptions over dingy‐looking doors—_Ama
+scientiam_, _Impostu ras fuge_, _Litteras disce_—but you will look in vain
+for public schools or collegiate piles. In these humble schools many great
+scholars were reared: S. Edmund of Canterbury, who, for instance, unless
+he chanced to spend it in relieving the distress of some poor scholar or
+little orphan child, left the money his pupils paid him lying loose on the
+window‐sill, where he would strew it with ashes, saying, “Ashes to ashes,
+dust to dust”; or, again, S. Richard, Edmund’s friend, and afterwards his
+chancellor at Canterbury, who while at Oxford was so poor that he could
+seldom allow himself the luxury of _mutton_, then reckoned as ordinary
+scholar’s fare, and who lodged with two companions, of whom we hear the
+Parisian tale of the single gown worn alternately at lecture by each,
+while the others remained at home; Robert Grossetêle, the Franciscan, a
+universal genius and a most holy man, a zealous lover of natural science,
+and so well versed in the Scriptures that one of his modern biographers
+has candidly admitted that his “wonderful knowledge of them might probably
+be worth remark in our day, though in its own _not more than was possessed
+by all theological students_”; Roger Bacon, the greatest natural
+philosopher who appeared in England before the time of Newton; and
+Alexander of Hales, “the Irrefragable Doctor,” who also taught in the
+Franciscan schools of Paris—were among prominent Oxford scholars of the
+middle ages. Then the marvellous Duns Scotus a scholar of Merton and
+afterwards a Franciscan monk, an Abelard in brilliancy, versatility, and
+keenness of argument, who, disputing one day before the doctors of the
+Sorbonne (to whom he was personally unknown), was interrupted by one of
+them with this exclamation, “This must be either an angel from heaven, a
+demon from hell, or Duns Scotus from Oxford!” A similar legend is told of
+Alanus de Insulis, a Paris doctor, who, having left the schools and become
+a lay‐brother at Citeaux, accompanied the abbot to Rome to take charge of
+his horses. Being allowed to sit at the abbot’s feet during the council
+against the Albigenses, and finding the scales inclining in favor of the
+heretics, he rose, and, begging the abbot’s blessing, suddenly poured
+forth his irresistible arguments and defeated the sophistry of the
+Albigenses, who, baffled and furious, exclaimed, “This must be either the
+devil himself or Alanus.”
+
+Thomas of Cantilupe, the son of the Earl of Pembroke, was another
+representative Oxford scholar. Of noble birth and great intellectual
+powers, he rose to the highest dignities of the realm, and, though Oxford
+was still a scene of violent disorders, he preserved his purity and
+calmness through all its dangers. The collegiate system soon came to put
+an end to this state of things, and Merton was the first college, properly
+so‐called, where moral order and architectural proportions received some
+attention. The aspect of the university now rapidly changed. Lollardism
+seriously affected the great seat of learning, and at first its doctrines
+were much upheld by the jealous secular teachers, who saw in his calumnies
+a weapon to be used against the saintly and successful friars; the tone of
+the university declined, and literature was wofully neglected for a time.
+However, as Lollardism faded from men’s minds, a revival of letters took
+place, and in the XVIth century Erasmus, who was very kindly entertained
+and welcomed at Oxford, pays the following tribute to its literary
+proficiency: “I have found here classic erudition, and that not trite and
+shallow, but profound and accurate, both Latin and Greek, so that I no
+longer sigh for Italy.”(101) And again: “I think, from my very soul, there
+is no country where abound so many men skilled in every kind of learning
+as there are here”(102) (in England). His own Greek learning was chiefly
+acquired at Oxford, for, previous to his coming hither, his knowledge of
+that language was very superficial.
+
+We have lingered over the history of mediæval Oxford longer than our
+readers may be inclined to think reasonable, and we must confess that our
+interest in the only institution of the middle ages which stands yet
+unimpaired in glory, influence, and renown, has led us beyond the limits
+we had honestly proposed to ourselves.
+
+Little now remains to be said. We have come upon the uninviting times when
+reason broke away from faith and carried desolation in its headlong course
+through the field of the human intellect. A literary and philosophical
+madness settled on men’s minds, and Babel seemed to have come again,
+except where the calm round of old studies was pursued with the old spirit
+of _quies_ within the sphere of the ancient faith. All beyond was
+confusion and hurry; every one set up as a teacher before having been a
+disciple; each man dictated and no one listened; each would be the
+originator of a system which his first follower was sure to alter, with
+the perspective of having _his_ alterations remodelled again by his first
+pupil, and so on _ad libitum_, till systems came to be called by men’s
+names, and to vary in meaning according to the particular temper of each
+one that undertook to explain them.
+
+With all its turbulence and occasional excesses contrasted with the
+cynical refinement and polite indifferentism of to‐day, was not the older
+system the better one?
+
+
+
+
+Fleurange.
+
+
+By Mrs. Craven, Author Of “A Sister’s Story.”
+
+Translated From The French, With Permission.
+
+Part Third.
+
+The Banks Of The Neckar.
+
+
+
+XXXIX.
+
+
+About a fortnight after Christmas, Clement was returning to his lodgings a
+little sooner than usual, when he met Wilhelm Müller at the door.
+
+“Ah! you have come at the right moment,” said he. “Let me tell you why. A
+courier from St. Petersburg arrived this morning with important news,
+which will have a serious effect on our business.”
+
+“Are you referring to the death of the Emperor Alexander? I knew that
+yesterday. What else is there?”
+
+“Quite another affair, indeed. Constantine has been set aside, and the
+Grand Duke Nicholas is to succeed his brother.”
+
+“Are you sure?”
+
+“Yes. But that is not all; we knew that yesterday. The news the courier
+brought this morning is more serious. It seems a conspiracy has broken
+out—”
+
+“A conspiracy! Where?”
+
+“At St. Petersburg. The courier left the twenty‐fourth of December. They
+were then fighting on the square before the palace, and the emperor was in
+the midst of the fight.”
+
+“Constantine?”
+
+“No, indeed; his brother.”
+
+“The Grand Duke Nicholas? Is he at the head of the plot?”
+
+“No; on the contrary, it seems to be Constantine, and yet it is not he
+either.—In fact, no one knows anything about it, the report is so very
+confused. But come and help me, if you will. We have despatches to send in
+every direction. We shall certainly have further news this evening. I dare
+say Waltheim (the chief member of the firm of which they were the
+principal clerks) is this very moment beside himself.”
+
+The two friends set off together. They had hardly gone two steps before
+they came upon quite a group standing around the doorway of a fine house
+almost opposite Müller’s. It was the residence of the Russian legation.
+They were told in reply to their questions that a courier had just arrived
+on horseback, covered with dust and half‐dead with fatigue. He left St.
+Petersburg on the twenty‐sixth, and had been ten days on the way.
+
+“Does anybody know what news he has brought?” asked Müller of the man who
+gave him this information.
+
+“Nothing definite, of course. And we shall learn nothing there,” pointing
+to the diplomatic residence, “except what they please to tell us.”
+
+Müller and Clement stopped no longer.
+
+“The twenty‐sixth!” said Müller. “I should like to know the contents of
+the despatch.”
+
+“The other legations must soon have news of as late a date, to say nothing
+of our own correspondent, who will give us the earliest information
+possible. But, now I think of it, one of the attachés of the French
+legation is somewhat of a friend of mine; what if I go and ask him for the
+details?”
+
+Müller thought this a capital idea, and Clement left him at once to go to
+the residence of the French legation. Müller kept on to his office at
+Waltheim’s, where he would wait for him.
+
+The young attaché referred to was the Vicomte de Noisy. He had been
+present at one of the public assemblies in which Clement distinguished
+himself as a speaker, and conceived a fancy for him from that time. They
+frequently made excursions together on foot or horseback, and the vicomte
+sought every opportunity of meeting Clement with an eagerness the latter
+sometimes reproached himself for not responding to with more warmth. He
+relied, therefore, on a cordial reception, and, in fact, as soon as he was
+announced, he was taken into a small room next the _chancellerie_, where
+M. de Noisy passed the greater part of his time. He found him seated at a
+table covered with papers. Before Clement had time to utter a word, the
+young attaché exclaimed, without leaving his place:
+
+“Have you come with news? or to get some?”
+
+“What a question! You know well our commercial agents are never able to
+rival the speed of the bearers of political despatches.”
+
+“And yet it happens sometimes.”
+
+“But not this time, unfortunately. The Russian legation has just received
+a despatch from St. Petersburg dated the twenty‐sixth.”
+
+“So we have just heard. It came in an incredibly short time. I fear ours
+will not do as well. And yet the French embassy at St. Petersburg is not
+often caught napping.”
+
+Some one rang furiously. A hussar opened the door and made a sign to the
+vicomte, who sprang forward.
+
+“The courier!” he exclaimed. “Bravo! Vive l’ambassadeur! To be only one
+hour behind the Russian courier is wonderful! Here, _mon cher_, are some
+cigars. Take the arm‐chair and wait till I return. I shall soon be back,
+and will bring you the news.”
+
+Clement threw himself into the arm‐chair, lit a cigar, took up a
+newspaper, and patiently awaited the young attaché’s return beside a good
+fire, which, without prejudice to the large stove at one end of the room,
+did not give out too much heat at this rigorous season. At the end of an
+hour, however, he was beginning to feel he was losing his time, when the
+Vicomte de Noisy reappeared with his hands full of letters, which he threw
+on the table.
+
+“There,” he said. “To decipher and read these is not all: they are to be
+answered, and I do not know when I shall be able to leave the
+_chancellerie_.”
+
+“Would it be indiscreet for you to tell me the nature of your despatches?”
+
+“By no means. We have good news. It is all over. The struggle was severe,
+but short. The new emperor conducted admirably. The regiments in revolt
+have returned to their duty, all the leaders of the insurrection have been
+taken. The only serious thing is that among the latter are several
+belonging to the _noblesse_, and a great many gentlemen of social standing
+are compromised. This interests me more than anything else, because I was
+connected with the embassy at St. Petersburg before I came here, and know
+them all.”
+
+“Have they given any of the leader’s names?”
+
+“Oh! yes: Troubetzkoï, Rilieff, Mouravieff, Wolkonsky, and a host of
+others. But among all these names there is one I am amazed at finding. Who
+would ever have thought Walden would be drawn into such a row?”
+
+Clement’s heart gave a leap. “Walden, did you say? What, the Count George
+de Walden?”
+
+“The very person. Do you happen to know him?”
+
+“Yes, I know him.”
+
+“Well, can you conceive of a man of his ability and distinction being
+mixed up in such a plot? It was an atrocious conspiracy to assassinate the
+emperor, and a foolish attempt to establish a republic. Constantine’s name
+was only made use of as a pretext.”
+
+“And is Count George seriously compromised?” asked Clement.
+
+“He could not be more so. He is classed among those who have no other
+alternative but Siberia or death.—But excuse me, Dornthal, I am forced to
+leave you. I dare say we shall have to work all night. Here,” said he,
+searching in his pocket, “here is a letter I have received from St.
+Petersburg by the courier. You may find in it some additional details that
+will interest you.”
+
+The attaché hurried off through the door of the _chancellerie_, and
+Clement left the house. It was not till he found himself in the street
+that he began to recover from the stupefaction caused by the news he had
+just heard. He turned mechanically towards the office, where Müller was
+waiting for him, and gave him an account of what he had just learned, with
+the exception of the one fact of this political event of infinitely more
+importance to him than all the rest. He remained some time at his post,
+making an almost superhuman effort to control his bewildered mind and keep
+it on the work he had to do. At last he took leave of Müller and went back
+to his lodgings. Without stopping, as he usually did, to see the family,
+he went directly up‐stairs, and shut himself up in his room. He wished to
+be alone, that he might decide at leisure upon the course to pursue in
+consequence of so unforeseen and serious an event.
+
+Gabrielle!—He thought of her—and her alone. How would she support such a
+blow? How was she to be informed of it?
+
+He remained a long time buried in these reflections without thinking of
+the letter in his pocket. At length he bethought himself of it, and with
+the hope of getting some light began to read it attentively. After some
+preamble, which he ran over hastily, he came to what follows:
+
+“This conspiracy, which broke out with the suddenness of a thunderbolt,
+and appeared to be only the spontaneous result of the prevailing doubt at
+the beginning of the present reign as to which of the two brothers was the
+real emperor, was really arranged a long time before, it seems. It is said
+to have had deep and extensive ramifications, and they who fomented and
+directed the plot only availed themselves of the circumstances that
+followed Alexander’s death as a pretext. It is said their plans were to
+have been executed in the spring, if the deceased emperor’s life had been
+prolonged till that time. But what seems equally certain is that a great
+number of those who are now seriously compromised had only a very
+imperfect idea of what was going on. Among these, I cannot doubt, is our
+poor friend George de Walden. You know he has always been dreaming of
+possible or impossible reforms. As evil would have it, he met in Italy
+during the past year a certain man named Lasko—very intelligent and
+capable, but an intriguer ready for anything, and mixed up with all the
+plots that have agitated Italy and Germany the past ten years. Imprisoned,
+then released, Heaven knows how, assuming a thousand names, in a word, one
+of those evil‐minded persons who are docile instruments in the hands of
+the real leaders of the great plots of the day, George was accidentally
+brought in contact with him, and once, only once, was persuaded to attend
+one of their meetings through mere curiosity. There by a still more
+unfortunate accident he happened to meet one of the leaders just referred
+to. The latter at once saw the influence to be derived from George’s name,
+position, enthusiasm, and even his ignorance of the extent of their
+schemes. He persuaded him to repair to St. Petersburg at a given time, and
+hold himself in readiness to second a combined movement, secretly
+arranged, but too extensive to be suppressed. This movement, he said, was
+to bring about the realization of some of George’s theories. I had these
+details from the Marquis Adelardi, the genial Milanais who spent a winter
+here three years ago, and is, you know, George’s intimate friend. The
+marquis, uneasy about the count’s sudden departure from Florence, and
+still more so when three months passed away without his return, came here
+to join him. He arrived only three days before the fatal twenty‐fourth. It
+appears George was certainly on the square that day and in the foremost
+ranks of the insurgents. Adelardi declares he went there sincerely
+convinced, by the representations of those who were desirous of leading
+him on, that Constantine’s renunciation was a pretence, and his rights
+ought to be maintained in the interests of their projects, which that
+prince, they declared, was ready to second. However that may be, it is
+only too certain that close beside him on the square was this same Lasko,
+who was killed at the very moment of firing at the Grand Duke Michael. One
+witness—and but one, for it requires some courage to testify in favor of a
+man in his situation—has stated it was George who turned his deadly weapon
+aside (thus saving the grand duke’s life) before the aide‐de‐camp of the
+latter shot the assassin. But there is so strong a feeling against him,
+both at court and in the city, that no one dares insist how much this
+circumstance is in his favor. He himself obstinately refuses to take
+advantage of it, and his haughty attitude since his arrest is by no means
+favorable to his interests. What makes his case more complicated, his
+secretary was an Italian most intimately connected with Lasko. This man,
+Fabiano Dini by name, was also on the square the day of the insurrection,
+and was severely wounded.”
+
+Here Clement stopped. These last lines increased his agitation to the
+highest pitch. All their vague fears were thus confirmed—his cousin’s
+fatal destiny pursued him to the end! Unfortunate himself and a source of
+misfortune to others! Yes, that was Felix: capable of realizing his
+disgrace, but not of repairing it; seeking the post of danger and the
+opportunity of displaying his courage, reluctant to leave the obscurity in
+which he had hidden his life, he became one of those secret agitators who
+were then, perhaps even more than now, silently undermining Europe. He
+soon became their agent, and his talents, contempt of danger and death,
+made him a useful one. In this way he speedily came to an end that was
+inevitable.
+
+Clement paced up and down his chamber a long time unable to calm his
+confused mind, but, after much reflection, came to the conclusion George’s
+trial would probably be prolonged, and might terminate less tragically
+than was to be feared from this letter. At all events, he ought to spare
+Fleurange all the anguish of this uncertainty as long as possible. This
+would not be difficult at Rosenheim, for the professor was not allowed to
+read the newspapers, and therefore none were left about the rooms occupied
+by the family. Hansfelt alone read them and communicated the news. Clement
+hastened to write his sister Hilda a few lines, confiding to her all he
+had just learned, and recommending her, as well as Hansfelt, to withhold
+from Gabrielle all information on the subject. “I shall be at Rosenheim in
+a week,” said he at the close, “and we will consult together, dear sister,
+about what will then be advisable. Meanwhile, I rely on your prudence and
+affection for her.”
+
+Clement and his sister had never discussed the subject now referred to,
+but they had long read one another’s thoughts. They were now of the same
+mind, and Fleurange would have remained a long time ignorant of what they
+wished to conceal from her, had not an unforeseen circumstance overthrown,
+a few days after, all the plans laid by their prudence and affection.
+
+
+
+XL.
+
+
+The poor you always have with you. This is our Saviour’s declaration, and
+it accords with human experience. We find the poor everywhere, unless we
+wilfully turn away our eyes with culpable indifference. Mademoiselle
+Josephine, we are well aware, was not of the number of these blind or
+insensible persons. She therefore found quite as much work on her hands at
+Heidelberg as at Paris, with this difference, which was a keen
+mortification—she was unable to hold any communication with the objects of
+her bounty, except by gestures rarely expressive enough on either side to
+be understood. This forced her to dispense with what had always been the
+most pleasant feature of charity—kind words, and sometimes long chats with
+the poor on whom she bestowed alms.
+
+“I only wish they understood a little French,” she said. “It seems as if
+it might be easy enough for them, whereas it is utterly impossible for me
+to learn German.” In a word, not to know French and to understand German
+seemed to Mademoiselle Josephine among the mysteries of nature.
+Nevertheless, as the poor people persisted in using only their own
+language, and resentment must not be carried so far as to refuse aiding
+them, mademoiselle was very glad to accept Fleurange as her interpreter
+and the agent of her charity. The young girl came every day at the same
+hour, either to accompany her or receive her orders and make the daily
+round in her stead.
+
+She generally found mademoiselle in her laboratory, that is, in a room on
+the ground‐floor, in which the principal piece of furniture was an immense
+_armoire_, containing all kinds of things to be distributed among her
+actual or anticipated _protégés_. She liked to have a good supply on hand,
+and it was seldom a poor person found her without the means of aiding them
+at once.
+
+“Here, Gabrielle,” said she one morning, when Fleurange appeared as usual,
+basket in hand, to get the charitable supplies for the day. “See,
+everything is ready.” And she pointed towards the things on the table,
+which, with the large _armoire_ and two chairs, comprised all the
+furniture in the room. Everything was indeed arranged in fine order: on
+one side were two pairs of stockings and a woollen skirt; on the other, a
+covered tureen of broth, a small quantity of sugar, a bottle of wine, some
+tobacco, and two or three newspapers. To all these things she added a
+small vial, the contents of which required some explanation.
+
+“The stockings and skirt,” said mademoiselle, “are for the mother of the
+little girl to whom you carried clothes yesterday. The broth and sugar are
+for our poor old woman, as well as this little vial of _eau de mélisse_ of
+my own preparation, and not the worse for that. And the wine and tobacco
+are for the invalid soldier, the old carpenter whom you visited last week.
+His daughter succeeded in making me understand yesterday that nothing
+would give this poor man more pleasure than to lend him a newspaper
+occasionally. You can give him these which I procured for him this
+morning. Ah!—apropos, your cousin Clement left two nice cigars for him
+which I forgot. While I am gone for them, you can put all these things in
+your basket.”
+
+The kind woman left the room to get the cigars. They were up‐stairs, but
+she never thought of counting her steps when it was a question of doing a
+kind act, however insignificant, for another. Only, she did not ascend the
+stairs quite as nimbly as she once did, and on this occasion it took her
+about fifteen minutes to go and return.
+
+During this time Fleurange, standing at the table, proceeded to stow away
+all the things in her basket, and last of all was about to put in the
+newspapers when her eye fell on a paragraph in one of them that gave her a
+start. She seized the paper, opened it, and began to read with ardent
+curiosity. All at once she uttered a feeble cry, the journal dropped from
+her trembling hands, a mist came over her eyes, and, when her old friend
+returned, she found her lying on the floor, pale, cold, and senseless.
+
+Fortunately, Mademoiselle Josephine did not lack presence of mind or
+experience. She flew to Fleurange, knelt beside her, raised her head, and
+supported her in her arms. Then she drew a smelling‐bottle from her pocket
+to revive her, and while showing her these attentions she racked her
+brains to guess what could have caused one so robust and generally so calm
+to faint in this mysterious way. All at once she noticed the newspaper,
+which had fallen at the young girl’s feet. “Ah!” she said, “she read
+something in that medley, perhaps some bad news; but, merciful heavens!
+what could it have been to produce such an effect?—Dear child,” she
+continued, looking tenderly at the pale and lovely face resting on her
+shoulders, “she said yesterday she never fainted but once in her life, and
+that was at our house in Paris two years ago when she was overcome by
+weakness and hunger.”
+
+Poor Mademoiselle Josephine! compassion, and the remembrances thus
+awakened, doubly affected her, and her eyes were still filled with tears
+when Fleurange opened hers with an expression of surprise soon followed by
+an indistinct recollection. She rose slowly up, but, before mademoiselle
+could aid her, she threw her arms around her old friend’s neck.
+
+“O dear mademoiselle!” she murmured, “did you know it?—did you know it?”
+
+Poor Josephine had never been so embarrassed. To say she was totally
+ignorant of the point was to invite a confidence quite unsuitable at such
+a moment, and a contrary reply would also have its inconveniences. She
+therefore took refuge in an innocent subterfuge.
+
+“Well, well, my poor child, what use is there in speaking of it now? Be
+calm, and do not say anything at present. We will talk about it another
+time. Be easy,” she added at a venture, “everything will be arranged if
+you take what I am going to give you.”
+
+Then aiding Fleurange to rise, and placing her in a chair, she ran for a
+glass of water, into which she poured a few drops of _eau de mélisse_—a
+genuine panacea in her estimation—which she held to the young girl’s lips.
+Fleurange drank it all, and then gave a long sigh.
+
+“What happened to me?” she said.
+
+“Nothing. You were only faint. That is all.”
+
+“That is strange, for I never faint.” And she passed her hand over her
+forehead.
+
+“O my God! I remember it all now,” she suddenly exclaimed. “But is it
+true? May not this be false—a mere idle tale?”
+
+“Who can tell?” replied mademoiselle vaguely. “That is quite possible.
+They say so many things.”
+
+“But tell me all you know.”
+
+“No, no, not now, Gabrielle, not now. You are not able to hear it. Do as I
+say, and we will talk about it at another time.”
+
+Fleurange made no reply. A moment after, she rose. “I am well now,” she
+said; “I feel revived.”
+
+She gathered up her long hair, which had fallen around her shoulders, took
+the journal and put it in her pocket, then put on the little velvet hat
+trimmed with fur which she generally wore in winter, and said: “Thanks,
+dear mademoiselle, and pardon me. I have quite recovered, but do not feel
+equal, however, to the visits you expected me to make to‐day.”
+
+“No, indeed, of course not.”
+
+“I must go home at once.”
+
+“Yes, certainly, I am going with you. You must go to bed. You are
+generally pale, but now your cheeks are as red as those curtains,”
+pointing to the bright cotton curtains at the window.
+
+“No, no, I am not ill,” said Fleurange, her eyes aflame. “The air will do
+me good. Do not feel uneasy. You see my faintness has entirely passed
+off.”
+
+As mademoiselle had not the least idea of the cause of this sudden
+indisposition, and the young girl really seemed quite recovered, she did
+not oppose her wish to go home alone and on foot. The distance was not
+far. Fleurange came every day without any escort, she allowed her
+therefore to go, merely accompanying her as far as the gate of her little
+yard, where they separated, bidding each other good‐by till evening.
+
+
+
+XLI.
+
+
+The thermometer was down to five or six degrees. The little hat Fleurange
+wore protected her forehead, but showed the tresses of her thick hair
+behind. She drew up her hood when she wished to guard more effectually
+against the severity of the weather. But now she did not take this
+precaution. She only drew the folds of her thick cloak around her form,
+and set off with rapid steps. The keen, frosty air was refreshing to her
+burning cheeks and revived her strength, and, with the exception of an
+unusual glow in her complexion and in her eyes, there was no trace of her
+recent faintness when she reached home. As soon as she entered, without
+stopping an instant, she went directly upstairs, and, giving a slight
+knock at the door, entered the chamber between her own and Hilda’s, which
+Hansfelt had used as a study since his arrival at Rosenheim. When
+Fleurange entered, she found him and his young wife together. They started
+with surprise at seeing her, and stopped talking, with a certain
+embarrassment which did not escape Fleurange.
+
+“I can guess the subject of your conversation,” she said with emotion, but
+without hesitation, “and it is what I wish to speak to you about.”
+
+Her cousin looked at her, uncertain what reply she ought to make.
+
+“Hilda,” said Fleurange, “you agreed never to mention Count George’s name
+to me till I should speak of him first. Well, I have now come to speak of
+him, and beg you both to tell me all you know about him. Here,” continued
+she, throwing the newspaper she had brought on the table, “read that, and
+then tell me all I am still ignorant of.”
+
+What could they say? She stood before them so calm, resolute, and decided,
+that any reticence seemed useless. Hansfelt ran over the journal. He saw
+the article Fleurange referred to did not contain any details, but only a
+list of the accused, followed by some very clear comments on the fate
+which awaited them. Count George’s name figured among the first on the
+list.
+
+“What is he accused of? What is the crime in question?” asked she in a
+decided tone.
+
+Hansfelt still hesitated. But his wife knew better than he the character
+of her who was questioning them. “Karl,” said she, “you can tell her, and
+ought to do so. We must conceal nothing more from Gabrielle.”
+
+“And why have you done so hitherto?” said Fleurange. “Ah! yes, I
+understand”—and a slight blush mounted to her forehead—“the secret I
+thought so well hidden has been discovered by you all!”
+
+“No, no,” cried Hilda, “only by me—and you know I can conceal nothing from
+Karl—by me and Clement.”
+
+“Clement also?” said Fleurange, with a start of surprise and a confusion
+which deepened her blush. “But, after all, what difference does it make?”
+she continued. “I shall conceal nothing more from any one, and I wish
+nothing to be kept from me either. Come, Karl, I assure you earnestly I do
+not lack fortitude, and hereafter you must not try to spare me. Surprise
+alone overpowered me for an instant. Now I am prepared for the worst, and
+ready to hear what you have to tell.”
+
+But in spite of these words, when Hansfelt at last decided, after some
+further hesitation, to satisfy her, while he was giving her a
+circumstantial account of all Count George had done to forfeit his life,
+the color produced by the keen air, her walking so fast, and her
+agitation, vanished completely from the young girl’s face, and she became
+as pale as death.
+
+“Siberia or death!” she repeated two or three times in a low tone, as if
+it were as difficult to understand as to utter such terrible words.
+
+“As to the worst of these two sentences, it is to be hoped he will
+escape,” said Hansfelt.
+
+Fleurange shuddered. Was it really of him—_him!_—they were talking in this
+way? “But tell me, Karl, is there no other alternative? May he not be
+condemned to prison or expatriation? They are also great and fearful
+punishments. Why speak only of two sentences, one almost as horrible as
+the other?”
+
+Hansfelt shook his head. “His name, his rank, the benefits the government
+had conferred on his family, the favors so many times offered him, will
+all aggravate his crime in the eyes of his judges. His life, I trust, will
+be spared, but—”
+
+“But—the mines, fetters, and fearful rigors of Siberia—do you think he
+will be condemned to suffer all these penalties without any alleviation?”
+
+Hansfelt was silent. Hilda pressed Fleurange’s hands and tenderly kissed
+her colorless cheeks.
+
+“I have said enough, and too much,” said Hansfelt. “Why will you ask me
+such questions, Gabrielle? And why do you tell me to answer her, Hilda?”
+
+“Because I wish to know everything,” said Fleurange, raising her head,
+which she had rested a moment on her cousin’s shoulder, and recovering her
+firmness of voice. After a moment’s hesitation she continued: “Then
+nothing can save him?”
+
+“You wished for the truth without any disguise, Gabrielle, and I have not
+concealed it from you. According to all human probability, nothing can
+save Count George from the fate that awaits him: that is beyond doubt. But
+it sometimes happens in Russia that sudden caprice on the part of the
+sovereign arrests the hand of justice. Nevertheless, it would be deceiving
+you if I did not add that there is nothing to lead us to hope he will be
+such an object of clemency. On the contrary, all the reports agree in
+stating that the irritation against him is extreme, and surpasses that
+against all the other conspirators.”
+
+Fleurange remained a long time absorbed in thought. “Thank you, Karl,”
+said she at length. “You will hereafter tell me all you learn, will you
+not?”
+
+After receiving the promise asked for, she turned to leave the chamber.
+“One more question,” said she. “My head must be very much confused, or I
+should have asked you before in what way his poor mother learned the news,
+and how she bears it.”
+
+“Clement heard she was at Florence, as usual at this season, but on
+learning the news started at once for St. Petersburg.”
+
+“St. Petersburg! at this time of year! The poor woman will die on the
+way.”
+
+“I can tell you nothing more. Clement will be here this evening. He may
+have additional news.”
+
+But when Clement arrived that night, Fleurange, prostrated by the anxiety
+and excitement of the day, was unable to leave her chamber. Her aunt, who
+remained with her, declared she should see no one else till the next day,
+and the interview she hoped to have with Clement was deferred. Meanwhile
+the latter was steeling himself for the new phase in the trial before him
+by listening to all the details of what had occurred. Mademoiselle
+Josephine informed them of what had happened to Fleurange at her house,
+and in return learned with interest mingled with profound astonishment the
+real cause of her fainting. Of all the sufferings in the world, those
+caused by love were the most unintelligible to her. If she had been
+suddenly informed that her dear Gabrielle had lost her mind, or was going
+into a consumption, she would not have been more surprised and disturbed.
+Perhaps less so, for the terror mystery lends to distress, and a complete
+ignorance of the suitable remedies for such a case, added powerlessness to
+anxiety. She, who had so many remedies of all kinds for every occasion,
+could absolutely think of nothing suitable for this. How this unknown
+person, whose name she had never heard until to‐day, could all at once
+become so essential to the happiness of this dear child, who was
+surrounded by so much affection from others and had always seemed so
+happy, was in her eyes a still greater phenomenon than knowing German. As
+for that language, she now resolved to study it, thinking the day might
+again arrive when there would be something within her comprehension and
+power to do for her. “I will endeavor to acquire it, that I may not lose
+an opportunity of profiting by it,” said she. This vague hope consoled her
+for her present incompetency, and satisfied, for the time, the devotedness
+of her kind heart, now quite out of its latitude.
+
+
+
+XLII.
+
+
+The following morning Fleurange, quite recovered from the physical effects
+of her agitation, was up at her usual hour, that is, at daybreak. She put
+on her thick cloak, her little fur‐trimmed hat, and started off to church
+for the first Mass, which she daily attended at this season. At her
+arrival she threw back her hood, and knelt as near the altar as possible.
+The church was so dark that each one brought a lantern, a bit of candle,
+or some other portable light to read by. These lamps and tapers,
+increasing with the number of worshippers, at last diffused sufficient
+light throughout the church to enable one to distinguish the people and
+objects in it. Fleurange did not bring a candle and needed none, for she
+had no prayer‐book, but she was not the less profoundly recollected. Pale
+and motionless, her hands clasped, her head raised, her eyes fastened on
+the altar, the delicate and regular outline of her face distinctly visible
+by a neighboring taper, she resembled a statue of white marble wrapped in
+sombre drapery. She prayed with fervor, but without agitation, without
+tears, and even without moving her lips. Her whole soul seemed centred in
+her eyes. Her look at once expressed the faith that implores and hopes,
+submission to God’s will, and courage to fulfil it. It was a prayer that
+must prevail, or leave the heart submissive and strengthened.
+
+The Mass ended, all the lights were extinguished one after the other, but
+the faint glimmering in the east soon increased to such a degree that,
+when Fleurange rose after the church was nearly empty, she recognized
+Clement only a few steps off. He followed her to the door, she took the
+holy water from his hand, and they went out together.
+
+It was now broad daylight, but the sky was veiled with gray clouds, a
+violent wind swept before it the snow that covered the ground, and when
+they issued into the street they were met by a perfect whirlwind of
+driving snow which Fleurange was scarcely able to withstand. Clement
+supported her, then retained her arm, and they walked on for some time
+without speaking. He had dreaded this interview in spite of himself, and
+now rallied all his strength to listen calmly to what she was about to
+say. But, at last, as she remained silent, he spoke first:
+
+“You were ill last evening, Gabrielle. I was far from expecting to find
+you at church so early in such severe weather.”
+
+“Ill?” replied Fleurange. “No; I was not ill, but suffering from a great
+shock, as you know, do you not, Clement?”
+
+“Yes, Gabrielle, I know it.”
+
+These few words broke down the barrier. What had haunted Clement’s
+thoughts now proved to be an actual reality; but energetic natures prefer
+the most terrible realities to vague apprehensions, and even to vague
+hopes, and he felt his courage rise in proportion as self‐abnegation
+became more completely rooted in his soul. After a moment’s silence, he
+said:
+
+“Gabrielle, why have you not treated me of late with the same confidence
+you once showed me?”
+
+She replied without any hesitation: “Because I made a resolution never to
+mention _him_—I made it,” she continued, without noticing the slight start
+Clement was unable to repress, “because I wished to forget him. It was
+therefore better for me to be reserved even with Hilda—even with you,
+Clement. But now,” continued she, with a kind of exaltation in which grief
+and joy were confounded, “now I think of that no longer. It seems as if a
+new life had commenced for him and for me. And yet we are separated, as it
+were, by death. But death breaks down barriers, and reunites, too. What
+shall I say, Clement? I seem nearer to him to‐day than yesterday, and in
+spite of myself (for I am well aware it is an illusion) I feel I shall be
+able to serve him in some way or other. At all events, I no longer have
+any motive for concealing my feelings, and to throw off this restraint is
+in itself a comfort.”
+
+Clement listened without interrupting her. Each word gave him a sharp
+pang, but he steeled himself, somewhat as one does to the clash of arms
+and the firing of cannon till there is not even a movement of the eyelids
+to betray the fear of death or the possibility of being wounded. As to the
+illusion she spoke of, it was the last dream of sorrow and love. He would
+not try to dispel it.
+
+“Let us hope, my dear cousin,” said he in a calm tone. “So many unforeseen
+circumstances may occur during a trial like that about to commence! There
+is no reason to despair.—Whatever may happen,” added he, as they
+approached the house, “promise me, Gabrielle, from this time forth, to
+show the same confidence in me you once did—a confidence which will induce
+you to tell me everything, and rely on me under all circumstances. You
+once made me such a promise: have you forgotten it?”
+
+“No, Clement, and I now renew it. You are my best friend, as I once told
+you. My opinion has not changed.”
+
+Yes, she had said so. He had forgotten neither the day nor the spot, and
+his heart throbbed at the remembrance! Though he was but little more than
+twenty years of age, and the honeysuckle he still preserved in memory of
+that hour was scarcely withered, a long life seemed to have intervened
+since they exchanged nearly the same words.
+
+But when they separated with a pressure of the hand at the end of the
+conversation, on that gloomy winter morning, Clement was left with a less
+painful impression than that which came over him on the banks of the
+Neckar, when, in the pale light of the moon, he had so sudden and fatal a
+revelation from the expression of her eyes and the tone of her voice. She
+had told him nothing to‐day he did not know before. Instead of happiness,
+a vague perspective of devotedness opened before him. But even this was
+something to live for.
+
+The following days passed without any new incident. The necessity of
+concealing their preoccupation from the professor obliged them all to make
+an effort which was beneficial especially to Fleurange, who remained
+faithful to her ordinary duties, passing as much time as usual beside her
+uncle’s arm‐chair, and with Mademoiselle Josephine and her poor
+_protégées_. But a feverish anxiety was sometimes apparent in her
+movements and in the troubled expression of her eyes when she went daily
+at the regular hour to ask Hansfelt what was in the newspapers. For more
+than a week, however, there was nothing new either to comfort her or to
+increase her sorrow. Clement had returned to Frankfort, and the days
+dragged along with deep and silent anguish. One morning, when least looked
+for, he suddenly appeared with unexpected news: the Princess Catherine was
+at Frankfort, and would be at Heidelberg the following day!
+
+Fleurange trembled.—The Princess Catherine!—All the remembrances connected
+with that name revived with an intensity that for a moment overpowered
+her. She felt incapable of uttering a word.—“Coming here?” she said at
+length. “To Heidelberg? What for? What can bring her here? How do you
+know? Who told you? Oh! tell me everything, and at once, Clement!”
+
+Clement implored her to be calm, and she became so by degrees while he
+related what he had learned the night before from the Princess Catherine
+herself. At her arrival at Frankfort, she was informed by M. Waldheim, her
+banker, that young Dornthal was in the city, and she begged him to call on
+her. Clement complied, but not without emotion, with the wish of Count
+George’s mother, and found her fearfully prostrated with grief and
+illness. He had, however, a long conversation with her, the substance of
+which was that, leaving Florence as soon as she learned the fatal news,
+she travelled night and day till she reached Paris, where she fell ill.
+After four days, however, she resumed her journey, but when she arrived at
+Frankfort the physician declared her utterly incapable of continuing it,
+and especially of enduring the increasing severity of the weather in
+proportion as she approached St. Petersburg. Able to go no further, she
+resolved at least to keep on as far as Heidelberg, hoping the care of a
+young physician of that city, since and even then very celebrated, would
+speedily enable her to resume her sad journey.
+
+“I shall make the effort,” said the princess, “for I wish to live. I wish
+to go to him, if possible. I long to behold him once more! I hope much
+from Dr. Ch——’s attendance, as well as your cousin Gabrielle’s. I depend
+on her, tell her so. Tell her,” added she, weeping, “that I long to see
+her again, and beg her to come to me as soon as I arrive at Heidelberg.”
+
+“And she will be here to‐morrow?” said Fleurange, much affected.
+
+“Yes, towards night. I am going to notify the physician, and have the best
+apartments in the city prepared for her. Though she did not say so, I am
+sure, Gabrielle, she expects to meet you at her arrival.”
+
+Fleurange merely replied she would be there, but her heart beat with a joy
+she thought she could never feel again. To behold George’s mother once
+more, and at such a time! Was it not like catching a glimpse of him? She
+would be sure of constantly hearing his name—of constant and direct news
+respecting him—in a word, this was the realization of a secret wish she
+had not dared utter.
+
+The next day, a long time before the appointed hour, Fleurange was in the
+room prepared for the princess, arranging the furniture in the way she
+knew would suit her, trying to give everything a cheerful aspect, to
+lessen the sadness of the poor traveller, who, towards the close of this
+long day, at length arrived exhausted with fatigue, and fell sobbing into
+the young girl’s arms.
+
+The time when she feared no other danger for her son than Gabrielle’s
+presence was forgotten. The impressions of the moment always overruled all
+others, and her present troubles were, besides, well calculated to absorb
+every thought. Therefore, in meeting her young _protégée_ she only thought
+of the pleasure of seeing her again, of the comfort to be derived from her
+care and presence at a time when they were most needed, and everything
+except her first fancy for Fleurange seemed to be effaced from her memory.
+
+
+
+XLIII.
+
+
+A subdued light veiled every object. A bright fire sparkled in the small
+fireplace, only intended to be ornamental, as the room was otherwise
+heated by a stove. The princess was, as we have already seen her,
+reclining on a _canapé_ sheltered by a large screen. Her elbow rested on a
+small table loaded with the various objects she always carried with her;
+her feet were covered with a large shawl, and near her sat Fleurange on a
+stool in the old familiar attitude.
+
+There was a great change, however. They no longer resorted to reading as
+they once did, or followed the lead of the princess’ thoughts, generally
+more or less frivolous. One subject alone absorbed every faculty—a subject
+which she who listened with such ardent interest was still less weary of
+than herself.
+
+To this the afflicted mother continually came back, sometimes with
+agitation, sometimes with a dull despair, but always with profound grief,
+heart‐rending to her whose sorrow equalled her own.
+
+It was the first time the Princess Catherine had ever been subdued by
+misfortune. Subdued, but not changed, she not only instinctively retained
+all her elegant habits, but her passionate nature was unchanged, and burst
+forth into recriminations against all whom she thought implicated in her
+son’s misfortunes. This enabled her to pity, without blaming, him. It was
+one of these occasions Fleurange heard her exclaim that “Fabiano Dini was
+his evil genius!” and she shuddered in recalling her presentiment, so soon
+and so fatally justified.
+
+“Yes,” said the princess during one of their conversations, “it was he—it
+was that Fabiano Dini who brought him in contact with that reprobate of a
+Lasko!”
+
+And then she told the young girl about that person whose tragical end did
+not seem to have sufficiently expiated all the evil he had done her
+son—about his arrival at Florence, the ascendency he acquired over George,
+and the skill and promptness with which he took advantage of all his weak
+points. She had been incredulous at first, notwithstanding Adelardi’s
+warnings—alas! too long, too foolishly incredulous! But her fears once
+roused, how much had she not suffered! What efforts had she not made!
+Alas! but in vain!
+
+“He was always so—that dear, unfortunate child! No prudence, no fear of
+danger, ever stopped him on the very brink where his inclinations led him.
+Oh! those wretches! they soon discovered his imprudence, his generosity,
+and his courage! And now,” she exclaimed, rising from her pillow, while
+her thick but somewhat gray hair fell over her shoulders in unusual
+disorder, “can he possibly be confounded with them? Oh! if I could only
+get well, only strong enough to start, to make the journey, to see the
+young empress even but once, I should obtain his pardon, I am sure!”
+
+Then she fell back exhausted, murmuring as she wrung her hands: “And
+Vera!—Vera absent from St. Petersburg at such a time! She was expected
+there, but who knows if she may not arrive too late? And above all, who
+knows but she will be his worst enemy, and if he has not foolishly
+poisoned the very source whence he might now derive safety?”
+
+These words, which perhaps might have caused fresh trouble, were not heard
+by her to whom they were addressed. Fleurange had softly left the
+princess’ side as she laid her weary head on her pillow, and was at the
+other end of the room preparing a soothing draught which the poor invalid
+mechanically took from her hand from hour to hour without obtaining the
+relief of a moment’s sleep. This overpowering excitement, which resisted
+every remedy, was somewhat soothed at the arrival of one of the Marquis
+Adelardi’s frequent letters. He was still at St. Petersburg, and kept her
+accurately informed of all that happened, sometimes reviving her hopes,
+and again confirming her fears. But hitherto he had not succeeded in
+learning anything certain as to the fate reserved for his friend.
+Sometimes, therefore, after eagerly reading these letters, she threw them
+into the fire with despair.
+
+So much agitation at length brought on a high fever, and the princess had
+been confined to her bed several days, when one morning another letter
+arrived from St. Petersburg. Fleurange softly approached the bedside, and
+perceived the invalid was fast asleep. It was important this brief moment
+of repose should not be disturbed, and, besides, the physician had
+requested, some days previous, that no letter should be given her till it
+had been read, for fear she might learn some distressing news before she
+was prepared—as it was easy to foresee might happen. Fleurange promised to
+read the letters first, and with the less scruple that for more than a
+week she had been obliged to read them to the princess, who was too worn
+out to do so herself.
+
+She now left her to the care of the faithful Barbara, and went into the
+salon, where, carefully closing the door, she broke the seal of the letter
+in her hands, which was also from the Marquis Adelardi. “At last,” he
+wrote, “I think I can certainly reassure you as to the most terrible of
+the events that seemed possible. The extreme rigor of the law will only be
+enforced against the acknowledged leaders of the conspiracy—four or five
+in number. All the others, among whom is George, will incur, alas! a
+terrible penalty, but we must be thankful not to look forward to one more
+frightful—I say we, my dear unfortunate friend, for, as to him, I fear
+this sentence will produce a contrary effect. I am persuaded he will
+consider it a thousand times more dreadful than the other.
+
+“Since I last wrote you, through the intervention of one of the
+ambassadors, I have been allowed the privilege of entering the fortress
+where George is confined, and having a private interview with him. Pardon
+has been offered him if he will reveal the names of some of his
+accomplices. You will not be surprised at his refusing. But the numerous
+proofs of their criminal projects, which have been set before him in order
+to wrest some acknowledgment from him, have convinced him of the nature of
+the enterprise in which he risked his honor and life. The effect of this
+discovery has been to plunge him in the deepest dejection, and his only
+fear now is that his life may be spared.
+
+“ ‘I merit death for my folly, Adelardi,’ said he: ‘you were right in
+warning me there would be no consolation in such a reflection at the
+extremity I am now in. But I shall submit to my fate without weakness, as
+you do me the honor to believe, I hope. I do not wish, however, to appear
+more courageous than I am, and if, instead of death, I am sentenced to
+drag out the life of a criminal in Siberia, I do not know what my despair
+might lead me to do.’
+
+“As much precaution therefore must be taken in informing him of the
+mitigation of his punishment, as in announcing to others the severity of
+theirs. Before that time, I hope to obtain entrance again.
+
+“Meanwhile I have learned with as much admiration as surprise that several
+who are doomed to the same punishment as he are to have an unexpected and
+unparalleled consolation. Their wives—their admirable and heroic
+wives—have begged to be allowed to share their fate, and at this very
+moment several ladies whom you know, young, beautiful, and accomplished,
+are preparing to follow their husbands to Siberia by inuring themselves to
+the rigor of the season. These unfortunate men, degraded from the
+nobility, deprived of their wealth, and stripped of everything in the
+world, cannot be deprived of the affection of these self‐sacrificing
+creatures whose noble devotedness nothing daunts. I confess this amazes
+and confuses me, for I never before realized, or even suspected, how much
+heroism and generosity there is in the heart of a woman!”—
+
+Fleurange’s own heart throbbed so violently she was unable to continue the
+letter. With overflowing eyes she was still dwelling on the page she had
+just finished—reading it over and over—when she was told the princess was
+awake, and wished to know if there was a letter for her. For some days her
+mind had been so full of terrible anticipations about the final result as
+sometimes to produce fits of delirium. When, therefore, the contents of
+this letter were communicated to her, she felt an unexpected—an unhoped‐
+for relief. His life—George’s life!—would be spared! There was yet time
+for her to effect something. She began to hope everything from the future,
+and became calmer than she had been for a long time. She was even to get
+up in the evening. She conversed, she spoke eagerly of her plans, her
+hopes, all she would do to soften her son’s exile, and the efforts she
+would make to abridge it; but what was extraordinary, Fleurange seemed
+absent‐minded and made scarcely any reply.
+
+About nine o’clock Julian or Clement always came to accompany her back to
+Rosenheim—a half‐hour’s walk from the princess’ house, which was at the
+other end of the city. On this occasion, when she was sent for, she was so
+absorbed in her own thoughts that she did not notice which of the two was
+with her. It was starlight, but very cold, and her hair was blown about by
+the wind from beneath her little velvet hat.
+
+“Draw your hood up, Gabrielle; it has not been so cold this winter.”
+
+It was Clement’s voice which suddenly roused her from her reverie.
+
+“Is it you, Clement?—Excuse me, I did not know whether I was with you or
+Julian.”
+
+He gently attempted to raise her hood.
+
+“No, no!” she said earnestly. “Let me breathe the air. Though it is
+scarcely more than two years since I saw snow for the first time in my
+life, I am not afraid of the cold. I could if necessary endure far more
+severe weather than this.—There!” And she took off her hat and walked some
+steps with her head completely exposed to the frosty night air. “You
+know,” she continued, with an animation that singularly contrasted with
+her previous silence—“you know, during the Russian campaign, those who
+endured the cold best were the Neapolitan soldiers. Well, like them, I
+have brought a supply of sunshine from the South which much harder frosts
+than this could not exhaust!”
+
+Nevertheless, at Clement’s renewed entreaties, she laughingly put on her
+hat, and they walked quickly along, leaving scarcely a trace of their
+steps on the hard snow, deep as it was.
+
+Her liveliness that evening was strange! Clement noticed it without
+comprehending the cause. Her cheerful tone and charming smile, instead of
+delighting him as usual, now made him inexpressibly uneasy, and sadder
+than ever!
+
+
+
+XLIV.
+
+
+As is often the case with people of violent and impressionable natures,
+the Princess Catherine seldom saw things long in the same light. Though
+her thoughts were sorrowfully fastened on one subject in consequence of
+the tragical events that so suddenly threw a dark, ominous veil over a
+life hitherto so smiling, she found means of giving a thousand different
+shades to her misfortune, and it was not always easy to follow her in the
+fitful turns of her grief. What consoled her one day was a source of
+irritation the next: what she affirmed in the morning, she vehemently
+denied in the evening. Sometimes she expressed her fears on purpose that
+they might be opposed; at other times, she burst into tears at the
+slightest contradiction, and, if they endeavored to reassure her, she
+accused them of cruelty and indifference to her troubles.
+
+In consequence of one of these sudden fluctuations, the day following the
+arrival of the Marquis Adelardi’s letter which had seemed so consoling,
+Fleurange, at the hour of her usual visit, found her abandoned to the
+deepest dejection. Everything had assumed a new aspect, or perhaps it
+would be more just to say that everything now wore the terrible aspect of
+truth. And was it really enough that her idolized son was delivered from
+death? Was not the prospect she now dwelt on almost as fearful to bear?
+He—George!—her son!—in her eyes the perfect model of manly beauty,
+elegance, and nobleness of character, clad in the frightful garb of a
+criminal!—and going alone amid that wretched crowd to that dreary region,
+where the hardest and most humiliating labor awaited him, without even the
+consoling voice of a friend to encourage him, to take him by the hand, to
+love him, and to tell him so!
+
+“Oh!” she exclaimed, in that accent which is as different from every
+other, as the grief of a mother differs from every other grief—“oh!
+feeble, ill, and exhausted as I am, why cannot I accompany him? It really
+seems to me, Gabrielle, if I were allowed, I should find strength, I
+should have the courage to go. I would start, I would go and share his
+wretched existence, I would participate in all the severities of so
+frightful a life, and by dint of affection I would make it endurable for
+him!”
+
+This energetic cry of disinterested affection—its evident sincerity—was so
+rare a thing with the princess that it was the more affecting. Pale,
+silent, and motionless before her, Fleurange listened with an emotion that
+prevented her uttering the words that hung on her trembling lips. The poor
+princess was sobbing aloud, with both hands to her face, apparently
+exhausted by her own vehemence, when Fleurange, suddenly kneeling beside
+her, said in a low tone:
+
+“Do you remember, princess, the promise you exacted from your son, one
+evening?”
+
+The princess raised her head with surprise and a shade of resentment:
+“What do you mean? Do you wish to reproach me at such a time? The moment
+is well chosen, but such a thing from you, Gabrielle, surprises me!”
+
+“Reproach you!” cried Fleurange. “No, I did not think of such a thing. It
+was a request, a petition, or, rather, it was a question I wished to ask
+you.”
+
+“A question!” The princess looked at Fleurange. She was struck by the
+expression of her countenance, and interest, mingled with surprise, roused
+her from her dejection. What request was she going to make in so
+extraordinary a manner? And why did she look so determined, and speak in
+so supplicating a tone?
+
+“Go on, speak, ask whatever you wish, Gabrielle.”
+
+“Well, first let me tell you this: The eve of my departure from Florence,
+while descending from San Miniato with him—with Count George, he asked if
+I would be his wife, adding he was sure of obtaining your consent.”
+
+“Why recall all these remembrances, Gabrielle? I thought you generous, but
+you are without mercy!”
+
+Fleurange went on as if she did not hear: “I replied that I would never
+listen to him, unless, by some unforeseen circumstance impossible to
+conceive, his mother—you, princess—would gladly consent to receive me as a
+daughter.” She stopped a moment, as if too agitated to continue.
+
+“What are you aiming at?” said the princess.
+
+“I beg you to listen to me, princess. Here is my question: When this
+terrible sentence is pronounced, when Count George de Walden is degraded
+from his rank, deprived of his wealth, and even of his name (you shudder,
+alas! and I also at the thought)—but to return—when that day comes, if he
+asks the consent he promised you to wait for, will you grant it?”
+
+The princess looked at her with astonishment, without appearing to
+comprehend her.
+
+“Will you allow me to tell him you have consented? Will you on that day
+tell me you are willing I should become your daughter?”
+
+The princess began to catch at her meaning, but she was too stupefied to
+reply.
+
+“Ah! say the word, princess,” continued Fleurange, her face expressing
+both angelic tenderness and a more than feminine courage, “say it, and I
+will start. I will be at St. Petersburg before his sentence is pronounced,
+and when he comes out of his dungeon I will be there, and before he
+departs for the place of his exile a tie shall unite us that will permit
+me to accompany him and share all its severity!”—She continued in
+faltering tones: “And if ever the tenderness of a mother, the care of a
+sister, or the love of a wife, were able to alleviate misfortune, my heart
+shall have the combined power of these various affections.”
+
+We are aware that, when certain chords were touched in the princess’
+heart, they vibrated strongly, and made her for a moment forget herself.
+But never, under any circumstances of her life, had she felt an emotion
+equal to that now caused by Fleurange’s words and accents. She looked at
+her a moment in silence while great tears rolled down her cheeks, then,
+opening her arms and pressing the young girl passionately to her heart,
+she covered her forehead and eyes with kisses, repeating at intervals with
+a voice broken by sobs: “Yes, yes, Gabrielle, be my daughter: I consent
+with joy—with gratitude. I give you now my consent and a mother’s
+blessing!”—
+
+To Be Continued.
+
+
+
+
+The Poor Ploughman.
+
+
+    A true worker and a good was he,
+    Living in peace and perfect charity;
+    God loved he, best, and that with alle his herte,
+    At alle times, were it gain or smart;
+    And then his neighbour right as himselve.
+    He wolde thresh, and thereto dyke and delve
+    For Christe’s sake, for every poor wight
+    Withouten hire, if it lay in his might.
+    His tithes paid he full fair and well,
+    Both of his proper work, and his cattel.—_S. Anselm._
+
+
+
+
+A Dark Chapter In English History.(103)
+
+
+One of the most gratifying features of the literature of the present, and
+one that in some measure compensates us for the evils produced by the many
+worthless books that are still allowed to issue from the press, is its
+tendency by close investigation and collation to vindicate the truth of
+modern history, and especially of that portion of it directly or
+indirectly relating to the XVIth century. Gradually, but most effectually,
+the inventions and gross calumnies of the post‐Reformation writers are
+being dissipated, and the meretricious grandeur with which the characters
+and acts of the anti‐Catholic sovereigns, statesmen, and generals of that
+eventful period were designedly clothed, has been stripped off, revealing
+to their descendants the deformity and impiety of the heroes of the
+Reformation. Whether we turn to England or Germany, Edinburgh or Geneva,
+we find the men and women who in our own school‐boy days we were urged to
+regard as patterns of patriotism and morality, become under the scrutiny
+of living historiographers the veriest counterfeits—the prey of passion
+and the untiring enemies of every principle of government and religion
+which we are bound to respect. Yet this is what, logically, we might have
+anticipated. A bad cause needs to be sustained by vicious instruments; but
+so closely and consistently has the web of falsehood been woven around the
+true designs and actions of the reformers that it required the labor of
+many skilful and patient hands to undo the meshes and reduce the fabric,
+so dexterously spun, to its original elements. This is peculiarly
+difficult with the works of English historians and biographers of the past
+three centuries, whose unanimity in magnifying the virtues and screening
+the crimes of their public men is so remarkable as to utterly destroy the
+value of their works as authorities among people of other nations. The
+beastly vices of the eighth Henry were, of course, so glaring that they
+could neither be denied nor extenuated; but who would expect to find that
+his worthy daughter Elizabeth, the “virgin queen” and _Gloriana_, before
+whose benign altar even Shakespeare offered the incense of his flattery,
+should at this remote period be discovered to be: as a woman ugly, ill‐
+tempered, and unchaste, and as a ruler fickle, cruel, cold‐blooded, and
+thoroughly despotic. James I., the head of a long line of gallant princes,
+to whom his pliant prelates attributed “divine illumination,” and
+subsequent historians praised for his learning and wit, we at length know
+to have been a miser and a charlatan, as deformed in mind as he was
+uncouth in person. “His cowardice,” says his compatriot and co‐religionist
+Macaulay, “his childishness, his pedantry, his ungainly person and
+manners, his provincial accent, made him an object of derision” to his
+English subjects. The unscrupulous Northampton and the subtle Cecil, the
+trusted ministers of both sovereigns, who had long been regarded as the
+unswerving champions of English independence and the bulwark of Protestant
+ascendency, are now proved to have been all along the paid tools of
+Catholic Spain, with whose ill‐gotten gold their lofty palaces were built
+and their luxurious wants regularly supplied.(104) The chivalrous and
+romantic Raleigh of other days, examined by the inexorable scrutiny of the
+XIXth century, turns out a spy in the pay of a foreign and by no means
+friendly power; the philosophic Bacon, a common peculator; and Coke, the
+father of English common law, a falsifier of sworn evidence and a
+concocter of legal conspiracies against the liberties of his countrymen.
+Yet these were the leading personages, who, with many others equally
+corrupt, in their day and generation swayed the destinies of England,
+desolated the church of God, originated or abetted plots and schemes, at
+home and abroad, for the spoliation and extermination of the professors of
+the ancient faith.
+
+This tardy measure of historical justice is partly due to the appearance
+in different parts of Europe of important public and private documents and
+correspondence, which have shamed British Protestant authors into
+something like truthfulness, but principally to the revival of Catholicity
+in England, which has been the means of drawing out a mass of original and
+reliable information, that had long been allowed to slumber in the dark
+closets of a few noble families or in inaccessible libraries during the
+gloomy era of persecution and proscription. Our readers are already
+familiar with the articles which formerly appeared in these columns on the
+long‐unsettled and vexed question of the character of Mary, Queen of
+Scots, and the justice or injustice of her treatment by
+Elizabeth—contributions to current literature which in their collective
+form have found their way among the _literati_ of all nations, and, from
+their admirable cogency of argument and conscientious appeals to
+contemporary authorities, have at length cleared away from the character
+of that ill‐starred lady the foul aspersions and unexampled obloquy heaped
+on it by the minions of the English sovereign.
+
+Some more recent publications have thrown additional light on the tragic
+incidents of her reign and of that of her successor James, which, as far
+as they relate to the Catholics of Great Britain, are full of freshness
+and interest. Chief among them is the _Life of Father John Gerard_, for
+many years a Jesuit missionary in England under both rulers, with his
+account of the celebrated Gunpowder Plot, written soon after the failure
+of that conspiracy. Many of the participants in the plot were personally
+known to him, and he himself was accused of having taken an active part in
+its formation; but, though his name has been frequently mentioned in
+connection with it and his manuscript narrative more or less correctly
+quoted, it remained for a member of his Order, the Rev. John Morris, the
+able editor of the book before us, to present to the world for the first
+time the only complete and accurate history of an event which has been the
+fruitful subject of misrepresentation and comment by every writer on
+English history for the last two hundred years.
+
+Few incidents of modern times can be said to have provoked more hostility
+to the church and the Jesuit Order than the Gunpowder Plot, few have been
+so dexterously used by the enemies of Catholicity to poison the public
+mind against the priesthood, and none the details of which are so little
+understood even at the present day by friends and foes. The 5th of
+November, the anniversary of its discovery, has long been a gala‐day with
+the more ignorant of the British populace; Protestant writers, divines,
+and politicians of the lower sort are not yet tired of alluding to the
+time when, as they are wont to allege, the Catholics by one fell swoop
+attempted to destroy king, lords, and commons; and even Lingard and
+Tiernay, with the very best intentions and after considerable examination
+of authorities, give a partial assent to the old popular conviction that,
+in some way or another, the Jesuits were at the bottom of the diabolical
+scheme, which in reality was the creation of a handful of desperate
+laymen. In fact, the former, with a penetration totally at variance with
+his general character, alludes to the taking of the oath of secrecy by
+Catesby and his companions in terms that would lead any superficial reader
+to adopt this absurd hypothesis. “All five,” he says, “having previously
+sworn each other to secrecy, received in confirmation of their oath the
+sacrament at the hands of the Jesuit missionary Father Gerard.”(105) It is
+true that in a subsequent edition of his _History_ he endeavored to
+explain away, but in a very unsatisfactory manner, the implication of
+guilty knowledge on the part of Gerard; but, whether from an imperfect
+acquaintance with the writings of that priest, then unpublished, or from
+that spirit of timidity which too often characterized the conduct of the
+English Catholics of the last generation, his refutation is not of that
+full and hearty nature which might be expected from so clear and critical
+a scholar.
+
+What Dr. Lingard was unwilling or unable to undertake may now, in view of
+more complete evidence, be accomplished by persons of lesser erudition,
+who, untrammelled by national partiality, are not alarmed at popular
+clamor or unwilling to disturb time‐honored but unfounded historical
+fallacies. We design, therefore, in this article to prove:
+
+1. That the Gunpowder Plot was formed and carried out to its disastrous
+end by not more than a dozen desperate men, the victims of unrelenting
+persecution for conscience’ sake.
+
+2. That the Catholic body in England, lay and clerical, till its
+discovery, neither were aware of its existence, approved of its aims, nor
+rendered any assistance to its projectors.
+
+3. That no priest, Jesuit or other, was concerned in its formation, or
+afforded it any encouragement at any time; and that of all the seculars
+and regulars in the kingdom but two were ever aware of its existence, and
+that to them the knowledge came under the seal of confession and could not
+be revealed.
+
+4. That those two used every possible effort to dissuade the conspirators
+from their design, and denounced on every occasion all violent attempts to
+redress the wrongs under which the Catholics suffered.
+
+The state of England at the beginning of the XVIIth century, when James of
+Scotland was called upon to ascend the throne of his mother’s murderer,
+was deplorable in the extreme. Less than half a century had sufficed to
+change entirely the whole face of the country socially and morally, and
+the once “merrie” people were divided into two hostile camps, one the army
+of plunder and persecution, the other the cowering, dissatisfied, and
+impoverished masses. Many were yet alive who recollected with sorrow the
+time when the cross gleamed on the spires of a thousand churches, when the
+solemn sacrifice was offered up on myriads of altars, when the poor and
+afflicted easily found food and shelter at the numerous convents and
+abbeys that dotted the land of S. Augustine, and the young and the aged,
+the weak woman and the strong man, together bowed their knees in reverence
+before the statues of the “blessed among women” and other saints. Now all
+was reformed away—changed not with the consent of the people nor by the
+argument or eloquence of the preacher, but by the brute force and cunning
+fraud of a corrupt sovereign, a dissolute and avaricious court, and,
+partially at least, by a venal and cowardly episcopate. The churches no
+longer resounded from morning till night with the solemn sacred chants,
+the monasteries were in ruins or the scenes of impious revelry, the
+festivals of the church were abolished, and the peasantry, formerly
+accustomed to look forward to them as days of rest from hard toil and
+occasions of innocent enjoyment, were sullen and discontented. Those who
+had shared in the ecclesiastical plunder spent their time in the
+metropolis in wild extravagance, while the gentry, most of whom still
+adhered secretly to the faith, remained at home, the prey of anxiety and
+the tax‐gatherer. The masses were fast degenerating into that state of
+stolid ignorance and unbelief from which all subsequent legislation has
+failed to raise them. The laws of Elizabeth aimed at the suppression of
+all outward manifestation of Catholicity and the ultimate protestantizing
+of the nation; those of James, at the utter extirpation of the Catholics
+themselves.
+
+As early as A.D. 1559, the first year of Elizabeth’s reign, a law was
+passed compelling every person holding office, either temporal or
+spiritual, under the crown, to take an oath of allegiance declaring the
+queen the supreme head of the church. The penalty for refusing this oath
+was forfeiture of goods and imprisonment, and a persistence in such
+refusal, _death_. Whoever affirmed the spiritual supremacy of the pope was
+declared guilty of treason; penalty, confiscation and _death_. Attendance
+at Mass was to be punished by perpetual imprisonment, and non‐attendance
+at Protestant service by a weekly fine. In the fifth year of her reign,
+any aider or abettor of such offenders was for the first offence to be
+fined and imprisoned for life, for the second to suffer _death_. Any
+clergyman celebrating Mass or refusing to observe the regulations of the
+_Book of Common Prayer_ forfeited offices, goods, and liberty. In the
+thirteenth year, introducing into the kingdom a bull or other instrument
+of the pope was treason, penalty _death_; abetting the same, _death_;
+acting under such authority, _death_; introducing, wearing, or having in
+his or her possession an _Agnus Dei_, cross, etc., confiscation and
+perpetual imprisonment; and for leaving the kingdom without permission,
+forfeiture of lands and personal estate. In the twenty‐third year, any
+person granting absolution from sin in the name of the “Roman Church,” or
+receiving the same, their aiders, etc., was declared guilty of treason,
+penalty _death_; and for not disclosing knowledge of such offenders,
+confiscation and imprisonment. In the twenty‐ninth year, the tax for non‐
+attendance at Protestant service was increased to £20 per lunar month, or
+forfeiture of two‐thirds of all lands and goods; and for keeping a
+schoolmaster or tutor, other than a Protestant, a fine of £10 per month
+was imposed, together with imprisonment at pleasure. By the statutes of
+the 21st, 27th, and 28th Elizabeth, every priest, Jesuit, or other
+ecclesiastic ordained out of the realm was obliged forthwith to leave the
+kingdom, and in case of his return he was to suffer _death_; those who
+received or harbored him were subject to a like punishment. Those being
+educated abroad were required to return home, and after neglect to do so,
+upon their being found in the kingdom, were to be put to _death_. For
+contributing money for colleges abroad and for sending students there,
+fine and imprisonment for life were considered adequate punishments; but
+by the 25th chapter of Elizabeth, all who persisted in refusing attendance
+on Protestant worship were liable to be transported for life, and if they
+evaded the statute they were liable to suffer _death_.(106)
+
+We see, therefore, by this comprehensive penal code that every office
+under the crown was reserved as a bribe to recreant Catholics; that
+private tutors were commanded to teach nothing but the new heresy in
+Catholic families, while those who objected to such method of instruction
+could neither send their children abroad nor contribute to the support of
+those already there. All priests were obliged to take the oath of
+supremacy and observe the _Book of Common Prayer_; such as did not were to
+be banished, and if they returned were to be executed forthwith. No priest
+could, of course, be ordained at home, and if ordained abroad he was to be
+hanged whenever caught, without delay. If one of the laity attended Mass
+or wore the image of his crucified Redeemer, he was to be imprisoned for
+life; if he did not attend Protestant service, he was to be fined
+enormously; if he had no money to pay the fine, he might be banished for
+ever from his home and country, and if he endeavored to conceal himself at
+home his career was to be ended by the hangman.
+
+Nor must it to be supposed that these sanguinary statutes, affecting the
+rights and liberties of at least one‐half of the population, were nothing
+but the splenetic fits of a jealous and tyrannical bigot or mere idle
+threats to frighten a half‐civilized horde. On the contrary, we have
+abundant facts to prove that they were thoroughly and cruelly enforced,
+and that the sufferers were principally the better class of the community.
+In 1573, the Rev. Thomas Woodhouse was drawn, half‐hanged, and then
+quartered alive in the usual way at Tyburn, for having denied the queen’s
+supremacy. Two years later, Father Cuthbert Mayne was executed with
+similar barbarity in Cornwall for having in his possession a copy of a
+Jubilee and for saying Mass in the house of a Mr. Teagian; the latter,
+with fifteen others, for being present on the occasion, was imprisoned for
+life. In 1577, Mr. Jenks was tried and convicted at Oxford for exposing
+some Catholic books for sale, and about this time we are informed the
+prisons were so full of “recusants” that a pestilence broke out and large
+numbers of the inmates perished. Among the sufferers in 1578 we find the
+names of Father Nelson and a Mr. Sherwood, who were hanged and quartered
+solely for being recusants. In 1582, Fathers Campion (the celebrated
+Jesuit missionary), Sherwin, and Briant, after the mockery of a trial,
+were executed in London, and in May of the year following no less than
+seven other priests suffered death at Tyburn. Thus nearly every year
+supplied its quota to the martyrology of the church in England, not to
+speak of the nameless thousands who died in confinement by the quick but
+silent process of torture and pestilence, or abroad, broken‐hearted and
+neglected. During the fourteen years succeeding the dispersion of the
+Spanish Armada, when fanaticism was rampant and bigotry held full sway in
+the councils of Elizabeth, sixty‐one clergymen, forty‐seven laymen, and
+two gentlewomen expiated their offence of being Catholics by a horrible
+and ignominious public death; while, according to the records still
+extant, the total number of the “good Queen Bess’” ecclesiastical victims
+amounted to the handsome number of one hundred and twenty‐three, including
+one hundred and thirteen seculars, eight Jesuits, one friar, and one monk,
+besides innumerable laymen in whose veins flowed the best blood of the
+land.
+
+The rack and the thumb‐screw almost invariably preceded the half‐hanging
+and disembowelling, so that many looked upon the gallows as a welcome
+relief from worse sufferings. Priests were tortured to compel them to
+disclose the names of their penitents, and laymen to force them into the
+betrayal of their pastors. Father Campion was four times racked, and then
+secretly brought before the queen to discuss theology with that model
+Supreme Head of the Church; while others like Nichols found it more
+convenient to swear to all their tormentors required, for, as that
+recreant shepherd naïvely says in his _Apology_, “it is not, I assure you,
+a pleasant thing to be stretched on the rack till the body becomes almost
+two feet longer than nature made it.” Father Gerard, who speaks from
+personal experience, has left us in his Memoirs the following account of
+this most effectual method of extorting confessions in the glorious reign
+of that queen to which so many of our modern writers refer with pride and
+congratulation:
+
+
+    “Then they led me to a great upright beam, or pillar of wood,
+    which was one of the supports of this vast crypt. At the summit of
+    this column were fixed certain iron staples for supporting
+    weights. Here they placed on my wrists manacles of iron, and
+    ordered me to mount upon two or three wicker steps; then raising
+    my arms they inserted an iron bar through the rings of the
+    manacles, and then through the staples in the pillar, putting a
+    pin through the bar so that it could not slip. My arms being thus
+    fixed above my head, they withdrew those wicker steps I spoke of,
+    one by one, from my feet, so that I hung by my hands and arms. The
+    tips of my toes, however, still touched the ground; so they dug
+    away the ground beneath, as they could not raise me higher, for
+    they had suspended me from the topmost staples in the pillar. Thus
+    hanging by my wrists I began to pray, while those gentlemen
+    standing around me asked again if I was willing to confess. I
+    replied, ‘I neither can nor will.’ But so terrible a pain began to
+    oppress me that I was scarcely able to speak the words. The worst
+    pain was in my breast and belly, my arms and hands. It seemed to
+    me that all the blood in my body rushed up my arms into my hands,
+    and I was under the impression at the time that the blood actually
+    burst forth from my fingers and the back of my hands. This was,
+    however, a mistake, the sensation was caused by the swelling of
+    the flesh over the iron that bound it.... I had hung this way till
+    after one of the clock, as I think, when I fainted.”(107)
+
+
+It must not be supposed, however, that the zeal of the queen’s ministers
+was satisfied with these harsh measures against the clergy and the more
+prominent delinquents. All Catholics were put beyond the pale of the law.
+The country swarmed with spies and informers. Lists were accurately made
+out and carefully preserved of the recusants who owned property of any
+sort, and every possible method of espionage was adopted to detect them in
+the slightest infraction of the bloody code. Domiciliary visits became the
+order of the day, or rather of the night, for that was the time usually
+chosen by the pursuivants. Doors were broken open, closets ransacked,
+bedrooms of women and invalids invaded without ceremony; and frequently,
+the previous movements having been properly concerted, whole families were
+simultaneously borne off to prison, there to be detained without the least
+warrant of law for months and years. The tax of £260 annually, equal to at
+least five thousand dollars at the present day, was not only vigorously
+enforced, but upon the faintest rumor of a foreign invasion or domestic
+broil, special imposts were laid on the remaining property of the
+Catholics, and the owners were carried to the nearest dungeon till the
+affair blew over, when they were as unceremoniously dismissed until the
+next occasion arose for plunder and personal revenge.
+
+Thus was the work of reformation and evangelization urged briskly forward
+in free England, and she was fast becoming converted and enlightened.
+Torture, death, and confiscation dogged the steps of the unhappy recusant
+who dare to profess, even in the privacy of his house, the faith of his
+fathers for ten centuries—that religion which had raised his ancestors
+from barbarism, freed him from the thraldom of feudalism, and given him
+_Magna Charta_, trial by jury, and representative government. The crown
+lawyers, like Coke, Stanhope, and Bacon, laid the plans, pious bishops
+like those of London, Ely, and Winchester, leaving their flocks to the
+devouring Puritan wolves, constituted themselves a sort of episcopal
+sheriffalty, and vied with each other in their ardor for the spread of the
+Gospel and their love for the spoils of the Papists. Their leader in all
+this was a vulgar wretch named Topcliffe, whose audacity, profanity, and
+lewdness made him the terror of men and the abhorrence of women, but whose
+usefulness was so apparent that he was constantly the object of government
+favors and clerical eulogy.
+
+But human hate and diabolical ingenuity, it was thought, could not last
+for ever. On the 24th of March, A.D. 1603, Elizabeth died, to the last the
+prey of vain desires and unsatisfied ambition. For weeks before her
+decease she was haunted by the phantoms of her innumerable crimes, and so
+terrified at the approach of death that she refused to lie in her bed or
+to receive any sustenance from her usual attendants. The courts of Europe,
+to which she had ever been an object of dislike and fear, could ill
+conceal their pleasure at the event, but millions of her subjects, the
+impoverished, the widowed, and the orphaned, made desolate by her despotic
+cruelty, in silence execrated her memory.
+
+The Catholics generally found consolation in the thought of her successor,
+and, with that unqualified confidence in the house of Stuart, which now
+seems like fatality, they began to hope for better days under his sway.
+Was he not, they asked each other, the son of Elizabeth’s royal victim,
+and could he be unmindful of the affection with which the Catholics of the
+three kingdoms ever regarded his mother? Had he not before he ever put
+foot in England authorized Father Watson to promise in his name justice
+and protection, and did not Percy, the agent and kinsman of the great Duke
+of Northumberland, assure his friends, on the strength of the royal word
+solemnly pledged, that the days of persecution were at an end? Poor
+deluded people, they little knew how much deceit lay in the heart of him
+whom the Protestant lord primate rather blasphemously averred “the like
+had not been since the time of Christ.” He had scarcely put on the crown
+when the Catholics discovered that they had neither mercy nor justice to
+expect from him. Once secure in the support of the Protestant party, he
+turned a deaf ear to their complaints, and even had the mendacity to deny
+his own word of honor, giving as a reason “that, since Protestants had so
+generally received and proclaimed him king, he had now no need of
+Papists.” Being by nature intolerant, he oppressed the Puritans, by whom
+he had been trained, to please the Episcopalians, and to gratify both he
+ground the Catholics into dust; arrests for recusancy multiplied, illegal
+visitations became more frequent, and if possible more annoying, the
+arrears of the monthly tax which he at first pretended to remit were
+demanded, and the amount, already enormous, was even increased so as to
+satisfy the ever‐increasing rapacity of his pauper courtiers who had
+followed him into England. In place and out of it, he made the most
+violent attacks on the faith of his dead mother and of at least one‐half
+of his English subjects, and his remarks were taken up and repeated from
+every Protestant pulpit and in every conventicle throughout the length and
+breadth of the land, till the hopes of the Catholics grew fainter and
+fainter, and finally expired. Unlike Elizabeth, he was not only expected
+to live a long life, but his progeny would succeed him, the heirs of his
+authority and cruelty; and being constitutionally a coward and an
+intriguer, he was bent on making peace with foreign powers, and thus
+cutting off all sympathy which the Catholic sovereigns might have felt it
+their interest to express for their suffering co‐religionists in Great
+Britain.
+
+Though the principles of reciprocal protection and allegiance were not as
+well defined at that period as, they have since been, the Catholics of
+England would have been more or less than human if they could have
+regarded James’ government with any feeling other than detestation, and
+the wonder is not that a plot was laid to destroy it, but that so very few
+of the persecuted multitude could be found to embark in it,
+notwithstanding the manifold reasons afforded by the king and parliament
+for their destruction. It was an age of conspiracies and counterplots,
+when the highest and most trusted in every land endeavored by force or
+fraud to accomplish political and personal ends, success being the only
+criterion of merit. The history of Europe from the middle of the preceding
+century is full of dark schemes and secret contrivances, in which nobles
+and princes figure alternately as the bribers or the bribed, the patrons
+or the victims of the assassin, now devoted patriots and anon double‐dyed
+traitors. The long civil wars, the vicious legacy of the Lutheran attempt
+to unsettle the faith of Christendom, had nearly ceased from sheer
+exhaustion, and unemployed soldiers of desperate fortunes but undoubted
+courage were to be easily had for any enterprise, no matter how dangerous.
+
+Of this character was Guy or Guido Fawkes, whose name, though not himself
+the originator of the Gunpowder Plot, is most intimately associated with
+it in popular tradition. The real authors were Robert Catesby, Thomas
+Percy, Thomas Winter, and John Wright; all of whom were country gentlemen
+of good family and education, but, except Catesby, very much reduced in
+circumstances owing to the unjust and repeated exactions of the penal
+laws, which had not only robbed them of their property and shut them out
+from all public employment, but had branded them with the stigma of
+traitors to their country and enemies to their sovereign; for, having in
+the early part of their lives conformed to Protestantism, they had
+subsequently returned to the church into which they had been baptized—an
+offence in the eyes of the rulers of that day of the deepest dye.
+
+In the early part of 1604, the five conspirators met in London, and,
+having taken a solemn oath of secrecy, determined on their future schemes
+for the total destruction of the government. Wishing, however, it seems,
+to exhaust all milder remedies, they sent agents to Spain and other
+foreign powers friendly to the Catholic cause, to induce them to use their
+good offices in mitigating the sufferings of the English recusants. The
+answers were generally favorable, but non‐committal, and the practical
+result nothing. They then determined to depend on themselves alone, and in
+the autumn rented a building adjoining the Palace of Westminster, the old
+House of Parliament, and commenced to undermine the dividing wall. This,
+some three yards thick of solid masonry, they found a work of difficulty,
+and from the paucity of their numbers and their inexperience in manual
+labor, advanced slowly. A circumstance soon occurred to modify their
+plans. A portion of the cellar immediately under the prince’s chamber,
+which had been used by a coal dealer, was vacated by the tenant, and Percy
+rented it, ostensibly for storage purposes. The mine was abandoned, and
+thirty‐two barrels of powder, which had been stored previously at Lambeth,
+were introduced in the night‐time, and covered from observation by wood,
+furniture, etc. All that was now required to complete the conspiracy was a
+proper moment for the application of the match. This work had brought them
+into the spring of 1605, and, as parliament was not to assemble for some
+months, they resolved to separate, some going into the country to see
+their relatives, and others to the Continent to enlist the assistance of
+such adventurers as could be found willing to take service under the
+anticipated new _régime_. Meanwhile eight more persons were admitted into
+the plot, the principal of whom were Rokewood, Grant, Tresham, and Sir
+Everard Digby, all young men of family and fortune, whose proud spirits
+chafed continually under the social and political ostracism to which all
+recusants of the period were doomed.
+
+The opening of parliament, expected in September, was, however, postponed
+till the 5th of November, but, to the secret satisfaction of Catesby and
+his fellows, the penal laws continued to be rigidly enforced, and
+additional measures of persecution were devised by the king’s council for
+the adoption by the legislature when it should meet. As that time
+approached and everything augured success, the parts of the leading actors
+in the bloody drama were distributed. Fawkes was to fire the powder which
+was to blow the king, his oldest son Henry, and the lords and commons into
+eternity; Prince Charles, the next in succession, having been seized by
+Percy, was to be proclaimed king at Charing Cross by Catesby; while
+Tresham, Grant, and Digby were to gain possession of the person of the
+infant princess Elizabeth, at Lord Harrington’s country‐seat. After the
+explosion, Fawkes was to sail for Flanders to bring over reinforcements,
+and the others, a protector for the royal children having been appointed,
+were to rendezvous at Digby’s residence and raise the country in favor of
+the new government. There was a method in the madness of these men, and
+the first part of their programme would undoubtedly have been carried out
+but for one important fact upon which it seems they did not reckon: Cecil
+was fully cognizant of all their movements, and for his own good reasons,
+as we shall hereafter see, allowed them to proceed unchecked to the very
+last moment.
+
+That moment expired soon after midnight on the night of the 4th‐5th of
+November, only a few hours before the expected catastrophe. As Fawkes was
+entering the cellar to assure himself that all was in readiness, he was
+seized by a body of soldiers under the command of Sir Thomas Knevett. His
+dress denoted that he was prepared for a journey, arms and matches were
+found upon his person, a dark‐lantern was discovered in a corner, and the
+removal of the _débris_ that was piled in the vault revealed the powder
+arranged ready for explosion.
+
+The scene that ensued was highly dramatic, and did great credit to the
+histrionic genius of the secretary. The lords of the council were hastily
+summoned to the king’s bed‐chamber, the prisoner was brought up for
+examination by torch‐light, and the royal pedant sat on the side of his
+couch in his night‐clothes for several hours, questioning and cross‐
+questioning the would‐be murderer. But Guy was made of stern stuff, and,
+while he freely admitted that his intention had been “to blow the Scotch
+beggars back to their native mountains,” he obstinately refused to
+disclose the names of his associates. The news spread with rapidity, and
+London at daylight was in the wildest commotion. The other conspirators in
+the city, with the exception of Tresham, fled to Digby’s house near
+Dunchurch, where a hunting party had assembled, but upon the disclosure of
+the treason and its failure the guests rapidly dispersed, two or three
+only, from friendship or other causes, resolving to remain with the
+conspirators and share the fate which now seemed certain to overtake them.
+One of these was Stephen Littleton, who resided at Holbeach in
+Staffordshire, a strongly Catholic county, and thither the whole party,
+numbering between forty and fifty, including grooms and other servants,
+proceeded through Warwick and Worcester, vainly endeavoring on their road
+to excite the people to join them. At Holbeach they resolved to make a
+stand, but an accident destroyed whatever little chance might have
+remained of a successful resistance. Their ammunition, which had been wet
+during their hurried journey, exploded while being dried, and not only
+seriously injured Catesby and three others, but afforded an excuse for
+their handful of followers to forsake them. In this condition they were
+soon surrounded by the forces of Sir Richard Walsh, who, after summoning
+them to surrender and receiving a defiant negative, ordered his men to
+fire. The brothers Wright, Percy, and Catesby, fell mortally wounded;
+Rokewood, Winter, Morgan, and Grant were wounded and taken prisoners, and
+Digby and the two others were soon after captured. They were immediately
+taken to London, tried, and with Fawkes executed on the 30th of the
+following January.
+
+Under ordinary circumstances, this insane conspiracy of a dozen desperate
+men would have ended here, and the plot itself have become lost in the
+thousand‐and‐one concerted crimes against authority which disfigure the
+annals of European monarchy in the middle ages; but the Puritan party in
+England, the more insatiable enemies of the Catholics, who saw in it an
+excellent opportunity for wholesale spoliation of what yet remained to the
+persecuted, endeavored to involve the millions in the treasonable guilt of
+the few, and Cecil, who had so long nursed the designs of the traitors,
+had his own deep schemes to subserve by endorsing this foul calumny. But
+James, bigot as he was, could not, in the face of such palpable facts to
+the contrary, go to this extreme length. “For though it cannot be denied,”
+he said in his speech to parliament recounting the discovery and origin of
+the plot, “that it was only the blind superstition of their errors in
+religion that led them to this desperate device, yet doth it not follow
+that all professing that Romish religion were guilty of the same.” Yet the
+Puritan party, who hungered for the spoils, by constant repetition
+succeeded in fastening the imputation of guilt on the entire Catholic body
+in England, and for a long time it was partially believed abroad, and re‐
+echoed without hesitation by subsequent historians. The author of _Her
+Majesty’s Tower_, to whom Catholicity owes little else, has, we are happy
+to say, had the manhood to set the matter in its true light in his recent
+publication. He says:
+
+
+    “The news of this plot was heard by the old English Catholics with
+    more astonishment than rage, though the expression of their anger
+    was both loud and deep. The priests were still more prompt to
+    denounce it than their flocks. The venerable Archpriest, George
+    Blackwell, took up his pen before a single man had yet been killed
+    or captured in the shires, and in a brief address to the Catholic
+    clergy stigmatized the plot as a detestable contrivance in which
+    no true Catholic could have a share—as an abominable thing,
+    contrary to Holy Writ, to the councils, and to the instructions of
+    the spiritual guides. Blackwell told his clergy to exhort their
+    flocks to peace and obedience, and to avoid falling into snares.”
+
+
+But it was necessary for the purpose of affording a decent pretext for
+further penal legislation, long since agreed upon in the council, as well
+as to destroy the sympathy still felt at foreign courts for the persecuted
+English, that the blame of the foul conspiracy should be laid not on the
+inhuman laws which had driven gallant and loyal men into deadly conflict
+with the government, but on the church. As it was impossible to implicate
+any considerable number of the laity or the secular clergy, it was
+resolved to single out the few Jesuits then in the country, and through
+them the entire Order, as fitting objects of national hatred and universal
+obloquy. The trick was not new even then, though since much practised and
+refined. Its execution was consonant also with the parliamentary design of
+exterminating Catholicity in the three kingdoms. The old clergy, or, as
+they were called, “Queen Mary’s priests,” were few, aged, and sure soon to
+die out in the course of nature, while the authorities had taken good care
+that they should leave no successors of native education. The Jesuits, on
+the contrary, were young men, generally scions of noble houses, gentle in
+breeding, and, from their continental training, thorough linguists, acute
+reasoners, and polished gentlemen. Their erudition made them feared by the
+half‐taught sophists of the reformed prelacy, their refined manners
+secured their admission into the best families, and their noble enthusiasm
+defied the utmost severity of the Puritan and Episcopal magistrates. Their
+knowledge of the country was accurate, and, though they were accused by
+such hired defamers as Coke of using many _aliases_, the odium was not
+theirs, but the law’s, that made their very presence in their native land
+treason. No religious community, it is well known, is the church, nor is
+she responsible for the conduct of each particular member, but the orders
+may be regarded as the _vedettes_ of her grand army, and before it can be
+successfully attacked they must be driven in or captured.
+
+Accordingly, one of the first steps taken by the king’s advisers after the
+trial of the conspirators was to issue a proclamation for the arrest of
+Fathers Gerard, Greenway, and Garnett, three of the four Jesuit
+missionaries then known to be in England. In this official document it was
+alleged “to be plain and evident from the examinations that all three had
+been peculiarly practisers in the plot.” Now, let us examine for a moment
+upon what those grave accusations were based. Simply on confessions of the
+prisoners, for it has never been alleged that the slightest proof,
+documentary or oral, other than those and the admission of Father Garnett,
+the provincial, were ever produced to connect the priests with the
+conspiracy. The examinations were conducted with the most exquisite
+tortures, taken down by the creatures of the government, and afterwards
+mutilated and altered by the attorney‐general to suit his own views.
+Fawkes, by special command of his majesty, was so frequently racked that
+he could not use a pen to sign his name, much less could he read what had
+been written for him, and Nicholas Owen, a lay‐brother, was so stretched
+that his bowels protruded and he expired in the hands of his tormentors.
+Of Father Gerard, mention was made by two of the original plotters, Fawkes
+and Winter, in allusion to the oath of secrecy. The latter said that “the
+five administered the oath to each other in a chamber _in which no other
+body was_,” which the latter confirms more in detail.
+
+
+    “The five,” he says, “did meet at a house in the field, beyond S.
+    Clement’s Inn, where they did confer and agree upon the plot, and
+    there they took a solemn oath and vows by all their force and
+    power to execute the same, and of secrecy not to reveal it to any
+    of their fellows, but to such as should be thought fit persons to
+    enter into that action; and in the same house they did receive the
+    sacrament of Gerard the Jesuit, to perform their vow and oath of
+    secrecy aforesaid. _But that Gerard was not acquainted with their
+    purpose._”(108)
+
+
+This last sentence was by order of Coke underlined with red, notated
+_hucusque_, and was carefully suppressed in the reading of the examination
+on the trial! The original document is still preserved in the Public
+Record Office, and how such an indefatigable student as Mr. Dixon could
+have overlooked this part of it is, to say the least, very suspicious. His
+version of the affair is as follows:
+
+
+    “An upper room of Widow Herbert’s house was turned into a chapel;
+    and when the priest was ready for his part, Catesby, Percy, Tom
+    Winter, Jack Wright, and Fawkes assembled in the house—a quaint
+    old Tudor pile at the corner of Clement’s Lane—first in the lower
+    room, where they swore each other upon the Primer, and then in the
+    upper room, where they heard Father Gerard say Mass, and took from
+    his hand the sacrament on that oath. Each of the five conspirators
+    was sworn upon his knees, with his hand on the Primer, that he
+    would keep the secret, that he would be true to his fellows, that
+    he would be constant in the plot.”
+
+
+Is this perversion of the facts of history accidental, or a piece of
+downright dishonesty? At first, overlooking the writer’s known hostility
+to the Jesuits, and his insinuation about the priest being “ready for his
+part,” we concluded that the sentence describing how the conspirators were
+sworn was intended to commence after the word “Primer,” to preserve the
+unity of the action, but by inadvertence was put after the mention of the
+taking of the sacrament, thus conveying the false idea that the
+conspirators swore also _after_ or during Mass; but, having had occasion
+to refer to the index, we find that we had done Mr. Dixon’s dexterity
+injustice at the expense of his veracity. In seeking for the page of his
+book upon which this opaque statement appears, we find the following words
+in the index under the head “Gerard”—“administers the oath of secrecy to
+the Powder Plot conspirators in a house in Butcher’s Row, p. 95.” Thus the
+author of _Her Majesty’s Tower_, who, we presume, occupies a decent
+position among men of letters in his own country, not only cannot discover
+after the “occasional labor of twenty years” a most essential point of
+testimony bearing on the very subject to which his book is mainly devoted,
+but to make out a case against the much‐hated Jesuits actually falsifies
+and perverts facts already known and admitted; doing in the year of grace
+1869 gratuitously, what Coke in 1606 did for hire. Can the force of malice
+go further? Digby, who, it will be remembered, was subsequently admitted
+into the plot, on his trial went even further than the originators of it;
+and, in exculpating the Jesuit Order, was most emphatic in denying any
+knowledge of the conspiracy on the part of Gerard, either in its progress
+or, as far as he knew, at its inception. So much for Father Gerard’s
+innocence as proved by others; the following is his own statement, made
+years after the occurrence when he was beyond the reach of English law,
+and subsequently affirmed in substance on his solemn oath:
+
+
+    “I have stated in the other treatise of which I spoke, that a
+    proclamation was issued against those Jesuit fathers, of whom I am
+    one; and, though the most unworthy, I was named first in the
+    proclamation, whereas I was the subject of one and far inferior in
+    all respects to the other. All this, however, I solemnly protest
+    was utterly groundless; for I knew absolutely nothing of the plot
+    from any one whatsoever, not even under the seal of confession, as
+    the other two did; nor had I the slightest notion that any such
+    scheme was entertained by any Catholic gentleman, until by public
+    rumor news was brought us of its discovery, as it was to all
+    others dwelling in that part of the country.”(109)
+
+
+The treatise referred to in this extract is his _Narrative_, and in it
+Gerard takes frequent occasion to reiterate in the most positive manner,
+speaking in the third person, all knowledge of the conspiracy, even to
+saying Mass on the occasion alluded to by Fawkes. The house in Clement’s
+Inn, he fully acknowledges, was used by him and his friends, among whom
+there were at least two priests during his absence; and we can well
+believe that the two prisoners were mistaken in his identity, as we have
+no evidence that they were familiar with his appearance or personally
+acquainted with him. However, this does not signify. Some priest
+undoubtedly celebrated Mass, and the question is, Did he administer the
+oath, or knowingly administer the sacrament in confirmation of it? Winter
+and Fawkes declare he did not; Digby, who was most intimate with Father
+Gerard, denied in open court that that Jesuit knew anything about the
+plot; and Gerard himself repeatedly, under the strictest forms known in
+his Order, asserts his entire innocence, and it has never even been hinted
+that any other priest was concerned in the early stages of the conspiracy.
+This matter may therefore be considered closed.
+
+Now, it is equally certain that Fathers Garnett and Tesimond, _alias_
+Greenway, did become acquainted with the plot during its progress; but the
+information came to them under the seal of confession, and _could not be
+revealed_. It is unnecessary to support this proposition by argument, as
+its wisdom is now generally recognized by the civil law even in Protestant
+countries. Confidential communications to priest, doctor, or lawyer are at
+last held sacred. What was the extent of their knowledge, and what was
+their conduct on receiving the same? In Thomas Winter’s public dying
+declaration, communicated by an eye‐witness to the author of the
+_Narrative_, he said: “That whereas divers of the fathers of the society
+were accused of counselling and furthering them in this treason, he could
+clear them all, and particularly Father Tesimond, from all fault and
+participation therein.” “And indeed Mr. Thomas Winter might best clear
+that good father, with whom he was best acquainted,” adds Father Gerard,
+“and knew very well how far he was from counselling or plotting that
+business. For himself, having first told the father of it (as I have
+heard) long after the thing was ready, and that in such secret as he might
+not utter it, but with his leave, unto his superior only, the father, both
+then and after, did so earnestly persuade him, and by him the rest, to
+leave off that course (as his duty was), that Mr. Winter might well find
+himself in conscience to clear this father from his wrongful accusation of
+being a counsellor and furtherer of the plot.”(110)
+
+This statement was also repeatedly confirmed by Father Tesimond, both in
+his writings and in his account of the matter soon after his escape,
+published by Joannes in his _Apologia_.
+
+Gerard and Tesimond having fled the country to avoid the popular tumult,
+“which,” says Mr. Dixon, “took no note of the difference between the
+children of S. Edward and the pupils of S. Ignatius,” the only remaining
+victim was the provincial Father Garnett. Him the government spies soon
+hunted down, and in company with Father Ouldcorne arrested at Hendlip
+House and lodged in the tower. This capture occurred on the 28th of
+February, and his trial took place on the 28th of March; the intervening
+month having been spent by the officers of the crown in procuring evidence
+of his guilt, but with so little success that an attempt was made to
+procure his condemnation by parliament, without the intervention of a
+jury, by inserting surreptitiously a clause in the bill of attainder
+introduced against the families of Digby and others. Cajolery was first
+resorted to, next torture, then the subterfuge of allowing him speech with
+his fellow‐prisoner Ouldcorne, overheard unknown to them by persons
+secretly hidden for the purpose, and again torture, but all to no effect.
+He at first refused to admit any knowledge of the conspiracy, but finally
+confessed that he had heard of it from Father Tesimond (Greenway) under
+the seal of confession, and that he had reprimanded that priest for ever
+so communicating it to him, and had admonished him to use all efforts to
+dissuade the conspirators from their rash designs. This was all that could
+be proved against him at his trial, but he was of course condemned, not
+however for treason, but for misprision of treason, and two months after
+executed, declaring his entire innocence most solemnly. Father Ouldcorne,
+who was also found guilty of knowledge after the fact, on no better
+evidence, suffered with him.
+
+The provincial was examined no less than twenty‐three times before his
+trial, and much stress was laid during its progress and long afterwards on
+his equivocations in answer to the various searching queries touching the
+guilt of himself and others. The question of the morality of such evasion
+of the truth under the peculiar circumstances has, however, no practical
+value for us, as now by the well‐recognized policy of law in all civilized
+countries no person is bound to criminate himself either as a principal or
+a witness, and every individual is allowed to be the judge of his own case
+in this respect. No one has a right to entrap a prisoner into a confession
+of guilt, much less compel disclosures by foul means or torture.
+
+Let us inquire for a moment how far Father Garnett’s statements in prison
+were borne out by his previous conduct. Several letters of his are still
+extant addressed to Father Persons, the English superior at Rome, on the
+state of the Catholics in England previous to the explosion of the plot,
+in which he intimates his suspicions that something desperate was about to
+be attempted against the government, and begs the superior to influence
+the Holy Father to interfere. On the 29th of August, 1604, he wrote: “If
+the affair of toleration go not well, Catholics will no more be quiet.
+What shall we do? Jesuits cannot hinder it. Let Pope forbid all Catholics
+to stir.” In May following he says: “All are desperate, divers Catholics
+are offended with Jesuits; they say that Jesuits do impugn and hinder all
+forcible enterprises.” On the 24th of July, after reviewing the
+threatening state of affairs in the kingdom, he repeats his request for
+pontifical assistance in keeping the people quiet. He then wrote:
+
+
+    “Wherefore, in my judgment, two things are necessary; first, that
+    his holiness should prescribe what in any case is to be done; and
+    then that he should forbid any force of arms to the Catholics
+    under censures, and by brief publicly promulgated, an occasion for
+    which can be taken from the disturbance lately raised in Wales,
+    which has at length come to nothing.”(111)
+
+
+His public acts were consistent with his views thus confidentially
+expressed. It is acknowledged that he was mainly instrumental in defeating
+the Grey conspiracy, in which Father Watson and many Catholics were
+involved, and, when Catesby and the other conspirators approached him on
+the subject of forcible resistance to James’ government, he denounced all
+such attempts in the most positive manner. “It is to you and such as you,”
+said that desperate plotter to the provincial, “that we owe our present
+calamities. This doctrine of non‐resistance makes us slaves. No authority
+of priest or pontiff can deprive a man of his right to repel injustice.”
+When it became apparent that such men as Catesby could not be stayed by
+ordinary means, he recommended that before any forcible measures were
+adopted an agent should be sent to Rome, and in the meantime took steps to
+procure the co‐operation of the sovereign pontiff himself to suppress all
+attempts at insurrection. In fact, his whole life was divided between his
+duty to God and his efforts to teach peace and longanimity to his
+persecuted countrymen, but the very fact that he was a Jesuit and a
+Catholic missionary was enough to condemn him in the eyes of the judges of
+that day. Let us hope that posterity will do him fuller justice.
+
+The general accusation against the Order was grounded on the fact that
+many of the conspirators were converts and pupils of the Jesuits, and
+_therefore_ they were their agents and instruments. This is plausible, and
+might be worthy of attention if true, but it lacks the essential element
+of reliability. Some were Catholics from their birth, others had only for
+the time being or during their minority outwardly conformed to
+Protestantism, and were simply reclaimed from their vicious habits by the
+Jesuits. But even if they had all been converts it would not strengthen
+their opponents’ position. So were many hundreds, nay, thousands of
+Englishmen who took no act or part in the conspiracy. Besides the Jesuits
+that had suffered in the preceding reign, the four fathers we have just
+mentioned had spent each over eighteen years in the country, laboring with
+a zeal and success seldom equalled, and it was this very success in
+gaining souls to Christ that furnished the greatest incentive for their
+destruction. Their intimacy with the conspirators was simply that of
+pastors with their penitents; the assertions of Bates, the servant of
+Catesby, to the contrary notwithstanding. That poor wretch was tortured
+and tampered with to induce him to make some accusation against the
+missionaries, and then hanged, but not before he retracted on the scaffold
+every sentence uttered by him when a hope of pardon had been held out as
+the reward of his perjury. Further, Mr. Dixon’s wild attempts to throw
+discredit on the English Jesuits abroad rest on no foundation whatever,
+nor has he a single impartial authority to support him in his broad
+assertions and elaborate reports of what are said to have been strictly
+private interviews and confidential correspondence between the plotters in
+England and the Jesuit colleges abroad. Owen and Baldwin, the alleged
+foreign correspondents, the parties most sought to be implicated, were
+never tried, but the latter was examined in England ten years after and
+discharged, nothing having been proved against him. So much for the
+bugbear of Catholics justifying wholesale assassination as a remedy for
+persecution, that has been such a sweet morsel under the tongues of
+Protestant divines and zealots for so many centuries.
+
+
+
+
+The Progressionists.
+
+
+From The German Of Conrad Von Bolanden.
+
+
+
+Chapter VI.—Continued.
+
+
+The tumult continued. As soon as the orator attempted to speak, his voice
+was drowned by cries and stamping.
+
+“Commissary!” cried the chairman to that officer, “I demand that you
+extend to our assembly the protection of the law.”
+
+“I am here simply to watch the proceedings of your meeting,” replied
+Parteiling with cool indifference. “Everybody is at liberty in meetings to
+signify his approval or disapproval by signs. No act forbidden by the law
+has been committed by your opponents, in my opinion.”
+
+“Bravo! bravo! Three cheers for the commissary!”
+
+All at once the noise was subdued to a whisper of astonishment. A miracle
+was taking place under the very eyes of progress. Banker Greifmann, the
+moneyed prince and liberal, made his appearance upon the platform. The
+rioters saw with amazement how the mighty man before whom the necks of all
+such as were in want of money bowed—even the necks of the puissant
+leaders—stepped before the president of the assembly, how he politely
+bowed and spoke a few words in an undertone. They observed how the
+chairman nodded assent, and then how the banker, as if to excite their
+wonder to the highest pitch, mounted to the speaker’s desk.
+
+“Gentlemen,” began Carl Greifmann, “although I have not the honor of
+sharing your political views, I feel myself nevertheless urged to address
+a few words to you. In the name of true progress, I ask this honorable
+assembly’s pardon for the disturbance occasioned a moment ago by a band of
+uncultivated rioters, who dare to pretend that they are acting in the
+cause and with the sanction of progress. I solemnly protest against the
+assumption that their disgraceful and outrageous conduct is in accordance
+with the spirit of the party which they dishonor. Progress holds firmly to
+its principles, and defends them manfully in the struggle with its
+opposers, but it is far from making itself odious by rudely overstepping
+the bounds of decency set by humanity and civilization. In political
+contests, it may be perfectly lawful to employ earnest persuasion and even
+influences that partake of the rigor of compulsion, but rudeness,
+impertinence, is never justifiable in an age of civilization. Commissary
+Parteiling discovers no legally prohibited offence in the expression of
+vulgarity and lowness—may be. Nevertheless, a high misdemeanor has been
+perpetrated against decorum and against the deference which man owes to
+man. Should the slightest disturbance be again attempted, I shall use the
+whole weight of my influence in prosecuting the guilty parties, and
+convince them that even in the spirit of progress they are offenders and
+can be reached by punishment.”
+
+He spoke, and retired to the other end of the hall, followed by loud
+applause from the ultramontanes. Nor were the threats of the mighty man
+uttered in vain. Spitzkopf hung his head abashed. The other revellers were
+tamed, they listened demurely to the speakers, ceased their contemptuous
+hootings, and stood on their good behavior. Greifmann’s proceeding had
+taken Seraphin also by surprise, and the power which the banker possessed
+over the rioters set him to speculating deeply. He saw plainly that
+Louise’s brother commanded an extraordinary degree of respect in the camp
+of the enemies of religion, and the only cause that could sufficiently
+account for the fact was a community of principles of which they were well
+aware. Hence the opinion he had formed of Greifmann was utterly erroneous,
+concluded Gerlach. The banker was not a mere secluded business man—he was
+not indifferent about the great questions of the age. Then there was
+another circumstance that perplexed the ruddy‐cheeked millionaire to no
+inconsiderable degree—Greifmann’s unaccountable way of taking things. The
+tyrannical mode of electioneering which they had witnessed at the sign of
+the “Green Hat” had not at all disgusted Greifmann. Spitzkopf’s threats
+had not excited his indignation. He had with a smiling countenance looked
+on whilst the most brutal species of terrorism was being enacted before
+him, he had not expressed a word of contempt at the constraint which they
+who held the power inhumanly placed on the political liberty of their
+dependents. On the other hand, his indignation was aroused by a mere
+breach of good behavior, an offence which in Gerlach’s estimation was as
+nothing compared with the other instances of progressionist violence. The
+banker seemed to him to have strained out a gnat after having swallowed a
+whole drove of camels. The youth’s suspicions being excited, he began to
+study the strainer of gnats and swallower of camels more closely, and soon
+the banker turned out in his estimation a hollow stickler for mere outward
+decency, devoid of all deeper merit. He now recollected also Greifmann’s
+dealings with the leaders of progress, and those transactions only
+confirmed his present views. What he had considered as an extraordinary
+degree of shrewdness in the man of business, which enabled him to take
+advantage of the peculiar convictions and manner of thinking of other men,
+was now to his mind a real affinity with their principles, and he could
+not help being shocked at the discovery.
+
+He hung his head in a melancholy mood, and his heart protested earnestly
+against the inference which was irresistibly forcing itself upon his mind,
+that the sister shared her brother’s sentiments.
+
+“This doubt must be cleared up, cost what it may,” thought he. “My God,
+what if Louise also turned out to be a progressionist, a woman without any
+faith, an infidel! No, that cannot be! Yet suppose it really were the
+case—suppose she actually held principles in common with such vile beings
+as Schwefel, Sand, Erdblatt, and Shund? Suppose her moral nature did not
+harmonize with the beauty of her person—what then?” He experienced a
+spasmodic contraction in his heart at the question, he hesitated with the
+answer, but, his better self finally getting the victory, he said: “Then
+all is over. The impressions of a dream, however delightful, must not
+influence a waking man. My father’s calculation was wrong, and I have
+wasted my kindness on an undeserving object.”
+
+So completely wrapt up was he in his meditations that he heard not a word
+of the speeches, not even the concluding remarks of the president.
+Greifmann’s approach roused him, and they left the hall together.
+
+“That was ruffianly conduct, of which progress would have for ever to be
+ashamed,” said the banker indignantly. “They bayed and yelped like a pack
+of hounds. At their first volley I was as embarrassed and confused as a
+modest girl would be at the impertinence of some young scapegrace. Fierce
+rage then hurried me to the platform, and my words have never done better
+service, for they vindicated civilization.”
+
+“I cannot conceive how a trifle could thus exasperate you.”
+
+Greifmann stood still and looked at his companion in astonishment.
+
+“A trifle!” echoed he reproachfully. “Do you call a piece of wanton
+impudence, a ruffianly outrage against several hundreds of men entitled to
+respect, a trifle?”
+
+“I do, compared with other crimes that you have suffered to pass unheeded
+and uncensured,” answered Gerlach. “You had not an indignant word for the
+unutterable meanness of those three leaders, who were immoral and
+unprincipled enough to invest a notorious villain with office and honors.
+Nor did you show any exasperation at the brutal terrorism practised by men
+of power in this town over their weak and unfortunate dependents.”
+
+“Take my advice, and be on your guard against erroneous and narrow‐minded
+judgments. The leaders merely had a view to their own ends, but they in no
+manner sinned against propriety. The raising a man of Shund’s abilities to
+the office of mayor is an act of prudence—by no means an offence against
+humanity.”
+
+“Yet it was an outrage to moral sentiment,” opposed Seraphin.
+
+“See here, Gerlach, moral sentiment is a very elastic sort of thing.
+Sentiment goes for nothing in practical life, and such is the character of
+life in our century.”
+
+“Well, then, the mere sense of propriety is not worth a whit more.”
+
+“I ask your pardon! Propriety belongs to the realm of actualities or of
+practical experiences, and not to the shadowland of sentiment. Propriety
+is the rule that regulates the intercourse of men, it is therefore a
+necessity, nothing else will serve as a substitute for it, and it must
+continue to be so regarded as long as a difference is recognized between
+rational man and the irrational brute.”
+
+“The same may be said with much more reason of morality, for it also is a
+rule, it regulates our actions, it determines the ethic worth or
+worthlessness of a man. Mere outward decorum does not necessarily argue
+any interior excellence. The most abandoned wretch may be distinguished
+for easy manners and elegant deportment, yet he is none the less a
+criminal. A dog may be trained to many little arts, but for all that it
+continues to be a dog.
+
+“It is delightful to see you breaking through that uniform patience of
+yours for once and showing a little of the fire of indignation,” said the
+banker pleasantly. “I shall tell Louise of it, I know she will be glad to
+learn that Seraphin too is susceptible of a human passion. But this by the
+way. Now watch how I shall meet your arguments. That very moral sentiment
+of which you speak has caused and is still causing the most enormous
+crimes against humanity, and the laws of morality are as changeable as the
+wind. When an Indian who has not been raised from barbarism by
+civilization dies, the religious custom of the country requires that his
+wife should permit herself to be burned alive on the funeral pyre of her
+husband. Moral sentiment teaches the uncivilized woman that it is a
+horrible crime to refuse to devote herself to this cruel death. The pious
+Jews used to stone every woman to death who was taken in adultery—in our
+day, such a deed of blood would be revolting to moral sentiment, and would
+claim tears from the eyes of cultivated people. I could mention many other
+horrors that were practised more or less remotely in the past, and were
+sanctioned by the prevailing moral sentiment. Here is my last instance:
+according to laws of morality, the usurer was at one time a monster, an
+arch‐villain—at present, he is merely a man of great enterprise.
+Propriety, on the other hand, enlightenment, and polish are absolute and
+unalterable. Whilst rudeness and impertinence will ever be looked upon as
+disgusting, good manners and politeness will be considered as commendable
+and beautiful.”
+
+Seraphin could not but admire the skill with which Greifmann jumbled
+together subjects of the most heterogeneous nature. But he could not, at
+the same time, divest himself of some alarm at the banker’s declarations,
+for they betrayed a soul‐life of little or absolutely no moral worth.
+Money, interest, and respectability constituted the only trinity in which
+the banker believed. Morality, binding the conscience of man, a true and
+only God, and divine revelation, were in his opinion so many worn‐out and
+useless notions, which the progress of mankind had successfully got
+beyond.
+
+“When those who hold power take advantage of it at elections, they in no
+manner offend against propriety,” proceeded Carl. “Progress has
+convictions as well as ultramontanism. If the latter is active, why should
+not the former be so too? If, on the side of progress, the weak and
+dependent permit themselves to be cowed and driven, it is merely an
+advantage for the powerful, and for the others it is a weakness or
+cowardice. For this reason, the mode of electioneering pursued by
+Spitzkopf and his comrades amused but nowise shocked me, for they were not
+acting against propriety.”
+
+Seraphin saw it plainly: for Carl Greifmann there existed no distinction
+between good and evil; he recognized only a cold and empty system of
+formalities.
+
+The two young men issued from a narrow street upon the market‐place. This
+was occupied by a large public building. In the open space stood a group
+of men, among whom Flachsen appeared conspicuous. He was telling the
+others about Greifmann’s speech at the meeting of the ultramontanes. They
+all manifested great astonishment that the influential moneyed prince
+should have appeared in such company, and, above all, should have made a
+speech in their behalf.
+
+“He declared it was vulgar, impudent, ruffianly, to disturb a respectable
+assembly,” reported Flachsen. “He said he knew some of us, and that he
+would have us put where the dogs would not bite us if we attempted to
+disturb them again. That’s what he said; and I actually rubbed my eyes to
+be quite sure it was banker Greifmann that was speaking, and really it was
+he, the banker Greifmann himself, bodily, and not a mere apparition.”
+
+“I must say the banker was right, for it isn’t exactly good manners to
+howl, stamp, and whistle to annoy one’s neighbors,” owned another.
+
+“But we were paid for doing it, and we only carried out the orders given
+by certain gentlemen.”
+
+“To be sure! Men like us don’t know what good breeding is—it’s for
+gentlemen to understand that,” maintained a third. “We do what men of good
+breeding hire us to do, and if it isn’t proper, it matters nothing to
+us—let the gentlemen answer for it.” “Bravo, Stoffel, bravo!” applauded
+Flachsen. “Yours is the right sort of servility, Stoffel! You are a real
+human, servile, and genuine reactive kind of a fellow—so you are. I agree
+with you entirely. The gentlemen do the paying, and it is for them to
+answer for what happens. We are merely servants, we are hirelings, and
+what need a hireling care whether that which his master commands is right
+or not? The master is responsible, not the hireling. What I am telling you
+belongs to the exact sciences, and the exact sciences are at the pinnacle
+of modern acquisitions. Hence a hireling who without scruple carries out
+the orders of his master is up to the highest point of the age—such a
+fellow has taken his stand on servility. Hallo! the election has
+commenced. Be off, every man of you, to his post. But mind you don’t look
+too deep into the beer‐pots before the election is over. Keep your heads
+level, be cautious, do your best for the success of the green ticket. Once
+the election is carried, you may swill beer till you can no longer stand.
+The gentlemen will foot the bill, and assume all responsibilities.”
+
+They dispersed themselves through the various drinking‐shops of the
+neighborhood.
+
+Near the door of the building in which the voting was to take place stood
+a number of progressionist gentlemen. They all wore heavy beards, smoked
+cigars, and peered about restlessly. To those of their party who chanced
+to pass they nodded and smiled knowingly, upon doubtful voters they smiled
+still more blandly, added some pleasant words, and pressed the acceptance
+of the green ticket, but for ultramontane voters they had only jeers and
+coarse witticisms. As Greifmann approached they respectfully raised their
+hats. The banker drew Gerlach to one side, and stood to make observations.
+
+“What swarms there are around the drinking‐shops,” remarked Greifmann. “It
+is there that the tickets are filled under the persuasive influence of
+beer. The committee provide the tickets which the voters have filled with
+the names of the candidates by clerks who sit round the tables at the
+beer‐shops. It is quite an ingenious arrangement, for beer will reconcile
+a voter to the most objectionable kind of a candidate.”
+
+A crowd of drunken citizens coming out of the nearest tavern approached.
+Linked arm‐in‐arm, they swayed about and staggered along with an unsteady
+pace. Green tickets bearing the names of the candidates whom progress had
+chosen to watch over the common weal could be seen protruding from the
+pockets of their waistcoats. Gerlach, seeing the drunken mob and
+recollecting the solemn and important nature of the occasion, was seized
+with loathing and horror at the corruption of social life revealed in the
+low means to which the party of progress had recourse to secure for its
+ends the votes of these besotted and ignorant men.
+
+Presently Schwefel stepped up and saluted the young men.
+
+“Do you not belong to the committee in charge of the ballot‐box?” inquired
+Greifmann.
+
+“No, sir, I wished to remain entirely untrammelled this morning,” answered
+the leader with a sly look and tone. “This is going to be an exciting
+election, the ultramontanes are astir, and it will be necessary for me to
+step in authoritatively now and then to decide a vote. Moreover, the
+committee is composed exclusively of men of our party. Not a single
+ultramontane holds a seat at the polls.”
+
+“In that case there can be no question of failure,” said the banker. “Your
+office is closed to‐day, no doubt?”
+
+“Of course!” assented the manufacturer of straw hats. “This day is
+celebrated as a free day by the offices of all respectable houses. Our
+clerks are dispersed through the taverns and election districts to use
+their pens in filling up tickets.”
+
+“I am forced to return to my old assertion: an election is mere folly,
+useless jugglery,” said the banker, turning to Seraphin. “Holding
+elections is no longer a rational way of doing, it is no longer a business
+way of proceeding, it is yielding to stupid timidity. Mr. Schwefel, don’t
+you think elections are mere folly?”
+
+“I confess I have never considered the subject from that point of view,”
+answered the leader cautiously. “But meanwhile—what do you understand by
+that?”
+
+“Be good enough to attend to my reasoning for a moment. Progress is in a
+state of complete organization. What progress wills, must be. Another
+party having authority and power cannot subsist side by side with
+progress. Just see those men staggering and blundering over the square
+with green tickets in their hands! To speak without circumlocution, look
+at the slaves doing the behests of their masters. What need of this silly
+masquerade of an election? Why squander all this money, waste all this
+beer and time? Why does not progress settle this business summarily? Why
+not simply nominate candidates fit for the office, and then send them
+directly to the legislature? This mode would do away with all this
+nonsensical ado, and would give the matter a prompt and business cast,
+conformable to the spirit of the age.”
+
+“This idea is a good one, but we have an election law that would stand in
+the way of carrying it out.”
+
+“Bosh—election law!” sneered the banker. “Your election law is a mere
+scarecrow, an antiquated, meaningless instrument. Do away with the
+election law, and follow my suggestion.”
+
+“That would occasion a charming row on the part of the ultramontanes,”
+observed the leader laughing.
+
+“Was the lion ever known to heed the bleating of a sheep? When did
+progress ever pay any attention to a row gotten up by the ultramontanes?”
+rejoined Greifmann. “Was not the fuss made in Bavaria against the
+progressionist school‐law quite a prodigious one? Did not our own last
+legislature make heavy assaults on the church? Did not the entire
+episcopate protest against permitting Jews, Neo‐pagans, and Freemasons to
+legislate on matters of religion? But did progress suffer itself to be
+disconcerted by episcopal protests and the agonizing screams of the
+ultramontanes? Not at all. It calmly pursued the even tenor of its way. Be
+logical, Mr. Schwefel: progress reigns supreme and decrees with absolute
+authority—why should it not summarily relegate this election law among the
+things that were, but are no more?”
+
+“You are right, Greifmann!” exclaimed Gerlach, in a feeling of utter
+disgust. “What need has the knout of Russian despotism of the sanction of
+constitutional forms? Progress is lord, the rest are slaves!”
+
+“You have again misunderstood me, my good fellow. I am considering the
+actual state of things. Should ultramontanism at any time gain the
+ascendency, then it also will be justified in behaving in the same
+manner.”
+
+Upon more mature consideration, Gerlach found himself forced to admit that
+Greifmann’s view, from the standpoint of modern culture, was entirely
+correct. Progress independently of God and of all positive religion could
+not logically be expected to recognize any moral obligations, for it had
+not a moral basis. Everything was determined by the force of
+circumstances; the autocracy of party rule made anything lawful. Laws
+proceeded not from the divine source of unalterable justice, but from the
+whim of a majority—fashioned and framed to suit peculiar interests and
+passions.
+
+“We have yet considerable work to do to bring all to thinking as clearly
+and rationally as you, Mr. Greifmann,” said the leader with a winning
+smile.
+
+Schwefel accompanied the millionaires into a lengthy hall, across the
+lower end of which stood a table. There sat the commissary of elections
+surrounded by the committee, animated gentlemen with great beards, who
+were occupied in distributing tickets to voters or receiving tickets
+filled up. The extraordinary good‐humor prevailing among these gentlemen
+was owing to the satisfactory course of the election, for rarely was any
+ultramontane paper seen mingling in the flood that poured in from the
+ranks of progress. The sides of the hall were hung with portraits of the
+sovereigns of the land, quite a goodly row. The last one of the series was
+youthful in appearance, and some audacious hand had scrawled on the broad
+gilt frame the following ominous words: “May he be the last in the
+succession of expensive bread‐eaters.” Down the middle of the hall ran a
+baize‐covered table, on which were numerous inkstands. Scattered over the
+table lay a profusion of green bills; the yellow color of the ultramontane
+bills was nowhere to be seen. The table was lined by gentlemen who were
+writing. They were not writing for themselves, but for others, who merely
+signed their names and then handed the tickets to the commissary. Several
+corpulent gentlemen also occupied seats at the table, but they were not
+engaged in writing. These gentlemen, apparently unoccupied, wore massive
+gold watch‐chains and sparkling rings, and they had a commanding and stern
+expression of countenance. They were observing all who entered, to see
+whether any man would be bold enough to vote the yellow ticket. People of
+the humbler sort, mechanics and laborers, were constantly coming in and
+going out. Bowing reverently to the portly gentlemen, they seated
+themselves and filled out green tickets with the names of the liberal
+candidates. Most of them did not even trouble themselves to this degree,
+but simply laid their tickets before the penman appointed for this special
+service. All went off in the best order. The process of the election
+resembled the smooth working of an ingenious piece of machinery. And there
+was no tongue there to denounce the infamous terrorism that had crushed
+the freedom of the election or had bought the votes of vile and venal men
+with beer.
+
+Seraphin stood with Greifmann in the recess of a window looking on.
+
+“Who are the fat men at the table?” inquired he.
+
+“The one with the very black beard is house‐builder Sand, the second is
+Eisenhart, machine‐builder, the third is Erdfloh, a landowner, the fourth
+and fifth are tobacco merchants. All those gentlemen are chieftains of the
+party of progress.”
+
+“They show it,” observed Gerlach. “Their looks, in a manner, command every
+man that comes in to take the green ticket, and I imagine I can read on
+their brows: ‘Woe to him who dares vote against us. He shall be under a
+ban, and shall have neither employment nor bread.’ It is unmitigated
+tyranny! I imagine I see in those fat fellows so many cotton‐planters
+voting their slaves.”
+
+“That is a one‐sided conclusion, my most esteemed,” rejoined the banker.
+“In country villages, the position here assumed by the magnates of
+progress is filled by the lords of ultramontanism, clerical gentlemen in
+cassocks, who keep a sharp eye on the fingers of their parishioners. This,
+too, is influencing.”
+
+“But not constraining,” opposed the millionaire promptly. “The clergy
+exert a legitimate influence by convincing, by advancing solid grounds for
+their political creed. They never have recourse to compulsory measures,
+nor dare they do so, because it would be opposed to the Gospel which they
+preach. The autocrats of progress, on the contrary, do not hesitate about
+using threats and violence. Should a man refuse to bow to their dictates,
+they cruelly deprive him of the means of subsistence. This is not only
+inhuman, but it is also an accursed scheme for making slaves of the people
+and robbing them of principle.”
+
+“Ah! look yonder—there is Holt.”
+
+The land cultivator had walked into the hall head erect. He looked along
+the table and stood undecided. One of the ministering spirits of progress
+soon fluttered about him, offering him a green ticket. Holt glanced at it,
+and a contemptuous smile spread over his face. He next tore it to pieces,
+which he threw on the floor.
+
+“What are you about?” asked the angel of progress reproachfully.
+
+“I have reduced Shund and his colleagues to fragments,” answered Holt
+dryly, then approaching the commissary he demanded a yellow ticket.
+
+“Glorious!” applauded Gerlach. “I have half a mind to present this true
+German _man_ with another thousand as a reward for his spirit.”
+
+The fat men had observed with astonishment the action of the land
+cultivator. Their astonishment turned to rage when Holt, leisurely seating
+himself at the table, took a pen in his mighty fist and began filling out
+the ticket with the names of the ultramontane candidates. Whilst he wrote,
+whisperings could be heard all through the hall, and every eye was
+directed upon him. After no inconsiderable exertion, the task of filling
+out the ticket was successfully accomplished, and Holt arose, leaving the
+ticket lying upon the table. In the twinkling of an eye a hand reached
+forward to take it up.
+
+“What do you mean, sir?” asked Holt sternly.
+
+“That yellow paper defiles the table,” hissed the fellow viciously.
+
+“Hand back that ticket,” commanded Holt roughly. “I want it to be here.
+The yellow ticket has as good a right on this table as the green one—do
+you hear me?”
+
+“Slave of the priests!” sputtered his antagonist.
+
+“If I am a slave of the priests, then you are a slave of that villain
+Shund,” retorted Holt. “I am not to be browbeaten—by such a fellow as you
+particularly—least of all by a vile slave of Shund’s.” He spoke, and then
+reached his ticket to the commissary.
+
+“That is an impudent dog,” growled leader Sand. “Who is he?”
+
+“He is a countryman of the name of Holt,” answered he to whom the query
+was addressed.
+
+“We must spot the boor,” said Erdfloh. “His swaggering shall not avail him
+anything.”
+
+Holt was not the only voter that proved refractory. Mr. Schwefel, also,
+had a disagreeable surprise. He was standing near the entrance, observing
+with great self‐complacency how the workmen in his employ submissively
+cast their votes for Shund and his associates. Schwefel regarded himself
+as of signal importance in the commonwealth, for he controlled not less
+than four hundred votes, and the side which it was his pleasure to favor
+could not fail of victory. The head of the great leader seemed in a manner
+encircled with the halo of progress: whilst his retainers passed and
+saluted him, he experienced something akin to the pride of a field‐marshal
+reviewing a column of his victorious army.
+
+Just then a spare little man appeared in the door. His yellowish, sickly
+complexion gave evidence that he was employed in the sulphurating of
+straw. At sight of the commander the sulphur‐hued little man shrank back,
+but his startled look did not escape the restless eye of Mr. Schwefel. He
+beckoned to the laborer.
+
+“Have you selected your ticket, Leicht?”
+
+“Yes, sir.”
+
+“Let me see the ticket.”
+
+The man obeyed reluctantly. Scarcely had Schwefel got a glimpse of the
+paper when his brows gathered darkly.
+
+“What means this? Have you selected the yellow ticket and not the green
+one?”
+
+Leicht hung his head. He thought of the consequences of this detection, of
+his four small children, of want of employment, of hunger and bitter
+need—he was almost beside himself.
+
+“If you vote for the priests, you may get your bread from the priests,”
+said Schwefel. “The moment you hand that ticket to the commissary, you may
+consider yourself discharged from my employ.” With this he angrily turned
+his back upon the man. Leicht did not reach in his ticket to the
+commissary. Staggering out of the hall, he stood bewildered near the
+railing of the steps, and stared vaguely upon the men who were coming and
+going. Spitzkopf slipped up to him.
+
+“What were you thinking about, man?” asked he reproachfully. “Mr. Schwefel
+is furious—you are ruined. Sheer stupidity, nothing but stupidity in you
+to wish to vote in opposition to the pleasure of the man from whom you get
+your bread and meat! Not only that, but you have insulted the whole
+community, for you have chosen to vote against progress when all the town
+is in favor of progress. You will be put on the spotted list, and the
+upshot will be that you will not get employment in any factory in town. Do
+you want to die of hunger, man—do you want your children to die of
+hunger?”
+
+“You are right—I am ruined,” said the laborer listlessly. “I couldn’t
+bring myself to write Shund’s name because he reduced my brother‐in‐law to
+beggary—this is what made me select the yellow ticket.”
+
+“You are a fool. Were Mr. Schwefel to recommend the devil, your duty would
+be to vote for the devil. What need you care who is on the ticket? You
+have only to write the names on the ticket—nothing more than that. Do you
+think progress would nominate men that are unfit—men who would not promote
+the interests of the state, who would not further the cause of humanity,
+civilization, and liberty? You are a fool for not voting for what is best
+for yourself.”
+
+“I am sorry now, but it’s too late.” sighed Leicht. “I wouldn’t have
+thought, either, that Mr. Schwefel would get angry because a man wanted to
+vote to the best of his judgment.”
+
+“There you are prating sillily again. Best of your judgment!—you mustn’t
+have any judgment. Leave it to others to judge; they have more brains,
+more sense, more knowledge than you. Progress does the thinking: our place
+is to blindly follow its directions.”
+
+“But, Mr. Spitzkopf, mine is only the vote of a poor man; and what matters
+such a vote?”
+
+“There is your want of sense again. We are living in a state that enjoys
+liberty. We are living in an age of intelligence, of moral advancement, of
+civilization and knowledge, in a word, we are living in an age of
+progress; and in an age of this sort the vote of a poor man is worth as
+much as that of a rich man.”
+
+“If only I had it to do over! I would give my right hand to have it to do
+over!”
+
+“You can repair the mischief if you want.”
+
+“Instruct me how, Mr. Spitzkopf; please tell me how!”
+
+“Very well, I will do my best. As you acted from thoughtlessness and no
+bad intention, doubtless Mr. Schwefel will suffer himself to be
+propitiated. Go down into the court, and wait till I come. I shall get you
+another ticket; you will then vote for progress, and all will be
+satisfactory.”
+
+“I am a thousand times obliged to you, Mr. Spitzkopf—a thousand times
+obliged!”
+
+The agent went back to the hall. Leicht descended to the courtyard, where
+he found a ring of timid operators like himself surrounding the sturdy
+Holt. They were talking in an undertone. As often as a progressionist drew
+near, their conversation was hushed altogether. Holt’s voice alone
+resounded loudly through the court, and his huge strong hands were cutting
+the air in animated gesticulations.
+
+“This is not a free election; it is one of compulsion and violence,” cried
+he. “Every factoryman is compelled to vote as his employer dictates, and
+should he refuse the employer discharges him from the work. Is not this
+most despicable tyranny! And these very tyrants of progress are
+perpetually prating about liberty, independence, civilization! That’s a
+precious sort of liberty indeed!”
+
+“A man belonging to the ultramontane party cannot walk the streets to‐day
+without being hooted and insulted,” said another. “Even up yonder in the
+hall, those gentlemen who are considered so cultivated stick their heads
+together and laugh scornfully when one of us draws near.”
+
+“That’s so—that’s so, I have myself seen it,” cried Holt. “Those well‐bred
+gentlemen show their teeth like ferocious dogs whenever they see a yellow
+ticket or an ultramontane. I say, Leicht, has anything happened you? You
+look wretched!” Leicht drew near and related what had occurred. The honest
+Holt’s eyes gleamed like coals of fire.
+
+“There’s another piece of tyranny for you,” cried he. “Leicht, my poor
+fellow, I fancy I see in you a slave of Schwefel’s. From dawn till late
+you are compelled to toil for the curmudgeon, Sundays not excepted. Your
+church is the factory, your religion working in straw, and your God is
+your sovereign master Schwefel. You are ruining your health amid the
+stench of brimstone, and not so much as the liberty of voting as you think
+fit is allowed you. It’s just as I tell you—you factorymen are slaves. How
+strangely things go on in the world! In America slavery has been
+abolished; but lo! here in Europe it is blooming as freshly as trees in
+the month of May. But mark my word, friends, the fruit is deadly; and when
+once it will have ripened, the great God of heaven will shake it from the
+trees, and the generation that planted the trees will have to eat the
+bitter fruit.”
+
+Leicht shunned the society of the ultramontanes and stole away. Presently
+Spitzkopf appeared with the ticket.
+
+“Your ticket is filled out. Come and sign your name to it.” Schwefel was
+again standing near the entrance, and he again beckoned the laborer to
+approach. “I am pacified. You may now continue working for me.”
+
+Carl and Seraphin returned to the Palais Greifmann. Louise received them
+with numerous questions. The banker related what had passed; Gerlach
+strode restlessly through the apartment.
+
+“The most curious spectacle must have been yourself,” said the young lady.
+“Just fancy you on the rostrum at the ‘Key of Heaven’! And very likely the
+ungrateful ultramontanes would not so much as applaud.”
+
+“Beg pardon, they did, miss!” assured Seraphin. “They applauded and cried
+bravo.”
+
+“Really? Then I am proud of a brother whose maiden speech produced such
+marvellous effects. May be we shall read of it in the daily paper.
+Everybody will be surprised to hear of the banker Greifmann making a
+speech at the ‘Key of Heaven.’ ” Carl perceived the irony and stroked his
+forehead.
+
+“But what can you be pondering over, Mr. Seraphin?” cried she to him.
+“Since returning from the turmoil of the election, you seem unable to keep
+quiet.” He seated himself at her side, and was soon under the spell of her
+magical attractions.
+
+“My head is dizzy and my brain confused,” said he. “On every hand I see
+nothing but revolt against moral obligation, sacrilegious disregard of the
+most sacred rights of man. The hubbub still resounds in my ears, and my
+imagination still sees those fat men at the table with their slaveholder
+look—the white slaves doing their masters’ bidding—the completest
+subjugation in an age of enlightenment—all this presents itself to me in
+the most repulsive and lamentable guise.”
+
+“You must drive those horrible phantoms from your mind,” replied Louise.
+
+“They are not phantoms, but the most fearful reality.”
+
+“They are phantoms, Mr. Seraphin, so far as your feelings exaggerate the
+evils. Those factory serfs have no reason to complain. There is nothing to
+be done but to put up with a situation that has spontaneously developed
+itself. It is useless to grow impatient because difference of rank between
+masters and servants is an unavoidable evil upon earth.” A servant entered
+to call them to dinner.
+
+At her side he gradually became more cheerful. The brightness of her eyes
+dispelled his depression, and her delicate arts put a spell upon his
+young, inexperienced heart. And when, at the end of the meal, they were
+sipping delicious wine, and her beautiful lips lisped the customary
+health, the subdued tenderness he had been feeling suddenly expanded into
+a strong passion.
+
+“After you will have done justice to your diary,” said she at parting, “we
+shall take a drive, and then go to the opera.”
+
+Instead of going to his room, Seraphin went into the garden. He almost
+forgot the occurrences of the day in musing on the inexplicable behavior
+of Louise. Again she had not uttered a word of condemnation of the
+execrable doings of progress, and it grieved him deeply. A suspicion
+flitted across his mind that perhaps Louise was infected with the
+frivolous and pernicious spirit of the age, but he immediately stifled the
+terrible suggestion as he would have hastened to crush a viper that he
+might have seen on the path of the beautiful lady. He preferred to believe
+that she suppressed her feelings of disgust out of regard for his
+presence, that she wisely avoided pouring oil upon the flames of his own
+indignation. Had she not exerted herself to dispel his sombre reflections?
+He was thus espousing the side of passion against the appalling truth that
+was beginning faintly to dawn upon his anxious mind.
+
+But soon the spell was to be broken, and duty was to confront him with the
+alternative of either giving up Louise, or defying the stern demands of
+his conscience.
+
+The brother and sister, thinking their guest engaged with his diary,
+walked into the garden. They directed their steps towards the arbor where
+Gerlach had seated himself.
+
+He was only roused to consciousness of their proximity by the unusually
+loud and excited tone in which Louise spoke. He could not be mistaken; it
+was the young lady’s voice—but oh! the import of her words. He looked
+through an opening in the foliage, and sat thunderstruck.
+
+“You have been attempting to guide Gerlach’s overexalted spirit into a
+more rational way of thinking, but the very opposite seems to be the
+result. Intercourse with the son of a strait‐laced mother is infecting you
+with sympathy for ultramontanism. Your speech to‐day,” continued she
+caustically, “in yon obscure meeting is the subject of the talk of the
+town. I am afraid you have made yourself ridiculous in the minds of all
+cultivated people. The respectability of our family has suffered.”
+
+“Of our family?” echoed he, perplexed.
+
+“We are compromitted,” continued she with excitement. “You have given our
+enemies occasion to set us down for members of a party who stupidly oppose
+the onward march of civilization.”
+
+“Cease your philippic,” broke in the brother angrily. “Bitterness is an
+unmerited return for my efforts to serve you.”
+
+“To serve me?”
+
+“Yes, to serve you. The disturbing of that meeting made a very unfavorable
+impression on your intended. He scorned the noisy mob, and was roused by
+what, from his point of view, could not pass for anything better than
+unpardonable impudence. To me it might have been a matter of indifference
+whether your intended was pleased or displeased with the fearless conduct
+of progress. But as I knew both you and the family felt disposed to base
+the happiness of your life on his couple of millions, as moreover I feared
+my silence might be interpreted by the shortsighted young gentleman for
+complicity in progressionist ideas, I was forced to disown the disorderly
+proceeding. In so doing I have not derogated one iota from the spirit of
+the times; on the contrary, I have bound a heavy wreath about the brow of
+glorious humanity.”
+
+“But you have pardoned yourself too easily,” proceeded she, unappeased.
+“The very first word uttered by a Greifmann in that benighted assembly was
+a stain on the fair fame of our family. We shall be an object of contempt
+in every circle. ‘The Greifmanns have turned ultramontanes because Gerlach
+would have refused the young lady’s hand had they not changed their
+creed,’ is what will be prated in society. A flood of derision and sarcasm
+will be let loose upon us. I an ultramontane?” cried she, growing more
+fierce; “I caught in the meshes of religious fanaticism? I accept the
+Syllabus—believe in the Prophet of Nazareth? Oh! I could sink into the
+earth on account of this disgrace! Did I for an instant doubt that
+Seraphin may be redeemed from superstition and fanaticism, I would
+renounce my union with him—I would spurn the tempting enjoyments of
+wealth, so much do I hate silly credulity.”
+
+Seraphin glanced at her through the gap in the foliage. Not six paces from
+him, with her face turned in his direction, stood the infuriate beauty.
+How changed her countenance! The features, habitually so delicate and
+bright, now looked absolutely hideous, the brows were fiercely knit, and
+hatred poured like streams of fire from her eyes. Sentiments hitherto
+skilfully concealed had taken visible shape, ugly and repulsive to the
+view of the innocent youth. His noble spirit revolted at so much hypocrisy
+and falsehood. What occurred before him was at once so monstrous and so
+overwhelming that he did not for an instant consider that in case they
+entered the arbor he would be discovered. He was not discovered, however.
+Louise and Carl retraced their steps. For a short while the voice of
+Louise was still audible, then silence reigned in the garden.
+
+Seraphin rose from his seat. There was a sad earnestness in his face, and
+the vanishing traces of deep pain, which however were soon superseded by a
+noble indignation.
+
+“I have beheld the genuine Louise, and I thank God for it. It is as I
+feared, Louise is a progressionist, an infidel that considers it
+disgraceful to believe in the Redeemer. Out upon such degeneracy! She
+hates light, and how hideous this hatred makes her. Not a feature was left
+of the charming, smiling, winning Louise. Good God! how horrible had her
+real character remained unknown until after we were married! Chained for
+life to the bitter enemy of everything that I hold dear and venerate as
+holy—think of it! With eyes bandaged, I was but two paces from an abyss
+that resembles hell—thank God! the bandage has fallen—I see the abyss, and
+shudder.
+
+“ ‘The ultramontane Seraphin’—‘the fanatical Gerlach’—‘the shortsighted
+Gerlach,’ whose fortune the young lady covets that she may pass her life
+in enjoyment—a heartless girl, in whom there is not a spark of love for
+her intended husband—how base!
+
+“ ‘Ultramontane’?—‘fanatical’?—yes! ‘Shortsighted?’ by no means. One would
+need the suspicious eyes of progress to see through the hypocrisy of this
+lady and her brother—a simple, trusting spirit like mine cannot penetrate
+such darkness. At any rate, they shall not find me weak. The little flame
+that was beginning to burn within my heart has been for ever extinguished
+by her unhallowed lips. She might now present herself in the garb of an
+angel, and muster up every seductive art of womanhood, ’twould not avail;
+I have had an insight into her real character, and giving her up costs me
+not a pang. It is not hollow appearances that determine the worth of
+woman, but moral excellence, beautiful virtues springing from a heart
+vivified by faith. No, giving her up shall not cost me one regretful
+throb.”
+
+He hastened from the garden to his room and rang the bell.
+
+“Pack my trunks this very day, John,” said he to his servant. “Tomorrow we
+shall be off.”
+
+He then entered in his diary a circumstantial account of the unmasked
+beauty. He also dwelt at length upon the painful shock his heart
+experienced when the bright and beautiful creature he had considered
+Louise to be suddenly vanished before his soul. As he was finishing the
+last line, John reappeared with a telegraphic despatch. He read it, and
+was stunned.
+
+“Meet your father at the train this evening.” He looked at the concise
+despatch, and fancied he saw his father’s stern and threatening
+countenance.
+
+The contemplated match had for several years been regarded by the families
+of Gerlach and Greifmann as a fixed fact. Seraphin was aware how
+stubbornly his father adhered to a project that he had once set his mind
+upon. Here now, just as the union had became impossible and as the youth
+was about to free himself for ever from an engagement that was destructive
+of his happiness, the uncompromising sire had to appear to enforce
+unconditional obedience to his will. A fearful contest awaited Seraphin,
+unequal and painful; for a son, accustomed from childhood to revere and
+obey his parents, was to maintain this contest against his own father.
+Seraphin paced the room and wrung his hands in anguish.
+
+To Be Continued.
+
+
+
+
+The Virgin.
+
+
+    Mother! whose virgin bosom was uncrost
+    With the least shade of thought to sin allied:
+    Woman! above all women glorified,
+    Our tainted nature’s solitary boast;
+    Purer than foam on central ocean tost,
+    Brighter than eastern skies at daybreak strewn
+    With fancied roses, than the unblemished moon
+    Before her vane begins on heaven’s blue coast,
+    Thy image falls to earth. Yet some, I ween,
+    Not unforgiven, the suppliant knee might bend,
+    As to a visible power, in which did blend
+    All that was mixed and reconciled in thee
+    Of mother’s love with maiden purity,
+    Of high and low, celestial with terrene.—_Wordsworth._
+
+
+
+
+The Homeless Poor Of New York City.
+
+
+In this class, the homeless poor, we embrace all those who have no fixed
+habitation—who have no idea in the morning where they will obtain shelter
+for their weary bodies during the coming night. We find here every age
+represented—from the infant in the mother’s arms, through the rapid stages
+of development (as it is well known that pain and hunger have a wonderful
+effect in maturing infant humanity), to the aged, tottering towards the
+grave, only waiting for their summons to cross over the river of time;
+looking with yearning eyes towards the Home prepared for them on the shore
+of eternity.
+
+It is impossible to estimate the number of this class, as we have no
+statistics to guide us, but it is supposed that there are about forty
+thousand vagrant children alone in this metropolis. From this frightful
+number of infant waifs we may judge of the amount of misery and
+destitution in our midst—hidden from view behind our imposing marble
+warehouses and stately brownstone mansions.
+
+We have been informed by a reliable police official that there are a large
+number of poor widows, whose husbands died in the service of our country
+during the late war, in a most destitute condition in this city, and that
+they frequently bring their children with them and apply for shelter at
+the station‐houses. They attempt to eke out a miserable livelihood by
+sewing, and when this fails them they are obliged to go (in this Christian
+city) to the abodes of crime, to avoid the inclemency of the winter
+nights. Few persons can form an idea of the struggles, the privations, and
+the daily sufferings of lone women who earn their daily bread by the use
+of the needle. If the fine ladies who adorn themselves in costly robes
+could go behind the scenes after they have left their orders at the
+elegant shops of the dressmakers; could they see their delicate fabrics
+taken home by the poor sewing‐women; see the weary forms bent over their
+work in the cheerless tenement‐houses, each stitch accompanied by a
+painful throb of heart and brain as the night wears on and the solitary
+candle burns low; the famishing child as he tosses and turns on his bundle
+of rags, murmuring, “Bread, mother, bread!”—ay! if the beaming eyes of the
+votaries of fashion could by some magic power see on their rustling silks,
+their costly linen, their beautiful lace, the imprint of the gaunt, lean
+fingers of the poor sewing‐women; could the tears that trickled down the
+worn cheeks crystallize where they have fallen; could the sighs which
+welled up from the overburdened heart strike with their low wailing sound
+on the ears of these worldlings—they would be filled with a larger sense
+of duty to their fellow‐creatures, a greater desire to follow the golden
+motto, “Do unto others as ye would that others should do unto you.”
+
+There is an official apathy to the condition of the extreme poor which,
+with the ballot placed in the hands of every man, has already produced
+baneful results to the well‐being of the Republic, and must eventually, if
+not remedied, act detrimentally to its safety. If an unfortunate wretch,
+clad in tattered garments, pass through our streets or loiter near our
+homes, he is at once eyed suspiciously—to wear the habiliments of poverty
+is evidence sufficient that the black heart of a criminal is enclosed
+within. It is true that promiscuous charity may do great harm, but it is
+surely the correct policy for a government, while it judiciously supplies
+the immediate wants of its poor classes with one hand, to open the avenues
+to employment with the other; thus teaching them the lesson impressed upon
+our first parents as they were banished from the Garden of Eden—that man
+must earn his daily bread by the sweat of his brow.
+
+We have already said that it is computed by well‐informed persons that we
+have in our midst some forty thousand vagrant children. Let us glance for
+a moment at their condition, and what is being done for them. It is
+difficult for any one to conceive the deplorable condition of these
+homeless children without personal observation. They tread the paths
+leading to moral destruction with such rapidity that hundreds of them are
+confirmed thieves and drunkards before they reach the age of twelve years.
+The day is passed in pilfering, and at night they sleep in some out‐of‐
+the‐way place—under door‐steps, in wagons, or wherever they can store
+their diminutive forms. Some time since, a regularly organized band of
+boys were discovered to have constructed a shelter under one of the piers;
+and here they congregated at night, each bringing in his booty stolen
+during the day. A few days since, during a visit to one of the mission‐
+houses of this city, the lady in charge pointed out to us a little girl,
+not more than nine years old, telling us that she never came to the house
+without being more or less under the influence of liquor, and a glance at
+the bloated features and nervous, trembling hands showed conclusively that
+it was her habitual condition. We understand that there are fiends in the
+shape of men and women in this city who will sell such children a penny’s
+worth of rum. Some persons have argued that these children are from bad
+parents, and under any circumstances, no matter how favorable, would be
+corrupt. Such an opinion is a libel on God and human nature. A certain
+proclivity to vice may be transmitted in the blood, but free‐will remains
+in the most degenerate, and is sufficient, with the aid of a good
+education and the grace of God, to overcome this obstacle to virtue. We
+know well the plastic nature of childhood, and, if educated from the first
+to honesty, morality, and sobriety, it will indeed be found a rare
+exception in which the developed man will not possess these virtues, and
+prove an honor to himself and society. But if the first lisp of the infant
+repeats an oath which is used more frequently than any other word by the
+debased mother, or if, as is the case with many, as soon as the babe can
+walk alone it is taught the art of begging and stealing, what can we look
+for in the same child simply developed to manhood? Are you surprised that
+he makes a thief? He has never been taught anything else, and he naturally
+looks upon the law as something that interferes with the right to take
+anything he desires, if he can only do so without being detected. Would
+you look for pure water from a stream whose bed is covered with filthy
+slime, and whose banks are the receptacle of disgusting, decomposed offal?
+Surely you would not drink of such, no matter how pure you knew the
+gurgling springs to be high up on the mountain‐side from whence it
+received its supply. Look at a babe as it is blessed with the first gleam
+of reason—its ability to notice things about it. Is there anything in the
+bright black eye to indicate the future cunning of the burglar? Do the
+rosy lips, wreathed in angel smiles, look as if they were fashioned to
+utter foul oaths and blasphemies? And the little chubby hands clasped in
+baby glee around the mother’s neck, could they, by a natural instinct,
+ever be turned in brutal wrath against that self‐same mother? Reason
+answers No to all these questions; and we argue that such vices are
+developed principally by education and example. Take this for granted,
+and, if we do nothing to save the child from such education, what right
+have we to imprison the developed man for acting upon the only doctrine he
+has ever been taught? Or a better view of the subject is: Would it not be
+the dictate of a sound political economy to take these children from the
+streets, and teach them some useful trade or pursuit, giving them, at the
+same time, the fundamental principles of Christianity, without which
+society is a tottering fabric, minus its very foundation? Do this, and we
+make producers out of the very men and women who will otherwise become
+consumers upon the state in the common prisons.
+
+In several parishes of this city benevolent efforts are being made to
+rescue these children, but, so far as we can learn, the only institutions
+established where they are regularly taken care of and kept permanently
+are the following: “The Five Points House of Industry,” “The Five Points
+Mission‐House,” “The Howard Mission”; and last, but we hope soon to be
+first in its wide‐spread influence over these little creatures, is the one
+established some two years ago, and now located in East Thirteenth Street.
+This is managed by certain charitable Catholic ladies, and called “An
+Association for Befriending Children.” As most of the poor children on the
+Island are, or should be, Catholics, it is but just that the last‐
+mentioned should receive support and countenance from every Catholic in
+the city able to assist it, and thus enable the lady managers in a short
+time to erect branch homes in every parish on the Island.
+
+But come with us, dear reader, and let us look for ourselves at the
+condition of those who take advantage of the hospitality of the station‐
+houses. Think for a moment that in 1862 there were seventy thousand nine
+hundred and thirty‐eight lodgers, while 1871 presents the fearfully
+increased number of one hundred and forty‐one thousand seven hundred and
+eighty who sought this shelter. Oh! that this number (equal nearly to one‐
+sixth of the population of this vast metropolis), with its fearful weight
+of destitution and misery, suffering and despair, could be placed in
+burning letters upon the minds of those able, even without discommoding
+themselves, to relieve it!
+
+Let us go back to midwinter. A blinding snow‐storm is wrapping the earth
+in a white mantle, and it is after midnight, but these are only better
+reasons for our undertaking, as they secure us increased opportunity to
+see the phase of suffering we seek; for surely in a night like this the
+shelter of any roof is a luxury compared to the exposure of the street.
+
+Let us stop first at the Fifteenth Precinct: we ask the sergeant at the
+desk for the presiding officer, and we are at once shown to the captain’s
+room. He reads the note from headquarters giving us the _entrée_, and
+informs us that he will give us any information we desire. We request him
+to show us the quarters of the night lodgers. He leads us through a rear
+door into the yard, and here we find a second building, two stories high,
+built of brick and stone. The lower story is cut up into cells, with iron
+cross‐barred doors, for prisoners; and the upper is divided into two
+rooms—one devoted to the female, and the other to male, lodgers. The heavy
+granite stone forming a roof to the cells is also the floor of the upper
+rooms. As we make an inspection of the prison, we ask the captain what he
+thinks of this connection of homeless vagrants with prisoners? He promptly
+replies that it is most unfortunate, and should not be allowed, and with
+great kindness of heart says he would be willing to take care of a house
+in his precinct for any number of lodgers, if allowed to do so. He tells
+us that he does everything to alleviate the condition of these paupers he
+can; that, if a particularly distressing case presents itself, he allows
+the doorman to give the party a cell in the prison, that this is far more
+comfortable than the rooms above.
+
+Think of this, you who at night rest your heads on pillows of down and
+wrap your bodies in fine rose blankets; think of beings so unfortunate
+that a prisoner’s cell, with the clanking iron‐barred door, is looked upon
+as a special favor! But let us ascend to the upper story. The door to the
+male apartment is opened, and the picture is before us. The ceiling is
+lofty, and a large ventilator opens to the roof from its centre, but where
+is the stone floor? It cannot be seen, so densely is it packed with
+outcast humanity. We can think of no other comparison but the way we have
+seen sardines packed in little tin boxes. Glance at this first row: here
+is an old German, next what looks to be a countryman, then three negroes,
+so black that they might have just arrived from the burning climate of
+Africa, then three Arabs, and in the distant corner more white men. The
+other rows are but copies of this, differing only in color or nationality,
+and such a heterogeneous mass of humanity, made common bed‐fellows by
+want, it would be impossible to find. Around the wall are placed iron
+frames, about one foot high, and in these fit plain boards, painted black;
+but here, again, none of this can be seen, the human flooring covers all.
+Think of this apartment, with seventy‐four men, of every description, from
+the octogenarian leaning over the brink of the grave, to the young boy
+seventeen or eighteen years old. Every clime has a representative; and in
+the vast group every variety of shade and color possessed by the human
+family can be seen. Opening the door to the female apartment, we find it
+occupied by a much smaller number; and we can see better the arrangement
+of the floor. The iron frames with their board covering extend from each
+wall towards the centre about six feet, leaving a space in the middle of
+the room as a passway. The same variety in color, age, and nationality is
+visible. Look at the different expressions of countenance—how replete with
+sadness, misfortune, degradation, and misery! These lodgers are divided
+into three classes: the first are officially known as bummers; they are
+generally inebriates and worthless idlers, the drones of the hive, who
+make the station‐houses their permanent lodging‐places, going night after
+night to different ones, thus distributing their patronage to a large
+number; but in spite of this the wary eye of the policeman soon recognizes
+them as belonging to this class. The second are those who by misfortune
+are obliged to seek this temporary shelter. Here are poor women, with
+their young children, forced out of their homes at night by drunken
+husbands; single persons, temporarily unable to obtain employment; here
+also you find those whose lives have been failures, whose every effort to
+succeed has proved abortive, who have been held down to the world’s hard
+grindstone by the iron grasp of poverty. The third class embraces those
+who have homes in the rural districts, and other poor strangers, who are
+by accident left in the city for the night.
+
+Having completed our survey here, let us look in for a few moments at the
+Eighth Precinct. We find the captain obliging in his politeness, and we
+ask at once to be permitted to see the night lodgers. About the centre of
+the building a door opens, leading by a common stairway to the basement
+below. A fearful and sickening odor greets us as we pass down, and this,
+the captain informs us, permeates every part of the building, to the great
+detriment of his officers. He also tells us that his accommodations for
+wayfarers are very poor; that he is obliged to put them in two small rooms
+in the basement, which are close and unhealthy. We find this statement
+correct, the floor upon which the lodgers rest being about four feet below
+the street level; the ceiling is also very low, and the ventilation
+extremely imperfect. The only light in the apartment is from a small oil‐
+lamp, and its sickly flame seems to add intensity to the aspect of the
+miserable surroundings. Look at that old man with long white beard and
+tattered garments, the first in the row near the entrance. There lingers
+still a look of dignity about his fine face, but his whole appearance
+denotes the victim of intemperance. See that young boy with his chest
+exposed, the third from the old man. He has never known his parents.
+Picked up in the streets when a babe by an old crone, he has been tossed
+about ever since with the vilest scum of metropolitan society. He is
+sixteen, but can count for you the number of dinners he has had in all
+those years, the number of times he has slept in a comfortable bed, ay,
+even the number of kind words that have been spoken to him! What can be
+expected from the future of such children, cradled in a den for the
+punishment of crime while yet the snowy innocence of babyhood is
+untarnished, the only lullaby the coarse jest, rude repartee, and foul
+oaths of the outcasts who surround them? The curses and impotent railings
+against a fate for which generally each is individually to blame, and the
+bitter invective against their more fortunate fellow‐beings, form a sad
+school in which to nurture pliable minds. But enough; the foul air of this
+basement oppresses us, and we gladly make our way to the outer world.
+
+In the large cities of Europe, there are refuges established for this
+class on the following simple plan: An airy, comfortable, and well‐
+ventilated room is procured, and fitted up with plain bedsteads and
+bedding, the latter of such materials as are easily washed. The next thing
+of importance is to provide means for bathing, and to require every person
+admitted to make use of these means before retiring to rest. It is also
+the custom to give the lodgers when they come in, and again in the morning
+when they leave, a large basin of gruel and a half‐pound of bread. The
+cost of such hospitality here would not exceed fifteen cents per night,
+and not as much as this if these houses were under the care of a religious
+community, saving by this the salaries of matrons and other employees, and
+at the same time ensuring the order always produced by the presence of
+disciplined authority. There should be separate houses for males and
+females, and each could be cared for by persons of their own sex; but all
+such institutions would require supervision by the police, as some unruly
+characters must be expected in a promiscuous crowd of vagrants. The night
+refuges of London for women and children, established by Catholics, are
+under the care of the Sisters of Mercy, and are most admirably conducted.
+The order and docility of the lodgers is said to be remarkable under the
+gentle sway of these ladies. Those in Montreal and Quebec are in charge of
+the Gray Nuns. It would not require a large number of these lodging‐houses
+for the relief of our city, but they should be located with regard to the
+density of population in given districts. Four or five for each sex, with
+proper accommodations, would be amply sufficient, as the total number of
+lodgers in the most inclement nights would hardly reach one thousand.
+
+It is difficult to estimate the advantage to society as well as to the
+poor these homes would prove. In erecting them we should strike at the
+very foundation of the great social evil, and save hundreds of young
+women—strangers and unfortunates out of employment—from the snares set for
+their ruin in their lonely wanderings at night in search of shelter.
+
+
+    “There is near another river flowing,
+      Black with guilt, and deep as hell and sin;
+    On its brink even sinners stand and shudder,
+      Cold and hunger goad the homeless in.”
+                                       —_Procter._
+
+
+As the station lodgings now are, they form an incentive to the class known
+as bummers to avoid work. These people know there are thirty station‐
+houses, and by frequent changes they manage to pass the year through
+without drawing marked attention at any one place. This class is composed
+of low thieves, drunkards, and beggars. If but few lodging‐places existed,
+they would soon become well known, and could then be committed to the
+workhouse. A sojourn for them on the “island of penance” in the East River
+would result in a marked decrease in the thieving constantly carried on
+about our wharves and private dwellings.
+
+In erecting these night homes, either by charity or legislative
+enactments, we should save our city from a burning disgrace, and give
+hopes of respectability to many a weary soul beaten down to the dust by
+the undeserved humiliations which link misfortune with crime.
+
+As a charitable investment, these homes would prove a wise economy, as
+they would permit the truly unfortunate to be properly cared for, which is
+impossible at present. They would throw a safeguard around the morals of
+homeless young women by giving them shelter with persons of their own sex,
+who could protect, sympathize with, and advise them. They would assist in
+detecting those who live by swindling their hardworking neighbors. Lastly
+and most important, they would separate the children of poverty from the
+abodes of crime.
+
+
+    [NOTE.—The foregoing article is the substance of a lecture
+    delivered by Dr. Raborg before the Catholic Institute connected
+    with the parish of S. Paul the Apostle in this city. Its
+    suggestions are so apropos to the present season that we have
+    deemed them worthy of reproduction in this permanent form. We
+    desire also to state that the lecture had the effect of inducing
+    several philanthropic ladies and gentlemen to visit the station‐
+    houses and make a personal examination themselves, the result of
+    which was a rather extended article in _Frank Leslie’s Newspaper_
+    of March 2, 1872, embracing some passages from the lecture, and
+    accompanied by a clever illustration.
+
+    The sectarian institutions for vagrant children having been
+    alluded to, and certain former allusions to the same in this
+    magazine having been misunderstood, we think it necessary to make
+    a remark here in explanation. We must admit and praise the
+    philanthropic motive which sustains these institutions. At the
+    same time, we regard them as really nuisances of the worst kind,
+    so far as Catholic children are concerned, on account of their
+    proselytizing character. Moreover, in their actual working they
+    violate the rights both of parents and children, and we have
+    evidence that these poor children are actually sold at the West,
+    both by private sale and by auction. The horrible abuses existing
+    in some state institutions are partly known to the public, and we
+    have the means of disclosing even worse things than those which
+    have recently been exposed in the daily papers. We trust,
+    therefore, that the eloquent appeal of the author of the article
+    will produce its effect upon all our Catholic readers, and
+    stimulate them to greater efforts in behalf of these poor
+    children.—ED. C. W.]
+
+
+
+
+The House That Jack Built.
+
+
+By The Author Of “The House Of Yorke.”
+
+In Two Parts.
+
+
+
+Part I.
+
+
+It stood in one of the wildest spots in New England, surrounded by woods,
+a “frame house” in a region of log‐houses, and, as such, in spite of
+defects, a touch beyond the most complete edifice that could be shaped of
+logs.
+
+The defects were not few. The walls were slightly out of the
+perpendicular, there were strips of board instead of clapboards and
+shingles, the immense stone chimney in the centre gave the house the
+appearance of being an afterthought, and the two windows that looked down
+toward the road squinted.
+
+Yes, a most absurd little house, with all sorts of blunders in the making
+of it, but, for all that, a house with a worth of its own. For Jack
+Maynard had put the frame together with his own unassisted hands, had
+raised it with but two men to help him, and had finished it off alone. And
+round about the work, and through and over it, while his hands built
+visibly, his fancy also built airy habitations, fair and plumb, and
+changed all the landscape. Before this fairy wand, the forest sank, broad
+roads unwound, there was a sprinkle of white houses through the green
+country, like a sprinkle of snow in June; and in place of this rustic nest
+rose a fair mansion‐house, with a comely matron standing in the door, and
+rosy children playing about.
+
+At this climax of his castle‐building Jack Maynard caught breath, and,
+coming back to the present, found himself halfway up a ladder, with a
+hammer suspended in his hand, the wild forest swarming with game all about
+him, and the matron of his vision still Miss Bessie Ware, spinster.
+
+Jack laughed. “So much the better!” he exclaimed, and brought his hammer
+down with such force, laughing as he struck, that the nail under it bent
+up double and broke in two, the head half falling to the ground, the point
+half flattened lengthwise into the board, making a fragment of rustic
+buhl‐work.
+
+“There’s a nail driven into the future,” said the builder, and selected
+another, and struck with better aim this time, so that the little spike
+went straight through the board, and pierced an oaken timber, and held the
+two firmly together, and thus did its work in the present.
+
+“Well done!” said Jack; “you have gone through fifty summers in less than
+a minute.”
+
+The startled woods rang to every blow, the fox and the deer fled at that
+tocsin of civilization, and the snake _slid_ away, and set the green grass
+_crawling_ with its hidden windings. Only one living creature, besides the
+builder, seemed happy and unafraid, and that was a brown‐and‐white spaniel
+that dozed in the shadow of the rising walls, stirring only when his
+master whistled or spoke to him.
+
+“Wake up, Bruno, and tell me how this suits your eyes,” Jack would call
+out. Whereat Bruno would lift his lids lazily, show a narrow line of his
+bright brown eyes, give his tail a slow, laborious wag, and subside to his
+dreams again, and Jack would go on with his work. It seemed to be his
+heart, rather than the hammer, that drove the nails in; and every timber,
+board, latch, and hinge caught a momentary life from his hands, and
+learned his story from some telegraphing pulse. The very stones of the
+chimney knew that John Maynard and Bessie Ware were to be married as soon
+as the house should be ready for them.
+
+There was not a dwelling in sight; but half a mile further down the road
+toward the nearest town, there was an odd, double log‐house, wherein lived
+Dennis Moran and his Norah, three little girls, and Bessie Ware, Dennis
+Moran’s sister’s child.
+
+Jack paused in his work, took off his straw hat to wipe away the
+perspiration from his face and toss his hair back, first hanging on a
+round of the ladder just above him the hammer that had driven a nail
+through fifty summers. As he put his hat on again, he glanced downward,
+and there, at the foot of the ladder, stood twenty summers, looking up at
+him out of a face as fair as summers ever formed. The apple‐blooms had
+given it their pink and white, the June heavens were not bluer than those
+eyes, so oddly full of laughter and languor. The deepest nook under a low‐
+growing spruce, nor shadow in vine‐draped cave, nor hollow in a thunder‐
+cloud, ever held richer darkness than that hidden in the loose curls and
+waves of hair that fell about Bessie Ware’s shoulders. No part of the
+charm of her presence was due to her dress, save an air of fresh neatness.
+A large apron, gathered up by the corners, was full of fragrant arbor‐vitæ
+boughs, gathered to make a broom of. The large parasol, tilted back that
+she might look upward, allowed a sunbeam to fall on her forehead.
+
+“Oh! what a tall pink has grown up since I came here!” exclaimed the
+builder, as he saw her.
+
+“And what a great bear has climbed on to my ladder,” retorted the girl.
+
+He came down from the ladder and began to tell her his plans.
+
+“Bessie, I mean this shall be yet one of the best farms in the state. On
+that hill I will have corn and clover; there shall be an orchard in the
+hollow next to it, with peach‐trees on the south side of the little rise;
+and I will plant cranberries in the swamp beyond. In ten years from now,
+if a man should leave here to‐day, he wouldn’t know the place.”
+
+Bessie smiled at the magician who was to work such wonders—never doubting
+but he would—then glanced about at the scene of his exploits. Sombre,
+blue‐green pines brooded over the hill that was one day to be pink with
+clover, or rustling with corn; oaks, elms, maples, birches, and a great
+tangle of undergrowth, with rocks and moss, cumbered the ground where
+peaches were to ripen their dusky cheeks, when Jack should bid them grow,
+and large, green, and red‐streaked and yellow apples were to drop through
+the still, bright, autumn air; and she knew that the future cranberry‐
+swamp now stood thick and dark with beautiful arborvitæ trees, whose high‐
+piled, flaky boughs, tapering to a point far up in the sunshine, kept cool
+and dim the little pools of water below, and the black mould in which
+their strong roots stretched out and interwove. But Jack could do anything
+when he set out, and her faith in him was so great that she could shut her
+eyes now and see the open swamp matted over with cranberry‐vines, and hear
+the corn‐stalks clash their green swords in the fretting breeze, and the
+muffled bump of the ripe apple as it fell on the grass.
+
+After a while, Bessie started to go, but came back again.
+
+“I forgot,” she said, and gave her lover a book that had been hidden under
+the boughs in her apron. “A book‐pedlar stopped at our house last night,
+and he left this. Uncle Dennis doesn’t want it, and I do not. Perhaps you
+can make some sense out of it.”
+
+It was a second‐hand copy of Comstock’s _Natural Philosophy_, for schools,
+and was scribbled through and through by the student who had used it,
+years before.
+
+Jack took the book.
+
+“And that reminds me of your white‐faced boarder,” he said, with a slight
+laugh. “Is he up yet?”
+
+“Oh! he gets up earlier than any of us,” she answered lightly. “He doesn’t
+act cityfied at all. And you know, Jack, the reason why he is white is
+because he has been sick. Good‐bye! Aunt Norah will want her broom before
+she gets it.”
+
+Bessie struck into the woods instead of going down to the road, and was
+soon lost to view. Standing beside her little house, she had looked a
+tall, fairly‐formed lassie; but with the great trunks of primeval forest‐
+trees standing about her, and lifting their green pyramids and cones far
+into the air, she appeared slim and small enough for a fairy. Even the
+birds, chippering about full of business, seemed to flout her, as if she
+were of small consequence—not worth flying from.
+
+She laughed at them, and whispered what she did not dare to say aloud:
+“Other people besides you can build nests!” then looked quickly around to
+see if any listener were in sight.
+
+There was a slight, rustling sound, and an eavesdropping squirrel
+scampered up a tree and peered down with twinkling eyes from a safe
+height. She was just throwing one of the green twigs in her apron at him,
+when she heard her name spoken, and turned quickly to meet a pleasant‐
+faced young man, who approached from an opposite direction. This was the
+white‐faced boarder who had left the city to find health in this wild
+place.
+
+The two walked on together, Bessie as shy as any creature of the woods,
+and her companion both pleased and amused at her shyness, and trying to
+draw her out. To his questioning, she told her little story. Her mother
+was Dennis Moran’s youngest sister, her father had been a color‐sergeant
+in the English army. There had been other children, all younger than she,
+but all had died, some in one country, some in another. For Sergeant
+Ware’s family had followed the army, and seen many lands.
+
+“I am an East Indian,” Bessie said naïvely. “I was born at Calcutta. The
+others were born in Malta, in England, and in Ireland. It didn’t agree
+with them travelling about from hot to cold. My father died at Gibraltar,
+and my mother died while she was bringing me to Uncle Dennis Moran’s. May
+God be merciful to them all!”
+
+Mr. James Keene had heard this pious ejaculation many a time before from
+the lips of humble Catholics, and had found nothing in it to admire. But
+now, the thought struck him that this constant prayer for mercy on the
+dead, whenever their names were mentioned, was a beautiful superstition.
+Of course he thought it a superstition, for he was a New England
+Protestant of the most liberal sort—that is, he protested against being
+obliged to believe anything.
+
+They reached the house, near which Dennis Moran and his wife stood
+watching complacently a brood of new chickens taking their first airing.
+The young gentleman joined them, and listened with interest to the farm
+talk of his host.
+
+What had set Dennis Moran, one of the most rigid of Catholics, in a
+solitude where he saw none of his own country nor faith, and where no
+priest ever came, he professed himself unable to explain.
+
+“I’m like a fly caught in a spider’s web, sir,” he said. “When Norah and I
+came over, and I didn’t just know what to do, except that I wanted to have
+a farm of my own some day, I hired out to do haying for John Smith’s
+wife—John had died the very week he began to cut his grass, and Norah she
+helped Mrs. Smith make butter. Then they wanted me to get in the crops,
+and after that I had a chance to go into the woods logging. When I came
+out of the woods, Mrs. Smith wanted me to plough and plant for her. And
+one thing led to another, and there was always something to keep me. Norah
+had a young one, and Bessie came—a young witch, ten years old,” said
+Dennis, pulling his niece’s hair, as she stood beside him. “So I had to
+take a house. And the long and short of the matter is, that I’ve been here
+going on ten years, when I didn’t mean to stay ten weeks. But I shall pull
+up stakes pretty soon, sir,” says Dennis, straightening up. “I don’t mean
+to stay where I have to go twenty miles to attend to my Easter duties, and
+where my children are growing up little better than Protestants (he called
+it Prodestant). I’m pretty sure to move next fall, sir.”
+
+At this announcement, Mrs. Norah tossed up her head and uttered an
+unspellable, guttural “Oh!” brought from the old land, and preserved
+unadulterated among the nasal‐speaking Yankees. “We hear ducks!”
+
+Whatever might be the meaning and derivation of this remark, the drift of
+it was evidently depreciatory, and it had the effect of putting an end to
+her husband’s eloquence. Doubtless, Mrs. Moran had heard such
+announcements made before.
+
+Bessie stole a little hand under her uncle’s arm, and smiled into his
+face, and told him that she had given Jack the book, and soon made him
+forget his mortification. She knew that he was sometimes boastful, and
+that the great things he was constantly prophesying of himself never came
+to pass; but she knew also that he had a kind heart, and it hurt her to
+see him hurt.
+
+That same book, which the girl mentioned merely to divert attention, was
+to be a matter of more consequence to her than she dreamed. It was more
+important than the wedding‐dress and the wedding‐cake, which occupied so
+much of her thoughts—more important than the jealous interference of
+Jack’s mother, who did not like Bessie’s foreign blood and religion,
+though she did like Bessie—more important than even her Uncle Dennis’
+actual flitting, when fall came—all which we pass by. Only one thing in
+her life then was of more consequence than that old school‐book, which the
+pedler left because no one would buy it, and that was the earnest and
+sorrowing advice of good old Father Conners when, against his will, he
+united her to a Protestant.
+
+John Maynard said later, that before he read that book he was like a beet
+before it is pulled out of the ground, when it doesn’t know but it is a
+turnip, and firmly believes that it is growing upward instead of downward,
+and that those waving leaves of its own, which it feels, but sees not,
+exist in some outer void where nothing is, and that angle‐worms are the
+largest of locomotive creatures.
+
+It is doubtful if the artistic faculty is any more a special gift in the
+fine than in the useful arts, or if he who creates ideal forms, in order
+to breathe into them the breath of such life as is in him, is more
+enthusiastic in his work, or more fascinated by it, than he who, taking
+captive the powers of nature, binds them to do his will.
+
+This enthusiastic recognition of the work to which nature had appointed
+him, John Maynard felt from the moment when he first knew that a crowbar
+is a lever. He read that book that Bessie gave him with interest, then
+with avidity, and, having read, all the power latent in that wide brow of
+his waked up, and demanded knowledge. He got other and more complete works
+on mechanics and studied them in his leisure hours, he made experiments,
+he examined every piece of mechanism that came in his way.
+
+Coming home one Sunday from a meeting which she had walked six miles to
+attend, Mrs. Maynard, senior, was horrified to find that her son had paid
+her a visit during her absence for the sole purpose of picking in pieces
+her precious Connecticut clock. There lay its speechless fragments spread
+out on the table, while the yawning frame leaned against the wall. Bessie
+sat near, looking rather frightened, and Jack, in his shirt‐sleeves, sat
+before the table, an open book at his elbow. He was studying the page
+intently, his earnest, sunburnt face showing an utter unconsciousness of
+guilt.
+
+“Land sakes, Jack!” screamed his mother. “You’ve been and ruined my
+clock!”
+
+A clock was of value in that region, where half the inhabitants told the
+hour by sun‐marks, by the stars, or by instinct.
+
+He put his hand out to keep her back, but did not look up. “Don’t worry,
+mother,” he said, “and don’t touch anything. I’ll put the machine together
+in a few minutes.”
+
+Mrs. Maynard sank into a chair, and gazed distressfully at the ruins. That
+the pendulum, now lying prone and dismembered, would ever tick again, that
+those two little hands would ever again tell the time of day, that the
+weights would run down and have to be wound up every Saturday night, or
+that she should ever again on any June day hear the faithful little gong
+strike four o’clock in the morning—her signal for jumping out of bed with
+the unvarying ejaculation: “Land sakes! it’s four o’clock!”—seemed to her
+impossible.
+
+“And to think that you should do such work on the Sabbath‐day!” she
+groaned out, casting an accusing glance on her daughter‐in‐law. “You seem
+to have lost all the religion you ever had since you got married.”
+
+Bessie’s blue eyes lighted up: “I think it just as pious for Jack to
+study, and find out how useful things are made, as to wear out a pair of
+shoes going to hear Parson Bates talk through his nose, or sit at home and
+spoil his eyes reading over and over about Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.”
+
+“Come, come!” interposed Jack; “if you two women quarrel, and bother me, I
+shall spoil the clock.”
+
+This procured silence.
+
+Had he been a little more thoughtful and tender, he would have told his
+mother that Bessie had tried to dissuade him from touching the clock, and
+had urged the impropriety of his doing such work on Sunday; but he did not
+think. She shielded him, and he allowed her to, scarcely aware that she
+had, indeed.
+
+The young man’s prediction was fulfilled. Before sunset, the clock was
+ticking soberly on the mantelpiece, the minute‐hand hitching round its
+circle, and showing the reluctant hour‐hand the way, and Jack was marching
+homeward through the woods, with his rifle on one arm and his wife on the
+other.
+
+They were both so silent—that dark‐browed man and bright faced woman—that
+they might almost be taken as kindred of the long shadows and sunstreaks
+over which they walked. He was building up a visionary entanglement of
+pulleys in the air, through which power should run with ever‐increasing
+force, and studying how he should dispense with an idle‐wheel that
+belonged in that maze; and she was thinking of him. He was thinking that
+this forest, that once had bounded his hopes and aspirations, now pressed
+on his very breathing, and hemmed his steps in, and wishing that he had
+wings, like that bird flitting before him; and she was watching his eyes
+till she, too, saw the bird.
+
+Jack stopped, raised his rifle, took a hasty aim, and fired. Bessie ran to
+pick up the robin:
+
+“How could you, Jack!” she exclaimed reproachfully, as she felt the
+fluttering heart stop in her hand.
+
+He looked at it without the slightest compunction. “I wanted to see, as it
+stood on that twig, which way the centre of gravity would fall,” he said.
+“Don’t fret, Bessie! There are birds enough in the world.”
+
+The young wife looked earnestly into her husband’s face, as they walked on
+together. “Jack,” she said, “you might kill me, and then say that there
+are women enough in the world.”
+
+He laughed, but looked at her kindly, as he made answer: “What would all
+the women in the world be to me, Bessie, if my woman were out of it?”
+
+Could she ask more?
+
+“Jack, where do you suppose the song has gone to?” she asked, presently.
+
+“Bessie, where does a candle go when it goes out?” was the counter‐
+question.
+
+There had been a season in this man’s life, during the brief bud and
+blossom of his love for Bessie Ware, when his mind had been as full of
+fancies as a spring maple of blossoms. But he was not by nature fanciful,
+and, that brief season past, he settled down to facts. Questions which
+could not be answered he cared not to ask nor ponder on and all
+speculations, save those which built toward an assured though unseen
+result, he scouted. The sole impression the bird had made on him was that
+it was a nice little flying‐machine, which he would like to improve on
+some day. Meantime, he had much to learn.
+
+The extent of his ignorance did not discourage John Maynard, perhaps
+because it opened out gradually before him, over a new, unknown path
+starting from the known one. He was strong, fresh, and healthy, and the
+very novelty of his work, and his coming to it so late, was an assistance
+to him. “I have a head for all I want to get into it,” he said to his
+wife. “When my brain gets hold of an idea, it doesn’t let go.”
+
+It seemed so, indeed; and sometimes when he sat studying, or thinking,
+utterly unconscious of all about him, his eyes fixed, yet glimmering, his
+mouth close shut, his breathing half lost, his whole frame, while the
+brain worked, so still that his hands and feet grew cold, Bessie became
+almost afraid of him, and was ready to fancy that some strange and perhaps
+malign spirit had entered into and taken possession of her husband’s soul.
+
+And thus it happened that, after two years, the house that Jack built was
+abandoned to one of his relatives, and the young couple, with their baby
+boy, left the forest for the city.
+
+Of course, no one is to suppose that John Maynard failed.
+
+It was summer again, and lavish rains had kept to July the fresh
+luxuriance of June. The frame house stood nearly as it was when its
+builder finished it. The walls had changed their bright yellow tint for
+gray, and a few stones had fallen from the top of the chimney—that was
+all. The forest still gathered close about, and only a few patches of
+cultivated land had displaced the stumps and stones. A hop‐vine draped the
+porch at the back of the house, and a group of tall sunflowers grew near
+one of the open curtainless windows.
+
+Civilization had passed by on the other side, and, though not really so
+remote, was still invisible. Twice a day, with a low rumble, as of distant
+thunder, a train of cars passed by through the valley beyond the woods.
+
+There was no sound of childish voices, no glimpse of a child anywhere
+about. The air bore no more intelligent burden than the low colloquial
+dropping of a brook over its pebbly bed, the buzzing of bees about a hive,
+and a rustling of leaves in the faint stir of air that was more a
+respiration than a breath. The only sign of human life to be seen without
+was a frail thread of blue smoke that rose from the chimney, and
+disappeared in the sky.
+
+Inside, on the white floor of the kitchen, the shadows of the sunflowers
+lay as if painted there, only now and then stirring slightly, as the air
+breathed on the wide, golden‐rayed shields outside. In the chimney‐corner,
+almost as silent as a shadow, an old woman sat in a rocking‐chair,
+knitting, and thinking. The two small windows, with crossing light, made
+one corner of the room bright; but where this woman sat, her face could be
+seen plainly only by firelight.
+
+It was a rudely‐featured face—one seldom sees finely moulded features in
+the backwoods—but it showed fortitude, good sense, and that unconscious
+integrity which is so far nobler than the conscious. The gray hair was
+drawn tightly back, and fastened high on the head with a yellow horn comb;
+the tall, spare figure was clad in a gown of dark‐blue calico covered with
+little white dots, and a checked blue‐and‐white apron tied on with white
+tape strings, and the hands that held the knitting were bony, large‐
+jointed, and large‐veined.
+
+The stick of wood that had been smouldering on the andirons bent in the
+middle, where a little flickering flame had been gnawing industriously for
+some time. The flame brightened, and made a dive into this break, where it
+found a splinter. The stick bent yet more, then suddenly snapped in two,
+one end dropping into the coals, the other end standing upright in the
+corner.
+
+“Bless me!” muttered the old woman, dropping her work with a start.
+“There’s a stranger! I wonder who it is.”
+
+She sat gazing dreamily at the brand a moment, and, as her face half
+settled again, it became evident that the expression was one of profound
+melancholy as well as thoughtfulness. The lifted eyelids, and the start
+that roused without brightening, showed that.
+
+After a moment’s reverie, she drew a long sigh, and, before resuming her
+work, took the long iron tongs that leaned in the corner, and most
+inhospitably tossed the figurative stranger into the coals.
+
+“I wonder why my thoughts run so on Jack and Bessie to‐day,” she
+soliloquized, fixing the end of the knitting‐needle into the leather
+sheath at her side. “I wish I knew how they are. It’s my opinion they’d
+have done as well to stay here. I don’t think much of that machinery
+business.”
+
+The coming event which had thus cast its shadow before, was already at the
+gate, or, more literally, at the bars. Bessie Maynard had walked alone up
+the road she had not trodden for years, and now stood leaning there, and
+looking about with eyes that were at once eager and shrinking. Her face
+was pale, her mouth tightly closed; she had grown taller, and her
+appearance disclosed in some indefinable way a capacity for sternness
+which would scarcely have been suspected, or even credited, in the girl of
+twenty we left her. A glance would show that she had suffered deeply.
+
+Presently, as she gazed, tears began to dim her eyes. She brushed them
+away, let down the slim cedar pole that barred her passage, stepped
+through, replaced the bar, and walked up the path to the house.
+
+The knitter in the chimney‐corner heard the sound of advancing steps, and
+sat still, with her face turned over her shoulder, to watch the door. The
+steps reached the threshold and paused there, and for a moment the two
+women gazed at each other—the one silent from astonishment, the other
+struggling to repress some emotion that rose again to the surface.
+
+The visitor was the first to recover her self‐possession. She came in
+smiling, and held out her hands.
+
+“Haven’t you a word of welcome for me, Aunt Nancy?” she asked.
+
+Her voice broke the spell, and the old woman started up with a true
+country welcome, hearty, and rather rough. It was many a year since Bessie
+Maynard’s hands had felt such a grasp, or her arms such a shake.
+
+“But where is Jack?” asked his aunt, looking toward the door over Bessie’s
+shoulder.
+
+“Oh! he’s at home,” was the reply, rather negligently given. “But how are
+you, Aunt Nancy? Have you room for me to stay awhile? I took a fancy to be
+quiet a little while this summer. The city is so hot and noisy.”
+
+The old lady repeated her welcomes, mingled with many apologies for the
+kind of accommodations she had to offer, all the while helping to remove
+her visitor’s bonnet and shawl, drawing up the rocking‐chair for her, and
+pressing her into it.
+
+“Do sit down and rest,” she said. “But where is the baby? Why on earth
+didn’t you bring her?”
+
+Bessie clasped her hands tightly in her lap, and looked steadily at the
+questioner before answering. “The baby is at home!” she said then, in a
+low voice.
+
+Aunt Nancy was just turning away for some hospitable purpose, but the look
+and tone arrested her.
+
+“You don’t mean—” she began, but went no further.
+
+“Yes,” replied Bessie quietly; “there is only James left.”
+
+James was the eldest child.
+
+Mrs. Nancy Maynard was not much given to expressions of tenderness—New
+England people of the old sort seldom were—but she laid her hand softly on
+her niece’s shoulder, and said unsteadily:
+
+“You poor dear, how tried you have been!”
+
+“We have all our trials,” responded the other, with a sort of coldness.
+
+The old woman knew not what to say. She turned away, mending the fire. If
+Bessie had wept, she would have known how to comfort her; but this strange
+calmness was embarrassing. Scarcely less embarrassing was the light,
+indifferent talk that followed, the questions concerning crops, and
+weather, and little household affairs, evidently put to set aside more
+serious topics.
+
+This baby was the fourth child that Bessie Maynard had lost. After the
+first, no child of hers had lived to reach its third year. Each one had
+been carried away by a sudden distemper. The first death had been
+announced to John Maynard’s aunt in a long letter from Bessie, full of a
+healthy sorrow, every line stained with tears. John had written the next
+time, his wife being too much worn out with watching and grief to write.
+At the third death, there came a line from Bessie: “My little boy is gone,
+Aunt Nancy. What do you suppose God means?”
+
+Aunt Nancy had wondered somewhat over this strange missive, but had
+decided that, whatever God meant, Bessie meant resignation.
+
+But now, as she marked her niece’s changed face and manner, and
+recollected that laconic note, she was forced to give up the comforting
+thought. There might be endurance, but there was no resignation in that
+face.
+
+The sense of distance and strangeness grew on her, though Bessie began to
+help her get supper ready, drawing out and laying the table as though she
+had done it every day of her life, and even remembering the cup that had
+been hers, and the little iron rack on which she used to set the teapot.
+“Jack found the brass‐headed nail this hangs on miles back in the woods,”
+she said. “It’s a wonder how it got there.”
+
+“Why didn’t Jack come with you?” asked Aunt Nancy, catching at the
+opportunity to say something personal.
+
+A deep blush ran up Bessie’s face at being so caught, but her hesitation
+was only momentary.
+
+“He is too busy,” she answered briefly.
+
+“But I should think he might take a rest now and then,” persisted her
+aunt.
+
+Bessie gave a short laugh that was not without bitterness.
+
+“What rest can a man take when he has a steam‐engine spouting carbonic
+acid in one side of his brain, a flying‐machine in the other side, and a
+wheel in perpetual motion between them? John is given over to metals and
+motions. I might as well have a locomotive for a husband. Shall I take up
+the applesauce in this bowl?”
+
+“Yes. I should think that James might have come.” Aunt Nancy held
+desperately to the thread she had caught.
+
+“James is a little John,” replied Bessie, pouring the hot, green
+applesauce into a straight, white bowl with a band of narrow blue stripes
+around the middle of it. “Never mind my coming alone, Aunt Nancy. I got
+along very well, and they will do very well without me.”
+
+They sat down to the table, and Bessie made a great pretence of eating,
+but ate nothing. Then they went out and looked at the garden, talking all
+the while about nothing, and soon, to the relief of both, it was bed‐time.
+
+To Be Continued.
+
+
+
+
+Where Are You Going?
+
+
+We happened, the other day, to notice in the columns of a ribald infidel
+newspaper an advertisement in which a young lady gave notice of her desire
+to find “board in an infidel or atheist family.” There are many persons
+nowadays who are looking for a lodging‐place and for food which will give
+rest and refreshment to their minds and hearts, in the bosom of the
+infidel and atheistic family circle. They may not, in most cases,
+distinctly perceive and expressly avow that they are going over to dwell
+in the tents of atheism, but they have turned their faces and steps in
+that direction, and into the path leading thitherward, and those who keep
+on their way must arrive, sooner or later, at that destination. It is to
+these that we address the question: Where are you going? We would like to
+have them reflect a little on the kind of entertainment which they may
+reasonably expect to find in the private family of the household, and in
+the larger family of human society, when these are constituted on
+atheistic principles.
+
+Before going any further, we will designate more precisely what class of
+persons we intend by the above description. In general, all who do not
+believe in a law made known to the mind and conscience by Almighty God,
+and, in particular, those who, having been brought up in the Catholic
+faith, no longer believe in that law as made known by the authority of the
+church. We class these last individuals, for whose benefit chiefly though
+not exclusively we are writing, with those first mentioned advisedly and
+for a reason; and warn them that they are included in the number of those
+whose faces are set toward atheism. Nevertheless, we do not say this on
+the ground that every one who is not a Catholic is either incapable of
+knowing God and his law, or logically bound to deny their existence. A
+Theist, a Jew, or a Protestant has a rational ground for holding against
+the atheist or infidel all that portion of Catholic truth which his
+religion includes. Therefore, we have not included any of these in the
+number of the atheistical.
+
+Those only who do not believe in any law of God over the conscience we
+have charged with this tendency to positive atheism. Against such, the
+justice of the charge is manifest. For they are practically atheists
+already, and by denying an essential attribute of the Creator, and a
+relation which the creature must have toward him on account of this
+attribute, the way is opened to a denial of his existence. As for those
+who have been instructed in the Catholic faith and have thrown off its
+authority over their conscience, we say that they have turned towards
+atheism, because we are convinced that, as a matter of fact, the motives
+and reasonings which have induced them to this fatal apostasy are
+practically and theoretically atheistical, even if they themselves are not
+distinctly aware of their ultimate tendency. We do not deny that a
+Catholic may lapse into some imperfect form of Christianity or natural
+religion. The first Protestants had been originally Catholics, and so have
+been some of the so‐called philosophers professing natural religion. But
+the present tendency of unbelief is toward atheism, and those believers in
+positive, revealed religion, whether Catholics, Protestants, or Jews, who
+are swept by this current, are carried toward the abyss whither it is
+rushing. Those who reject the law of God which is proclaimed and enjoined
+by the authority of the church, do so because its moral or intellectual
+restraints are irksome, and they wish to be at liberty. In plain words,
+they wish to be free to sin, to follow the proclivity of our fallen nature
+to indulge in pride and concupiscence, without any fear of God before
+their eyes to disturb their peace. Therefore, they deny the authority of
+the church to bind their conscience to believe the doctrines and obey the
+moral precepts which she promulgates in the name of God. Their revolt is
+against the law itself and the sovereign authority of God. They sin
+against faith and against reason also; against the natural as well as the
+revealed law. They sin with the understanding as well as with the will,
+and their sin is one which goes to the root of all moral obligation and
+responsibility in the creature toward the Creator. It is an assertion of
+perfect individual liberty of thought and action, of independence and
+self‐sovereignty; and as such an independence is completely incompatible
+with the existence of God, it is but a step to deny that he exists, or at
+least that we have any knowledge of his existence. Moreover, modern
+unbelief proceeds by the way of objections, difficulties, and doubts. It
+is sceptical in its principle; and one who rejects the authority of the
+church and of divine revelation on the principle of scepticism, easily
+rejects all philosophy and natural religion on the same principle, and
+runs down into pure materialism and atheism.
+
+There are many persons in Europe, and some in this country, who have sunk
+into a state of avowed impiety and violent hostility to all religion which
+places them beyond the reach of every appeal to reason, conscience, or
+right feeling. We do not attempt to argue with such as these; but we
+suppose in those whom we address a condition of the mind and heart much
+less degenerate and hopeless. We suppose them to recognize the excellence
+and necessity of the private and social virtues, and to retain some
+intellectual and moral ideal in their minds which they cherish and
+venerate. They believe in truthfulness, honor, fidelity, honesty, true
+love, friendship, in the cultivation of knowledge and the fine arts, in
+all that can give decorum, refinement, and charm to domestic and social
+life, power, dignity, and splendor to political society. But all this is
+looked on as a spontaneous, natural growth, which finds its perfection and
+its end from and on this earth, and in this life, without any direct
+relation to God and an immortal life in another sphere of existence. Now,
+that such persons are intellectually and morally on a height which
+elevates them far above those who are wholly degraded in mind and
+character, we readily admit. But they are on the verge of a precipice. It
+is the black and awful abyss of atheism which yawns beneath them. And we
+invite them to look over the brink, and down into those dark depths, that
+they may consider deliberately whither their steps are leading them,
+before it is too late to retreat to a safer position.
+
+In what consists the reality of truth, let us ask of one who professes to
+love truth, or the obligation of respecting it, if Christianity is a
+falsehood, and its Founder a deceiver of mankind? One who knows the
+evidence on which Christianity rests, and rejects it as a delusion, has
+adopted a principle of scepticism which destroys all the evidence on which
+any truth can rest. The principles of reason are denied or called in
+question, unbelief or doubt extends to everything. The existence of God is
+doubted, the distinct and immortal existence of the soul is questioned,
+nothing remains but the senses and the phenomena which are called sensible
+facts. Take away God, the Essential Truth, who can neither be deceived nor
+deceive us, and who has manifested to us the truth by the lights of reason
+and revelation, and there is no such thing as truth. The descendants of
+apes, whose whole existence is merely one of sensation, who have sprung
+from material forces and are resolved into them by dissolution, can have
+no more obligation of speaking the truth than their cousins the monkeys.
+If lying, calumny, or perjury will increase the means of your sensible
+enjoyment, why not employ them against your brother‐apes, as well as
+entrap a monkey and cage him for your amusement? Whence comes the
+excellence and obligation of honor, that principle which impels a man
+rather to die than to betray a trust or abandon the post of duty? On what
+is based honesty? Why should one choose to pass his life, and to make his
+family pass their lives, in poverty and privation, rather than take the
+gold of another, when he can steal it with impunity? Where lies the
+detestable baseness of bribery and swindling? Why does the heart revolt
+against the conduct of the man or woman who is faithless to conjugal,
+parental, or filial love, who is a false friend, ungrateful for kindness,
+a traitor to his country? It is all very well to say that our natural
+instincts impel us to love certain qualities and detest others, as we
+spontaneously admire beauty and are displeased with ugliness. This is
+certainly true. And it is very well to say that happiness and well‐being
+are, on the whole, promoted by virtuous sentiments and actions, and
+hindered by those which are vicious. But if mere selfish, sensitive
+enjoyment of the good of this life be the end of life itself, all virtue
+is resolved at last into the quest of this enjoyment by the most sure and
+suitable means. When virtue requires the sacrifice of this enjoyment, it
+is no longer virtue. Why should a wife sacrifice her happiness to a cruel,
+sickly, or disagreeable husband, a husband preserve fidelity to a wife who
+is hopelessly deranged or who has violated her marriage vows? Why should a
+soldier expose his life in obedience to the order of a stupid or reckless
+commander, or shed his blood in an unnecessary war brought on by the folly
+or ambition of incompetent or unscrupulous rulers? Why should a seaman die
+for the sake of saving passengers who are nothing to him, and many of whom
+are perhaps worthless persons, leaving his widow and children without a
+protector? Why trouble ourselves about taking care of the poor, ruined
+wrecks of humanity, who can never more be capable of enjoying life or
+contributing to the enjoyment of others? If we are not the offspring of
+God, but of the earth, mere sensitive and mortal animals, existing for the
+pleasure of a day, all the virtues which demand self‐sacrifice are absurd;
+and the sentiments which we feel about these virtues are illusions. It is
+very well to appeal to these sentiments; but those who do so must admit
+that these sentiments must be capable of being justified by reason. An
+atheist or a sceptic cannot do this. If a man is essentially the same with
+a pig, there cannot be any reason for treating him otherwise than as a
+pig. Our natural sentiments, which revolt against the practical
+consequences of the degrading doctrine of atheism, prove that it is
+contrary to nature, and therefore false. It is because our nature is
+rational and immortal that we owe to ourselves and our fellows those
+obligations and charities which are not due to the brutes; that life,
+chastity, property, honor, love and friendship, promises and engagements,
+political, social, and personal rights of all kinds, are to be respected
+and held sacred. Our rational and immortal nature cannot exist except by
+participation from God, and its constitutive principle is the capacity to
+know God and recognize his law as our supreme rule. The obligation of
+doing that which is just and honorable is derived from that law. Our own
+rights and the rights of our neighbor are inviolable, because God has
+given them. They are the rights of God, as that great philosopher Dr.
+Brownson has so frequently and conclusively proved. God, as our lawgiver,
+must necessarily give us a law which is plain and certain. It can be no
+other than the Christian law. And every one who has been instructed in the
+Catholic faith must see that Christianity and the Christian law are
+guaranteed, defined, proclaimed, and enforced on the conscience by the
+authority of the church.
+
+Let him reject that authority, and he has disowned God; and by so doing
+has taken away the basis of virtue. Self‐interest, sentiment, and human
+instincts are no sufficient support for it. For, although our temporal
+interests coincide in great part with the claims of virtue, and natural
+sentiments and instincts are radically good, we are subject to inordinate
+and even violent passions. Take away the fear of God, and the passions
+will sweep away all slighter barriers. Pride and concupiscence will assert
+their sway, make a wreck of virtue, and eventually destroy even our
+earthly and temporal happiness.
+
+Even with all the power and influence which religion can exercise over men
+under the most favorable circumstances, there is enough of sin and misery
+in the world; but what are we to expect if atheism should prevail? The
+practical atheism, or, to speak Saxon, the ungodliness of the age, has
+produced enough of bitter and deadly fruit to give us a taste of the
+entertainment which is awaiting us if the time ever comes when the power
+which religion still retains is altogether taken away. We do not need to
+refer to the pages of professed moralists, or to quote sermons on this
+topic. It is enough to take what we find in the works of those masterly
+novelists who describe and satirize the crimes and follies of modern
+society and depict its tragic miseries, and what we read every day in the
+newspapers. The intrigues, villanies, swindlings, divorces, murders, and
+suicides which blacken the record of each passing month, and the hidden,
+untold tragedies going on perpetually in private life, give us proof
+enough of the ravages which the passions of fallen, weak human nature will
+make when all fear of God is removed, and they are left uncontrolled by
+anything stronger than self‐interest, and physical coercion in the hands
+of the civil power. No one who casts off all faith in God, allegiance to
+his authority, and fear of his just retribution, can foresee what he
+himself may become, or what he may do before his life is ended. The
+natural virtues, the intellectual gifts, the education, refinement,
+elevated sentiments, and pure affections which such a person may possess
+in youth, whether it be a young man or a young woman, are no sure
+guarantee or safeguard, even in a religious and moral community. Much less
+are they in one which is wholly irreligious. No one knows, therefore, how
+wicked he may become, or how miserable he may make himself. Still less can
+any one foresee what treachery, cruelty, and ingratitude, what bitter
+sufferings, and what ruin, may await him at the hands of others, if he is
+to be a member of a great infidel or atheist family which he has helped to
+form. He will be like the unhappy Alpine tourist who fell down from the
+Matterhorn, dragging with him and dragged by his companions from his
+dangerous foothold, and all dashed in pieces in the abyss beneath.
+
+Let any one who has been brought up in the enjoyment of those advantages
+which give decorum, charm, and refined pleasure to life—and who wishes and
+expects to possess the same in the future which he looks forward to in
+this world, with a zest and freedom increased by the riddance of all fear
+of God—think for a moment about one very important question. To what is he
+indebted for the blessings he has already enjoyed, and to what can he look
+for those he is expecting? In order that he should have a happy home, his
+parents must fulfil all the obligations of the conjugal and parental
+relations. If he is born to wealth, his father has had to work for him, or
+at least to take care of his property. If he has had a good mother, it is
+needless to expatiate on all that a woman must be, must do, and must
+suffer, to give a child such a blessing as that which is expressed by the
+tender and holy name of mother. For his education, how many noble and
+disinterested men have toiled, how many generous sacrifices of time, and
+labor, and money have been required! To create the nation which gives him
+the advantages of political order, the civilization which gives him a
+society to live in, the arts which minister to his higher tastes and
+personal comforts, how many causes have concurred together, what a
+multitude of the most noble, self‐sacrificing, heroic exertions of genius,
+philanthropy, patriotism, fructified by a plentiful besprinkling of the
+blood of just and faithful men, have been necessary through long ages of
+time! In his ideal of a happy life, which he hopes for in this world, what
+a multitude of things he requires which presuppose the fidelity of
+thousands of persons to those obligations and relations of life on which
+he is dependent as an individual. His bride must bring to the nuptial
+feast her virgin purity, and keep her wedding‐ring unbroken and undimmed.
+His children must be such as a father’s heart can regard with pride and
+joy. Those with whom he has relations of business must act with honesty
+and integrity. He must have good servants to work for him, and hundreds of
+skilful and industrious hands must minister to his wants or caprices.
+Society must be kept in order, the machinery of the world must be kept
+going, the law must protect his life and property, and the majority of his
+fellow‐men must remain content with a lot of hard work and poverty, that
+he may enjoy his dignity, leisure, splendor, and comfort in peace and
+security.
+
+Now it is a simple fact, that the principles and laws which have wrought
+out whatever is high and excellent in modern civilization, have been
+derived from the Christian religion. The public, social, and private
+virtues which alone preserve society from corruption and extinction, are
+the fruit either of religious conscientiousness, or of the influence of
+religion on the natural conscience of those who live in the atmosphere
+which it has purified and irradiated. There has never been such a thing as
+human society founded on atheism; and when atheism, practical or
+theoretical, has begun to prevail in any community, it has begun to
+perish. Whoever tampers with that poison is preparing suicide for himself,
+and death for all around him that is living. A large dose will kill at
+once all that is capable of death in a soul which is, in spite of itself,
+immortal. The slow sipping of small doses will gradually produce the same
+effect. The general distribution of the poison will destroy more or less
+rapidly the vital principle of the family, of society, of the state, of
+human civilization. Human beings cannot live together in peace and order,
+in love and friendship, in mutual truth and fidelity, in happiness and
+prosperity, if they believe that they are mere animals, whose only good is
+the brief pleasure which can be snatched from the present life. Even the
+imperfect amity and good‐fellowship, the lower grade of society, the
+inferior well‐being and enjoyment, the faint dim similitude of the
+rational order which exists among the irrational animals, cannot be
+attained by the human race when it strives to degenerate itself to the
+level of the brute creation. The irrepressible, inextinguishable, violent
+appetite for a satisfying good, when it is defrauded of its true object
+and turned away from its legitimate end, becomes a devastating tornado of
+passion. There is too much suffering, and too small a supply of sensible
+enjoyment in human life, to allow mankind to be quiet, and to agree
+together amicably in the relations of civilized society, in the common
+pursuit of temporal happiness. Pride and concupiscence are as insatiable
+as the grave and as cruel as death. The fear of God can alone restrain
+them. Take that away from the individual, and he will be faithless to the
+duties of life, friendship, honesty, patriotism, philanthropy, to his
+nobler instincts, his higher sentiments, his ideal standard of good, in
+proportion as his passions gain power over him. Take it away from the
+family and the social order, and mutual faithlessness, breeding mutual
+hatred and warfare, will be the result. Take it away from the masses of
+men, and the commune will come, the maddened rabble will rush for the
+coveted possessions of the smaller number who appear to have exclusive
+possession of the real good, and at last all will be resolved into a state
+of barbarism in which the race will become extinct.
+
+This will never take place; for the church and religion of Jesus Christ
+are imperishable, and God will bring the world to a sudden end before the
+human race has had time to destroy itself. But such is the tendency of the
+infidelity and atheism of the age. Whoever turns his back on Christianity
+is a partaker in this tendency, and a companion of that band of
+conspirators against religion and society whose end is more infernal and
+whose means are more cruel than those of the Thugs of India.
+
+
+
+
+Number Thirteen. An Episode Of The Commune. Concluded.
+
+
+There was music enough chiming at No. 13 to keep a choir of angels busy.
+Mme. de Chanoir, with the petulance of weakness, grumbled unceasingly,
+lamenting the miseries of her own position, altogether ignoring the fact
+that it was no worse, but in some ways better, than that of those around
+her, whinging and whining from morning till night, pouring out futile
+invectives against the Prussians, the Emperor, the Republic, General
+Trochu, and everybody and everything remotely conducive to her sufferings.
+She threatened to let herself die of hunger rather than touch horse‐flesh,
+and for some days she so perseveringly held to her determination that
+Aline was terrified, and believed she would hold it to the end. The only
+thing that remained to the younger sister of any value was her mother’s
+watch, a costly little gem, with the cipher set in brilliants; it had been
+her grandfather’s wedding present to his daughter‐in‐law. Aline took it to
+the jeweller who had made it, and sold it for one hundred and fifty
+francs. With this she bought a ham and a few other delicacies that tempted
+Mme. de Chanoir out of her suicidal abstinence; she ate heartily, neither
+asking nor guessing at what price the dainties had been bought; and Aline,
+only too glad to have had the sacrifice to make, said nothing of what it
+had cost her. Gradually everything went that could be sold or exchanged
+for food. Aline would have lived on the siege bread, and never repined,
+had she been alone, but it went to her heart to hear the never‐ending
+complaints of Mme. de Chanoir, to see her childish indignation at the
+great public disasters which her egotism contracted into direct personal
+grievances. Fortunately for herself, Mlle. de Lemaque was not a constant
+witness of the irritating scene. From nine in the morning till late in the
+evening she was away at the Ambulance, active and helpful, and cheering
+many a heavy heart and aching head by her bright and gentle ministry, and
+forgetting her own sufferings in the effort to alleviate greater ones.
+
+“If you only could come with me, Félicité, and see something of the
+miseries our poor soldiers are enduring, it would make your own seem
+light,” she often said to Mme. de Chanoir, when, on coming home from her
+labor of love, she was met by the unreasonable grumbling of the invalid;
+“it is such a delight to feel one’s self a comfort and a help to them. I
+don’t know how I am ever to settle down to the make‐believe work of
+teaching after this long spell of real work.”
+
+She enjoyed the work so much, in fact, that, if it had not been for the
+sufferings, real and imaginary, of her sister, this would have been the
+happiest time she had known since her school days. The make‐believe work,
+as Aline called it, which had hitherto filled her time had never filled
+her heart. It was a means of living that kept her brains and her hands at
+work, nothing more; and it had often been a source of wonder to her in her
+busiest days to feel herself sometimes seized with _ennui_. That trivial,
+hackneyed word hardly, perhaps, expresses the void, the sort of hunger‐
+pang, that more and more frequently of late years had made her soul ache
+and yearn, but now the light seemed to break upon her, and she understood
+why it had been so. The work itself was too superficial, too external. It
+had overrun her life without satisfying it; it had not penetrated the
+surface, and brought out the best and deepest resources of her mind and
+heart—it had only broken the crust, and left the soil below untilled. She
+had flitted like a butterfly from one study to another; history, and
+literature, and music had attracted her by turns; she had gone into them
+enthusiastically, mastered their difficulties, and appropriated their
+beauties; but after a time the spell waned, and she glided imperceptibly
+into the dry mechanism of the thing, and went on giving her lesson because
+it brought her so much a _cachet_. But this work of a Sister of Mercy was
+a different sort of life altogether. The enthusiasm, instead of waning,
+grew as she went on. At first, the prosaic details, the foul air, the
+physical fatigue and moral strain of the sick‐nurse’s life were
+unspeakably repugnant to her; her natural fastidiousness turned from them
+in disgust, and she would have thrown it all up after the first week but
+for sheer human respect; she persevered, however, and at the end of a
+fortnight she had grown interested in her patients; by degrees she got
+reconciled to the obnoxious duties their state demanded of her; and before
+a month had passed it had become a ministry of love, and her whole soul
+had thrown itself into the perfect performance of her duties. She was
+often tired and faint on leaving the Ambulance, but she always left it
+with regret, and the evident zest and gladness of heart with which she set
+out each morning became at last a grievance in the eyes of her sister.
+Mme. de Chanoir vented her discontent by harping all the time of breakfast
+on the hard‐heartedness of some people who could look at wounds and all
+sorts of horrors without flinching; whereas the very sight of a drop of
+blood made her almost faint; but then she was so constituted as to feel
+other people’s wounds as if they were her own; it was a great misfortune;
+she envied people who had hard hearts; it certainly enabled them to do
+more, while she could only weep and pity. Aline bore the querulous
+reproaches as cheerfully as if she had been blessed with one of those
+hearts of stone that Mme. de Chanoir so envied. She had the indulgence of
+a happy heart, and she had found the secret of making her life a poem. But
+the nurse’s courage was greater than her strength. After the first three
+months, material privations, added to arduous attendance on the sick and
+wounded, began to tell; her health showed signs of rebellion.
+
+M. Dalibouze was the first to notice it. He came regularly on the Saturday
+evenings as of old; his age exempted him from the terrible outpost work on
+the ramparts; and he profited by the circumstance to keep up, as far as
+possible, his ordinary habits and enjoyments, “_afin de soutenir le
+morale_,” as he said. When he noticed this change in Aline, he immediately
+used his privilege of friend of the family to interfere; he begged her to
+modify her zeal for the poor sufferers at the Ambulance, and to consider
+how precious her life was to her sister and her friends.
+
+Aline took the advice very kindly, but assured him that, far from wearing
+out her strength as he supposed, her work was the only thing that
+sustained it. The tone in which she said this convinced him it was the
+truth. It then occurred to him that her pallor and languid step must be
+caused by the unhealthy diet of the siege. Everybody suffered in a more or
+less degree; but, as it always happens, those who suffered most said least
+about it. The _gros rentier_, who fared sumptuously on kangaroo, and
+Chinese puppies, and elephant at a hundred francs a pound, talked loud
+about the miseries of starvation which he underwent for the sake of his
+country; but the _petit rentier_, whose modest meal had long since been
+replaced by a scanty ration of horse‐flesh, and that only to be had by
+“making tail,” as they call it, for hours at the butchers shop—the _petit
+rentier_ said very little. He was perishing slowly off the face of the
+earth; but, with the pride of poverty strong in death, he gathered his
+rags around him, and made ready to die in silence.
+
+It was on such people as Mme. de Chanoir and her sister that the siege
+pressed hardest; their _concierge_ was far better off than they; she could
+claim her _bons_, and fight for her rations; and she had fifteen sous a
+day as the wife of a National Guard.
+
+As to Mme. Cléry, she proved herself equal to the occasion. She had no
+National Guard to fall back upon, but she was sustained by the thought
+that she was suffering for her country; she, too, was a good patriot.
+Patriotism, however, has its limits of endurance, and hay bread was the
+border line that Mme. Cléry’s patriotism refused to pass. When the good
+bread was rationed, she showed signs of mutiny; but when it degenerated
+into that hideous compound, of which we have all seen specimens, her
+indignation declared itself in open rage. “What is this?” she cried, when
+the first loaf was handed to her after three hours’ waiting. “Are we
+cattle, to eat hay?” And, breaking the tawny, spongy lumps in two, she
+pulled out a long bit of the offensive weed, and held it up to the scorn
+of the _queue_.
+
+As to Mme. de Chanoir, when she saw it she went into hysterics for the
+rest of the day. But Providence was mindful of No. 13. Just at this
+crisis, when Aline’s altered looks aroused her sister from the selfish
+contemplation of her own ailments and wants, M. Dalibouze arrived early
+one morning soon after Mme. de Lemaque had started for the Ambulance, and
+announced that he had received the opportune present of a number of hams,
+tins of preserved meat, condensed milk, and an indefinite number of pots
+of jam. It was three times as much as he could consume before the siege
+was raised—for raised it infallibly would be, and, if he were not greatly
+mistaken, within forty‐eight hours—so he begged Mme. la Générale to do him
+the favor of accepting the surplus.
+
+Mme. de Chanoir, with infantine simplicity, believed this credible story,
+and did M. Dalibouze the favor he requested. So, thanks to his generous
+friend, the professor in turn became the benefactor of the two sisters,
+and had the delight of seeing Aline revive on the substantial fare that
+arrived so apropos. Well, it came at last, the end of the _blocus_; not,
+indeed, as M. Dalibouze had prognosticated. But that was not his fault. He
+had not reckoned with treachery. He could not suspect what a brood of
+traitors the glorious capital of civilization was nourishing in her
+patriotic bosom. But wait a little! It would be made square yet. Europe
+would see France rise by‐and‐by, like the Phœnix from her ashes, and
+spread her wings, and take a flight that would astonish the world. As to
+the Prussians, those vile vandals, whose greasy moustaches were not fit to
+brush the boots of Paris, let them bide a while, and they shall see what
+they should see!
+
+Thus did M. Dalibouze _resumer la situation_, while Paris on her knees
+waited humbly the terms that Prussia might dictate as the price of a loaf
+of bread for her starving patriots.
+
+But the worst was to come yet. Hardly had the little _ménage_ at No. 13
+drawn a long breath of relief after the prolonged miseries and terrors of
+the siege, than that saturnalia, the like of which assuredly the world
+never saw before, and let us hope never will again, the Commune, began.
+Like a fiery flood it rose in Paris, and rose and rose till the red wave
+swept from end to end of the city, spreading desolation and terror
+everywhere, and making the respectable party of order long to call back
+the Prussians, and help them out of the mess. How it began, and grew, and
+ended we have heard till we know the miserable story by heart. I am not
+going to tell it here. The Commune is only the last episode in the history
+of No. 13.
+
+There was work to do and plenty in binding the wounds and smoothing the
+pillows of dying men, and words to be spoken that dying ears are open to
+when spoken in Christian love. Aline de Lemaque’s courage did not fail her
+in this last and fearful ordeal. She resumed her duties as Sister of
+Mercy, asked no questions as to the politics of the wounded men, but did
+the best she could for them. Mme. de Chanoir could not understand how her
+sister spent her time and service on Red Republicans; the sooner the race
+died out, the better, and it was not the work of a Christian to preserve
+the lives of such snakes and fiends.
+
+“There are dupes and victims as well as fiends among them,” Aline assured
+her; “and those who are guilty are the most to be pitied.” After a time,
+however, the dangers attendant on going into the streets became so great
+that Aline was forced to remain indoors. Barricades were thrown up in
+every direction, and made the circulation a dangerous and almost
+impracticable feat to members of the party of order. The Rue Royale, which
+had been safe during the first siege, was now a threatened centre of
+accumulated danger. It was armed to the teeth. The Faubourg end of it was
+barred by a stone barricade that might have passed for a fortress—a wall
+of heavy masonry weighted with cannon, two black giants that lay couched
+like monster slugs peeping through a hedge. But after those terrible weeks
+there came at last the final tug, the troops came in, and Greek met Greek.
+Shell and shot rained on the city like hailstones. The great black slugs
+gave tongue, bellowing with unintermitting fury; all round them came
+responsive roars from barricades and batteries; it was the discord of hell
+broke upward through the earth, and echoing through the streets of Paris.
+
+Aline de Lemaque and her sister sat in the little saloon at No. 13,
+listening to the war‐dogs without, and straining their ears to catch every
+sound that shot up with any significant distinctness from the chaos of
+noise. Mme. Cléry was with them; she stayed altogether at No. 13 now,
+sleeping on the sofa at night. It would have been impossible for her to
+come and go twice a day while the city was in this state of commotion. To‐
+day the old woman could not keep quiet; she was constantly up and down to
+the _concierge’s_ lodge to pick up any stray report that came through the
+chinks of the _porte‐cochère_. Once she went down and remained so long
+that the sisters were uneasy. An explosion had reverberated through the
+street, shaking the house from cellar to garret, and, like an electric
+shock, flinging both the sisters on their knees simultaneously. Mme. de
+Chanoir’s spine had recovered itself within the last week as if by magic.
+She had abandoned her usual recumbent position, and came and went about
+the house like the rest of them. If the Commune did nothing else, it did
+this. We must give the devil his due.
+
+“Félicité, I must go and see what it is. I hear groans close under the
+window; perhaps a shell has fallen in the court and killed her,” said
+Aline. And, rising, she turned to go.
+
+“Don’t leave me! For the love of heaven, don’t leave me alone, Aline!”
+implored her sister. “I’ll die with terror if that comes again while I’m
+here by myself.”
+
+“Come with me, then,” said Aline. And, taking her sister’s hand, they went
+down together.
+
+Mme. Cléry was not killed. This fact was made clear to them at once by the
+spectacle of the old woman standing in the _porte‐cochère_, and shaking
+her fist vehemently at somebody or something at the further end of it.
+
+“Stay here,” said Aline to Mme. de Chanoir, motioning her back into the
+house. “I will see what it is; and if you can do anything I’ll call you.”
+
+It was the _concierge_ that Mme. Cléry was apostrophizing. And this was
+why: a shell had burst, not in the yard, as the sisters fancied, but in
+the street just outside, and the explosion was followed by a shriek and a
+loud blow at the door, while something like a body fell heavily against
+it.
+
+“_Cordon!_” cried Mme. Cléry; “it is some unfortunate hit by the shell.”
+
+“More likely a communist coming to pillage and burn. I’ll _cordon_ to none
+of ’em!” declared the _concierge_. “The door is locked; if they want to
+get in, they may blow it open.” But Mme. Cléry flew at her throat, and
+swore, if she didn’t give up the key, she, Mme. Cléry, would know the
+reason why. The _concierge_ groaned, and felt, in bitterness of spirit,
+what a difficult task the _cordon_ was. But she opened the door; under it
+lay two wounded men, both of them young; one was evidently dying; he had
+been mortally struck by a fragment of the shell that had burst over the
+thick oaken door and dealt death around and in front of it. The other was
+wounded, too, but much less seriously; he had been flung down by his
+companion, and the shock of the fall, more than his wound, had stunned
+him. Mme. Cléry dragged them in under the shelter of the _porte‐cochère_,
+and proposed laying them on the floor of the lodge. But the _concierge_
+had no mind to take in a dead and a dying man, and vowed she would not
+have her lodge turned into a coffin. The dispute was waxing warm, Mme.
+Cléry threatening muscular argument, when Aline made her appearance. Her
+training in the Ambulance stood her in good stead now.
+
+“Poor fellow! He will give no more trouble to any one,” she said, after
+feeling the pulse of the first, and laying her hand for a moment on his
+heart; “bring a cloth, and cover his face; he must lie here till he can be
+removed.”
+
+The _concierge_ obeyed her. They composed the features, and laid the body
+under cover of the gateway.
+
+Aline then examined the other. His arm was badly wounded. While she was
+still probing the wound, the man opened his eyes, stared round him for a
+moment with a speculative gaze of returning consciousness, made a
+spasmodic effort to rise, but fell back at once. “You are wounded—not
+severely, I hope,” said Aline; “but you must not attempt to move till we
+have dressed your arm.”
+
+She despatched Mme. Cléry for the box containing her ambulance appliances,
+lint, bandages, etc., and then, with an expertness that would have done
+credit to a medical student, she washed and dressed the shattered limb,
+while Mme. de Chanoir watched the operation in shuddering excitement
+through the glass door at the foot of the stairs. What to do next was the
+puzzle. The _concierge_ resolutely refused to let him into her lodge;
+there was no knowing who or what he was, and she was a lone woman, and had
+no mind to compromise herself by taking in bad characters. The poor fellow
+was so much exhausted from loss of blood that he certainly could not help
+himself, and it would have been cruel to leave him down in the courtyard,
+where his unfortunate comrade was lying dead within sight of him. Aline
+saw there was nothing for it but to take him up to their own apartment.
+How to get him there was the difficulty. He looked about six feet long,
+and might have weighed any number of stone. She and Mme. Cléry could never
+succeed in carrying him. He had not spoken while she was dressing his arm,
+but lay so still with his eyes closed that they thought he had fainted.
+
+“We must carry him,” said Aline in a determined voice, and beckoned the
+_concierge_ to come and help.
+
+But before proceeding to the gigantic enterprise, Mme. Cléry poured out a
+tumbler of wine, which she had had the wit to bring down with the lint‐
+box, and held it to the sufferer’s lips, while Aline supported his head
+against her knee. He drank it with avidity, and the draught seemed to
+revive him instantaneously; he sat up leaning on his right arm.
+
+“We are going to carry you up‐stairs, _mon petit_,” said Mme. Cléry,
+patting him on the shoulder with the patronizing manner an amazon might
+have assumed towards a dwarf.
+
+“_You_ carry me!” said the young man, measuring the short, trim figure of
+the charwoman with a sceptical twinkle in his eyes: they were dark‐gray
+eyes, particularly clear, and piercing.
+
+“Me and Mlle. Aline,” said Mme. Cléry, in a tone that testified against
+the supercilious way in which her measure was being taken.
+
+Aline was behind him. He turned to look at her with a jest on his lips,
+but, changing his mind apparently, he bowed; then, with a resolute effort,
+he bent forward, and, before either she or Mme. Cléry could interfere, he
+was on his feet. It was well, however, they were both within reach of him,
+for he staggered, and must have fallen but for their prompt assistance.
+
+“La!” said Mme. Cléry, “what it is to be proud! Lean on Mlle. Aline and
+me, and try and get up‐stairs without breaking your neck.”
+
+“It is the fortune of war,” said the gentleman laughing, and accepting the
+shoulder that Aline turned towards him.
+
+They accomplished the ascent in safety, and then, in spite of his
+assertion that he was all right now, Mme. de Chanoir insisted on their
+guest lying down on her sofa while the charwoman prepared some food for
+him. But safety, in truth, was nowhere. The fighting grew brisker from
+minute to minute. The troops were in possession of the neighboring
+streets; they had taken the Federals in the rear, and were mowing them
+down like corn. The struggle could not last much longer, but it was
+desperate, and the loss of life, already appalling, must be still greater
+before it ended. The stranger who had introduced himself so unexpectedly
+to No. 13 had formed one of the party of order, he told his good
+Samaritans, who had gone unarmed, with a flag of truce, to the Federals in
+the Rue de la Paix; he had seen the ghastly butchery that followed, and
+only escaped as if by miracle himself; he had fought as a _mobile_ against
+the Prussians, and received a sabre‐cut in the head, which had kept him in
+the hospital for weeks; he had, of course, refused to join the Federals,
+and it was at the risk of his life that he showed himself abroad in Paris;
+just now he had been making an attempt to join the troops, when that shell
+burst, and stopped him in his venturesome career. All day and all night
+the four inmates of the little _entresol_ waited and watched in breathless
+anxiety for the close of the battle that was raging around them. It never
+flagged for an instant, and as it went on the noise grew louder and more
+bewildering, the tocsin rang from every belfry in the city, the drum beat
+to arms in every direction, the chassepots hissed, the cannon boomed, and
+yells and shrieks of fratricidal murder filled the air, mingling with the
+smell and smoke of blood and powder. It was a night that drove hundreds
+mad who lived through it. Yet the worst was still to come. Late the next
+afternoon, Aline, who was constantly at the window, peeping from behind
+the mattress stuffed into it to protect them from the shells, thought she
+discovered something in the atmosphere indicative of a change of some
+sort. She said nothing, but slipped out of the room, and ran up to a
+bull’s‐eye at the top of the house that served as a sort of observatory to
+those who had the courage of their curiosity, as the French put it, and
+ventured their heads for a moment to the mercy of the missiles flying
+amongst the chimney‐pots. It was an awful sight that met her. A fire was
+raging close to the house. Where it began and ended it was impossible to
+say, but clearly it was of immense magnitude, and blazed with a fury that
+threatened to spread the flames far and wide. She stood rooted to the
+spot, literally paralyzed with horror. Were they to be burnt to death,
+after living through such miseries, and escaping death in so many shapes?
+Yet how could they escape it? There were barricades on every side of them;
+if they were not shot down like dogs, which was the most likely event,
+they would never be allowed to pass. All this rushed through her mind as
+she gazed in blank despair out of the little bull’s‐eye, that embraced the
+whole area of the Rue Royale and the adjacent streets. As yet, there was a
+space between the fire and No. 13. Mercifully, there was no wind, and she
+saw by the swaying of the flames that they drew rather towards the
+Madeleine than in the direction of the Rue de Rivoli. Flight was a forlorn
+hope, but still they must try it. She turned abruptly from the window, and
+was crossing the room, when a loud crash made her heart leap. She looked
+back. The roof of another house, one nearer to No. 13, had fallen in, and
+the flames, leaping through like rattlesnakes out of a bag, sprang at the
+sky, writhing and hissing as they licked it with their long red tongues.
+
+“O God, have pity on us!”
+
+Aline fell on her knees for one moment, and then hurried down to the
+_salon_.
+
+“We must leave this at once,” she said, speaking calmly, but with white
+lips; “the street is on fire.”
+
+M. Varlay, _citoyen_ Varlay, as he gave his name, started to his feet,
+and, pulling the mattress from the window, looked out. He saw the flames
+above the house‐top.
+
+“Let us go, with the help of God!” he exclaimed. “We must make for the Rue
+de Rivoli!”
+
+Mme. de Chanoir and the charwoman, as soon as they caught sight of the
+fire, shrieked in chorus, and made a headlong rush at the stairs.
+
+“You must be quiet, madame!” cried M. Varlay in a tone that arrested both
+the women; “if we lose our presence of mind, we had better stay where we
+are. Have you any valuables, papers or money, that you can take in your
+pocket?” he said, turning to Aline. She alone had not lost her head.
+
+Yes; there were a few letters of her parents, and some trinkets, valuable
+only as souvenirs, which she had had the forethought to put together. She
+took them quickly, and the four went down the stairs. There was no one in
+the lodge. The _concierge_ had taken refuge in her cellar, and her husband
+was supposed to be saving France somewhere else. Mme. Cléry pulled the
+string, and the little band sallied forth into the street. The air was so
+thick they could hardly see their way, except for the fiery forks of flame
+that shot up successively through the fog, illuminating dark spots with a
+momentary lurid brightness, while now and then the crash of a roof or a
+heavy beam was followed by a pillar of sparks that went rattling up into
+the sky like a fountain of rockets. The Babel of drums, and bells, and
+artillery added to the confusion of the scene as the fugitives hurried on
+singly under the shadow of the houses. They fared safely out of the Rue
+Royale and turned to the left. The Tuileries was enveloped in smoke, but
+the flames were nearly spent, only here and there a tongue of fire crept
+out of a crevice, licked the wall, twisted and twirled, and drew in again.
+A crowd was gathered under the portico of the Rue de Rivoli, watching the
+last throes of the conflagration, and discussing many questions in excited
+tones. Our travellers pushed on, and came unmolested to the corner of the
+Rue St. Florentine, where a sentry levelled his bayonet before them, and
+cried “Halt!” Mme. de Chanoir, who walked first, answered by a scream.
+_Citoyen_ Varlay, laying his hand on her shoulder, drew her quickly behind
+him. “Stand here while I speak to him,” he said, and he advanced to parley
+with the Federal, at the same time putting his hand into his pocket. They
+had not exchanged half a dozen words when the sentinel shouldered his
+chassepot, and said:
+
+“Quick, then, pass along!”
+
+Varlay stood for the women to pass first. Mme. de Chanoir and the
+charwoman rushed on, but no sooner had they stepped into the street than,
+clasping their hands, they fell upon their knees with a cry of agonized
+terror. The sight that met them was indeed enough to make a brave heart
+quail. To the left, extending right across the street, rose a barricade, a
+fortress rather, surmounted at either end by two warriors of the Commune,
+bending over a cannon as if in the very act of firing; in the centre two
+amazon _pétroleuses_ stood with chassepots slung _en baudelière_ and red
+rags in their hands that they waved aloft proudly like women who felt that
+the eyes of Europe were upon them; the intermediate space on either side
+of them was filled up with soldiers planted singly or in groups, and
+_poséd_ in the attitudes of men whom forty centuries look down upon. Just
+as Mme. de Chanoir and her _bonne_ came in front of the terrible _mise‐en‐
+scêne_, and before they could go backward or forward, the word _Fire!_
+rang out from the fortress, two matches flashed in the hands of the
+gunners, and the women dropped to the ground with a shriek that would have
+waked the dead.
+
+“What’s the matter now?” cried the sentinel.
+
+“They are going to fire!”
+
+“Imbeciles! No, they are going to be photographed!”(112)
+
+And so they were. A photographic battery was set up against the railings
+opposite. Aline and _citoyen_ Varlay seized the two half‐fainting women by
+the arm, and dragged them across and out of the range of the formidable
+_tableau vivant_. Meanwhile, the fire was gaining on No. 13. The house
+three doors down from it was _flambée_. It had been deserted the day
+before by all its occupants, save one family composed of a husband and
+wife, who had obstinately refused to believe in the danger till it was too
+late to evade it. They were friends of M. Dalibouze’s and the professor
+turned in to see them this morning on his way to No. 13. “The situation
+was a difficult one,” he said; “it were foolhardy to defy it, and the time
+was come when good citizens should save themselves.” He convinced M. and
+Mme. X—— that this was the only reasonable thing to do. So casting a last
+look at their belongings, they sallied forth from their home accompanied
+by their servant, an _ex‐sapeur_, too old for military service, but as
+hale and hearty as a youth of twenty. The professor had got in by a
+backway from the Faubourg St. Honoré, and thither he led his friends now;
+but, though less than fifteen minutes had elapsed since he had entered,
+the passage was already blocked: part of the wall had fallen and stopped
+it up. There was nothing for it but to go boldly out by the front door,
+and trust to Providence. But they reckoned without the _pétroleuses_.
+Those zealous daughters of the Commune, braving the shot, and the shell,
+and the vengeful flames of their own creation, sped from door to door,
+pouring the terrible fluid into holes and corners, through the gratings of
+cellars, under the doors, through the chinks of the windows, everywhere,
+dancing, and singing, and laughing all the time like tigers in human
+shape—tigers gone mad with fire and blood. When the _sapeur_ opened the
+door, he beheld a group of them on the _trottoir_; one was rolling a
+barrel of petroleum on to the next house, another was steeping rags in a
+barrel already half empty, and handing them as fast as she could to
+others, who stuffed them into appropriate places, and set a light to them;
+every flame that rose was hailed by a shout of demoniacal exultation. The
+_sapeur_ banged the door in their faces.
+
+“We must set to work, and cut a hole through the wall,” he said; “it’s the
+last chance left us.”
+
+No sooner said than done. He knew where to lay his hands on a couple of
+crowbars and a pickaxe; the professor fired the contents of his chassepot
+at the wall, and then the three men went at it, and worked as men do when
+death is behind them and life before. It was an old house, built chiefly
+of stone and mortar, very little iron, and it yielded quickly to the
+hammering blows of the workmen. A breach was made—a small one, but big
+enough to let a man crawl through. M. X—— passed out first, and then
+helped out his wife. M. Dalibouze and the _sapeur_ followed. They hurried
+through the next apartment. M. Dalibouze reloaded his gun; whiz! whiz!
+went the bullets; bang! bang! went the crowbars; down rattled the stones;
+another breach was made, and again they were saved. Three times they
+fought their way through the walls, while the fire like a lava torrent
+rolled after them, and then they found themselves at No. 13. M.
+Dalibouze’s first thought was for the little apartment on the _entresol_
+at the other side. They made for it; but as they were crossing the court a
+blow, or rather a succession of blows, struck the great oak door; it
+opened like a nut, and fell in with a crash like thunder. The burglars
+beheld M. Dalibouze in his National Guard costume scudding across the
+yard, and greeted him with howls like a troop of jackals. Whiz! went the
+grape‐shot. M. Dalibouze fell.
+
+Mme. X—— and her husband had fallen back before the door gave way, and
+thus escaped observation. No one was left but the old _sapeur_.
+
+“What sort of work is this?” he said, walking defiantly up to the
+men—there were five of them—“what do you mean by breaking into the houses
+of honest citizens?”
+
+“You had better break out of this one if you don’t want to grill,”
+answered one of the ruffians; “we are going to fire it, _par ordre de le
+Commune_.”
+
+The women had disappeared, and left their implements in the hands of the
+men.
+
+“Oh! _par ordre de le Commune!_” echoed the _sapeur_; “then I’ve nothing
+to say; I hope they pay you well for the work?”
+
+“Not over and above for such work as it is,” said one of the incendiaries,
+rolling a barrel into the concierge’s lodge.
+
+“How much?”
+
+“Ten francs apiece.”
+
+“Ten francs for burning a house down! Pshaw! you’re fools for your pains!”
+
+The _sapeur_ shrugged his shoulders, and, turning on his heels, walked
+off. Suddenly, as if a bright thought struck him, he turned back, and
+faced them with his hands in his pockets.
+
+“Suppose you got twenty for leaving it alone?”
+
+“Twenty apiece?”
+
+“Twenty apiece, every man of you!”
+
+They stopped their work, and looked from one to another.
+
+“_Ma foi_, I’d take it, and leave it alone!” said one.
+
+“_Pardie!_ we’ve had enough of it, and, as the _citoyen_ says, it’s
+beggarly pay for the work,” said another.
+
+“Done!” said the _sapeur_.(113)
+
+He pulled out a leathern purse from his breast‐pocket, and counted out one
+hundred francs in five gold pieces to the five communists.
+
+“_Une poignée de main, citoyen!_” said the first spokesmen. The others
+followed suit, and the _sapeur_, after heartily wringing the five rascally
+hands, sent them on their way rejoicing to the cabaret round the corner.
+This is how No. 13 was saved. No. 11 was burnt to the ground, and then the
+fire stopped.
+
+But to return to Aline and her friends. They got on well till they came to
+the Rue d’Alger, where they were caught in a panic, men, and women, and
+children struggling to get out of reach of the flames, and threatening to
+crush each other to death in their terror. Our friends got clear of it,
+but, on coming out of the _mélée_ at separate points, the sisters found
+they had lost each other. Mme. de Chanoir had held fast by Mme. Cléry, and
+was satisfied that Aline was safe under the wing of _citoyen_ Varlay. But
+she was mistaken. He had indeed lifted her off the ground, holding her
+like a child above the heads of the crowd, and so saved her from being
+trampled under foot, most likely; but when he set her down, and Aline
+turned to speak to him, he was gone. It would have been madness to attempt
+to look for him in the _mélée_, so she determined to wait at the nearest
+point of shelter, and then when the crowd dispersed they would be sure to
+meet. She made for the door‐way of a mourning house at the corner of the
+Rue St. Honoré. But she had not been many minutes there when she heard a
+hue and cry from the Tuileries end of the street, and a troop of men and
+women came flying along, driving some people before them, and firing at
+random as they went. The sensible thing for Aline to do was, of course, to
+flatten herself against the wall, and stay where she was, and of course
+she did not do it. She saw a flock of people running, and she started from
+her hiding‐place, and turned and ran with them. They tore along the Rue
+St. Honoré till they came to the Rue Rohan; here the band broke up, and
+many disappeared at opposite points; but one little group unluckily kept
+together, and, though diminished to a third its size at the starting
+point, it still held in view, and gave chase to the pursuers. Mlle. de
+Lemaque kept with this. On they flew like hares before the hounds, till,
+turning the corner of the Place du Palais Royal, they were stopped by two
+Federals, who levelled their chassepots and bade them stand. The fugitives
+turned, not like hares at bay to face the hunters and die, but to rush
+into an open shop, and fall on their knees, and cry, “Mercy!”
+
+The Federals were after them in a second. Instead of shooting them right
+off, however, they set to discussing the propriety of taking them out and
+standing them in regulation order, with their backs to the wall, and doing
+the thing in a proper business‐like manner. While this parley was going
+on, Aline de Lemaque cast a glance round her, and saw that her fellow‐
+victims were two young lads and half a dozen women, all of them of the
+lower class apparently; most of them wore caps. The men who were making
+ready to shoot them without rhyme or reason, as if they were so many rats,
+were evidently of the very dregs of the Commune, and looked half‐drunk
+with blood or wine, or both—it was hard to say—but there was no trace of
+manhood left upon the faces that gave a hope that mercy had still a
+lurking‐place in their hearts. One of the women suddenly started to her
+feet. “What!” she cried, “you call yourselves men, and you are going in
+cold blood to shoot unarmed women and boys? Shame on you for cowards!
+There is not a man amongst you!”
+
+She snapped her fingers right into their faces with an impudence that was
+positively sublime. The cowards were taken aback. They looked at each
+other, and burst out laughing.
+
+“_Sapristi!_ She’s right,” exclaimed one of them; “they’re not worth
+wasting our powder on!”
+
+Like lightning, the women were on their feet, fraternizing with the men,
+embracing, shaking hands, and swearing fraternity in true communistic
+fashion. Mlle. de Lemaque alone stood aloof, a silent, terror‐stricken
+spectator of the scene.
+
+“What have we here? _Une canaille d’aristocrate_, I’ll be bound! It’s
+written on her face,” said one of the ruffians, seizing her by the arm;
+“let us make away with her, comrades! It will be a good job for the
+Republic to rid it of one more of the lazy aristos that live by the
+_ouvrier’s_ meat.” There was a lull in the kissing and hand‐shaking, and
+they turned to stare at Aline. Her life hung by a thread. A timid word, a
+guilty look, and she was lost. But the soldier’s blood rose up in her; she
+bethought her of her _abus_, and _lancéd_ it.
+
+“Lazy!” she cried; “I am a soldier’s daughter; my father fought for
+France, and left his children nothing but his sword; I work for my bread
+as hard as any of you!”
+
+The effect was galvanic; they gathered around her, shouting, “Bravo! Give
+us your hand, citoyenne!”
+
+And Aline gave it, and, like the statesman who thanked God he had a
+country to sell, she blessed him that she had a hand to give.
+
+—Blood ran like water in the sewers of Paris for a few days, and then the
+troops were masters of the field, and order was restored—restored so far
+as to enable honest men to sleep in their beds at night.
+
+Mme. de Chanoir was back again in the little saloon at No. 13, and
+diligently reading the newspaper aloud to a gentleman who was lying on the
+sofa near her; the _générale’s_ spine complaint had been radically cured
+by the Commune, and she sat erect in a chair now like other people. The
+invalid’s face and head were so elaborately bandaged that it was
+impossible to see what either were like, while his bodily proportions
+disappeared altogether under a voluminous travelling‐rug. He listened for
+some time without comment to the political tirade which Mme. de Chanoir
+was reading to him, an invective against France, and her soldiers, and her
+generals, and the nation at large—a sweeping anathema, in fact, of
+everything and everybody, till he could bear it no longer, and, sitting
+bolt upright, he exclaimed:
+
+“Madame, the man who wrote that article is a traitor. France is greater
+to‐day in her unmerited misfortunes than she was in the apotheosis of her
+glory; she is more sublime in her widowed grief than her ignoble foe in
+his barbarous successes! She is, in fact, still France. The situation is
+compromised for a moment, but—”
+
+“_Lâ, lâ, voyons!_” broke in Mme. Cléry, putting her head in at the door,
+and shaking the lid of a sauce‐pan at the invalid. “How is the _tisane_ to
+take effect if you will talk politics and put yourself into a rage about
+_la situation_! Mme. _la Générale_, make ’um keep still!”
+
+The _générale_ thus adjured laid down the newspaper, and gently insisted
+on M. Dalibouze’s resuming his horizontal position on the couch. Aline was
+not there; she was off at her old work at the Ambulance again. The
+hospitals had been replenished to overflowing by the street‐fighting of
+the last week of the Commune, _la dénouement de la situation_, as M.
+Dalibouze called it, and nurses were in great demand. _Citoyen_ Varlay had
+not turned up since the night they had lost him in the crowd. The
+excitement and confusion which had reigned in the city ever since had made
+it difficult to set effective inquiries on foot, even if the sisters had
+been accurately informed regarding their quondam guest’s identity and
+circumstances, which they were not. All they knew of him was his
+appearance, his name, and his wound. This was too vague to assist much in
+the search. Mme. de Chanoir was sincerely sorry for it; she had been
+attracted at once by the frank bearing and courteous manners of the young
+_citoyen_; but his cool courage, his forgetfulness of himself for others,
+and the stoical contempt for bodily pain which he had displayed on the
+occasion of their flight, had kindled sympathy into admiration, and she
+spoke of him now as a hero. She spoke of him constantly at first, loudly
+lamenting his loss; for lost she believed him. He had, no doubt, been
+overpowered by the crowd; his disabled arm deprived him of half his
+strength, and, exhausted as he was by previous pain, and the violent
+effort to protect Aline in the struggle, he had probably fainted and been
+suffocated or crushed to death. This was the conclusion Mme. de Chanoir
+arrived at; but when she mentioned it to Aline, the deadly paleness that
+suddenly overspread the young girl’s features made her wish to recall her
+words, and from that out the name of the young soldier was never
+pronounced between the sisters.
+
+Mme. Cléry had formed on her side an enthusiastic affection for him, and
+sincerely regretted his fate, but with a woman’s instinct she guessed that
+the one who regretted it most said least about it. She never mentioned
+_citoyen_ Varlay to Aline, but made up for the self‐denial by pouring out
+his praises and her own grief into the sympathizing ear of the _générale_.
+
+“What a pretty couple they would have made!” said the old woman one
+morning, wiping her eyes with the corner of her apron; “he was such a fine
+fellow, and so merry; he only wanted the _particule_ to make him perfect;
+but, after all, who knows? He may not have been as good as he looked. One
+can never trust those _parvenus_.”
+
+A month passed. Mme. de Chanoir was alone one afternoon, when Mme. Cléry
+rushed into the room in a state of breathless excitement, her eyes
+literally dancing out of her head.
+
+“Madame! madame! I guessed it! I was sure of it! I’m not that woman not to
+know a gentleman when I see him. I told madame he was! Let madame never
+say but I did!”
+
+And having explained herself thus coherently between laughing and crying,
+she held out a card to her mistress.
+
+Mme. de Chanoir read aloud:
+
+
+    LE BARON DE VARLAY,
+      _Avocat à la Cour de Cassation_.
+
+
+Another month elapsed, and the great door of the Madeleine was opened for
+a double marriage. The first bridegroom was a tall, slight man, on whose
+face and figure the word _distingué_ was unmistakably stamped. The second
+was a plump, dapper little man, who, as he walked up the carpeted aisle of
+the church, seemed hardly to touch the ground, so elastic was his step;
+his countenance beamed, he was radiant, and it is hardly a figure of
+speech to say that he was buoyant with satisfaction. If he could have
+given utterance to his feelings, he would have said that “the situation
+was perfect, and absolutely nothing more could be desired.”
+
+Mme. Cléry was present in her monumental cap, trimmed with Valenciennes
+lace brand‐new for the occasion, and a chintz gown with a peacock pattern
+on a pea‐green ground that would have lighted up a room without candles.
+She, too, looked the very personification of content. The first couple was
+all her heart could wish, and more than her wildest ambition had ever
+dreamed of for her favorite Aline. The second she had grown
+philosophically reconciled to. The marriage had one drawback, a grievous
+one, but the charwoman consoled herself with the reflection that Mme. de
+Chanoir might condone the _bourgeoisie_ of her new name, by signing
+herself:
+
+
+    FELICITE DALIBOUZE,
+      _Née_ de Lemaque.
+
+
+
+
+Use And Abuse Of The Novel.
+
+
+If the question were put to us—What class of books, viewed merely as
+reading, without tutelage or commentary of any kind, had the greatest
+influence in moulding and training the thoughts, aspirations, mode of
+life, of the mass of readers in these days?—we should, notwithstanding the
+slur and sneer which it is fashionable for clever writers to cast upon
+them, answer unhesitatingly—Novels.
+
+This answer, we have no doubt, might shock the sensibilities of some of
+our readers, as it might very cordially agree with those of a not
+insignificant body of others. Without going into a dry analytical
+discussion of the _pros_ and _cons_ of the question, we will adopt the
+easier course of taking at the outset everything we want for granted, and
+allowing the truth of it to emanate from the body of our article; merely
+premising that, if it be true, Catholics have too much neglected, are far
+too weak in, this very important collateral branch of modern education.
+
+Every age, every cycle, every period in the history of the world has its
+distinctive features, its proper individualities, its representative men,
+systems, or facts, strongly and clearly marked. Ours is the iron age. Our
+province is matter. Our tastes are material. The world seems, strangely
+enough, to be working backwards. We began with intellect: we finish with
+matter. The signs of the past are stamped with intellect or the
+intellectual. The development of the present is steam and electricity. If
+we ask the ages, What have you given us? the answer comes rolling down out
+of the dim mountain of the past: Homer, Phidias, Apelles; the alphabet,
+the geometrical figure, the science of numbers; Plato and Aristotle;
+Virgil and the historians; the practical greatness of Rome; the great
+faith of the new‐born middle ages; the Crusades, the Gothic order, the
+great masters, Dante, Shakespeare, and Milton. We have our distinctive
+mark; the one indicated: the mastery over the material world. In the
+intellectual order, if we look for one, we must set it in the daily
+newspaper and the novel. These are the peculiar intellectual development
+of the XIXth century. Against the names of Homer, Plato, Æschylus, Virgil,
+Horace, Dante, Shakespeare, we pit those of Scott, Thackeray, Dickens,
+Eugene Sue, George Sand, Victor Hugo, Dumas, Bulwer, Wilkie Collins, Miss
+Braddon, and her kin.
+
+Surely this is rank heresy. Is not this the age of the rationalists, the
+free‐thinkers, “the swallowers of formula,” of Hegel, Cousin, Comte, Mill,
+Herbert Spencer, Huxley, Thomas Carlyle? All these are nothing to the
+purpose. Thinkers, dreamers, idealists, doubters, belong to all ages. The
+novelists belong to ours alone, as surely as do the steamboat, the
+railway, the electric telegraph, the daily press, the penny post.
+
+In saying this, we are not blind to the fact that novels and romances were
+written long before our century dawned. Cervantes and Le Sage are old
+enough; the Romaunts are older still. De Foe, Fielding, Smollett, Sterne,
+Richardson, are names of a bygone century. But novelism, to use the word
+in a new sense, considered as a science—for such it has practically
+become—as the most popular branch of literature known in these days, with
+men and women of genius devoted to its pursuit, with an ever‐increasing
+progeny spreading and growing, and stifling each other out of life, is an
+intellectual phase proper of to‐day.
+
+Philosophic historians trace the decline of peoples and periods in the
+decline of their literature; in its tone, its style, its subjects, and
+manner of treatment. If this test be applied to us, what a show should we
+make! But happily the test, though in the main a true one, is not an
+infallible one. The facility opened up by the invention of printing for
+writers of every shade of opinion to express their thoughts upon any given
+subject at any length and in any quantity, provided only they pay the
+printer, must weaken to some extent the theory that writers are the exact
+reflex of the times and peoples for and among whom they write. Still there
+rests the significant fact that to‐day the novel, and particularly the
+worst form of it, is the _book of the period_; the most popular, widely
+read, best paid class of literature that we possess—a fact which tells its
+own tale of our intellectual and moral advance.
+
+The ancients seem not to have conceived such a thing. And, despite the
+danger of such an admission in the face of what the novel has come to be
+among ourselves, we can only regret its loss among them. Had the Greeks
+and Romans caught the idea, and turned their brilliant, clear‐sighted,
+manly, and truth‐loving intellects to the portrayal of everyday life; to
+the picture of how the world wagged behind the scenes long ago, what a
+flood of light would have been let in on their history, its meaning, its
+philosophy, so as to render almost superfluous the works of such men as
+Niebuhr, Gibbon, Grote. We should have had plenty of evil undoubtedly,
+plenty to sicken us; but, after all, would the foulness of the pagans have
+been much worse than the spicy dishes cooked and served up to us every day
+by our own novelists; by gray‐haired men; by ladies, at whose age we will
+not venture to guess; by smart young girls who have just bounced out of
+their teens? The glimpse we have had of Socrates’ spouse makes us wish for
+a closer acquaintance with that dame. We are anxious to know how she
+received the news of his draught of hemlock, for she evidently entertained
+the utmost contempt for all his doctrine and philosophy, and must have
+been rather surprised at the state bothering itself so much about _her_
+husband. What an irreparable loss we have sustained in Diogenes, his
+sayings and doings, his snarls and life in that tub of his! What living
+pictures would have been left us of the life in the groves, the
+disputations, the clash of intellect with intellect where all was
+intellect; the great games, who betted, who lost, who won, who contended;
+of the mysteries and the sacrifices; of Greece at the invasions; of the
+party strifes; how Alcibiades pranked and ruled in turn; how Balbus built
+that famous wall of his that he is always building in the _Delectus_; how
+Agricola ploughed his field; how the _Symposia_ passed off with Cicero and
+his friends; how Cæsar spent his youth, and how the conspiracy worked that
+destroyed him; what sort of companions brought Catiline’s conspiracy
+about; the effect of the _quousque tandem_ speech related by an eye‐
+witness; the coming of the great Apostles; the dawn of Christianity; how
+the gay Greeks listened to that first strange sermon given from the altar
+to the Unknown God.
+
+These things have been told us in a way. We can pick and sort them out of
+the brilliant works of the writers of the time. But had they been told us
+by a Greek or Roman novelist, a Thackeray, Dickens, or Bulwer, with the
+actors set living and real and palpable on the scenes, speaking the
+language, using all the little peculiarities, of everyday life, with all
+their natural surroundings and coincidents, what a lost world would have
+been opened up to us!
+
+Abandoning, however, such vain and useless regrets, let us turn to the
+immediate subject of our own article. The title, Novel, we here use in the
+popular signification of the word, as comprising all works of fiction,
+distinct from those that are purely satirical, and history as written by
+such men as Mr. James Anthony Froude and Mr. John S. C. Abbott. Novelists,
+we know, are apt to be nice on the question of titles. No lady of third‐
+rate society, who with time on her hands to do good devoted it to the
+study of the court balls and the pages of Debrett, was ever more so. Here
+is your romance, which looks down upon your mere story; your novelette
+which shrinks with awe from your psychological romance; your story of real
+life, a republican sort of fellow often, who hustles and bustles and
+shoulders them all and stands on his own legs; and a variety of others as
+numerous as they are, to the public at large—which is, as it should be, a
+poor respecter of titles—unnecessary. We purpose, in the name of the
+public, dealing very summarily with these titled folk, throwing them, high
+and low, in the same category, and designating one and all as novels pure
+and simple, with the single distinction, which shall appear in due time,
+of the sensational novel.
+
+As we have arrived at this point, it may not be amiss to ask, What purpose
+do novels serve; with what object are they written?
+
+A hard question truly. We reply to the second part of the query first. It
+may not be unnatural, nor dealing unfairly with their authors, to suppose
+that novels are written, in the first place, with the very laudable desire
+of earning one’s bread: so that “the root of all evil” lies at the bottom
+of the “psychological romance,” as of far humbler things in this world. As
+to what purpose, earthly or unearthly, they serve, the answer to that
+depends, first of all, on the author’s secondary motive in writing them;
+secondly, on the effect they produce on the reader—which are two very
+different things. We have not the slightest doubt that the French
+novelists, as popularly known, entertained the very loftiest ideas with
+regard to morality, Christianity, the laws of God and man, the
+conventional relations between husband and wife, and so on, before
+ushering into the world the representatives of their—to put it
+mildly—somewhat peculiar views on these questions. Well, if the world read
+them wrongly, mistook faith for infidelity, a deep lesson in purity for
+adultery, loyalty and obedience to the sovereign for rank outspoken
+disturbance and rebellion, who was to blame? The world was simply stupid.
+M. Dumas _fils_, for instance, has lately been good enough to enlighten us
+with his ideas on the vexed questions of matrimony and women in general.
+M. Dumas _fils_ is undoubtedly an excellent guide on such subjects. He is
+an advanced man, a man of the age, of society, of the world. His
+testimonies on such subjects ought, therefore, to be of value. He has
+disposed of the whole question in, for a Dumas, a few words—a single
+volume. The moral of his doctrine comes to this: if your wife is
+faithless, kill her. We have not yet heard of any practical results
+arising from this new gospel, as preached by M. Dumas _fils_; from which,
+we have no doubt, he will draw the very agreeable inference that his
+remedy for the regeneration of society, and the nice adjustment of the
+marriage‐knot once for all, was altogether unnecessary. If his doctrine
+should spread to any alarming extent, no doubt M. Dumas _fils_ will be
+satisfied that at last the world is beginning a new era of advancement,
+that there is still hope for it; and he will hold himself answerable for
+all the consequences. By the bye, we believe he has omitted one little
+thing: the course to be adopted by the wife in the event of the husband’s
+infidelity. But probably such a high‐minded, virtuous man as M. Dumas
+never contemplated the possibility of such a contingency arising.
+
+Mr. Collins, Mr. Reade, Miss Braddon, and the rest hold, doubtless, the
+same ideas with regard to the relative value of their productions. Whether
+their praiseworthy efforts have been duly appreciated; whether they have
+ever made man, woman, or child a whit better or sounder by the perusal of
+any of their works, we do not know. We are inclined to think not. If any
+reader would kindly come forward and show that we are wrong in this from
+his or her own experience, we shall only be too happy to stand corrected.
+At all events, the advantage derived must be in very small proportion to
+the quantity of literary medicine and advice administered by those social
+physicians to the craving multitude.
+
+Laying aside, then, the invariably pure and lofty motives of the authors;
+laying aside the cloak which novels serve for at times, as in the hands of
+a Disraeli, to attack a policy or a system; and taking them as they affect
+ourselves, the readers, one may safely say that they serve mainly to
+amuse; to fill up those spare moments that nothing else can fill up. They
+constitute the play‐ground of literature—a recreation and relief for the
+mind. We gulp them down as we are whirled along in the railway train. We
+take them with us on long voyages, as the Scotch patient took his weekly
+sermon at the kirk, as an opiate—thus fulfilling to the letter the
+traditional notion of the “Sabbath” being a day of rest. When the brain is
+heavy and the body worn, when to talk is labor and to think is pain, then
+we can seize the novel, loll on the sofa, or recline under the leafy shade
+by the brink of the musical river, and float away, half asleep, half
+awake, into dreamland. In a moment a new world, as real and living to the
+mind’s eye as that in which we move, is conjured up before us. We are on
+intimate terms with a villain whose dagger is as air‐drawn as Macbeth’s.
+We can commit cold‐blooded murders that will never bring us to the dock;
+or shocking improprieties that even the far‐reaching nose of Mrs. Grundy
+will fail to catch scent of. Or we go over “the old, old story,” and are
+bumped, jerked, and jolted along the delicious course that never _will_
+run smooth; mapping it out if we have not yet had the fortune (or
+misfortune) to traverse it; filling it in with many a well‐known form, if
+we have. And if the never‐running‐smooth theory be true of love, this much
+we ungrudgingly grant the novelists—they certainly hold to their tether.
+The labyrinth of Dædalus was nothing to it; the twistings, the windings,
+the sudden and unexpected meetings, the separations, the jiltings, the
+halts by the way, the joy, the sorrow, the ecstasy, the despair, the
+losings, the seekings, the findings, the torturing uncertainty, the
+wanderings through hopeless mazes, to end, as we knew at the outset it
+would and must end, according to “the eternal fitness of things,” in some
+man marrying some woman—the most extraordinary phenomenon that the world
+ever witnessed!
+
+The novel invites us, as the noonday devil is supposed to do, at dangerous
+moments—those moments that come to all of us when matter holds the mastery
+over mind. Place in the hands of the reader at such a time a book which,
+while it interests, while it soothes, lulls, and gently enwraps in its
+kindly meshes the abstracted brain, never palls; containing at least what
+is harmless; and good, not very great certainly, but at least of a kind,
+is effected.
+
+But let the novel be like the favorites of its class, a thing to fire the
+imagination with impure thoughts clothed in the thinnest veil of mock
+morality, at the very moment when the imagination of the reader is ready
+to run riot; and evil, great, sometimes irreparable, is produced.
+
+“All the wrong that I have ever done or sung has come from that confounded
+book of yours,” writes Byron to Moore in a moment of bitterness. If the
+accusation be well founded, what an intellectual wreck has Moore to answer
+for; what a multitude of lesser disasters following in the train of a
+great genius, so early led astray!
+
+The novelist beats every other writer from the field. We all read him,
+from the crop‐haired schoolboy to the octogenarian who has quite grown
+through his hair; from the nearest approach to Mr. Darwin’s ideal man to
+the philosopher “who would circumvent God”; from the artless maiden who
+fondly dotes over those wicked but excessively handsome villains, those
+athletic but ridiculously stupid lovers, those consumptive heroines with
+the luminous eyes and rippling glories of golden hair; those lady
+poisoners with the floating locks and sea‐green orbs—to the dyspeptic lady
+who makes novel‐reading a science, who dawdles out her languid existence
+in elegant nothingness, who looks to the production of a new story as men
+look to a change in the constitution, or as astronomers lately looked to
+the comet that would not come; who is, in a word, utterly useless for all
+the purposes of life, of wifehood, of womanhood—novel‐struck, novel‐bred,
+only fit to “resolve and thaw into a dew” of weak sentimentality and
+essence of inanity. From this category of readers we must not omit the
+typical old maid, who is continually telling us that she renounced such
+things as love and other rubbish long ago; yet daily treats herself to her
+spruce, strong, highly flavored dish of the purest, spiciest scandal, and
+takes her diurnal dose of immorality as regularly as her “drops” or her
+tea.
+
+All the world lies open to the novelist. From no place is he excluded,
+save from a few high and dry quarterlies; and even they are stirred from
+their abstract regions into sledgehammer activity or solemn admiration by
+him from time to time. Of monthlies, fortnightlies, weeklies, dailies, he
+forms the chief ingredient. Even editors of metaphysical fortnightlies
+find they must flavor their own romance with a spice, of the more regular
+and orthodox in order to make it “go down with the public.”
+
+What a field, then, is the novelist’s!—what ground for a high, pureminded
+man or woman to sow seeds in that may sprout, and spread, and fill the
+world with truth, with purity, with noble aspirations, with right
+teachings set in the goodliest garb! The youth of the generations is their
+own.
+
+Who has forgotten those earlier days when we stood, fair‐haired, open‐
+hearted children, on the threshold of life, steeped in the morning sun of
+a future that looked all golden? A warm mist hung about us, shrouding all
+in beautiful, mystical dimness. There was no storm, no darkness, no night.
+Whisperings of soft voices stole out of the magic mist, and called us on
+to do great things; to rift the mist and open up the glorious world of
+God, as we saw it in our imaginings. The morning of life, like the morning
+of the world, is all Eden. We walk with God, for we are innocent. But the
+doom is on us; we must pluck the fruit of the tree of knowledge. The
+moment we taste of it, the golden dream is no more; the mist is reft
+asunder; and slowly the world opens on our saddened eyes in all its hard
+reality, to be subjected by the labor of our hands and the sweat of our
+brow. As we merge from that innocence, so we go on. Some great event may
+change us; may make this one a saint, that a fiend. But, as a rule, the
+sapling grows into the tree, weakly or strong, straight and tall and
+looking heavenwards, or stunted, useless, and unsightly as it grew from
+the grafting.
+
+The grafting is the mother’s voice, the father’s example, the companions
+around us, the guidance of our thoughts. And the great mass of our
+thoughts, at a time when we are all imagination, springs from the books we
+read. Here steps in the crying need of a series of story‐books for
+Catholic children; for all children up to the age when study becomes a
+more serious work.
+
+One other glance back at the days of our childhood, and the manner in
+which they were spent; for it is not the least important part of our
+subject. What a round of acquaintance we had, necessitating a
+corresponding round of visits! One day we dropped in on our best of
+friends, _Robinson Crusoe_, on that lonely island of his, wishing that all
+the world were islands and we were all Crusoes. All we wanted to live
+happily was a boat, six or seven guns and pistols, a goat‐skin cap, a
+parrot, a Man Friday, an umbrella, and an occasional savage to kill. After
+taking a sail with him in his boat, helping him to build his castle,
+tending the goats, running down to see if we could find that second
+footprint on the sand, giving Friday a lesson in English, we bade him
+good‐bye with the promise of calling again soon, and hurried off on that
+expedition to the other end of the world with our old acquaintance Captain
+Marryat, to search for our father, play our practical jokes, and fight our
+triangular duels. Then we had to hunt up that Indian trail for Cooper, and
+no redskin ever followed the track half so keenly as we, marking the way,
+notching the giant trunks with our six‐bladed penknife, shooting the
+buffalo with our pop‐guns, sleeping round the campfires in those limitless
+prairies and thickest jungles of our imagination. Ha! by’r Lady! Here we
+are at the gentle trial of spears at Ashby de la Zouch. How brave it was!
+The glinting of the lances, and the clash of steel on helm and hauberk;
+the gay plumes shorn and floating on the wind like thistledown. And out we
+rushed, and called the friend of our bosom a caitiff knight and a false
+knave, and plighted our troth to that imprisoned maiden—no matter who, and
+no matter where—to do her right, and do our devoir as leal and belted
+knight. That caitiff deals in leather now, and does a thriving business;
+his knightly limbs are cased in the best of cloth, cut by the cleverest of
+artists; his knightly stomach is naught the worse for wear, but quite
+beyond the girth of steel armor; and he has a son who, at this moment, is
+assisting at the joust as we did, spurring into the _mêlée_ and bearing
+all down before us, to spur out again victor, and meet Charlie O’Malley
+waiting for us outside; to ride with him for dear life into to‐day. What a
+race it is; how the world spins past us; how our heart throbs, and our
+eyes grow dim, and our hopes sink as we fall and dislocate our shoulder at
+that last fence. By heaven! up again—on, and in a winner! And we sink to
+the ground with the shouts of thousands ringing in our ears, to wake in a
+darkened chamber with low voices breaking on us—the voices of our dear
+Irish girls, who make “smithereens” of our hearts only to heal them the
+next minute, and sit there wooing us back into life and love.
+
+Such was the favorite mental food of our earlier days, our literary candy.
+If the reading of youth were restricted to authors such as these, on the
+whole we might consider them in safe hands. But books multiply and cheapen
+day by day, and as usual “the cheap and nasty” carries everything before
+it. The favorite stories of the mass of boys that we see consist of what
+is known as the _Dime Novel_ and those blood‐and‐thunder weeklies with the
+terrific titles and startling pictures. By some strange freak of nature,
+boys are fond of blood; the warlike element prevails; the peaceful is
+nowhere. We feel certain that, if Mr. Barnum possessed a real live
+murderer among his collection of curiosities—though we fear he could
+scarcely ticket such an animal “a curiosity” in these days—and caged him
+up among the other wild beasts, he would prove a greater attraction to the
+juvenile visitor than anything else in the famous exhibition. It were easy
+enough to satisfy this morbid craving for muscular Christianity in a safe
+and sound manner, if our writers of fiction took up systematically the
+incidents of history; the great wars; the crusades, the parts played by
+great Christian heroes, by the saints of God; the scenes of martyrdom, the
+labors of the missionaries, and a thousand other subjects as entertaining
+as they are instructive and strictly true. We know that there are many
+such; but we want to be overloaded with them, as we are with those others
+to which we referred. We can scarcely at the moment call to mind one
+Catholic story to compete at all with a crowd of children’s books written
+by Protestants. The production of children’s stories has grown into a
+science among them. We frequently see pages of stately reviews and the
+columns of the London _Times_ devoted to as critical an examination of
+this class of books as to the works of the greatest writers. They
+recognize the necessity and the advantage of giving their children
+something to save them from the evil effects that must ensue from a
+continual history of daring and impossible feats by young burglars,
+detectives, spies, and the like. The best writers of this kind are, as
+they should be, women, who know best how to interest children, who watch
+them with an eye to their every want, that a man cannot attain. Here,
+then, is a field for Catholic ladies—a field wide open, which cries to be
+filled up.
+
+But our article deals not alone with children and children’s books. We
+purpose looking higher and looking deeper, at the mental recreation of the
+day, of the age; at the literature that loads our tables, our shelves, our
+public libraries, our bookstalls: the book “of the period”—the sensational
+novel.
+
+What is a sensational novel? Who has defined it? Who dare define it? It is
+a pity the author of _Rasselas_ had not some faint conception of it. The
+idea of calling _Rasselas_ a novel in these days! We might imagine him to
+have dealt with it somewhat in the following style:
+
+Sensational Novel: A complexity of improbabilities woven around a crowd of
+nonentities, interspersed with fashionable filth, and relieved by sleek‐
+coated beastliness; meaning nothing, and good for less.
+
+What is this word that possesses us! Sensation!—as though we had not
+enough of it. The age is so dreadfully prosaic, so workaday, so dull. We
+must run off the track, out of the common groove, or we are ill at ease.
+Where is the sensation in steam and electricity? We are whirled through a
+continent in a week: but that is a thing done every day. It almost equals
+the mantle of the genii in the _Arabian Nights_; we had only to step upon
+it, and find ourselves at whatever point of the compass we wished. We
+cross thousands of miles of ocean in a similar period, mastering the
+elements with a clockwork regularity, fair weather or foul. We knit sea to
+sea. We rise from foe‐encircled cities, and sail safe away into the air.
+The whisper of what has been done in one quarter of the world has not had
+time to pass abroad before it is discussed in the others. We have linked
+the disjointed world by an electric flame that flashes knowledge
+throughout its circle instantaneously. We build up vast empires and topple
+down thrones every day, as though they were ninepins, and yet we want
+sensation! We sigh for the cap and bells; the jousts and games and
+junketings of old. Even the feast of horrors, crimes, and incidents, the
+births, deaths, and marriages, and the scandals of the “fashionable
+world,” served up to us at breakfast daily, with all the inventive genius
+of the newspaper correspondent, pall upon our surfeited appetites. “We
+have supped full of horrors. Time was when our fell of hair would have
+uplifted to hear a night‐shriek. But now, how weary, stale, flat, and
+unprofitable seem to us all the uses of this world of ours. Life is as
+dreary as a twice‐told tale.” We are not satisfied; we feel a craving
+after something. Our want, our craving, springs not from the desire for a
+higher spirit in it all, not from an absence of faith and noble purpose,
+of something greater than utility, not from a horror of a daily widening
+infidelity and impurity that mocks the pagan; but simply and purely from a
+lack of sensation! In the face of the dull routine of this age of marvels
+that old Friar Bacon dimly saw in his dreams, and was deemed a madman for
+his foresight; in the face of wars like our own rebellion and the
+devastation of France; in the midst of fallen thrones and falling
+peoples—we ask for sensation! as the philosopher, though perhaps with more
+reason, took a lantern to look for a man. We find it not in these things;
+we pass them by, and bury ourselves in the pages of Wilkie Collins, Miss
+Braddon, and their kind. They are the wonder‐workers of the age.
+
+Here we find what we are seeking; here is a response to our ravenous
+craving, in those delicious, torturing plots that take our breath away.
+Here we sit hob and nob with what the fourth‐rate newspaper is fond of
+calling “the scions of nobility.” We get an animated description and
+category of their articles of clothing, from their boots and who made
+them, to their linen and where it was bought. What a pleasure it is to
+know a count and a lord, and a lady and a duchess; to know how they eat
+and drink, and the chronicle of all the fearful scandal that goes on in
+what the newspaper man again knows as “certain circles”! What peeps we
+have into the green‐room! Pages are devoted to the eyes of an opera‐
+singer, the ankles of a _danseuse_, the charming slang of an actress. The
+scene is varied by dips into the purlieus of society; into the bagnio and
+the gin‐mill; the prize‐ring and the barracks; the dancing saloon and the
+gaming‐table; the betting ring; into every place, every person, everything
+the lowest, the meanest, the worst.
+
+Is this exaggeration? Is it a false, outrageous libel on this age, so full
+of great things, and still greater capabilities? Is it particularly false
+of ourselves, the simple‐hearted, simple‐mannered republicans, who have
+set our faces as sternly against the ungodly and the ways of sin as our
+old crop‐haired, steeple‐crowned Puritans professed to do? We shall only
+be too happy if somebody convinces us that such is the fact. In the
+meanwhile; incidentally to our purpose appeared a few statistics the other
+day from public libraries, bearing on this very question, showing that in
+libraries, which, as a rule, a class of intelligent and sensible readers
+are supposed to frequent, the books most in demand were of the style we
+deplore, and complaints were laid at their doors because they failed
+adequately to supply this demand.
+
+There must be something very delicious in vice. Nothing else will satisfy
+us. The novelists have sounded the depths of depravity; and in their
+efforts to find a lower depth still, are driven to walking the hospitals,
+diving into blue‐books, frequenting the asylums for the diseased, the
+depraved, the insane. The repertory of evil seems almost used up. They
+have so beaten the drawing‐room carpet, so sifted and shaken out for the
+public gaze the smallest speck of fashionable filth that the most
+delicately organized imagination of the refined lady could discern, that
+there is nothing left on it. Titles even are growing common, and we want
+some new type of a coroneted brow to bind our scandal on. Dickens and
+Collins and Yates have overrun us with burglars and detectives. They did
+good service in their day; but even they are growing unromantic. The
+Krupp, the mitrailleuse, the needle‐gun, have killed off the slashing
+cavalry heroes, who rode at everything, neck or nothing, in perfect
+safety, and were as irresistible in love as in war. We must abandon these
+higher regions with a sigh, and go down to the dirtiest columns of the
+dirtiest newspapers in our efforts to find “something rich and strange.”
+And to this men and women of “genius,” as it is called, bend their every
+effort. The gifts that God has given them to ennoble man they devote to
+stirring the puddle of filth which they take as the mirror of human
+nature, and, holding before the admiring gaze of humanity whatever they
+have fished up, say—Behold yourselves!
+
+Are these the lessons society must look for in its gifted children? Is the
+great book of nature narrowed down to these limits? Is there nothing in
+human life, human thought, human activity, more worthy our attention, more
+deeply interesting to man, than the chronicle of his vices? Is the
+attractive in human nature confined to third or fourth hand glimpses of
+“the scions of nobility,” the bywords of the barracks, the slang of the
+gutter, the echoes of the footlights? Is vice alone captivating, and
+morality such an everyday, humdrum affair that we are sick of excess of
+it? Is love the thing they present to us?—love, the great passion, the
+pure divine flame that God has set in our hearts to link together and
+perpetuate the generations, and finally lead us up to him? Is this maudlin
+rubbish that the writers of the day surfeit us with, love?—this weak,
+puny, consumptive thing; inane, jejune, sickly, fleshly, sensual, impure,
+inhuman? Love is a divine‐inspired passion of the soul, planted there by
+God, to grow and flourish in its great, pure, single strength. They have
+cut it, and hacked and torn it to shreds, and left nothing of divinity in
+it. They set it in the flesh, and convert a heaven‐born gift into the
+lowest of animal passions.
+
+It requires no very powerful stretch of the imagination to draw from the
+foul pens of these writers the germ of the question which to‐day threaten
+to turn the world topsy‐turvy—the so‐called theory of _Woman’s
+Rights_—which has for champions philosophers of the stamp of Stuart Mill
+and Professor Fawcett, and for first‐born, _Free Love_.
+
+We will suppose Mr. Stanley, of the _New York Herald_, to have brought
+back with him a native of the countries he visited in his marvellously
+successful search for Dr. Livingstone. The native has learned the English
+language on his journey. He is suddenly thrown among a people whom he can
+only look upon as gods, as the Indians first looked upon the Spaniards. He
+is surrounded by the results of all the ages. He wishes to learn something
+about these gods: how they live and move and have their being. A novel “of
+the period”—any one by any of the thousand authors of the species—is put
+into his hands as the faithful reflex of this society. What can we imagine
+would be his feelings at the end of its perusal? A comparison rather in
+favor of his own countrymen would be the most natural inference.
+
+But it may be objected that we are pessimists. We attack a class whom no
+decent person would defend. There are more schools of novelists than the
+sensational school. There are Scott, Thackeray, Dickens, Bulwer. Are these
+all that we would wish, or do they also fall under our sweeping
+condemnation?
+
+As for Scott, we are still proud to acknowledge him by his old title—“The
+Wizard of the North.” He was a man who, taking into account the times in
+which he lived, the prejudices still rife, the people for whom he wrote,
+the purpose of his writings, turned every faculty of his marvellously
+gifted, richly stored mind to its best account. Even Livy’s “pictured
+page” almost dims in our eyes before the range and variety of his. His
+works are the illumination of history; his characters almost as true, as
+rounded, as full as Shakespeare’s, and partaking of the great master’s
+“infinite variety.” His plots are deeply interesting, his fidelity to
+nature in character and scene sustained and equal, whether the subject be
+Queen Bess or Queen Mary of Scotland, Louis XI. or King Jamie, a moss‐
+trooper or a crusader, a free‐lance or a pirate, a bailie or a Poundtext;
+whether the scene lie in Palestine or in the Trosachs, in mediæval France
+or mediæval England, in the camp or the court, the prisons of Edinburgh or
+the purlieus of Alsatia. He has laughed at us Catholics good‐naturedly
+sometimes, but despite that, his novels did us a vast service at a time
+when our road was very dark, and we were looked upon at best as something
+utterly inhuman—something, in fact, like what the sailor conceived who,
+when stranded somewhere with his mess‐mate in the neighborhood of the
+North Pole, beheld for the first time a white bear squatted on its
+haunches before them, and taking a contented survey.
+
+“What’s that ’ere beggar, Jack?”
+
+“Oh!” said the other, taking a solemn glance at the animal, between the
+whiffs of his pipe, “I can’t say exactly, but I expect it’s one o’ them
+there what they call Roman Cawtholics too.”
+
+Scott first made us known to the mass of English readers in a fair way.
+The barriers of anti‐Catholic prejudice, centuries old, which had resisted
+stoutly and stubbornly every effort which reason, right, and common
+humanity made against it, crumbled at once beneath the fairy wand of the
+magician, and English Protestants came to know something of us and
+recognize us, though still in a cautious manner, as fellow‐men.
+
+From Scott all readers may undoubtedly derive much good. And now we turn
+to the others, the leaders of modern fiction: the standard, though, as we
+showed, not the most widely read authors of the day.
+
+They are Thackeray, Dickens, Bulwer; and though the men themselves, so far
+as their lives are known to us, had little or no faith in any particular
+church or any particular creed, and must therefore be wanting in a firm,
+steadfast groundwork, absolutely necessary to impart a pure, high‐minded
+spirit to their writings, we lay this aside, and look at them only through
+their works. In Thackeray and Bulwer we have two eminently clever, highly
+cultivated men—writers who cannot fail to grace everything that they
+touch, who cannot fail to interest deeply and always. They were men of
+much learning, of great insight into character, whose mode of life and
+circle of acquaintances threw them into the heart of the world, their
+world, and gave them every facility of knowing it thoroughly. They came
+and saw. And what is the result of their investigation? They found it all
+a great sham. The genius of both consists in thoroughly exposing this
+great sham, in tearing off the gilded mask, and showing the hollow, empty,
+grim death’s‐head beneath it; in leaving not a rag to cover its nakedness.
+After reading Thackeray, there springs up in us an utter contempt for
+ourselves and for the world in general. All human nature is false, rotten,
+and utterly worthless. There is no religion in it, no faith, and as a
+consequence no honesty and no law save the law of expediency. If there are
+any characters to admire at all, they are certainly not his good men; for
+they, and those of Dickens also—Tom Pinch, for instance—are the most
+insipid numskulls that ever crossed our vision; the most wretched
+caricatures of goodness that could possibly be conceived. Very truly might
+he say that, “when he started a story, he was very dubious as to the
+morality of his characters.” We respect his good men infinitely less than
+his rogues. Among them he is at home: in his Lord Steynes, his Becky
+Sharpes, his drunken parsons, his wicked gray‐hairs, his asses or black‐
+legs among the young, his solemn humbugs, his tuft‐hunters, his silly,
+useless, vain, untruthful women, his worldly mammas who hold up their
+charming daughters at auction; those charming daughters who submit to it
+with such good grace, who simper so chittishly under their pink bonnets
+and look for soft places on the sofa to faint; his designing and
+unprincipled adventuresses, to whom the world is as a market, a betting
+ring, or a faro‐table, and the thing to be sold, the stake to be played
+for, is the virtue they never possessed. Such is Thackeray’s world; and he
+has done well to show it up so openly and unsparingly in all its
+nakedness. But is it altogether a true portrait; could he do no more than
+this? Is this the true world, after all—so utterly depraved and given over
+to evil? Are there no such things as truth, honesty, morality, religion,
+among us? Are there no men and women, no bodies, endowed with sense
+enough, power enough, and wit enough to give the lie to this, and bring
+this false world with shame to their feet? If there be, it is not to be
+found in the pages of Thackeray.
+
+In Bulwer, it is the same story told in Bulwer’s way, with less of heart
+and more of licentiousness. Thackeray was, we believe, a virtuous man, as
+the phrase goes; that is, he was contented with one wife, paid his bills,
+kept his word, and very rarely woke with a headache. But Bulwer rather
+glories, or was wont to do, in the opposite character. He used to be fond
+of telling us that he knew the world; had mixed in, shared, felt its vices
+and its follies. He comes out of this world of his, sits down, and tells
+us all about it; what sort of men and women he found in it; what motives
+actuate them; what they live for, what code of morality they follow. Taken
+as a whole, their code of morality is fashion; their temple is the world;
+their religion, worldliness; their god, themselves. Crime is only crime in
+the humble; in the wealthy it is elevated into vice. Such is the doctrine
+of the Bulwer world; the doctrine that our children imbibe unconsciously,
+while only diverted momentarily by the interest of the story. So far,
+then, notwithstanding grace of style, elegance of diction, happiness of
+conception—all which may be found in a hundred writers infinitely
+superior, essayists and historians—we have nothing but a very doubtful
+negative gain.
+
+And Dickens—who has made us weep over fireside virtues, the hardness and
+quiet nobleness of humble struggle, and the greatness of spirit that beats
+as strong in the cottage as on the throne—must we cast him into the same
+category? Hard as it is to say, we find him wanting, though in a less
+degree than the two above‐mentioned. He has fought sham, and fought it, as
+few others have done, successfully. He did not take up the whole world and
+fight it as one gigantic falsehood. This is useless. The world is large
+enough and strong enough to withstand the mightiest single‐handed and hold
+its own. It will not be put down in this way, and it only laughs at the
+tooting tin whistles that are continually blowing such shrill but tiny
+blasts of regeneration at it, till they crack and are silenced for ever.
+Dickens fought it as the first Napoleon fought the combinations arrayed
+against him; he cut them off in detachments. So with the world; you must
+take it by pieces. Show it one sham, and all the other shams will cry
+shame. The silks, and the satins, and the perfumed licentiousness of the
+drawing‐room, Dickens left to other hands. But he opened up to the eyes of
+these fine folk, who sinned so elegantly in their carriages and palaces, a
+black, yawning, startling gulf right under their feet; with its hot
+elements seething in corruption and danger beneath them, because they
+would not look at it; because they would not recognize this other nation,
+as Disraeli called it in _Sybil_; because that world was to them as far
+off and unknown as Timbuctoo. He showed them the thieves’ and harlots’
+dens, and how they were fed; by the innocent and pure, brutalized by the
+system of the jail, school, and workhouse, presided over by such men as
+have lately stood unabashed in the broad light of day before us, and
+openly confessed to cruelties that Squeers would have blushed at; who
+passed unharmed and triumphant from the court of justice, and found
+lawyers and excellent “ministers of God’s Word” to uphold them, and
+proclaimed in the press and elsewhere that they were honest, humane men
+and maligned saints. Dickens showed us what these Squeerses and Stigginses
+were made of. He showed us what the jails were made of, the asylums, the
+workhouses, the schools; and undoubtedly aided in effecting many a reform.
+He warmed our hearts towards each other, and towards the unfortunates to
+whom all life was a bitter trial from birth to the grave. He undoubtedly
+did great good; and many a book of his is a never‐ending, never‐wearying
+sermon, preached to a broad humanity. As Catholics we owe him a deep debt
+for never having systematically or seriously abused his talents by abusing
+us, where abuse is ever welcome and well rewarded. But he has given us so
+much that we look for more from him; for some great, broad, sound
+principles to guide us through the hard battle of life; since his problem
+was life, human nature, its difficulties and its dangers. While confessing
+our debt to him for what he has done, we find a good deal in Dickens that
+we do not like. His code of ethics is a very easy one, and a very
+dangerous one, running into that indifferentism so prevalent and
+demoralizing to‐day. We find, after reading him, that there is a great
+amount of evil in the world counterbalanced by a tolerably fair amount of
+good, and that it is useless to hope for anything more. That, so far as
+religion goes, mankind may be divided into two classes—the humbugs and the
+humbugged: the humbugs—the Chadbands, the Stigginses—getting decidedly the
+better of the bargain. That, provided a man is not intolerably bad, he is
+as good as the generality of his neighbors, and has a fair chance of
+arriving safe at the end of life’s journey, wherever or whatever that end
+may be, without being extraordinarily particular about it. That
+drunkenness is not a vice unworthy of man, it is rather an amiable
+weakness, a good joke, something funny, something to be laughed at;
+something that you and ourselves might fall into now and again without
+doing much harm. Nowhere in Dickens, as far as we recollect, does
+drunkenness appear as what it is, a vice lower than the appetite of the
+brute. As for our quarrel with him as Americans, though a grievous and a
+just one, we will let that pass now. He endeavored to atone for it at the
+end, so let it rest with him in his grave. In considering his works as a
+whole, his almost unrivalled power of moving us to laughter or to tears,
+we cannot help contrasting what he has done, great as it is, with what he
+might have done had he been endowed with a clear religious belief, and not
+a heart open only to mere human goodness.
+
+To conclude, then: the point of our article is this. The novel is a power
+among us to‐day: a new weapon thrown into the midst of the strife of good
+and evil, to be taken up by either party. Those who would uproot all
+morality, all law, all faith, the basis of humanity, have been quick to
+see its efficacy, seize upon it, and turn it to a terrible account. It is
+not so much the open direct teachings of heathen, pagan,
+rationalistic—call it what you will, it means the same in the long
+run—philosophy that we are to fear. The intellects that breathe in that
+atmosphere are few and far between. But when this heathenism comes
+filtered down to us through sources that meet us at every turn, and
+impregnates and poisons the innocent streams that ought to beautify and
+fertilize the intellect of the mass—when it comes to us half disguised in
+the literature that we place in the hands of our sons and daughters, it is
+time for us to purge this poison out.
+
+Stop novels we cannot. Let preachers thunder as they may, they will be
+written, and they will be read. It is for us to seize upon that weapon,
+and turn it to our own purpose. We have already done so to a degree. Our
+great thinkers, Wiseman, Newman, have recognized the necessity of this,
+and themselves set us the example. But not to such men as these are we to
+look for a Catholic school of novelists: their duties are higher, their
+work more laborious, though not, and we may say it advisedly, from the
+necessities of the day more important. We want a crowd of such writers as
+Gerald Griffin, Bernard McCabe, Lady Fullerton, the authoress of _The
+House of Yorke_. In France, Belgium, Germany, Italy, and Spain, we have
+been more successful. The Countess of Hahn Hahn, Bolanden, Mrs. Craven,
+Conscience, Manzoni, Fernan Caballero, show us that Catholic writers who
+give themselves to this necessary and noble work can make the novel their
+own, and compete successfully even in the matter of sale with the Dumases,
+the Eugene Sues, George Sands, Wilkie Collinses, Charles Reades, Miss
+Braddons. Their works are received with heartfelt approval by the critics
+of the Protestant press. And we cannot refrain from thanking these
+gentlemen for the very fair, honest and manly, and conscientious use they
+make of their pens in this particular at least. Critics are heartily weary
+of the mass of rubbish they are compelled to wade through week after week,
+month after month. If anything, they are too mild. We lack something of
+that hearty knock‐down criticism which prevailed in the palmy days of the
+quarterlies; which killed or cured; which lashed Byron into savagery and
+brought out his true genius; which crushed the weakly and the worthless.
+
+Catholic novelists, and Protestant also, have a noble field before them
+wherein to sow and reap. It is for them to show that vice and unchastity
+are not the only subjects which can interest us; that godliness and _true_
+love are not such dull, insipid, everyday things; that suffering and self‐
+denial and sacrifice for a noble purpose, the soul‐conflict of human
+passion against the eternal decrees, and its mastery after much struggle
+and weary strife, are full of the profoundest interest for man; that
+history is but the chronicle of this conflict, and when rightly read shows
+it forth in every page; that our souls can be fired, our flagging senses
+stimulated, our admiration aroused, by the well‐told story of the struggle
+of right when we see a God moving and acting in it all, far more than by
+the adoration of indecency deified.
+
+
+
+
+Review Of Vaughan’s Life Of S. Thomas: Concluded.(114)
+
+
+In our last number, we endeavored to give our readers some idea of Prior
+Vaughan’s _Life of S. Thomas of Aquin_. We purposely omitted, however, to
+say anything of his treatment of the personal history of the saint
+himself. The name of Thomas of Aquin belongs to church history, to
+theology and philosophy; but it also belongs to what is known by the
+somewhat uncouth name of hagiography; and the story of the _saint_ is more
+engaging to the greater number of readers, than the history of the
+theologian or the philosopher. We have already hinted that some of Prior
+Vaughan’s best pages are to be found in the narrative of the saint’s
+personal story.
+
+Biography is as old as the days of Confucius, or at least as the times of
+his early disciples; and whilst its object has been, on the whole, the
+same in all ages, its forms have undergone infinite variety. Men have
+written Lives in order to cheat Death of his victims. They have tried to
+keep heroes alive by embalming them in incorruptible and imperishable
+speech, that all time might know them, and their influence might reach
+from age to age. Biography has always had a moral purpose: to make men
+patriotic, or brave, or virtuous—to make them better in heart, rather than
+more subtle in intellect. Example being the great motive power in the
+world, the images of men in books have done much to shape the world’s
+course. But the books that have preserved the memory of heroic men have
+been of many different sorts. In old times, they used to be books of
+anecdote—books which were a threaded series of pithy sayings and generous
+deeds, each with a point of its own, and altogether tending to form the
+citizen, the soldier, or the virtuous man. And the style of Plutarch and
+of Diogenes Laertius was continued by Ven. Bede, by William of Malmesbury,
+by Froissart, and by the innumerable chroniclers of the middle ages. The
+biographer speaks in his own person now and then, but his words are very
+brief, and are often not so much an assistance to the tale, as a break in
+it or a sort of private _aside_ with the reader. The personal features of
+the hero, his mind or his body, are not made much of by the old
+biographers. You hear about his height, his complexion, the color of his
+hair, or the length of his chin; but you are never told when his eye
+flashes or his lip curls. Dates are not matters of importance. You have
+his birth and his death, but there is none of that curious comparative
+chronology which modern readers know of. And as for any sense of the
+picturesque, any idea of scene‐painting or putting in backgrounds, it need
+not be said that the old biographies are as plain as the background of a
+Greek theatre. They now and then give particulars of time, place, and
+circumstance which their modern transcribers seize upon as a miner seizes
+on the rare and welcome nugget; but these are entirely beyond their own
+intention. The historical and the moral are the only two elements to be
+found in lives from Xenophon down to Dr. Johnson. The latter biographer
+suggests that, in his days, the _moralizing_ element had developed out of
+the merely moral. But the life of Prior and the life of Alcibiades are not
+very distantly related. The time was coming when lives began to be
+picturesque. The growth of the propensity to the picturesque is a curious
+problem. Why is it that Homer never describes Troy, that Herodotus never
+gives us a picture of Marathon, that Cæsar has no eye for the Rhine, and
+that Froissart does not paint St. Denis on the day of the Oriflamme,
+whilst, on the other hand, Montalembert stops his story to describe the
+Western Isles, De Broglie lets us see the Council of Nicea as it sat,
+Stanley consecrates pages to paint Judæa and Carmel, and every writer of a
+saint’s life at the present hour provides for a picture or two in every
+chapter? Who began this? We do not mean who began the picturesque in
+literature, for that question, though a curious one is not so difficult to
+answer; but who began the picturesque in biography? It is Chateaubriand
+who usually gets the credit of having initiated all the romance and
+sentimentality that has crept into serious literature during the last
+half‐century. Chateaubriand has only left, if we remember rightly, one
+attempt at biography, and the _Vie de Rancé_ contains certainly sentiment
+and romance enough, but it is not graphic in the way that modern
+biographies are. The author dashes off brilliant sketches of society, he
+recites imaginary scenes, or rather episodes, in which nature plays her
+part, he makes incisive remarks, and utters beautiful poetry; but when he
+comes face to face with De Rancé, the penitent and the monk, his hand
+seems to falter, and he grows feeble and disappointing, just where a
+modern writer would have seized the opportunity of powerful painting and
+strong situation. For ourselves, whatever influence Chateaubriand had—and
+he had much—in directing men’s thoughts to analogies that lie beneath the
+surface of nature, of history, and of the human heart, we are inclined to
+attribute the modern craving for the picturesque to the development of a
+quality in which Chateaubriand did not especially excel; we mean,
+earnestness and reality. Many causes, and most of all, perhaps, that
+series of political and religious phenomena which is summed up in the word
+_revolution_, have combined, during the present century, to take
+literature out of the hands of merely professional writers, or to make
+those only choose it as a profession who have something earnest to say.
+Style and thought have come to be considered one thing. As De Quincey
+observes, style is not the mere alien apparelling of a thought, but rather
+its very incarnation.
+
+It is easy to see how earnestness leads to the picturesque in biography.
+In proportion as the writer is able to fix his mind upon his hero, in the
+same proportion he comes to realize him, as the phrase is. Not only are
+all the facts and circumstances collected with the care of a lawyer
+getting up a brief, but words and names that look dead and speechless are
+analyzed as with magnifying power, till they take significance and life.
+Every name, as Aristotle saw, is itself a picture; but it is a picture
+that only requires a more powerful imaginative lens to grow greater,
+fuller, and more living. And therefore the earnest writer, because he
+looks more intently at his subject, sees more in it to put upon his
+canvas; and the reader, struck by the significance that he cannot gainsay,
+and moved by the pictures, as pictures always move the human fancy, is
+held in bonds by the writer, and remembers long and vividly what impressed
+his thought so strongly at the first. He is like one who has seen the site
+of a great battle, and has once for all fixed for himself, as he gazed,
+the relative positions and movements of the fight; he will not easily
+forget it. Something must, no doubt, be added to this; something must be
+allowed to modern culture, to modern appreciation of art as art, to modern
+love of landscape, and to the general _romanesque_ tendency begun by
+Chateaubriand. But so far from the tendency to picturesque biography being
+wholly attributable to sentiment, we hold that it is precisely our modern
+earnestness that makes us demand to see things nearer and more real.
+Doubtless the picturesque biographer is exposed to many dangers, and his
+readers to many trials. He may “realize” what does not exist; he may
+“analyze” out of his inner consciousness alone; he may usurp what is the
+privilege of the poet and the romancer, and give names and habitations not
+only to airy nothings, but, what is much more serious, to unsubstantial
+mistakes. And therefore we do not wonder that many well‐meaning people,
+with the results of romantic biography or history before their eyes, and
+youthful remembrances of Lingard and Butler, have come to distrust every
+account of a personage or of a fact which contains the smallest mixture of
+imagination.
+
+The length of these prefatory remarks may lead the reader to suppose that
+Prior Vaughan has written picturesquely and sensationally about S. Thomas
+of Aquin. Yet this, stated absolutely, would by no means be true. We shall
+presently give one or two passages, in which a fine imaginative and
+descriptive power, we think, is displayed. But the book bears no sign of a
+straining after pictorial effect. Yet its whole idea is pre‐eminently
+picturesque. Prior Vaughan has written with the idea of not merely giving
+the history of his chosen saint, but of localizing it in time and in
+space. It is with this view that he enters into descriptions of Aquino, of
+Monte Cassino, of Paris and its University; it is for this that he brings
+S. Dominic and S. Francis on the canvas, and sketches the figures of
+Frederick II., of Abelard, of S. Bernard, of William of Paris. Each of
+these names has some connection with Thomas of Aquin, and each throws
+fresh light on the central object, when it is analyzed with care.
+
+Here is the description, taken from the opening pages of the first volume,
+of the town of Aquino, which was, if not the birthplace of the saint, at
+least the principal seat of his family:
+
+
+    “The little town of Aquino occupies the centre of a vast and
+    fertile plain, commonly called Campagna Felice, in the ancient
+    Terra di Lavoro. This plain is nearly surrounded by bare and
+    rugged mountains, one of which pushes further than the rest into
+    the plain; and on its spur, which juts boldly out, and which was
+    called significantly Rocca Sicca, was situated the ancient
+    stronghold of the Aquinos. The remnants of this fortress, as seen
+    at this day, seem so bound up with the living rock, that they
+    appear more like the abrupt finish of the mountain than the ruins
+    of a mediæval fortress. Yet they are sufficient to attest the
+    ancient splendor and importance of the place; and the torrent of
+    Melfi, which, tumbling out of the gorges of the Alps, runs round
+    the castellated rock, marks it out as a fit habitation for the
+    chivalrous and adventurous lords of Aquino, Loreto, and
+    Belcastro.”—i. 3, 4.
+
+
+Prior Vaughan, as a Benedictine, is naturally drawn to dwell upon the fact
+of S. Thomas having lived as a boy for five or six years in the Abbey of
+Monte Cassino. It certainly seems true that the child was placed by his
+parents in the abbey with a view to his continuing there after he came to
+years of discretion; just as so many children had been from the days of S.
+Benedict downwards. “To all intents and purposes,” says the author, “S.
+Thomas of Aquin was a Benedictine monk. Had he continued in the habit till
+his death—without any further solemnity beyond the offering of his
+parents—he would have been reckoned as much a Benedictine as S. Gregory,
+S. Augustine, S. Anselm, or S. Bede” (i. 20). We do not think that this
+can be denied. It was affirmed on oath, in the process of canonization, by
+an exceedingly trustworthy witness, that the saint’s father “made him a
+monk” at Monte Cassino. And a monk he was, no doubt, as much as a boy of
+twelve can be a monk—and the Council of Trent, be it remembered, had not
+then fixed the age of religious vows at sixteen. But the frightful
+confusion of the times brought his Benedictine days to a premature close.
+Monte Cassino was pillaged and nearly destroyed, the community was
+scattered, and Thomas of Aquin went to Naples to study—and to find the
+habit of S. Dominic.
+
+The personal character which is drawn in this work is that of a large‐
+minded, serene man, of powerful natural genius and winning character, who
+steps forth from the ranks of mediæval nobility, and, turning his back on
+sword and lance, and giving no heed to the tumult of war and rapine,
+deliberately consecrated himself wholly to God, and, grace being added to
+natural gifts, illuminates the world as a doctor and as a saint. It would
+be interesting to dwell, if we had space, upon the circumstances of S.
+Thomas joining the Order of S. Dominic. The opposition of his family, the
+utter unscrupulousness with which they carried out their opposition, the
+quiet yet fervent persistence of the saint—feudal violence, maternal
+desperation, and ecclesiastical interference—all this makes up a scene of
+wonderful reality and deep suggestiveness. But we must pass it over. S.
+Thomas became a Dominican, and we follow him from Naples to Cologne, from
+Cologne to Paris. We follow the course of his academical life, his
+writings, his teaching, his promotion to the grade of bachelor, of
+licentiate, of doctor. The first chapter of the second volume is entitled
+“S. Thomas made doctor.” It contains a lively picture of the great
+University of Paris and its life from day to day; and with it, moreover,
+the author gives an eloquent summary of the character of his hero, part of
+which we extract, because it is in some sort a key to the whole story of
+his life.
+
+
+    “A man with the power possessed by the Angelical could afford to
+    be serene and tranquil. He lived, as it were, behind the veil; he
+    saw through, and valued at its intrinsic worth, this earth’s
+    stage, and took the measure of all the actors on it. Like Moses,
+    he came down from the mountain, into the turmoil of the chafing
+    world below, and, enlarged by the greatness of the vision in which
+    he habitually lived, it shrank into insignificance before his eye;
+    and those events or influences which excited the minds of others,
+    and disturbed their peace, were looked upon by him somewhat in the
+    same way as we may imagine some majestic, solitary eagle surveys
+    from his high crag, with half‐unconscious eye, the world of woods
+    below him. The Angelical himself had drawn his first lessons from
+    a mountain eyrie. His elastic mind, even as a boy, had expanded,
+    as he looked down from the mighty abbey, on teeming plain and
+    rugged mountain, with the far‐distant ranges of the snowy
+    Apennines standing up delicate and crisp against the sky. God, who
+    made all this, had drawn him to himself, and the fingers of a
+    heavenly hand, striking on his large, solitary heart, had sealed
+    him imperially, for all his life to come, as the great master of
+    the heavenly science, and as the gentle prince of peace....
+    Immense weight of character, surpassing grasp of mind, and
+    keenness of logical discernment, added to a sovereign benignity
+    and patience, and to a gentleness and grace which spoke from his
+    eyes and thrilled in the accents of his voice, made men conscious,
+    when in contact with him, that they were in presence of a man of
+    untold gifts, and yet of one so exquisitely noble as never to
+    display them, save for the benefit of others. Men knew that he had
+    the power to crush them; but since he was so great, they knew also
+    that he never would misuse it; they found him ever self‐forgetting
+    and self‐restrained. A character with such a capability of
+    asserting itself, and yet ever manifesting such gentle self‐
+    repression, must have acted with a singular fascination on any
+    generous mind that came into relation with it.... He was a vast
+    system in himself, and appears to have been specially created for
+    achieving such an end. He was one single, simple man—doubtless.
+    But he was a ‘system,’ or the representation of a system—the
+    highest type of what heroism can do in human heart and mind.
+    Christ, in choosing him, had chosen the most majestic of human
+    creations, converting it into a powerful exponent of the light,
+    peace, and splendor which strike out from the cross. He, if any
+    man, had rested on the bosom of his Lord. He, the great Angelical,
+    with the golden sun flashing from his breast, and the fire of
+    heaven scintillating round his massive brow—he, if any man, had
+    broken the bread of the strong, and had refreshed his lips with
+    the blood of the grape, and had been transfigured by the draught.
+    There is a largeness about him which, whilst it expands the heart,
+    seems almost to take away the breath. We look up at him, and say:
+    ‘How great art thou! how gently courteous, and how tenderly true!
+    Sweet was the power of God, and the grace of Christ, which made
+    thee all thou art. O gentle mighty sun, shine on in thy sweet
+    radiance, spread thy pure invigorating rays amidst the deep sad
+    shadows of the earth!’... Such was his character. And, prescinding
+    from his natural gifts, how did he become so mighty? The cause has
+    been touched on and partially developed already. The reader,
+    adequately to realize it, would do well to study and master, with
+    his heart as well as with his head, the monastic theology of S.
+    Victor’s—the Benedictine science of the saints. Grasp the spirit
+    of S. Anselm, S. Bernard, and the Victorines, weigh it as a whole,
+    follow its drift, mark its salient points, learn to recognize the
+    aroma of that sweet mystic life of tough yet tender service and
+    self‐forgetfulness, and you will have discovered that spring of
+    living waters which ran into the heart and mind of the great
+    Angelical, and lent to all his faculties—aye, and even to his very
+    person and expression—a warmth and glow which seemed to have come
+    direct from heaven. From the rock, which was Christ, flowed
+    straight and swift into the paradise of his soul four crystal
+    waters: Love—fixing the entire being on the sovereign good, and
+    doing all for him alone; Reverence—that is, self‐distrust and
+    self‐forgetfulness, produced by the vision of God’s high majesty
+    awfully gazed on with the eye of faith; Purity—treading all
+    created things, and self first, under the feet, and, with entire
+    freedom of spirit, basking and feeding in the unseen world;
+    Adoration—love, reverence, and purity, combined in one act of
+    supreme worship, as the creature, with all he has and all he is,
+    bends prone to the earth, and with a feeling of dust and ashes
+    whispers to his soul: ‘The Lord he is God, he made us, and not we
+    ourselves!’ ” (ii. 31‐48.)
+
+
+The mind and heart are both fond of dwelling on the heroic; and the heroic
+is met with at every step in the life of S. Thomas. We are reminded, as we
+read, of that Achilles on whose prowess hangs the fate of Troy and of the
+Greeks,
+
+
+    “Full in the midst, high‐towering o’er the rest,”
+
+
+his limbs encased in an armor that is more divine than that which the
+father of fire forged for the son of Peleus, the gold upon his breast, the
+sword of the Spirit by his side, the “broad refulgent shield” of heavenly
+faith upon his arm, and in his hand the great paternal spear that none but
+he can wield—not a “whole ash” felled upon Pelion by old Chiron; but the
+seven gifts of the Christian doctorate wielded by the force of seraphic
+love. His appearance in the lists of argument, in the contest of the
+schools, in the field of intellectual strife, has all the _quelling_ power
+that is ascribed to the greatest heroes of the battle‐field; and his place
+in the records of mental and theological history is that of a discoverer,
+a conqueror, and a king. Here is a scene which is perhaps more or less
+familiar, but it is a type of many scenes in this wonderful life. It
+occurred whilst Thomas was under Albertus Magnus, at Cologne:
+
+
+    “Master Albert had selected a very difficult question from the
+    writings of Denis the Areopagite, and had given it to some of his
+    scholars for solution. Whether in joke or in earnest, they passed
+    on the difficulty to Thomas, and begged him to write his opinion
+    upon it. Thomas took the paper to his cell, and, taking his pen,
+    first stated, with great lucidity, all the objections that could
+    be brought against the question; and then gave their solutions. As
+    he was going out of his cell, this paper accidentally fell near
+    the door. One of the brothers passing picked it up, and carried it
+    at once to Master Albert. Albert was excessively astonished at the
+    splendid talent which now, for the first time, by mere accident,
+    he discovered in that big, silent student. He determined to bring
+    out, in the most public manner, abilities which had been for so
+    long a time so modestly concealed. He desired Thomas to defend a
+    thesis before the assembled school, on the following day. The hour
+    arrived. The hall was filled. There sat Master Albert. Doubtless
+    the majority of those who were to witness the display imagined
+    that they were about to assist at an egregious failure. How could
+    that heavy, silent lad—who could not speak a word in
+    private—defend in public school, against the keenest of opponents,
+    the difficult niceties of theology? But they were soon undeceived,
+    for Thomas spoke with such clearness, established his thesis with
+    such remarkable dialectical skill, saw so far into the coming
+    difficulties of the case, and handled the whole subject in so
+    masterly a manner, that Albert himself was constrained to cry
+    aloud, ‘_Tu non videris tenere locum respondentis sed
+    determinantis_!’ ‘Master,’ replied Thomas with humility, ‘I know
+    not how to treat the question otherwise.’ Albert then thought to
+    puzzle him, and show him that he was still a disciple. So, one
+    after another, he started objections, created a hundred
+    labyrinths, weaving and interweaving all manner of subtle
+    arguments, but in vain. Thomas, with his calm spirit and keen
+    vision, saw through every complication, had the key to every
+    fallacy, the solution for every enigma, and the art to unravel the
+    most tangled skein—till, finally, Albert, no longer able to
+    withhold the expression of his admiration, cried out to his
+    disciples, who were almost stupefied with astonishment: ‘We call
+    this young man a dumb ox, but so loud will be his bellowing in
+    doctrine that it will resound throughout the whole world’ ” (i.
+    321, 322).
+
+
+How exactly this prophecy was fulfilled need not be said. S. Thomas was
+soon employed in speaking to the world what God had given him to say. He
+spoke in the class‐hall and in the church; he wrote for young and for old;
+and wherever his voice was heard men wondered as at a portent. The
+students of Paris, the professors of France and of Italy, his fellow‐
+religious, the intimate friend of his privacy, the rough people round his
+pulpit, the pope himself as he sat and heard him preach, every one said
+over again the wondering words that Albert the Great had used in the hall
+at Cologne. And if we had no record of what men thought, we should still
+be secure in saying that they were astonished; for we are astonished
+ourselves. Many men who have made a great noise in their lifetime have
+left posterity to wonder, not at themselves, but at their reputation. But
+the writer of the _Summa_ _must_ have been great even in his lifetime.
+That breadth of view, that keenness of analysis, that comprehensive reach
+of thought, that enormous memory—we can see it for ourselves, and every
+story of his prowess we can readily credit from what the imperishable
+record of his written works attests to our own eye. Prior Vaughan relates
+interesting anecdotes of his power of discussion, and of his influence
+over the irreverent world of his scholastic compeers, filling up the
+outlines of the annalist with no greater exercise of imagination than is
+fairly permitted to the serious biographer.
+
+But the heroic in the life of the Angel of the Schools would not be
+perfect unless the giant strength had been joined to the gentleness of the
+servant of Christ. There is nothing, perhaps, that will so strike a reader
+of this Life as his mild, equal, and gentle spirit. It does not seem that
+S. Thomas was naturally of a quick and impetuous nature, like S. Ignatius
+or S. Francis of Sales. From his youth he had been a contemplative in the
+cloisters of Monte Cassino; when but a child he had charmed his teachers
+by asking with childish meditative face, “_What was God?_” His quiet
+determination had conquered his mother when she opposed him being a
+Dominican; his calm courage had converted his sisters and shamed his
+brothers. And in the schools, his silence and his humility, virtues never
+more difficult to be practised than in the field of intellectual combat,
+had soon become the marvel of all who knew him. A great natural gift—the
+gift of a changeless serenity of heart and temper—was perfected in him by
+grace, until it became heroic. The contest he once had in the Paris
+schools with Brother John of Pisa, a Franciscan friar who afterwards
+became Archbishop of Canterbury, is typical of what always happened when
+the Angelical discussed:
+
+
+    “John of Pisa, though a keen and a learned man, had no chance with
+    the Angelical. It would have been folly for any one, however
+    skilled—yes, for Bonaventure, or Rochelle, or even Albert the
+    Great himself—to attempt to cross rapiers with Br. Thomas. He was
+    to the manner born. Br. John did all that was in him, used his
+    utmost skill—but it was useless: the Angelical simply upset him
+    time after time. The Minorite grew warm; the Angelical, bent
+    simply on the truth, went on completing, with unmoved serenity,
+    the full discomfiture of the poor Franciscan. John of Pisa at
+    length could stand it no longer. In his heat he forgot his middle
+    term and forgot himself, and turned upon the saint with sarcasm
+    and invective. The Angelical in his own gentle, overpowering way,
+    giving not the slightest heed to these impertinences, went on
+    replying to him with inimitable tenderness and patience; and
+    whilst teaching a lesson which, after so many hundred years, men
+    can still learn, drew on himself, unconsciously, the surprise and
+    admiration of that vast assembly. Such was the way in which the
+    Angelical brought the influence of Benedictine _quies_ and
+    _benignitas_ into the boisterous litigations of the Paris schools.
+    And what is more, Frigerio tells us that the saint taught the
+    great lesson of self‐control, not only by the undeviating practice
+    of his life, but also by his writings; that he looked upon it as
+    an ‘ignominy’ (ignominia) to soil the mouth with angry words; and
+    contended that ‘quarrels,’ immoderate contentions, vain
+    ostentation of knowledge, and the trick of puzzling an adversary
+    with sophistical arguments—such as is often the practice of
+    dialecticians—should be banished from the schools” (ii. 57‐59).
+
+
+The appearance of such a man as S. Thomas, in the midst of the scholastic
+agitation of the XIIIth century, partakes of that providential character
+which the eye of faith sees in the lives of all the great saints. We have
+already, in a former notice, touched upon the marvellous way in which he
+turned the current of thought against rationalism, heresy, and impiety.
+But his personal influence was no less than what we may term his official.
+At the moment when theology was beginning, with philosophy as her
+handmaid, to enter on that course of development in which system, on the
+one hand, advanced in equal steps with discovery on the other, it was the
+will of God that a saint should show the world in his own person a perfect
+model of the Catholic scholastic theologian. His powers were undeniable,
+his genius imperial, his rights undoubted; and he used his privileges and
+his grand position to enforce upon the noisy spirits of the time, and upon
+all generations of students yet to be, that the true type of theological
+discussion was “_humilis collatio, pacifica disputatio_.”
+
+The theologian was to be no proud dogmatist, laying down the law as if he
+had discovered all truth, but one who, taking the faith for his standing‐
+point, humbly put forth and peacefully discussed the views that he thought
+to be true. This was his great lesson; he taught it in the tone of his own
+lectures and discussions, in the turn of his phrase when he wrote, in the
+meekness of his answers, and in the moderation of his conclusions. And we
+may thank the Providence that sent S. Thomas for that calm and judicial
+serenity which has ever been the prevailing character of Catholic
+theology. The great Dominican school that he founded carried on the
+traditions of their master; and (to take an example not far from our own
+days) the weighty and admirably clear pages of a Billuart are not
+unworthy, in their broad, searching, yet tranquil argument, of the master
+whom they follow. A troubled reach of time separates Paris in the XIIIth
+century from Douay in the XVIIth; yet the spirit of S. Thomas had been
+living over it all. Not only in his own religious family was his influence
+strong. The Franciscan Order has its own tradition; but it is a tradition
+that sprung up side by side with the Dominican. It was the seraphic
+Bonaventure that sat beside Thomas of Aquin in the hall of the University
+of Paris on the day when each of them received the insignia of the
+doctorate. They were friends—more than friends, for each knew the other to
+be a saint. Each heard the other speak, and the spirit of one was the
+spirit of both. And in spite of divergences and varieties, such as our
+Lord permits in order to draw unity from diversity or good from evil, the
+two Orders have taught in harmonious spirit during all the long centuries
+they have been before the world. S. Thomas, who reverenced S. Bonaventure,
+has had the reverence of all S. Bonaventure’s children; and we have before
+us as we write the _Cursus Theologiæ_ of a venerable bearded Capuchin,
+considerably esteemed in the theological classes of the present day, who
+stops in his enumeration of fathers and of doctors to add his emphatic
+tribute of veneration to the Angelic Doctor, who, he reminds us, is, with
+S. Augustine, “_præcipuus theologorum omnium temporum magister_”—the great
+master of theologians of all ages. And what we say of the Franciscan Order
+we may say of that great school which dates its traditions from that
+Cardinal Toletus who was the pupil of the Dominican Soto. It is not that
+the Jesuit theologians, even the many‐sided Suarez, have looked up to S.
+Thomas as to their prince and teacher: this they have done; but even if
+they had left his teaching, or where they have left his teaching, they
+have followed his spirit. That spirit we might name the spirit of
+_conciliation_. We do not mean the spirit of compromise, or of going only
+half‐way in matters of truth. S. Thomas was as downright as Euclid. But
+what we refer to is that readiness to admit all the good or the true in an
+opposite view, the shrinking from forcing a vague word upon an adversary,
+the impartial dissection of words and phrases which issues from the
+scholastic and Thomistic method of _distinction_. The _distinguo_ of the
+tyro or the sophist is a trick that is easily learned and easily laughed
+at; but we claim for the scholastic method that its _distinguo_ is the
+touchstone of truth and of falsehood; it requires acuteness and stored‐up
+learning to make it and sustain it; but it requires, above all, that
+perfect fairness of mind, that judicial impartiality of view, which calms
+the promptings of ambitious originality; it requires that patience which
+seeks only the truth and cares nothing for the victory, and that honesty
+which is afraid of declamation, and sets its matter out in unadorned and
+colorless simplicity. This is the true scholastic spirit, and it is pre‐
+eminently the spirit of S. Thomas. If we might personify that grand
+science which has been so high in this world, and seems now to have sunk
+so low (yet, with the signs around us, we dare hardly say so now), it
+would be under the figure of him who is its prince and lawgiver.
+
+
+    “See him, then, our great Angelical, as with calm and princely
+    bearing he advances, a mighty‐looking man, built on a larger scale
+    than those who stand around him, and takes the seat just vacated
+    by Bonaventure. His portrait as a boy has been sketched already.
+    Now he has grown into the maturity of a man, and his grand
+    physique has expanded into its perfect symmetry and manly
+    strength, manifesting, even in his frame, as Tocco says, that
+    exquisite combination of force with true proportion which gave so
+    majestic a balance to his mind. His countenance is pale with
+    suffering, and his head is bald from intense and sustained mental
+    application. Still, the placid serenity of his broad, lofty brow,
+    the deep gray light in his meditative eyes, his firm, well‐
+    chiselled lips, and fully defined jaw, the whole pose of that
+    large, splendid head—combining the manliness of the Roman with the
+    refinement and delicacy of the Greek—impress the imagination with
+    an indescribable sense of giant energy of intellect, of royal
+    gentleness of heart, and untold tenacity of purpose. That sweet
+    face reflects so exquisite a purity, that noble bust is cast in so
+    imperial a mould, that the sculptor or the painter would be struck
+    and arrested by it in a moment; the one would yearn to throw so
+    classical a type into imperishable marble, and the other to
+    transfer so much grandeur of contour, and such delicacy of
+    expression, so harmonious a fusion of spotlessness with majesty,
+    of southern loveliness with intellectual strength, to the enduring
+    canvas” (ii. 108, 109).
+
+
+The angelic quality of the Angel of the Schools—his calmness and his power
+over men—was not bought without a price. Like all the saints, he too had
+to bear the cross, and like all the saints he was not content with
+suffering the cross, but he sought it and courted it. We cannot quote much
+more of Prior Vaughan’s narrative, or else we would fain draw attention to
+the account he gives from authentic sources of Thomas’ holy distress of
+mind, and his midnight prayer the night before he received the doctorate.
+But the following paragraph must be transcribed:
+
+
+    “Let the carnal man, after looking on the sweet Angelical
+    fascinating the crowded schools, take the trouble to follow him,
+    as silently, after the day’s work, he retires to his cell,
+    seemingly to rest; let him watch him bent in prayer; see him take
+    from its hiding‐place, when all have gone to sleep, that hard iron
+    chain; see him—as he looks up to heaven and humbles himself to
+    earth—without mercy to his flesh, scourge himself with it,
+    striking blow upon blow, lacerating his body through the greater
+    portion of the sleepless night: let the carnal man look upon this
+    touching sight; let him shrink back in horror if he will—still let
+    him look on it, and he will learn how the saints labored to secure
+    a chaste and spotless life, and how a man can so far annihilate
+    self‐seeking as to be gentle with all the world, severe with
+    himself alone. If in human life there is anything mysteriously
+    adorable, it is a man of heroic mould and surpassing gifts showing
+    himself great enough to smite his own body, and to humble his
+    entire being in pretence of his Judge” (ii. 60, 61).
+
+
+S. Thomas died in the prime of life—when scarcely forty‐eight years old.
+He was called away a little before his great work, the _Summa_, was
+completed, as if his Master wished to show the lamenting world that his
+own claims were paramount to every other thing. But it was that divine
+Master himself who had rendered it necessary to take away his servant when
+he did; for S. Thomas could write no more. After that vision and ecstasy
+which rapt his soul in the chapel of S. Nicholas at Naples, he ceased to
+write, he ceased to dictate; his pen lay idle, and the _Summa_ stood still
+in the middle of the questions on penance. It was, as he said to his
+companion Reginald, _Non possum!_ “I cannot! Everything that I have
+written appears to me as simply rubbish.” From that day of S. Nicholas he
+lived in a continual trance: he wrote no more. As the new year (1274) came
+in, he set out, at the pope’s call, to attend the general council at
+Lyons: but he was never to get so far. He had not journeyed beyond
+Campania—he was still travelling along the shores of that sunny region
+which had given him birth, when mortal illness arrested him, and he was
+taken to the Abbey of Fossa Nuova to die.
+
+
+    “The abbot conducts him through the church into the silent
+    cloister. Then the whole past seems to break in upon him like a
+    burst of overflowing sunlight; the calm and quiet abbey, the
+    meditative corridor, the gentle Benedictine monks; he seems as if
+    he were at Cassino once again, amidst the glorious visions of his
+    boyish days—amidst the tender friendships of his early youth,
+    close on the bones of ancient kings, near the solemn tomb of
+    Blessed Benedict, in the hallowed home of great traditions, and at
+    the very shrine of all that is fair and noble in monastic life. He
+    seemed completely overcome by the memories of the past, and,
+    turning to the monks who surrounded him, exclaimed ‘_This_ is the
+    place where I shall find repose!’ and then ecstatically to
+    Reginald in presence of them all: ‘_Hæc est requies mea in sæculum
+    sæculi, hic habitabo quoniam elegi eam_—This is my rest for ever
+    and ever; here will I dwell, for I have chosen it’ ” (ii. 921).
+
+
+The whole of this last scene of the great saint’s pilgrimage is admirably
+and most touchingly brought out by the author, and our readers must go to
+it themselves. As we conclude the story, we are forced to agree with Prior
+Vaughan when he exclaims, “It is but natural, it is but beautiful, that he
+who in early boyhood had been stamped with the signet of S. Benedict,
+should return to S. Benedict to die!”
+
+We are sure that this life of S. Thomas of Aquin will do good. It is a
+large book, but it deals with a large and a grand life. It is the work of
+one who evidently has an interest in his subject far beyond that of the
+mere compiler. The earnestness, the warmth, the very redundancy and
+fulness of the author’s style, leave the impression of one whose heart is
+strongly impressed by the glorious career which he has been following so
+minutely, and there is little doubt that his readers will sympathize with
+him. And there can be just as little doubt of the benefits which a
+practical study of the life of the great doctor will confer upon students,
+upon priests, and upon all serious men at the present day. Sanctity taught
+by example is always an important lesson; but the saintliness of learning
+and genius is still more important and still more rare. We live in an age
+when there are numbers of men who are profoundly scientific and splendidly
+accomplished in the different branches of knowledge which they profess;
+and there is no one who is more sure of the world’s attention and
+reverence than the man who can show that he knows something which other
+men do not. The present time, therefore, is one at which we are to look
+for and to hope for men who in theology and Catholic philosophy shall be
+as able and as learned as are the leaders of profane science. Hard work
+and unwearying devotedness are essential to this; and the example of S.
+Thomas shows us what these things mean. But there is something which is
+more necessary still; something which is especially necessary in sacred
+science. “_In malevolam animam non intrabit Sapientia, nec habitabit in
+corpore subdito peccatis._” There is no such thing as the highest wisdom
+without the highest purity of heart. The perfection of the Christian
+doctorate is the consequence of the perfect possession and exercise of the
+Seven Gifts of the Holy Ghost. And the holy fathers who have written on
+Christian wisdom tell us repeatedly, using almost identical words, that a
+man might as well try to study the sun with purblind eyes as to be perfect
+in theology with a heart defiled. There has been no greater example in the
+range of sanctity of what S. Augustine calls the “_mens purgatissima_”
+than that of him who on account of his purity has been called the
+Angelical. Leaving the world as a child, his heart hardly knew what
+earthly concupiscence was. With his loins girded by angels’ hands, with
+his body subdued by hard living, with his thought always ranging among
+high and elevating things, the soul of S. Thomas lived in a region that
+did not belong to the world. He learnt his wisdom of the crucifix, he
+found his inspirations at the foot of the altar; and the same lips that
+dictated the _Commentaries on Aristotle_ were ready to break forth with
+the _Lauda Sion_ and the _Pange Lingua_. If he taught in the daytime, he
+chastised his body during the watches of the night. Born to a gentle life,
+with powerful friends, with the world and its attractions within his
+reach, he lived in his narrow cell, cleaving to his desk and to his
+breviary, walking the streets with a quick step and downcast eye, letting
+the world go on its way. He wanted only one thing—not as a reward for his
+labor, because his labor was only a means to a great end—he wanted only
+that one object which he asked for when the figure spoke to him from the
+Cross, “Thee, O Lord! and thee alone!”
+
+Prior Vaughan has accomplished a task for which he will receive the thanks
+of all English‐speaking Catholics. His book will be read, and will be
+treasured; for it is a book with a large purpose, carried out with
+unwearying labor, presenting the results of wide reading, and offering the
+student and the general reader a large variety of solid information and of
+suggestive thought. If the book were less honestly wrought out than it is,
+we could excuse the author, in consideration of the heart and soul he has
+thrown into it. S. Thomas of Aquin is evidently a very real, living being
+with him. His hero is no abstraction of the past, no quintessence of a
+scholastic that must be looked at as one looks at an Egyptian papyrus in a
+museum. He is a man to _know_, not merely to know about; a man who taught
+in Paris and who reigns in heaven; a man who led an angel’s life here
+below, and who can help us to lead a life more or less angelic from his
+place above. To have worked with such a spirit is to have worked in the
+true spirit of the Catholic faith. The saints are our teachers and
+masters; and, what is more, they are the trumpets that rouse us to battle,
+the living voices that make our hearts burn to follow them. And therefore
+a true life of a saint will live, and will do its work. Our wish is that
+Prior Vaughan’s _S. Thomas_ may make its way into the hearts of earnest
+men, and it is our conviction that it _will_ make its way, and that men
+will be the better for it.
+
+
+
+
+To S. Mary Magdalen.
+
+
+    ’Mid the white spouses of the Sacred Heart,
+    After its Queen, the nearest, dearest, thou.
+    Yet the auréola around thy brow
+    Is not the virgins’. Thine a throne apart.
+    Nor yet, my Saint, does faith‐illumined art
+    Thy hand with palm of martyrdom endow:
+    And when thy hair is all it will allow
+    Of glory to thy head, we do not start.
+    O more than virgin in thy penitent love!
+    And more than martyr in thy passionate woe!
+    How should thy sisters equal thee above,
+    Who knelt not with thee on the gory sod?
+    Or where the crown our worship could bestow
+    Like that long gold which wiped the feet of God?
+
+
+
+
+God’s Acre.
+
+
+In all countries and in all creeds, the dead have claimed the affectionate
+notice of the living. The idea of housing them, deifying them,
+propitiating them, of remembering them in _some_ way, however diverse, has
+always been a prominent one. The belief in the soul’s immortality seems to
+have been even more clear to the ordinary mind of the natural man than
+that of a Supreme and Almighty Being. When Christianity appeared, the
+departed had a place assigned them among the members of the church, and
+were commemorated as absent brethren gone before their fellows one stage
+further on the last great journey; when the Reformation disfranchised
+human nature in the XVIth century, and levelled all its hallowed
+aspirations with the brute instincts of the animal kingdom, the dead,
+though divorced from communion with the living, were yet remembered, and
+placed in two categories—the elect, or the precondemned. Another life was
+even then believed in, and later branches of the reforming sects all
+condescended at least to theorize on the future state of disembodied
+spirits. It remained for our times to foster the cruel _un_belief that
+dooms our loved ones, not even to everlasting perdition, but to absolute
+annihilation. It was hard enough in Puritan days for a pious though
+mistaken mind to bring itself to the belief that possibly the loved
+companion of childhood, the chosen mate of youth, the venerable parent,
+the upright teacher, was one of those predestined to eternal torments, one
+of the holocausts to the greater glory of God; but how far harder now for
+a fond heart, a clinging nature, to see in those it loves so many
+perishable puppets, without future and without hope! But happily there is
+a haven to which these storm‐tossed souls may come with the precious
+freight of their love and their unerring Catholic instincts. Their
+companions and brethren are not gone into trackless chaos, they are not
+absorbed into that monstrous “nothing” of which a false philosophy has
+made a bewildering bugbear. Every year the church protests against such
+revolting doctrines on the day which she publicly consecrates to prayers
+for and remembrance of the departed. This festival is like a spiritual
+harvest‐home; coming as it does just at the close of the ecclesiastical
+year, it marks an epoch in the life of the church suffering; and various
+“revelations” made to saints, as well as the collective belief of the
+faithful, agree in considering it a day of liberation and rejoicing among
+the souls in Purgatory. “God’s Acre” (according to the touching and
+suggestive German idiom) is reaped on that auspicious day, though, like
+Boaz, the Divine Reaper leaves yet a few ears of corn to be gleaned into
+heavenly rest by the prayers of the faithful on earth.
+
+Before we go further into our own beautiful view of the future life, let
+us stop to see how other races and religions have treated the dead.
+
+Of the Egyptians, it is difficult to speak except at too great a length,
+and, not having at hand sufficient authority, we can only set down what
+our recollection will supply. The readers of THE CATHOLIC WORLD will no
+doubt remember some interesting articles published a few months since
+regarding the ancient civilization of Egypt, in which copious reference
+was made to the esteem and respect paid to the dead in that country. The
+singular custom of pledging the embalmed body of a father or ancestor, on
+the receipt of a loan, was noticed; also the dishonor attaching to the
+non‐redemption of such a pledge. A learned English author, speaking
+incidentally of Egyptian embalming, mentions that the word mummy is
+derived from “mum,” which, he says, is Egyptian for _wax_. Representations
+of the embalming process have been found on tombs and sarcophagi, in which
+the men engaged in it are seen wearing masks with eagles’ beaks, probably
+iron masks, thereby denoting of what a poisonous and dangerous nature this
+absolutely incorruptible embalmment must have been. The Pyramids are
+perhaps the most imposing funeral monuments ever raised to the memory of
+mortals, and even the famous Mausoleum of Artemisia can have had no more
+massive or _eternal_ an aspect.
+
+To pass from the cradle of older civilization to the land whose original
+peopling has sometimes been attributed, though we believe inaccurately, to
+Egyptian enterprise, the America of the Aztec and the Red Indian, we find
+in Parkman’s _Jesuits in America_ some lengthy details on the funereal
+customs of the Huron tribe, now extinct. He says that “the primitive
+Indian believed in the immortality of the soul, but not always in a state
+of future punishment or reward. Nor was the good or evil to be rewarded or
+punished (when such a belief _did_ exist) of a moral nature. Skilful
+hunters, brave warriors, men of influence, went to the happy hunting‐
+grounds, while the slothful, the weak, the cowardly, were doomed to eat
+serpents and ashes in dreary regions of mist and darkness.... The spirits,
+in form and feature, as they had been in life, wended their way through
+dark forests to the villages of the dead, subsisting on bark and rotten
+wood. On arriving, they sat all day in the crouching posture of the sick,
+and when night came hunted the shades of animals, with the shades of bows
+and arrows, among the shades of trees and rocks; for all things, animate
+and inanimate, were alike immortal, and all passed together to the gloomy
+country of the dead.” The public ceremony of exhuming the dead, of which
+some interesting details are given further on, was supposed to be the
+occasion of the beginning of the other life. The souls “took wing, as some
+affirmed, in the shape of pigeons; while the greater number believed that
+they journeyed on foot ... to the land of shades, ... but, as the spirits
+of the old and of children are too feeble for the march, they are forced
+to stay behind, lingering near their earthly homes, where the living often
+hear the shutting of their invisible cabin doors, and the weak voices of
+the disembodied children driving birds from their corn‐fields.... The
+Indian land of souls is not always a region of shadows and gloom. The
+Hurons sometimes represented the souls of their dead as dancing
+joyously.... According to some Algonquin traditions, heaven was a scene of
+endless festivity, ghosts dancing to the sound of the rattle and the
+drum.... Most of the traditions agree, however, that the spirits were
+beset with difficulties and perils. There was a swift river which must be
+crossed on a log that shook beneath their feet, while a ferocious dog
+opposed their passage, and drove many into the abyss. This river was full
+of sturgeon and other fish, which the ghosts speared for their
+subsistence. Beyond was a narrow path between moving rocks which each
+instant crashed together, grinding to atoms the less nimble of the
+pilgrims who endeavored to pass. The Hurons believed that a personage
+named Oscotarach, or the Head‐Piercer, dwelt in a bark house beside the
+path, and that it was his office to remove the brains from the heads of
+all who went by, as a necessary preparation for immortality. This singular
+idea is found also in some Algonquin traditions, according to which,
+however, the brain is afterwards restored to its owner.”
+
+Le Clerc, in his _Nouvelle Relation de la Gaspésie_, tells a curious
+story, which is mentioned in a foot‐note by Parkman. It was current in his
+(Le Clerc’s) time among the Algonquins of Gaspé and Northern New
+Brunswick, and bears a remarkable likeness to the old myth of Orpheus and
+Eurydice. “The favorite son of an old Indian died, whereupon the father,
+with a party of friends, set out for the land of souls to recover him. It
+was only necessary to wade through a shallow lake, several days’ journey
+in extent. This they did, sleeping at night on platforms of poles which
+supported them above the water. At length, they arrived and were met by
+Papkootparout, the Indian Pluto, who rushed on them in a rage, with his
+war‐club upraised, but, presently relenting, changed his mind and
+challenged them to a game of ball. They proved the victors, and won the
+stakes, consisting of corn, tobacco, and certain fruits, which thus became
+known to mankind. The bereaved father now begged hard for his son’s soul,
+and Papkootparout at last gave it to him in the form and size of a nut,
+which, by pressing it hard between his hands, he forced into a small
+leather bag. The delighted parent carried it back to earth, with
+instructions to insert it into the body of his son, who would thereupon
+return to life. When the adventurers reached home, and reported the happy
+issue, of their journey, there was a dance of rejoicing; and the father,
+wishing to take part in it, gave his son’s soul to the keeping of a squaw
+who stood by. Being curious to see it, she opened the bag, upon which it
+escaped at once, and took flight for the realms of Papkootparout,
+preferring them to the abodes of the living.”
+
+These superstitions, although they may make us smile, yet attest, through
+their rude simplicity, the _natural_ and deep‐rooted existence in all
+races of a belief not only in the immortality of the soul, but in the
+possibility of communication with the departed. The Buddhist doctrine of
+transmigration is but a distorted version of the truth we call purgatory,
+that is, a state of temporary expiation and gradual cleansing. The
+Egyptian practice of embalming the dead and often of preserving the bodies
+of several generations of one’s forefathers in the family house, is
+another consequence of the primeval belief in the soul’s immortality.
+Everywhere reverence for the dead implied this belief and symbolized it,
+and even the custom of placing in the mouth of the Roman dead the piece of
+money, _denarius_, with which to pay their passage over the Styx, is
+referable to the true doctrine of good works being laid up in heaven and
+helping those who have performed them to gain the desired entrance into
+eternal repose.
+
+The following minute description of the Indian feast of the dead, of which
+mention has already been made, is interesting, and is condensed from the
+account given by Father Brebœuf: “The corpses were lowered from their
+scaffolds and lifted from their graves. Each family claimed its own, and
+forthwith addressed itself to the task of removing what remained of flesh
+from the bones. These, after being tenderly caressed with tears and
+lamentations, were wrapped in skins and pendent robes of beaver. These
+relics, as also the recent corpses, which remained entire, but were
+likewise carefully wrapped in furs, were carried to one of the largest
+houses, and hung to the numerous cross poles which, rafterlike, supported
+the roof. The concourse of mourners seated themselves at a funeral feast,
+the squaws of the household distributed the food, and a chief harangued
+the assembly, lamenting the loss of the deceased and praising their
+virtues. This over, the mourners began their march for Ossonané, the scene
+of the final rite. The bodies remaining entire were borne on litters,
+while the bundles of bones were slung at the shoulders of the relatives,
+like fagots. The procession thus defiled slowly through the forest
+pathways, and as they passed beneath the shadow of the pines, the mourners
+uttered at intervals and in unison a wailing cry, meant to imitate the
+voices of disembodied souls, ... and believed to have a peculiarly
+soothing effect on the conscious relics that each man carried. The place
+prepared for the last rite was a cleared area in the forest, many acres in
+extent. Around it was a high and strong scaffolding of upright poles, with
+cross‐poles extended between, for hanging the funeral gifts and the
+remains of the dead. The fathers lodged in a house where over a hundred of
+these bundles of mortality hung from the rafters. Some were mere shapeless
+rolls, others were made up into clumsy effigies, adorned with feathers,
+beads, etc. In the morning (the procession having arrived over night at
+Ossonané) the relics were taken down, opened again, and the bones fondled
+anew by the women, amid paroxysms of grief. When the procession bearing
+the dead reached the ground prepared for the last solemnity, the bundles
+were laid on the ground, and the funeral gifts outspread for the
+admiration of the beholders. Among them were many robes of beaver and
+other rich furs, collected and preserved for years with a view to this
+festival. Fires were lighted and kettles slung, and the scene became like
+a fair or _caravanserai_. This continued till three o’clock in the
+afternoon, when the gifts were repacked, and the bones shouldered afresh.
+Suddenly, at a signal from the chiefs, the crowd ran forward from every
+side towards the scaffolding, like soldiers to the assault of a town,
+scaled it by the rude ladders with which it was furnished, and hung their
+relics and their gifts to the forest of poles which surmounted it. The
+chiefs then again harangued the people in praise of the departed, while
+other functionaries lined the grave throughout with rich robes of beaver
+skin. Three large copper kettles were next placed in the middle, and then
+ensued a scene of hideous confusion. The bodies which had been left entire
+were brought to the edge of the grave, flung in, and arranged in order at
+the bottom by ten or twelve Indians, stationed there for the purpose, amid
+the wildest excitement and the uproar of many hundred mingled voices.
+Night was now fast closing in, and the concourse bivouacked around the
+clearing.... One of the bundles of bones, tied to a pole on the scaffold,
+chanced to fall into the grave. This accident precipitated the closing
+act, and perhaps increased its frenzy. All around blazed countless fires,
+and the air resounded with discordant cries. The naked multitude, on,
+under, and around the scaffolding, were flinging the remains of their
+dead, relieved from their wrappings of skins, pell‐mell into the pit,
+where were discovered men who, as the ghastly shower fell around them,
+arranged the bones in their places with long poles. All was soon over;
+earth, logs, and stones were cast upon the grave, and the clamor subsided
+into a funereal chant, so dreary and lugubrious that it seemed like the
+wail of despairing souls from the abyss of perdition.”
+
+These processions and ceremonies relating to the bones of the dead remind
+us of the singular custom observed at the Capuchin Convent of the Piazza
+Barberini in Rome. The skeletons of the dead monks are robed in the habit
+of the order and seated in choir‐stalls round the crypt, until they fall
+to pieces, or are displaced by a silent new‐comer to their ghostly
+brotherhood. The bones which are thus yearly accumulating are formed into
+patterns of stars and crosses on the walls of the crypt and surrounding
+corridors, while the skulls are often heaped up in small mounds against
+the partitions. The convent is strictly enclosed, and is only accessible
+to men during the rest of the year, but on All Souls’ day and during the
+octave, the public, men and women alike, are allowed to visit this strange
+place of entombment. Crowds flock to see it, especially foreigners.
+Hawthorne, in his _Marble Faun_, has described it in terms that make one
+feel as if _his_ impression were vivid enough to supply the place of a
+personal one on the part of each of his readers.
+
+The ancient Roman customs and beliefs concerning the dead are well worth
+noticing, as embodying the essence of the utmost civilization a heathen
+land could boast. It is said that the Romans chose the cypress as
+emblematic of death because that tree, when once cut, never grows again.
+The facts of natural history are sometimes disregarded by the ancient
+poets, but it is not with that that we now have to deal, but with the
+false idea symbolized by this choice. The Romans, nevertheless, fully
+believed in an after‐life, though one modelled much on the same principle
+as their life on earth. The unburied and those whose bodies could not be
+found were supposed to wander about, unable to cross the river Styx, and
+their friends therefore generally built them an empty tomb, which they
+believed served as a retreat to their restless spirits. Pliny ascribes the
+Roman custom of burning the dead to the belief that was current amongst
+the people, that their enemies dug up and insulted the bodies of their
+soldiers killed in distant wars. During the earlier part of the Republic,
+the dead were mostly buried in the natural way, in graves or vaults. Some
+very strange ceremonies are recorded in Adams’ _Roman Antiquities_
+concerning the funeral processions, which usually took place at night by
+torch‐light. (This was chiefly done to avoid any chance of meeting a
+priest or magistrate, who was supposed to be polluted by the sight of a
+corpse, as in the Jewish dispensation.) After the musicians, who sang the
+praises of the deceased to the accompaniment of flutes, came “players and
+buffoons, one of whom, called _archimimus_ (the chief mimic), sustained
+the character of the deceased, imitating his words or actions while alive.
+These players sometimes introduced apt sayings from dramatic writers.”
+Actors were also employed to personate the individual ancestors, and
+Adams’ commentator adds in a foot‐note: “A Roman funeral must therefore
+have presented a singular appearance, with a long line of ancestors
+stalking gravely through the streets of the capital.” Pliny, Plautus,
+Polybius, Suetonius, and others are the authorities quoted on this curious
+point. It is said by some authors that, in very ancient times, the dead
+were buried in their own houses; hence the origin of idolatry, the worship
+of household gods, the fear of goblins, etc. Relations also consecrated
+temples to the dead, which Pliny calls a very ancient custom, which had
+its share in contributing to the establishment of idol‐worship. In the
+Book of Wisdom(115) we find a reference to this in these words: “For a
+father, being afflicted with bitter grief, made to himself the image of
+his son, who was quickly taken away, and him who then had died as a man,
+he began now to worship as a god, and appointed him rites and sacrifices
+among his servants. Then in process of time, wicked custom prevailing,
+this error was kept as a law.” Adams tells us that “the private places of
+burial of the Romans were in fields or gardens, usually near the highway
+(such as the Via Appia near Rome, the Via Campana near Pozzuoli, the
+Street of Tombs at Pompeii), to be conspicuous and remind those who passed
+of mortality. Hence the frequent inscriptions—_Siste, viator_,(116)
+_Aspice, viator_.”(117) Games of gladiators were frequently held both on
+the day and the anniversaries of great funerals; and on the pyre slaves
+and clients were sometimes burnt with the body of their deceased master,
+as also all manner of clothes and ornaments, and, “in short, whatever was
+supposed to have been agreeable to him when alive.” As the funeral cortége
+left the place where the body had been burnt, they “used to take a last
+farewell, repeating several times _Vale_, or _Salve æternum_,”(118) also
+wishing that the earth might lie light on the person buried, as Juvenal
+relates, and which was found marked on several ancient monuments in these
+letters, S.T.T.L.(119) “This is a very remarkable instance of the dead
+being considered, in one sense, as conscious, sentient beings, and
+evidently has an origin which can hardly be disconnected from some remote
+or indistinct recollection of the true religion.”
+
+Adams goes on to say that “oblations or sacrifices to the dead were
+afterwards made at various times, both occasionally and at stated periods,
+consisting of liquors, victims, and garlands, as Virgil, Tacitus, and
+Suetonius tell us, and sometimes to appease their _manes_, or atone for
+some injury offered them in life. The sepulchre was bespread with flowers,
+and covered with crowns and fillets. Before it there was a little altar,
+on which libations were made and incense burnt. A keeper was appointed to
+watch the tomb, which was frequently illuminated with lamps. A feast was
+generally added, both for the dead and the living. Certain things were
+laid on the tomb, commonly beans, lettuce, bread, and eggs, or the like,
+which it was supposed the ghosts would come and eat. What remained was
+burnt. After the funeral of great men,... a distribution of raw meat was
+made to the people.”
+
+“Immoderate grief was thought to be offensive to the manes, according to
+Tibullus, but during the shortened mourning that was customary, the
+relations of the deceased abstained from entertainments or feasts of any
+sort, wore no badge of rank or nobility, were not shaved, and dressed in
+black, a custom borrowed (as was supposed) from the Egyptians. ‘No fire
+was ever lighted, as it was considered an ornament to the house.’ ”
+
+The common places of burial were called _columbaria_, from the likeness of
+their arrangement to that of a pigeon‐house, each little niche scooped out
+in the walls holding the small urn in which the ashes of the dead were
+deposited. These _columbaria_, Adams tells us, were often below ground,
+like a vault, but private tombs belonging to wealthy citizens were in
+groves and gardens; as, for instance, that of Augustus, mentioned by
+Strabo, who calls it a hanging garden supported on marble arches, with
+shrubs planted round the base, and the Egyptian obelisks at the entrance.
+The tomb of Adrian, now the Castel S. Angelo, was a perfect palace of
+wealth and art, and supplied many a later building with ready‐made
+adornment before it became what it now is, a fortress. The tomb of Cecilia
+Metella, on the Via Appia, was also used as a mediæval stronghold, and
+looks more fit for such a use than for its former funereal distinction.
+
+From ancient and imperial, we now pass to modern and Christian Rome, so
+undistinguishable in the chronology of their first blending, so widely
+apart in the moral order of their succession.
+
+The subject of the catacombs and the early inscriptions on Christian
+graves is one so widely known and so copiously illustrated by many learned
+works, both English and foreign, that it would be superfluous to say much
+about it. Yet Cardinal Wiseman is so popular an author, and _Fabiola_ so
+standard a novel, that we may be forgiven for drawing a little on
+treasures so temptingly ready to our hand. There is in the first chapter
+of the second part of _Fabiola_ an interesting reference to the old
+established craft of the _fossores_, or excavators of the Christian
+cemeteries. Cardinal Wiseman says that some modern antiquarians have based
+upon the assertion of an anonymous writer, contemporary with S. Jerome, an
+erroneous theory of the _fossores_ having formed a lesser ecclesiastical
+order in the primitive church, like a _lector_ or reader. “But,” he adds,
+“although this opinion is untenable, it is extremely probable that the
+duties of this office were in the hands of persons appointed and
+recognized by ecclesiastical authority.... It was not a cemetery or
+necropolis company which made a speculation of burying the dead, but
+rather a pious and recognized confraternity, which was associated for the
+purpose.” Father Marchi, the great Jesuit authority on ancient
+subterranean Rome, says that a series of interesting inscriptions, found
+in the cemetery of S. Agnes, proves that this occupation was continued in
+particular families, grandfather, father, and sons having carried it on in
+the same place. The _fossores_ also transacted such rare bargains as were
+known in those days of simplicity and brotherly love, when wealthy
+Christians willingly made compensation for the privilege of being buried
+near a martyr’s tomb. Such an arrangement is commemorated in an early
+Christian inscription preserved in the Capitol. The translation runs thus:
+“This is the grave for two bodies, bought by Artemisius, and the price was
+given to the _fossor_ Hilarus—that is ... (the number, being in cipher, is
+unintelligible.) In the presence of Severus the _fossor_, and Laurentius.”
+
+Cardinal Wiseman, jealous of Christian traditions, particularly notes that
+the theory of the subterranean crypts, now called catacombs, ever having
+been heathen excavations for the extraction of sand, has been disproved by
+Marchi’s careful and scientific examination. He then describes the manner
+of entombment used in these underground cemeteries: “Their walls as well
+as the sides of the staircases are honeycombed with graves, that is, rows
+of excavations, large and small, of sufficient length to admit a human
+body, from a child to a full‐grown man.... They are evidently made to
+measure, and it is probable that the body was lying by the side of the
+grave while this was being dug. When the corpse was laid in its narrow
+cell, the front was hermetically closed either by a marble‐slab, or more
+frequently by several broad tiles put edgeways in a groove or mortise, cut
+for them in the rock, and cemented all round. The inscription was cut upon
+the marble, or scratched in the wet mortar.... Two principles, as old as
+Christianity, regulate this mode of burial. The first is the manner of
+Christ’s entombment; he was laid in a grave in a cavern, wrapped up in
+linen, embalmed with spices, and a stone, sealed up, closed his sepulchre.
+As S. Paul so often proposes him for the model of our resurrection, and
+speaks of our being buried with him in baptism, it was natural for his
+disciples to wish to be buried after his example, so as to be ready to
+rise with him. This lying in wait for the resurrection was the second
+thought that regulated the formation of these cemeteries. Every expression
+connected with them alluded to the rising again. The word to _bury_ is
+unknown in Christian inscriptions: ‘_deposited_ in peace,’ ‘the
+_deposition_ of ...’ are the expressions used; that is, the dead are left
+there for a time, till called for again, as a pledge or precious thing,
+entrusted to faithful but temporary keeping. The very name of cemetery
+suggests that it is only a place where many lie, as in a dormitory,
+slumbering for a while, till dawn come and the trumpet’s sound awake them.
+Hence the grave is only called the ‘place,’ or more technically ‘the small
+home,’(120) of the dead in Christ.”
+
+The old Teutonic _Gottes‐Acker_, the acre or field of God, denotes the
+same eminently Christian idea; the dead are thus likened to the seed
+hidden in the ground for a while, to ripen into a glorious spiritual
+harvest when the last call shall be heard. We have read somewhere, in an
+English novel whose name has escaped our memory, the same beautiful idea
+most poetically expressed. It was something to this effect: “We put up a
+stone at the head of a grave, just as we write labels in the spring‐time
+for the seeds we put into the earth, that we may remember what glorious
+flower is to spring from the little gray, hidden handful that seems so
+insignificant just now”—a Catholic thought found astray in a book that had
+nothing Catholic about it save its beauty and poetry; for beauty is a ray
+of truth, and truth is one and Catholic. One other remark is worth
+remembering about the early Christian inscriptions on the tombs of the
+departed. There is generally some anxiety to preserve a record of the
+exact date of a person’s death, and, in modern days, if it happened that
+there was no room for both the day and the year, no doubt the _day_, would
+be left unnoticed, and the year carefully chronicled. “Yet,” says Cardinal
+Wiseman, “while so few ancient Christian inscriptions supply the year of
+people’s deaths, thousands give us the very day of it on which they died,
+whether in the hopefulness of believers or in the assurance of martyrs. Of
+both classes annual commemoration had to be made on the very day of their
+departure, and accurate knowledge of this was necessary. Therefore it
+alone was recorded.”
+
+O ages of faith! when it was the ambition of Christians to be inscribed in
+the Book of Life, instead of leaving names blazoned in gold in the annals
+of an earthly empire!
+
+Prayers for the dead were in use among the primitive Christians, and in
+one of the inscriptions mentioned by Cardinal Wiseman the following
+reference to these prayers is found: “Christ God Almighty refresh thy
+spirit in Christ.” That this hallowed custom is akin to the natural
+feelings of a loving heart is self‐evident; the coldness of an “age of
+philosophy” alone could doubt it. Well might it be called the age of
+disorganization and not of philosophy (which is “love of wisdom”), for the
+wisdom that seeks to pull down instead of building up is but questionable.
+The disorganization of political society which we see at work through the
+International and the Commune; the disorganization of moral society which
+we behold every day increasing through the ease with which the marriage‐
+tie is dissolved, and the hold the state is claiming on children and even
+infants; the disorganization of religious society which we find in the
+ever‐multiplying feuds of sects, like gangrene gradually eating away an
+unsound body; these are all fitting companions to that most ruthless
+severing of this world from the next which pretends to isolate the dead
+from the spiritual help and sympathy of the living, and to dwarf in the
+souls of men what even human laws commanded, or at least protected,
+concerning their bodies. The want of our age is a want of heart;
+heartlessness and callousness to the most sacred, the most _natural_
+feelings, is shown to a fearful extent among our modern mind‐emancipators
+and reformers. On the one hand, nature is held up as a god to which all
+moral laws are to be subject, or, rather, before whose _fiat_ they are to
+cease to exist, while, on the other, nature (in everything lawful,
+touching, noble, generous) is told that she is a fool, and must learn to
+subdue “childish” aspirations and outgrow “childish” beliefs!
+
+But the belief of a communication between the living and the departed is
+not only a _natural_ one; it is also Biblical. S. Matthew speaks of the
+middle state of souls when he mentions the strict account that will have
+to be rendered of “every idle word.”(121) S. Paul says that “every man’s
+work ... shall be tried in _fire_: and the fire shall try every man’s work
+_of what sort it is_. If any man’s work burn, he shall suffer loss, but he
+himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire.”(122) S. Peter makes mention of
+“the spirits in prison,”(123) and S. John, in the Apocalypse, implies a
+state of probation when he says that “there shall not enter into it [the
+New Jerusalem] anything defiled or that worketh abomination, or maketh a
+lie.”(124) In the Second Book of Machabees, one of the most national of
+the Jewish records, and the most favorite and consolatory of the religious
+books held by the Jews as infallible oracles, the whole doctrine of
+purgatory and prayers for the departed is most plainly adverted to.
+
+After a great battle and victory, Judas Machabeus searches the bodies of
+his slain warriors, and finds that some of them had appropriated heathen
+votive offerings made to the idols whose temples they had burnt at Jamnia
+a short time before. Upon this discovery, according to the sacred text,
+which is here too precious a testimony to be condensed, he, “making a
+gathering, sent twelve thousand drachms of silver to Jerusalem for
+sacrifice to be offered for the sins of the dead, thinking well and
+religiously concerning the resurrection. (For if he had not hoped that
+they that were slain should rise again, it would have seemed superfluous
+and vain to pray for the dead.) And because he considered that they who
+had fallen asleep with godliness, had great grace laid up for them. It is
+therefore a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead, that they may
+be loosed from their sins.”(125)
+
+It may not perhaps be generally known that, among the Jews, the custom of
+praying for the dead exists, and has always existed uninterruptedly. Some
+of the supplications are very beautiful, and we do not hesitate to give
+them here, as an interesting corroboration of the assertions we have made
+throughout.
+
+The chief prayers for the dead are contained in the “Kaddisch” for
+mourners, which forms part of the evening as well as the morning service
+for the Jewish Sabbath. Although the dead are not mentioned by name, it is
+to them alone that the prayers apply, as we understand from persons of
+that persuasion. The text is the following:
+
+“May our prayers be accepted with mercy and kindness; may the prayers and
+supplications of the whole house of Israel be accepted in the presence of
+their Father who is in heaven, and say ye Amen. [The congregation here
+answer Amen.] May the fulness of peace from heaven with life be granted
+unto us and to all Israel, and say ye Amen.” “My help is from the Lord,
+who made heaven and earth. May he who maketh peace in his high heavens
+bestow peace on us and on all Israel. And say ye Amen.”
+
+During these prayers, the mourners stand up and answer. Other invocations
+mention “the soul of my father” or “mother,” etc., as the case may be. In
+the service for the dead read over the corpse, these words occur: “O Lord
+our God, cause us to lie down in peace, and raise us up, O our King, to a
+happy life. I laid me down fearless and slept; I awoke, for the Lord
+sustained me.” All through the Old Testament we constantly find “sleep”
+used as a synonym for death. Scattered through the morning and evening
+services of the Hebrew liturgy there are invocations, frequently repeated,
+referring to the dead, such as these: “Thou, O Lord, art for ever
+powerful; thou restorest life to the dead, and art mighty to save. Thou
+art also faithful to revive the dead: blessed art thou, O Lord, who
+revivest the dead.” God is also said “to hold in his hands the souls of
+the living and the dead,” thus giving at least equal prominence to the
+departed and those they have left in their place. The Jews believe and
+hope that their prayers on earth benefit and refresh their lost brethren,
+and pray daily for them. The bodies of the departed are plainly dressed in
+a linen shroud without superfluous ornamentation, but many of the old
+ceremonies and purifications enjoined in the old law are now dispensed
+with. The old manner of burial was in a cave or spacious sepulchre in a
+field or garden, and the body was wrapped in spices, which were often
+burnt around it. The double cave of Mambre, bought for Sarah by Abraham,
+stood at the end of a field, and the sepulchres of the kings were also in
+a field. The garden where Our Lord was laid is another instance of the
+universality of this custom. In the Second Book of Chronicles(126) we read
+of King Asa that “they buried him in his own sepulchre which he had made
+for himself in the city of David: and they laid him on his bed full of
+spices and odoriferous ointments, which were made by the art of the
+perfumers, and they burnt them over him with great pomp.” This burning (of
+spices) is often mentioned throughout Holy Writ. Rachel, says the Book of
+Genesis,(127) was buried “in the highway” that led to Bethlehem, and Jacob
+erected a pillar over her sepulchre; Samuel, “in his own house at
+Ramatha”; and Saul, beneath an oak near the city of Jabes Galaad, the
+inhabitants of which place provided for his burial, and fasted seven days
+in sign of mourning for their sovereign. Joram, king of Juda, was punished
+for his misdeeds by exclusion from the sepulchre of his fathers, “and the
+people did not make a funeral for him according to the manner of burning
+[spices], as they had done for his ancestors.”(128) Ozias, being a leper,
+a disease which came upon him in punishment for having usurped sacerdotal
+functions, was buried “in the field” only “of the royal sepulchre.” Thus
+we see the immense importance attached to the place of burial under the
+old Jewish dispensation, and how it was an eternal disgrace to be expelled
+in death from the neighborhood of one’s family and their hereditary place
+of entombment. This feeling has continued very strong in most civilized
+and in all savage races; the graves of their forefathers are even more
+symbolical of home and fatherland to the wandering desert tribes of
+different nations, than what we should call their hearths and firesides.
+In later times, how often have we not seen gorgeous and imposing
+buildings, especially cathedrals and abbeys, built over the shrine of a
+dead king or bishop, canonized by that popular veneration whose last
+expression was the public honor decreed them by the Roman Pontiff? In
+places where these monuments are not dedicated to the sainted dead whose
+shrines they guard, we often find them burdened with the condition of
+Masses being perpetually offered within their walls for the soul of the
+dead founder; others are memorial churches to friends or relations of the
+founder. Public charities, doles of bread and money, annual distributions
+of clothing, hospitals, schools, or municipal institutions, etc., spring
+chiefly from the desire of the survivors to have their loved ones
+remembered to all future ages, while sometimes a generous testator himself
+will take this simple and practical means of recommending himself to the
+prayers of unborn generations. Family names are perpetuated in remembrance
+of the departed; family records are valuable only in proportion as they
+embody a proof of longer or shorter descent from the distinguished dead.
+There is no test of success or popularity so sure as that of death, and no
+one can tell which of our living friends will be known to and loved by
+future nations, and which other will be passed by in obscurity and
+silence, until long after our exit and their own from this present life‐
+scene. _Real_ life is centred in the dead, it revolves around them, it
+depends on them. They are the root of which we are the leaves and flowers.
+The life of fame is theirs, while only the life of struggle is ours; they
+are victors calmly bearing their palms, umpires gently encouraging their
+successors, but we are only striving competitors, who know not and never
+will know our fate till we have gone with them beyond the veil.
+
+Germany is, above all, the home of these beautiful traditions of an
+unbroken communion between the souls who have left earth and those who
+remain behind. _There_ are the churchyards most loved, and the
+anniversaries of deaths most remembered, even among Protestants. It is a
+custom in Germany to wear black and to keep the day holy every recurring
+anniversary, were it twenty, forty, fifty years after the death of a
+relative or beloved friend. The cemeteries are always blooming with every
+flower of the season, the crosses or headstones always hung with wreaths
+of immortelles. In Catholic German countries, such as Bavaria, the
+festival of All Souls’ is one of the most interesting, because the most
+individual of the ecclesiastical year. We happened to be in Munich on one
+of these occasions, and had been there for a week previous, visiting the
+galleries and inspecting the art‐manufactures for which that city is
+world‐famous. But rich as it is in such treasures, the hand of its old
+King Louis—the grandfather of the present sovereign, and whom in his
+retirement we have met at Nice some few years before his death—has effaced
+much of its mediæval stamp, and attempted to varnish it over with a
+Renaissance coating very uncongenial to the northern character of its
+people and the northern mistiness of its atmosphere. Here we have again
+the wretched imitation in plaster of the marble Parthenon and Acropolis;
+the cold stuccoed pillars looming like huge bleached skeletons through a
+November fog, and yet supposed to represent the sun‐tinted columns of
+exquisite workmanship that rear themselves against the purple sky of
+Greece; the vast desert‐looking streets which, bordered by “Haussmann”
+palaces, seem intended for _future_ rather than present habitation, and
+each of which, if cut into a dozen equal parts, would furnish any capital
+with twelve good‐sized public squares; above all, a stuccoed church,
+dazzlingly, painfully white, the _Theatiner‐Kirche_, a sort of S. Paul’s
+(London) without the smoky coat thrown over it by the chimneys of the busy
+city. Then, turning with relief to the little that is left of the old
+town, we find a few quaint streets leading to the cathedral, a plain but
+grand building, very fairly “restored” and adorned with the distinctive
+Munich statues of angels and saints, which are now sold all over the
+world, as the worthy substitutes of plaster‐of‐Paris images of the Bernini
+type of sculpture. A very interesting old triptych stands over the altar,
+with its strange medley of figures forming a striking and novel reredos. A
+procession was slowing winding its way down the aisles as we entered the
+cathedral one afternoon, and though the congregation was not numerous it
+was very devout. A few comfortable‐looking old houses and quiet streets
+surround the cathedral, and form quite an oasis in the midst of the
+modernized city. Indeed, the monotonous stretch of apparently uninhabited
+mansions was really wearying to look at, and we began to think that King
+Louis had built his town as if he expected its population to increase at a
+_Chicagoan_ rate! It is true the season of fêtes had not come, and,
+according to the recognized phrase, “all the world” had left Munich for
+the country villas and hunting‐boxes in its neighborhood, but on the day
+of All Saints, the vigil of All Souls, how magically the scene changed!
+After Mass in the Royal Chapel, which, by the way, is beautifully
+decorated with frescoes of mediæval saints on a gilt background, we
+started for the great “Gottes‐Acker” (churchyard.) We had been told that
+this was worth seeing, and so it proved. The desert seemed to have
+blossomed like the rose. The road leading to the cemetery was crowded with
+carriages, carts, horsemen, and foot passengers. Every one, especially
+those on foot, carried wreaths of immortelles and small lanterns. The
+carriages were mostly laden with wreaths. Every one looked cheerful, but
+great quiet prevailed throughout the crowd. It seemed to us that until the
+dead called for a visit, the living in Munich must have been well hidden,
+so great were now the numbers that incumbered the hitherto lonely road.
+All were going in the same direction, and once there the scene was almost
+festive. Military bands (the best, we believe, next to the Austrian) were
+stationed near the cemetery gates. The “Gottes‐Acker” itself is an immense
+square, the length being about twice the breadth of the inclosure. Round
+the four sides runs a covered cloister, under which are all the graves,
+monuments, and vaults of the more wealthy part of the Munich population.
+Each of these was a perfect forest of evergreens and hot‐house plants,
+artistically heaped up around a vessel of holy water, from which any pious
+passer‐by was free to sprinkle the grave while repeating a prayer for its
+occupant. The large square in the centre was crossed and recrossed by
+narrow paths between the serried files of graves. Nearly all were
+distinguished by a cross, of stone, marble, wood, or metal. To these the
+wreaths and lamps were hung, and here and there a kneeling figure might be
+seen. Within the covered cloister a dense crowd promenaded slowly, while
+the bands played unceasingly, not always, however, appropriately. It was a
+striking scene, the like of which we do not remember to have ever
+witnessed elsewhere. At Innsbruck, in the Tyrol, the cemetery is similar
+to this in construction and arrangement, though it is, of course, smaller
+in size. Night fell gradually as we were admiring this peculiar expression
+of national idiosyncrasy, but the crowd did not seem to grow less dense.
+It was a remembrance worth carrying away from that old Munich whose
+spirit, though outwardly imprisoned in a pseudo‐classic shape, lives yet
+in the simple Christian instincts of its laboring classes. At this time,
+when it threatens to become another Wittenberg, have we not also seen the
+unconscious and magnificent protest of its inveterately Catholic feelings
+in the unique Passion Play, that worthily kept relic of the heroic ages of
+faith and chivalry? Kings and philosophers cannot change the world as long
+as peasants like those of Ammergau, and artisans such as work in the
+Munich manufactories—that should not be degraded to comparison with the
+materialistic establishments of Manchester or Sheffield—are yet to be
+found bearing through the present times the banner of their forefathers’
+undying traditions. There is more simple faith among the German people,
+including also the Slavic and Hungarian races, than among some other
+modern Christian nations, and no doubt there must be a hidden law of
+gracious compensation in this fact, since the same country has been the
+cradle and the teacher of almost every modern heresy and philosophical
+(_sic_) aberration. No doubt the faith of the masses is intimately
+connected with their wonderful love of home and fatherland, their domestic
+instincts, their love of quiet family gatherings. All this easily leads to
+great love and tenderness for the departed, and it reads almost more like
+a German than a French saying, that “the dead are not the forgotten, but
+only the absent.”(129) Love for the dead and a reverent, prayerful
+remembrance of them are as much bulwarks to the morality of the living, as
+they are spiritual boons to the departed themselves. We would not speak
+ill of an absent friend, or break our word with one who had gone on a long
+journey; even a short earthly distance seems to make a pledge more sacred.
+How much more when the distance is the immeasurable breadth of the valley
+of the shadow of death! We all of us remember promises once made to those
+who have fallen asleep in Christ: those promises will be guardian angels
+to us, if we keep them; they will be so many drops of refreshing dew to
+those who are perhaps suffering at this moment for the unfulfilled
+promises once made by them in life. Shall we whose faith includes the
+communion of saints as a vital dogma, and whose humble hope it must ever
+be to become one of the church suffering after having done our weak share
+in the cause of the church militant—shall we be no better for this belief
+than are those who have it not? Let the dead be guides to us, while we are
+helps to them; let us each remember that besides the angel we have at our
+side, there is another spirit who rejoices or grieves for and with us—a
+company of spirits perhaps, but seldom less than one.
+
+Mother or father, sister, brother, husband, wife, or child, that spirit
+from its prison looks sadly and lovingly earthward, marking our every step
+from its own patient haven of suffering sinlessness. No longer racked by
+the personal fear of falling away, no longer haunted by the possibility of
+temptation, it concentrates its loving anxiety on the soul whom it will
+perchance precede to heaven, but on whom it is yet dependent; let us not
+grieve it, let us not willingly or knowingly wound it, but rather let us
+take heed that we fit ourselves to go and bear it company in the new and
+glorious God’s‐Acre to which we hope to be called when that “which was
+sown in mortality shall be raised in immortality, and that which was sown
+in dishonor and weakness shall be raised in glory and in power.”
+
+
+
+
+Personal Recollections Of The Late President Juarez Of Mexico.
+
+
+
+I. The President In The Reception‐Room.
+
+
+We saw President Juarez for the first time in the fall of 1865. He was
+then temporarily established with his government in the town of El Paso,
+on the northern frontier of Chihuahua, and within almost a stone’s throw
+of American soil. Fort Bliss, Texas, then recently reoccupied by the Union
+troops, was not more than ten minutes’ distance from the Plaza of El Paso.
+
+The prospects of the Mexican Republic were not then very bright; the
+treasury was almost exhausted, the government was barely on Mexican soil,
+and on the American side of the Rio Grande it was generally looked upon as
+a question of time when President Juarez would have to seek safety on our
+own side of the boundary. It is needless to say that he would have been
+received by the Americans of that region with right royal hospitality.
+
+American sympathy and material aid were looked for, and Americans were
+very popular with all the followers of the Mexican president.
+
+Shortly after the arrival of President Juarez and his cabinet in El Paso,
+we joined a party of American gentlemen who paid him a visit. The party
+comprised, we think, nearly all the Americans of any standing about El
+Paso. There were the American consul, the collector of customs, three or
+four army officers from Fort Bliss, some local civil officials, and one or
+two leading business men.
+
+President Juarez and his cabinet occupied a house on the Plaza—a large
+building constructed in the usual Mexican fashion. On announcing ourselves
+as a party of American citizens desirous of paying their respects to the
+chief of a sister republic, we were immediately ushered into a room where
+we found President Juarez with most of the members of his cabinet—notably
+his successor Señor Lerdo de Tejada, then Secretary of State, and Señor
+Yglésias, Secretary of the Treasury—now also named for the
+presidency—rather a sinecure office at the time.
+
+We were presented in turn to the president by Señor Yglésias, the only
+person present attached to the president who spoke English. President
+Juarez spoke neither English nor French. He shook hands cordially with
+each of us, and expressed through Señor Yglésias the very great pleasure
+it gave him to receive our visit. We were sufficiently familiar with the
+Pueblo type to recognize Juarez immediately on entering.
+
+President Juarez was low in stature, rather stout, but dignified, and at
+the same time easy in his manners. The Pueblo Indian was marked in every
+lineament of his face—the aquiline nose, the small bright black eyes, the
+straight cut mouth showing no trace of redness in the lips, the coal‐black
+hair, the swarthy complexion. Yet he was, as it were, an Indian idealized;
+his forehead was high, capacious, and the light of intellectual
+cultivation illuminated his face. He was dressed in plain black.
+
+The secretary of state, Señor Lerdo de Tejada, is evidently, judged merely
+from externals, a man of great intellectual ability. His skin is as white
+as that of the fairest daughter of the Anglo‐Saxon. A forehead, so high as
+to seem almost a monstrosity, and of a marble whiteness, towered above a
+face that gleamed with the glance of the eagle.
+
+Señor Yglésias was of a darker complexion than his colleague in the
+cabinet. He seemed to be in rather indifferent health. The expression of
+his face was remarkably gentle and pleasing. We have already said that he
+acted as interpreter. He spoke English with a very marked accent, but with
+great care and correctness. We happened to be seated next him on a sofa,
+President Juarez being on his right. He told us that he learned to speak
+English in the city of Chihuahua, and that he had never been a day in an
+English‐speaking country.
+
+Notwithstanding that President Juarez did not speak English, and the
+necessity of an interpreter naturally causes some embarrassment, yet his
+manners were so pleasant and affable that he placed us at our ease at
+once. He spoke about our war, and asked with much interest about our great
+military leaders, Generals Grant, Sherman, and Sheridan. He seemed to feel
+some sympathy with Gen. McClellan. A very pleasant half‐hour was spent in
+conversation on these and kindred subjects. It was at length interrupted
+by the entrance of a _péon_ bearing a tray with quite a generous number of
+bottles of champagne on it.
+
+We were invited to partake of the Green Seal. We stood around the table,
+President Juarez standing at the head. Toasts were drunk to the lasting
+friendship of the two North American republics, to the independence of
+Mexico, etc. The péon, who was not a very bright specimen of his tribe,
+exerted himself to his utmost to open the bottles sufficiently fast. In
+his tremulous hurry he got within point‐blank range of the president, and
+a peculiarly excited bottle going off prematurely, discharged about half
+its contents into the president’s shirt‐bosom. Juarez looked at the poor
+_péon_—whose swarthy face grew sickly pale, and who seemed about to sink
+to the ground with terror and confusion—neither in sorrow nor in anger. He
+took no notice whatever of the incident, but went on talking cheerfully as
+before. Such an accident happening to most men would have been laughable
+in the extreme. It did not seem to us to place Juarez in a ludicrous
+position at all, his self‐command was so perfect, his dignity so
+thoroughly preserved.
+
+After all the patriotic toasts proper to the occasion had been drunk, we
+took our leave. The president again shook hands with us, again expressed,
+through Señor Yglésias, his gratification at meeting American citizens and
+officers, and hoped that he should receive further visits from us.
+
+We departed very greatly prepossessed in favor of the Mexican president.
+We agreed in thinking that there was a simplicity and honesty of purpose
+about him which made him the best man for the difficult position of chief
+magistrate of the struggling republic in her great hour of trial.
+
+
+
+II. The President In The Ball‐Room.
+
+
+Some time after the visit just described, President Juarez gave a ball in
+honor of the anniversary of Mexican independence. We had the honor, in
+common with some other Americans, of receiving an invitation to the ball,
+which, of course, we accepted.
+
+There were four American ladies in our party—two the wives of infantry
+officers stationed at Fort Bliss, the post surgeon’s wife, and the wife of
+one of the leading citizens of Franklin. We were all invited to pass the
+night—or such portion of it as would remain after the close of the ball—at
+the mansion of a lady, a native of El Paso, of American descent.
+
+We were bestowed in three or four vehicles, and forded the Rio Grande
+successfully a little before dark. We found El Paso in festal array. The
+cathedral was covered with shining lamps from foundation to steeple. The
+Plaza was brilliantly illuminated, and crowds of both sexes were already
+assembling for the grand open‐air _baile_ of the _profanum vulgus_. Class
+lines of demarcation are very sharply drawn in El Paso, and the _gente
+fina_ alone were admissible to the president’s ball.
+
+We dined at the Señora L——’s, where we had the pleasure of meeting several
+Mexican officers of high rank. Among them were General Ruiz, the
+Postmaster‐General (another sinecurist just then), and other staff
+officers, whose names we have forgotten. A little son of one of the
+officers at Fort Bliss—a child of five or six, who spoke Spanish very
+well, having passed nearly all his little life in New Mexico, only
+remaining sufficiently long in New York to set all doubts at rest as to
+his being born in the Empire State—became a very great favorite with the
+Mexican officers.
+
+Between ten and eleven P.M. our vehicles were again in requisition, and
+away we went to the ball. It was given in the spacious house of a wealthy
+citizen, the front of which was brilliantly illuminated. A guard of
+Mexican soldiers was posted in front of the house, and lined the long hall
+leading to the ball‐room. Their pieces were at order, and they saluted the
+chief officers by striking the butt of their muskets against the ground.
+They were dressed in gray jackets, like the undress of the New York
+National Guard, white cross belts, white trousers, and a leather cap,
+somewhat Hussar shape.
+
+We had the honor of giving an arm to one of the four American ladies on
+entering. Arrived at the door of the ball‐room, four white‐vested and kid‐
+gloved Mexican gentlemen offered an arm each to the four American ladies,
+bowing at and smiling most sweetly on us the while. At first, we were
+disposed to resist “the deep damnation of this taking off.” The ladies
+hesitated and drew back. The situation would have become remarkably comic;
+but Don Juan Z——, well‐known to all Americans who visit El Paso, seeing
+the critical state of affairs, came to us and whispered that it was the
+_costumbre del pais_—the custom of the country. We submitted, but, we
+fear, not with a good grace. By the way, we only saw our American ladies
+at a distance for the rest of the evening. The Mexican gentlemen took
+entire charge of them. Don Juan informed us that we were expected to take
+our revenge among the señoras and señoritas.
+
+The ball‐room was very tastefully arranged. The _placeta_, or open square
+in the centre of all Mexican houses, on which all the rooms in the
+building open, was roofed and floored for the ball‐room. The window‐
+curtains were hung outside the window of the house; mirrors, paintings,
+etc., were hung on the outer walls, making the illusion that you were
+inside the house instead of outside of it, complete. American and Mexican
+flags were festooned around the walls. The music, softly and sweetly
+played, was placed in a side room, entirely out of sight. No braying
+cornet flayed your ears, and no howling fiddler, calling out the figures
+from a position dominating everything and everybody, gave you an _attaque
+de nerfs_. The fiddlers would be heard, not seen. The waltz, the national
+dance of Mexico, was, of course, the terpsichorean _pièce de résistance_;
+but a fair number of quadrilles were sprinkled through the programme, in
+compliment to the Americans.
+
+We have seen many balls in the Empire City—some given under “most
+fashionable auspices”—but we must in justice declare that we have seen
+none which surpassed the Mexican President’s ball. There may have been
+more glare, more glitter, more diamonds, if you will, but there certainly
+was not more good taste, more elegance and refinement, more genuine good‐
+breeding and gentlemanly and ladylike good‐humor. There was no rushing,
+steam‐engine fashion, the length of the ball‐room; knocking couples to the
+right and left, and tearing dresses, without even an apology. The ladies
+were richly but not gaudily dressed, and made no barbaric display of
+golden ornaments, as their New Mexican sisters are wont to do on _bailé_
+occasions. The gentlemen—except the army officers—wore the traditional
+black dress‐coat and pantaloons, with white vest and gloves, clothes and
+gloves fitting admirably, for the _gente fina_ of El Paso got both from
+Paris. The army officers were, of course, in full uniform, the American
+uniform looking rather sombre compared with the red‐leg top trousers, with
+broad gold or silver stripes, and the magnificent gold‐embroidered sashes
+of the Mexican general and field officers. By the way, the lowest officer
+in rank of the Mexicans in the ball‐room was a colonel. The only captains
+and lieutenants admitted were the Americans. Juarez’ son—“the image of his
+father”—though somewhat shorter in stature, in the undress uniform of a
+second lieutenant of artillery was in the vestibule with the guard.
+
+The president, with his cabinet and staff, was already in the ball‐room
+when we arrived. After being dispossessed of our fair companions, we were
+ushered to the portion of the room in which the president sat. We paid our
+respects in turn, and were kindly and cordially welcomed. Juarez was
+dressed in plain black, except his gloves, which, of course, were white.
+
+The male portion of the American party then broke ranks, and spread
+themselves through the ball‐room, enjoying themselves each after his
+fashion; some in the fascinating “see‐saw” of the Spanish dance, others in
+the apartments off the ball‐room where exhilaration of a different kind
+was provided.
+
+We passed a very agreeable hour with Signor Prieto, a Mexican poet and
+orator of distinction. Signor Prieto was then known as the “Henry Clay” of
+Mexico. He spoke French very well. He told us with just pride that he
+considered the highest recognition his efforts had received was the
+translation of one of his poetical pieces by our American patriarch‐poet,
+William Cullen Bryant.
+
+Just before supper‐time, an official came with President Juarez’
+compliments, to say that President Juarez and the members of his cabinet
+would take the American ladies in to supper, and requesting the American
+gentlemen to take in Mexican ladies. We immediately sought our friend Don
+Juan T——, and begged him to find us some Mexican lady who could talk
+either English or French. He found compliance with our request impossible,
+but gave into our charge the Señora S——, a magnificent beauty of the
+Spanish type, with coal‐black hair and large lustrous black Juno‐like
+eyes—_fendus en amande_. The other gentlemen of the American party were
+soon provided with supper partners, and we began our march for the supper‐
+table, President Juarez taking in Mrs. Capt. O——; the secretary of state,
+Señor Lerdo de Tejada, Mrs. Capt. B——; the secretary of the treasury, Mrs.
+Dr. S——; and the secretary of war, Mrs. W——, of Texas. The first table was
+for the president and cabinet, with the American party. The supper was
+rather a solemn affair. It consisted of nine courses, though the courses
+seemed as like each other as railway stations on the plains. All seemed to
+be desiccated, and reminded us somewhat of what we had read about Chinese
+feasts. When a course was served to every guest, the President looked down
+the table to his right and bowed; he then looked to his left and bowed.
+Then, and not before, knives and forks were observed, and the guests
+attacked the viands. This repeated nine times was not calculated to impart
+gaiety to the repast. It was slow, but ended at last, and we retired in
+the same order in which we entered, making way for the ladies and
+gentlemen of the second table.
+
+After the supper, President Juarez sat for over an hour with the American
+ladies, chatting pleasantly with them in the simplest Spanish phrases he
+could devise. Seeing him chatting away and laughing gaily, no one could
+have imagined that he had the cares of a tottering government with an
+empty treasury upon his shoulders.
+
+Capt. O—— asked us to go out with him and have a look at the great
+_bronco_, the public fandango, on the Plaza. As we passed out through the
+hall, the Mexican guard—now lying on their arms—jumped up and brought
+their muskets to the ground with a crash to salute our companion, much to
+his discomposure, as he wished to go out without attracting attention.
+
+The great fandango was a sight worth seeing. A leviathan Spanish dance
+wound its way around and through the Plaza, filling to overflowing the
+market‐place, the sidewalks, and the arcades. Swarthy Mexicans with
+immense sombreros, with cigarettes of corn‐husks in their mouths,
+abandoned themselves to the swaying movements of the slow waltz, their
+dark‐eyed partners—often partners in the cigarette as well as the
+dance—now moving with a graceful languor, now dashing out with wild and
+unrepressed vigor to the clattering of a thousand castanets.
+
+Unusual gambling facilities were to be found everywhere, of course. Cake
+merchants, fried hot cakes in the open air, lemonade, _vino del pais_,
+fresh _queso_, fruits, _puros_, were to be had for the paying.
+
+Having seen sufficient of the great unwashed fandango, we returned to the
+ball‐room. Our companion was again the object of another demonstration of
+respect on the part of the guard. “I wish,” said he, “those fellows would
+go to sleep; this begins to be unpleasant.”
+
+A waltz was in full gyration when we returned to the ball‐room. We took
+chairs and sat near the door chatting. Suddenly we became aware that some
+one stood behind us, placing a hand on either chair. Looking round, we saw
+that it was President Juarez. We immediately arose, but he insisted on our
+being seated, and resumed his former attitude. He talked with us for half
+an hour, in Spanish well adapted to our limited knowledge of the language,
+and which we had no difficulty in understanding.
+
+During the evening, from time to time, we had received invitations from
+the president to drink wine with him—invitations which, of course, we did
+not refuse. Many patriotic toasts and sentiments were offered on both
+sides. It must have been in one of those festive moments that an
+enthusiastic gentleman of our party slapped the president on the back,
+called him “Ben” (Juarez’ Christian name was Benito), said he was “a
+brick,” and bade him “never say die” till he was dead! We were not a
+witness to this scene. It was described to us by members of our party.
+
+Between two and three P.M. the president’s party left the ball‐room.
+Shortly after, the American clans were gathered, we got our fair ones back
+again, and set out for the hospitable dwelling of the Señora L——.
+
+There was plenty of bustle and activity there. It seemed to us that half
+the people at the ball must have been guests of this house. All the rooms
+opening on the large _placeta_ were turned into lodging‐rooms. There was
+hurrying to and fro with lights in hand, putting every one in his place.
+Some people put themselves in other people’s places. Notably our
+enthusiastic friend, who had taken up his quarters in a room intended for
+F—— and his new Spanish bride. He was found by the happy pair, just as
+happy as they were, sleeping the sleep of the just. In the meantime, the
+partner of his joys and sorrows sat solitary and alone in the room
+intended for her and her spouse, on the other side of the _placeta_,
+wondering at his absence and anxiously awaiting his return. This
+complication, however, was settled by transferring the lady to the room in
+which lay her sleeping lord, and bestowing the F——s in the room she had
+occupied.
+
+After a good breakfast, we set out on our return to the Land of the Free,
+forded the Rio Grande at about noon, under a September sun—no contemptible
+luminary about latitude 32°, let us assure the reader. We sought our
+_casas_, darkened up our respective rooms, and shut the venetian blinds to
+keep out the flies, and having turned night into day, proceeded to turn
+day into night.
+
+
+
+
+New Publications.
+
+
+    ELEMENTS OF LOGIC. Designed as a Manual of Instruction. By Henry
+    Coppée, LL.D., President of the Lehigh University. Revised
+    edition. Philadelphia: E. H. Butler & Co. 1872.
+
+
+President Coppée has carefully excluded from this edition of his Logic
+everything which could give offence to a Catholic. The main part of the
+work, treating of formal logic, is of course substantially the same with
+other treatises of this kind, and is written in a clear, simple style,
+well adapted to an elementary text‐book. But here our approbation must
+cease. The history of logic is altogether defective. The author advocates
+the doctrine derived by Hamilton from Kant, that our rational knowledge is
+merely “conditioned,” which is pure scepticism, and confounds Christian
+philosophy with theology, which is effectually to subvert both sciences.
+Teachers may find some useful assistance from this book in explaining the
+laws of thought; but it is altogether unfit to be placed in the hands of
+Catholic pupils. We reiterate the desire we have so often expressed, that
+some competent person would translate one of our standard Latin text‐books
+of logic, for the use of pupils and teachers who cannot read them in the
+original language.
+
+
+    THE POCKET PRAYER‐BOOK. Compiled from approved sources. New York:
+    The Catholic Publication Society. 1872.
+
+
+This is certainly the most complete little manual we have seen, and,
+although it contains 650 pages, is small enough for the pocket; and gives,
+among other things, the three indulgenced litanies, the entire Mass in
+Latin and English, Vespers, and the Epistles and Gospels for the Sundays
+throughout the year. The type, moreover, is singularly large and good.
+Thus the book supplies a long‐felt want; and ought to become very popular
+amongst Catholic men, for whose especial benefit it was compiled. There is
+another edition without the Epistles and Gospels, which fits the vest
+pocket, and can therefore be made emphatically a daily companion.
+
+
+    ENGLAND AND ROME. By the Rev. W. Waterworth, S.J. London: Burns &
+    Lambert. 1854. (New York: Sold by The Catholic Publication
+    Society.)
+
+    A COMMENTARY BY WRITERS OF THE FIRST FIVE CENTURIES ON THE PLACE
+    OF S. PETER IN THE NEW TESTAMENT, AND THAT OF S. PETER’S
+    SUCCESSORS IN THE CHURCH. By the Very Rev. J. Waterworth, D.D.,
+    Provost of Nottingham. London: Richardson. 1871. (New York: Sold
+    by The Catholic Publication Society.)
+
+
+The reader will perceive, if he takes notice of the titles of these two
+books, that they are by two different authors, both bearing the name of
+Waterworth. They are brothers, and one of the two is a Jesuit, the other
+being a dignitary of the Catholic Church in England. The work whose title
+stands first in order at the head of this notice, is not a recent
+publication, having been issued as long ago as 1854. We think it, however,
+not unsuitable to recall attention to it as a work specially useful at the
+present time. About one‐third of the volume is taken up with a very solid
+and scholarly disquisition on the general topic of the Papal supremacy.
+Its principal and special topic is, however, the relation of the church in
+England to the Holy See from the year 179 to the epoch of the schism of
+Henry VIII. It is handled with great learning and ability, and the
+sophisms and perversions of those disingenuous or ill‐informed
+controversialists who pretend to establish the original independence of
+the British Church are scattered to the winds.
+
+The work of Dr. Waterworth, the Provost of Nottingham, was published last
+year. This learned divine is the author of the celebrated treatise
+entitled _The Faith of Catholics_, and is well known as a most profound
+and accurate patristic scholar. The present volume was prepared by him for
+the press before the publication of the Decrees of the Vatican Council;
+but its issue having been delayed by an accident, the author took the
+opportunity of making a re‐examination of its contents, with special
+reference to the objections raised by Dr. Döllinger, and of adding some
+new prefatory remarks. The result of his revision did not suggest to him
+the necessity of any alteration whatever, or show anything in the cavils
+of the petulant old gentleman, who has so completely stultified himself by
+retracting the deliberate convictions of his better days, worthy of any
+special refutation.
+
+As for Dr. Waterworth’s work itself, it is quite unique in English
+Catholic literature, and different from the other works on the Papal
+supremacy, able and learned as these are, which we have hitherto
+possessed. It is literally an exhaustive collection of all the sayings of
+fathers and councils on the two topics discussed, during the first five
+centuries of the Christian era, by one who has mastered the whole of this
+vast body of literature. One hundred and seven fathers and councils are
+quoted, and copious tables at the end of the volume place the whole array
+of authorities in a convenient order for reference under the eye of the
+reader. It is needless for us to expatiate on the value of such a work, or
+to say anything more to recommend it to the attention of all who wish to
+study this great subject of the Papal supremacy.
+
+
+    THE TROUBLES OF OUR CATHOLIC FOREFATHERS, RELATED BY THEMSELVES.
+    First Series. Edited by John Morris, Priest of the Society of
+    Jesus. London: Burns & Oates. 1872. (New York: Sold by The
+    Catholic Publication Society.)
+
+
+One of the outward and by no means the least significant signs of the
+revival of religion in England is the appearance in rapid succession of a
+most useful class of books, having for their main object the vindication
+of the character and constancy of the Catholics of that country during and
+subsequent to the so‐called Reformation. We have had occasion elsewhere to
+refer to Father Morris’ work on the _Condition of Catholics under James
+I._ The book before us may be considered a continuation of that
+exceedingly interesting contribution to history, and, as it is the first
+of a series, we may expect at an early day others equally valuable from
+the same painstaking and indefatigable student.
+
+Until lately, with very few exceptions, historical works relating to Great
+Britain have been the composition of prejudiced, anti‐Catholic writers,
+each in his turn guilty of the same omissions while servilely copying the
+misrepresentations of his predecessors; so that the public mind has at
+length become impressed with the conviction that, when the tocsin of
+rebellion against God’s law was sounded by Henry Tudor, the people of the
+whole of his dominions arose in hostile opposition to the authority of the
+church. None but a critical few, familiar with foreign contemporary
+authorities, were aware that, while the nobles who hungered for the spoils
+of convents and monasteries, and the suppliant courtiers, lay and
+ecclesiastical, whose fortunes depended upon the smiles of the sovereign,
+basely bowed down before the brutal passions of Henry and Elizabeth, the
+mass of the people, particularly the educated and moral middle class, held
+firmly to the faith, braving persecution, poverty, imprisonment, and even
+death, in defence of Catholicity. England, in fact, can count her
+thousands of uncanonized martyrs, priests and laity, men and women, who,
+in common with their co‐religionists of the Continent, fell victims to the
+lust, cupidity, and inhumanity of the “Reformers.” Some of their most
+glorious achievements will probably never be recorded in this world, but
+there is every hope that, through the exertions of such conscientious
+searchers as this learned Jesuit, a flood of light will be thrown ere long
+on the darkest, but not least edifying, days of the Christian Church in
+England. Heretofore this noble work has been delayed for various reasons.
+Contemporary documents were either in the hands of the Government, or were
+scattered among many convents and private libraries, and from long neglect
+had become almost forgotten; and it required so much industry as well as
+knowledge to search for and utilize them, that until lately no one was
+found equal to the task. Besides, the English Catholics of the last
+generation were so few and so lukewarm that it was difficult to find a
+publisher willing to risk his money and his reputation in bringing out
+books that were considered neither profitable nor politic. A change has
+come over the spirit of their dream, as the appearance of late of so many
+Catholic works, well printed and handsomely bound, from some of the first
+publishing houses in Europe, amply testifies; and the ancient faith is
+fast regaining its power in what, for three centuries, has been considered
+the stronghold of dissent. While of primary interest to English readers,
+works of this character will also have peculiar attractions for Americans,
+many of whom by blood and affinity are as much heirs to the virtues and
+courage of the British Catholics of the XVIth and XVIIth centuries as
+those born on that soil. No historical library in our language would be
+complete without such works as those of F. Morris, containing as they do
+original, authentic documents which hitherto have never appeared in print,
+in whole or in part. Such documents, carefully annotated, and modernized
+only as regards their obsolete orthography, are the true materials of
+history, worth an infinity of commentaries and second and third hand
+statements filtrated through the minds of ignorant or partial writers.
+
+The present volume contains the memoirs of Mother Margaret Clement; a
+sketch of the history of the Monasteries of SS. Ursula and Monica at
+Louvain; an account of the dissolution of the Carthusian Monastery of the
+Charter House, London, and the execution of several of its monks, in the
+reign of Henry VIII.; a detailed narrative of the imprisonment of Francis
+Tregian for sixteen years; some additional particulars relating to the
+missions of Fathers Tesimond and Blount; the trial of the Rev. Cuthbert
+Clapton, chaplain to the Venetian ambassador, as related by himself, and
+the correspondence of that official with his government from A.D. 1638 to
+1643; with several interesting details of the sufferings and persecution
+of some noble Catholic families. These documents were procured in various
+places—in the Public Record Office; S. Mary’s College, Ascott; Stonyhurst;
+the Archives de l’Etat, Brussels; S. Augustine’s Priory, Abbotsleigh;
+Archives of the Archbishop of Westminster, and in numerous private MS.
+collections; each original being preceded by a short but comprehensive
+introduction from the pen of the learned editor.
+
+
+    PETERS’ CATHOLIC CLASS BOOK: A Collection of copyright Songs,
+    Duets, Trios, and Choruses, etc., etc. Compiled and arranged by
+    William Dressler. New York: J. L. Peters.
+
+
+The first half of this work is a reproduction of ballads of sentiment of
+no special merit, issued, as the foot‐notes ingeniously advertise to the
+purchaser, “in sheet‐music form, with lithograph title‐page,” by the
+publisher. The latter half is chiefly a reprint of so‐called religious
+songs which persistently return to us under one or another guise in
+publications of this class, like poor relations, and with as hearty a
+welcome as such visitors proverbially receive.
+
+THE CATHOLIC PUBLICATION SOCIETY has fixed upon the 5th of November as the
+publication day of _The Illustrated Catholic Family Almanac_ for 1873:
+over 35,000 copies have already been ordered by the different booksellers.
+The Society has just published an edition of _The Little Manual of
+Devotion to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and Spiritual Bouquet_, formerly
+published by John P. Walsh, of Cincinnati; and will soon issue in book‐
+form _Fleurange_, by Mrs. Craven; Col. Meline’s translation of _Hubner’s
+Life of Sixtus V.; Myrrha Lake, or Into the Light of Catholicity. All‐
+Hallow Eve and Unconvicted_ will appear early in November. Canon Oakeley’s
+work on _Catholic Worship_ is in press, and will be published uniform with
+his excellent treatise on _The Mass_.
+
+
+
+
+
+THE CATHOLIC WORLD. VOL. XVI., NO. 93.—DECEMBER, 1872.
+
+
+
+
+The Spirit Of Protestantism.
+
+
+Recent events in Europe, particularly in Prussia and Italy, have done much
+to awaken the attention of thinking men in this country to the true spirit
+of what is known as Protestantism. While they have once more presented to
+our view humiliating spectacles of human weakness, injustice and downright
+tyranny under the guise and in the sacred names of religion and liberty,
+they have confirmed with remarkable force all that has been alleged
+against the spirit that actuates and has always governed the enemies of
+the Catholic Church.
+
+When the revolt against Catholic doctrine and the spiritual authority of
+the See of Rome was first inaugurated in the XVIth century under the
+banner of liberty of conscience and freedom of thought, it was asserted by
+those who then upheld the ancient faith that these were specious pretexts
+invented to cover ulterior designs, which, by giving full scope to the
+worst passions of our nature, would inevitably fix in the minds and in the
+hearts of mankind a moral slavery more debasing, and a servitude more
+irradicable, than even the most astute pagans of ancient times ever
+dreamed of; that dissent from the dogmas and discipline of the universal
+church did not in itself constitute a creed, but simply the negation of
+all Christian truth, and that the right of private judgment in matters of
+faith meant in reality the right, when seconded by the power, to pull down
+and destroy, to persecute and proscribe, to desecrate and desolate the
+Christian temples and charitable institutions which pious hands had reared
+and richly endowed throughout Europe. How sadly prophetic were the
+sagacious champions of true liberty and divine authority, the history of
+the last three centuries fully attests.
+
+Whoever has studied the career of modern civilization, either in the
+detached records of nations and dynasties, or by following the course of
+the church herself from her foundation to the present day, cannot fail to
+discover that the advance of Europe from the epoch of the disruption of
+the Roman Empire until the commencement of the XVIth century was a steady,
+constant, and rapid march towards true civil polity and enlightenment;
+frequently checked, it is true, by wars and local schisms, but ever
+flowing onward in an irresistible and majestic flood.
+
+From the barbarism and chaos incident to the disappearance of the central
+authority of the empire, Europe emerged into the preparatory condition of
+feudalism, at that time another name for order; and, through this state of
+order, the first necessity of freedom, she was fast acquiring that second
+essential element of political excellence—liberty. Already the humble
+peasants of Helvetia were as free as the air of their romantic mountains;
+Italy was dotted with republics; the Spanish peninsula was ruled more by
+its cortes than by its sovereigns; France had her several “estates”;
+Poland her elective monarchy; and Germany and the North were fast becoming
+imbued with liberal and constitutional ideas; England, the last to adopt
+the feudal system, had by degrees abrogated its slavish restraints and
+commercial restrictions, and, with justice, boasted of her great charters
+and independent parliaments; while over all a species of international law
+was established, the chief executive of which sat in the chair of S.
+Peter, before whose moral power warriors sheathed their swords and crowned
+kings bowed their heads in submission. Municipalities, the germs of which
+had first clustered around the monasteries, had become numerous and
+powerful enough to defy and, on occasion, to curb the power of the feudal
+nobles, and, under the protection of the guilds, the mechanical arts had
+acquired a degree of perfection fully equal if not superior to that of our
+own time. Those workers in wool, cotton, and silk, stone, metal, and wood,
+have left us lasting monuments of their skill not only in the productions
+of the looms of Flanders and Italy, and the forges of Spain and England,
+but, better still, in the multiplicity of magnificent cathedrals and
+basilicas, in the contemplation of which the artisan of this generation,
+with all his supposed advantages, is lost in silent admiration. Poetry,
+painting, architecture, and sculpture, the four highest developments of
+creative genius, may be said to have reached, at the period immediately
+anterior to the Reformation, the acme of glory and greatness, never before
+nor since excelled or even equalled by man; while the discovery of the art
+of printing had given a new impetus to literature, and commerce spread her
+white wings in the Indian Ocean and along the shores of the New World.
+
+Now, all these beneficent results were directly and indirectly the work of
+the Catholic Church. From the details of ordinary life to the more
+profound schemes of state policy, her animating presence was felt, and her
+influence cheerfully recognized and obeyed, for it was always exercised
+for the benefit of humanity and the greater glory of God. From the forging
+of the Toledo blade that flashed in the dazzled eyes of the Saracen, to
+the rearing aloft of that wonder of the Christian and pagan world, S.
+Peter’s; from the humble Mechlin girl meshing a robe for a statue of the
+Virgin, to Columbus exploring unknown seas in search of treasure to ransom
+the holy shrines; from the poor friar teaching the child of the degraded
+_villein_, to Archbishop Langdon framing _Magna Charta_; from the
+enfranchisement of a serf, to the organization of the crusades, there was
+no step in human progress that was not inspired and directed by the church
+for the wisest and most exalted purposes. Guided by the spirit of
+religion, the amount of solid happiness, simple virtue, and rational
+liberty enjoyed by the people of Europe at the opening of the XVIth
+century was greater, far greater, than their descendants possess at the
+present time, after nearly four hundred years’ experience, and countless
+attempts at religious, social, and political revolutions.
+
+Yet, under the name of Reformation and greater liberty, this grand march
+towards human perfection and eternal bliss was to be stayed, and even for
+a time turned backwards, so that morally and politically Christendom has
+not yet, nor is it likely for a long time, to recover from the shock which
+it experienced at the hands of the Protestant reformers, their aiders and
+abettors. The motives which actuated these reactionists were neither new
+nor doubtful. Under various names and pretences, bodies of fanatics or
+knaves swayed by the same inducements had appeared from time to time in
+different parts of the world, generally causing much local disturbance,
+but always suppressed by the authority of the church or the strong arm of
+the state. They were simply detached efforts on the part of the worst
+portion of the population to throw off all spiritual restraint as well as
+temporal authority, and, by being thus freed both from moral and civil
+law, to give full scope to their passions, undeterred by either religious
+or social considerations. The history of fanaticism, of the Albigenses,
+the Fratricelli, and the Lollards, proves that the leaders in such
+movements were invariably the enemies of existing civil authority, and
+that profligacy and plunder were the lures by which they drew around them
+their deluded followers. The “Reformation,” as the last and greatest
+rebellion is called, forms no exception to the rule.
+
+In the early part of the XVIth century it broke out in Germany under the
+auspices of three or four Saxon ecclesiastics, principal among whom were
+Luther and Melanchthon. The former schismatic, who was a preacher of some
+eminence, commenced by inveighing against the abuse of indulgences, and by
+rapid transitions ended by totally denying the authority of the church in
+every point of doctrine and discipline. He bases man’s salvation on faith
+alone regardless of works, proclaimed the right of every individual to
+make his own religion according as it seemed best to himself, and boldly
+advocated the massacre of priests and bishops and the pillage of churches
+and religious homes—the existence of all of which he declared to be
+contrary to Holy Writ. “Now is the time,” he wrote, at the commencement of
+his crusade, “to destroy convents, abbeys, priories, and monasteries”; to
+which advice he added a little later, “These priests, these Mass‐mumblers,
+deserve death as truly as a blasphemer who should curse God and his saints
+in the public streets.” A system of belief at once so convenient and so
+conformable with the greatest license, so free from all moral
+responsibility and so suggestive of rapine and spoliation, could not but
+attract followers, and Luther became so popular with the more debased of
+his countrymen and with the rapacious among the nobles, that rivals soon
+sprang up, who, accepting his premises, quickly outstripped him in the
+race of fanaticism. The Anabaptists under Münzer, thinking that they also
+had a right to private judgment, declared against infant baptism, demanded
+a reorganization of society on what would now be called a socialistic
+basis, and proceeded to put the heresiarch’s theory into practice by
+overrunning the fairest provinces of Germany with fire and sword,
+destroying alike feudal castles and Catholic churches, and slaughtering
+with unheard‐of barbarity every one who opposed them, whether layman or
+cleric.
+
+This practical commentary on the new doctrine affrighted even its founder,
+so he hastened to implore the interposition of his friends among the
+German nobility. Accordingly, Philip of Hesse, in 1625, marched an army
+against them, and, meeting their main body under Münzer, a quondam friend
+and pupil of Luther, at Mülhausen, cut them to pieces and subsequently
+hanged their leader. About thirty thousand peasants are stated to have
+been slaughtered on this occasion, when the new Reformation may be said to
+have been baptized, and the right of private judgment according to Luther
+fully vindicated. Nearly at the same time another scene of even greater
+barbarity was enacted at the other extremity of the Continent. Attracted
+by reports of rich spoil to be obtained in Italy during the wars of the
+emperor and the French king for the possession of that lovely but
+unfortunate country, sixteen thousand German Lutheran mercenaries crossed
+the Alps and joined the forces of Constable de Bourbon, himself a traitor
+in arms against his country. Under the command of that gifted apostate,
+they marched on Rome, and, though their leader fell in the attack, the
+city was captured. Had he survived, the fate of the Eternal City might
+have been sad enough, but, unrestrained by superior authority, the conduct
+of the victors was simply diabolical. For weeks and months the city was
+given over to plunder, and the inhabitants to every species of outrage by
+those wretches, who, true to their master and his teachings, even went to
+the extent, in mockery of the church, to formally suspend Clement VII.,
+and elect in his stead their new apostle. How Luther must have chuckled at
+the news!
+
+
+    “Never perhaps, in the history of the world,” says a distinguished
+    historian, “had a greater capital been given up to a more
+    atrocious abuse of victory; never had a powerful army been made up
+    of more barbarous elements; never had the restraints of discipline
+    been more fearfully cast aside. It was not enough for these
+    rapacious plunderers to seize upon the rich stores of sacred and
+    profane wealth which the piety or industry of the people had
+    gathered into the capital of the Christian world; the wretched
+    inhabitants themselves became the victims of the fierce and brutal
+    soldiery; those who were suspected of having hidden their wealth
+    were put to the torture. Some were forced by these tortures to
+    sign promissory notes, and to drain the purses of their friends in
+    other countries. A great number of prelates fell under these
+    sufferings. Many others, having paid their ransom, and while
+    rejoicing to think themselves free from further attacks, were
+    obliged to redeem themselves again and died from grief or terror
+    caused by these acts of violence. The German troops were seen,
+    drunk at once with wine and blood, leading about bishops in full
+    pontifical attire, seated upon mules, or dragging cardinals
+    through the streets, loading them with blows and outrages. In
+    their eagerness for plunder, they broke in the doors of the
+    tabernacles and destroyed masterpieces of art. The Vatican library
+    was sacked; the public squares and churches of Rome were converted
+    into market‐places, where the conquerors sold, as promiscuous
+    booty, the Roman ladies and horses; and these brutal excesses were
+    committed even in the basilicas of S. Peter and S. Paul, held by
+    Alaric as sacred asylums; the pillage which, under Genseric, had
+    lasted fourteen days, lasted now two months without
+    interruption.”(130)
+
+
+Having disposed of his rivals the Anabaptists and set afloat his anathemas
+against the church, Luther proceeded systematically to disorganize society
+and obstruct the efforts of the sovereign pontiff and the Catholic princes
+to save Europe from the horrors of a Mahometan invasion, at that time most
+imminent. He formed a league among the semi‐independent German princes
+favorable to his views, particularly on the matter of confiscation, and
+the power he had denied to the pope and bishops of the church he assumed
+to himself by forthwith creating a number of evangelical ministers to
+preach the new gospel. In 1529, the members of this league, with other
+nobles of the empire, were summoned by the Emperor Charles V. to a diet at
+Spires to concert means for the general defence of Christendom against the
+Turks, then threatening it by the way of Hungary. The Lutherans, taking
+advantage of the critical condition of affairs, and not being particularly
+adverse to the success of any movement that would destroy Christianity,
+demanded the most unreasonable terms as the price of their active co‐
+operation. On the part of the emperor, it was proposed that all questions
+of a religious nature should remain _in statu quo_ pending the struggle
+against the infidels, and be submitted as soon as practicable thereafter
+to a general or œcumenical council of the church, at which all parties
+were to be represented. “The edict of Worms,” they proposed, “shall be
+observed in the states in which it has already been received. The others
+shall be free to continue in the new doctrines until the meeting of the
+next general council. However, to prevent all domestic troubles, no one
+shall preach against the sacrament of the altar; the Mass shall not be
+abolished; and no one shall be hindered from celebrating or hearing it.”
+But these concessions to heresy for the general good, this weak
+recognition of an unlawful assumption of ecclesiastical and political
+authority, were not what the reformers desired. Not even toleration or
+equality would satisfy them. They wanted the right to persecute, to
+eradicate by forcible means and as far as their power extended, every
+vestige of Catholicity. They declared that in their opinion “the Mass is
+an act of idolatry, condemned by a thousand passages of Sacred Scripture.
+It is our duty and our right to overthrow the altars of Baal.” Thus
+_protesting_ their duty and right to persecute, they retired from the
+diet, left the Mahometans, as far as they were concerned, free scope to
+destroy Christianity wherever they pleased, and Lutheranism, or rebellion,
+was henceforth known by the generic title of Protestantism.
+
+So far from Protestantism being, as popularly represented, the assertion
+of liberty of conscience in religion, it originated in the denial of that
+liberty, by asserting the right to persecute those who differed from them
+in religion.
+
+From this time the Reformation under its new and more comprehensive name
+made vast strides on the Continent, its path being everywhere marked by
+the same spirit of fanaticism, sacrilege, and destruction of property
+devoted to religion, learning, and charity; the insane dissensions of the
+Catholic rulers granting it immunity, if not positive encouragement.
+Geneva and part of Switzerland first embraced the gloomy doctrines of
+Calvin, and made active war on the church; spreading into France, the
+Netherlands, and the northern countries, their adoption by the ignorant
+and venal was invariably followed by the greatest atrocities and the
+wildest anarchy. Europe was shaken to its centre, and wars, the worst of
+wars, because waged in the name of religion, desolated the entire
+Continent for over a century with but pause enough to enable the
+combatants to rest and recruit their strength. The destruction of life
+during this period must have been immense, morals degenerated, industry
+languished, and the principles of rational freedom, which had been
+steadily gaining ground, were lost sight of in the clash of arms and the
+angry conflict of contending systems. From this epoch we may date the rise
+of modern Cæsarism and revolutionary ferocity which at the present moment
+are contending for supremacy in the Old World.
+
+But it was not continental nations alone that suffered from the blight of
+this stupendous curse. Great Britain and Ireland soon experienced its
+baleful influence. Henry VIII., in order to be able to divorce his lawful
+wife and marry a mistress, cut himself loose from the See of Rome, and
+became, by act of parliament, head of the church in his own dominions.
+Henry was no mean reformer, as the record of his life testifies. He
+married in succession six wives, two of whom he repudiated, two beheaded,
+and his sudden demise alone prevented the execution of his surviving
+consort, whose death‐warrant had been signed by his royal and loving hand.
+“For the glory of Almighty God and the honor of the realm,” he seized upon
+all the churches in England, as well as nearly four hundred religious
+houses, and confiscated their property “for the benefit of the crown”—that
+is, for his own use and that of his facile courtiers and parliament. With
+the same pious purpose, we suppose, he ordered for execution, at different
+times, besides his wives, a cardinal, two archbishops, eighteen bishops,
+thirteen abbots, five hundred priors and monks, thirty‐eight doctors,
+twelve dukes and counts, one hundred and sixty‐four noblemen of various
+ranks, one hundred and twenty‐four private citizens, and one hundred and
+ten females. If all of those did not suffer the fate of the Charter‐house
+monks, Sir Thomas More, Bishop Fisher, and the Countess of Salisbury, it
+was not his fault, but theirs who were ungrateful enough to fly their
+country and perish in poverty and exile, thus robbing the Reformation in
+England of half its glory.
+
+Under his daughter Elizabeth, nearly two hundred ecclesiastics are known
+to have suffered for their faith on the scaffold, besides laymen, and the
+multitude who died in prison: and if her successor, James I., does not
+present as striking a record of his zeal, it was because there were very
+few priests left to be hunted down, and very little Catholic property to
+be confiscated. To do that light of the Reformation justice, wherever he
+could catch a priest he hanged him, and, with a keenness eminently
+national, wherever a penny could be squeezed out of a recusant Papist he
+or his friends were sure to have it. Still he was only a gleaner in the
+field so cleanly reaped by his predecessors; for even in unhappy Ireland
+Elizabeth’s captains had done their work so thoroughly that he had nothing
+to seize upon or give away but the uninhabited and desolated lands.
+
+However, lest the traditions of the early fathers of his church—Luther,
+Calvin, and the royal Henry—should be forgotten, and having no longer any
+Catholics to persecute, he turned his attention to the Presbyterians,
+Covenanters, and Puritans with some effect. The humanizing custom of
+cropping the ears and slitting the noses of those dissenters became
+greatly the fashion in this reign; for, though James acknowledged the
+right of private judgment in the abstract, the exercise of the right was
+found by his subjects to be a very dangerous pastime. The Puritans, who
+also based their religion on the same right, improved on the lessons thus
+taught; for, when in the next reign it became their turn to persecute and
+punish, instead of cutting off the ears or the nose of his son and
+successor, they took off the entire head, and gave to the English Church
+its first and only martyr. Oliver Cromwell and the Long Parliament
+interpreted “King James’ Version” too literally, and of course, believing
+in freedom of conscience, swept away episcopacy, kings, bishops, and all.
+After the Restoration, the English Church was again in the ascendant. Then
+they dug up the bones of the Puritan regicides, scattered them to the
+winds, and ever since the followers of John Knox and the believers in the
+_Westminster Catechism_ have held a very subordinate place under the feet
+of “the church as by law established.”
+
+If the fell spirit of Protestantism, which, as we have seen, was bloody
+and cruel in its inception and growth, had been confined to the eastern
+hemisphere, we, as Americans, feeling grateful to Providence for the
+exemption, might have less cause of complaint against it. But
+unfortunately it was not so. The virgin soil of the New World, from the
+first consecrated to freedom, we are often told, was destined to be
+polluted by the evil genius evoked by the apostate monk of Wittenberg.
+Every breeze from the east that wafted hither an immigrant‐ship bore on
+its wings the deadly moral pestilence of intolerance and persecution. It
+accompanied the Huguenots to the Carolinas, landed at Jamestown with the
+royalists, went up the Delaware with the Swedes and Quakers, up the Hudson
+with the Hollanders, and pervaded the hold of the _Mayflower_ from stem to
+stern. Whatever physical, mental, and moral qualities those early
+adventurers, of many lands and divers creeds, may have possessed,
+Christian charity was certainly not of the number, and though they each
+and all proclaimed the right of every one to be his own judge in matters
+of religion—and most of them claimed to have suffered for conscience’s
+sake—not one had the consistency or the courage to tolerate, much less
+protect, the expression of an opinion or the observance of a form of
+worship differing from his own. So completely had the rancor of the
+founders of Protestantism eaten up whatever of Christianity it retained of
+the church’s teaching, that each of the sects, having no common enemy to
+prey upon, turned round, and, like hungry wolves, were ready to tear and
+rend each other. With the exception of one small settlement, there were no
+Catholics in the early colonies; but still, the Puritan found it as unsafe
+to live in Virginia as the Episcopalian did in New England, while the non‐
+combatant Friend dared not risk his life in either locality. There was one
+little bright spot in the darkened firmament that hung over the infant
+settlements, and that was near the mouth of the St. Mary’s, on the
+Potomac. Here Lord Baltimore had planted a colony of Catholics which soon
+showed signs of life and vigor, worshipping according to the old faith,
+and proclaiming the doctrine of charity and religious toleration to all
+Christians. But it was not long allowed to enjoy its honors in peace. Its
+very existence was a reproach to its bigoted neighbors. Taking advantage
+of its humane and equitable laws, Protestants of the various
+denominations, persecuted in the other colonies, flocked to it as to a
+city of refuge, abused its hospitality, when strong enough in numbers
+changed its statutes, and actually commenced to persecute the very people
+who had sheltered them.
+
+As the colonies grew in population and extent, we do not find that they
+increased in equity or liberality. Many of them were even at the pains of
+passing laws prohibiting the settlement of Catholics within their limits;
+and now and then we hear of some solitary priest being executed or a group
+of humble Catholics driven into further exile. The dawn of our Revolution
+created some change in religious sentiment, but it was more on the surface
+than in the heart. England, the oppressor, was the champion of
+Protestantism; France, the ally, was as essentially Catholic; so it was
+not considered politic to manifest too openly that bigotry of soul which
+pervaded all classes of society in those days, though even in the
+continental congress there were found some candid enough to object to
+asking the assistance of Catholic Frenchmen to help them to wrest their
+liberties from their Protestant enemy. These patriots preferred the
+Hessians and their Lutheranism to Lafayette and Rochambaud.
+
+Our independence once gained by the efficient aid of the troops of the
+eldest son of the church, a pause appears to have occurred in the
+persecuting progress of the sects. Common decency required as much, but
+commercial interest demanded it. Our finances were in a ruinous condition,
+and it was only among the Catholic nations of Europe that we could look
+for sympathy and support. Then the new states very generally repealed the
+colonial penal laws, and finally the amended constitution prohibited the
+interference of the general government in matters of religion. Still,
+though we owe much to French sympathy and influence in placing us, as
+Catholics, free and equal before the law, we owe more to those of our own
+countrymen who actually had no religion at all. We would rather, for the
+honor of human nature, that the benefits thus received had been derived
+from another source; but it is an historical fact that the minds of many
+of the leaders of the Revolution, before and during that struggle, had
+become deeply imbued with the false philosophy then prevalent among the
+intellectual classes in Europe, and, believing in no particular
+revelation, dogma, or religion, they could see no reason why one party
+calling itself Christian should ostracise another claiming the same
+distinction. To their credit, be it said, our countrymen never carried
+their theories to the same extent as their fellow‐philosophers across the
+Atlantic, and their impartiality, which we would fain hope to have been
+sincere, took a direction in accord with the spirit of justice and
+impartial legislation.
+
+If, then, our young Republic has not been disgraced by such penal
+enactments against Catholics as have long disfigured the statute‐books of
+England, and which are yet in force in Holland, Denmark, Sweden, and
+Norway, the Protestant sects, as such, deserve neither credit nor
+gratitude. The active Protestants of that day—the ministers, deacons, and
+politicians—were just as narrow‐minded and as bigoted as were their
+ancestors, and as would be their descendants if it were not for certain
+good reasons best known to themselves. Witness the periodical outbursts of
+Nativism or Know‐Nothingism which have from time to time disgraced our
+national character. These have been directed invariably against
+Catholics—not against foreigners as such, for with a Protestant or even
+infidel foreigner their promoters have never professed to find fault. The
+occasional destruction of a convent, the burning of a church—and we have
+had many so dealt with—or the mobbing of a priest may only show that
+depravity exists in certain sections of the country, but the news of such
+atrocities has been received with such ill‐concealed
+satisfaction—certainly with nothing like hearty condemnation—by the
+clerical demagogues and the so‐called religious press, that we are forced
+into the conviction that to the absence of opportunity and power on their
+part we alone owe our exemption from such villanies on a larger and better
+organized system.
+
+We are told, in a tone of patronage, if not menace, that we ought to be
+content as long as the Catholics of America are free and enjoy equality
+under the law. We grant the freedom and equality, but only so far as the
+letter, not the spirit, of the law is concerned. Let any one look at the
+way our Catholic missions in the far West have been defrauded for the
+benefit of Methodist and Baptist preachers of the Word and cheaters of the
+Indians, and tell us are they free and equal? How many Catholic chaplains
+are there in the army and navy, the bone and sinew of which are mainly
+Catholics? For how many foreign consuls are we paying merely to act as
+agents for the Board of Foreign Missions, Bible Societies, and Book
+Concerns? How are our numerous state institutions—penitentiary,
+reformatory, and eleemosynary—attended to in the interests of their
+Catholic inmates? When these questions are satisfactorily answered, we
+will be able to estimate the extent of the legal equality we possess. For
+so much of freedom and equality as we actually enjoy, we are thankful.
+Grateful not, however, to the Protestant sects, but to a benevolent
+Providence who has vouchsafed it to us; and, under him, to our Catholic
+predecessors who helped to found, and our co‐religionists who have bravely
+defended, our institutions, and who now stand ready to oppose with might
+and main any attempt to infringe upon our liberties.
+
+But even as to the letter of the law we are not without just cause of
+complaint. For instance, we object most emphatically to the present school
+law of this state as unjust and inequitable in its provisions and method
+of administration. The state has no right to prescribe how or what our
+children shall be taught, and then make us pay for its so doing. We
+Catholics are unanimously in favor of educating our own offspring
+according to our conception of the demands of religion and morality, and,
+as the artificial body called the state is a judge of neither, it is
+manifestly incompetent to direct the training of our children. We are also
+willing to pay, and are actually expending, large sums of money in this
+good work; and while we are doing so, we hold it not just to tax us for
+the support of schools we do not require. Our duty to the state and
+society is performed when we teach our children to obey the laws of one
+and respect the usages of the other, and, if parents and the ministers of
+religion are unable to do this, mere officials and strangers certainly
+cannot. However, if the state will insist on levying a school‐tax, let it
+in justice give us a pro rata share of the money, and let the Evangelical
+Alliance of the sects take theirs and bring up their children in their own
+way. We ask nothing for ourselves that we would not willingly see granted
+to others, but, until one or other of these measures be adopted, we
+maintain that a large class of the citizens of the United States is
+deprived of one of its most vital and dearest religious rights.
+
+Then, again, look at the treatment meted out by the legislative
+authorities to Catholic institutions, to our hospitals, foundling‐asylums,
+reformatories, and orphanages, which save annually to the state hundreds
+of thousands of dollars, and are daily conferring on society incalculable
+advantages. What begging, petitioning, and beseeching must we not resort
+to, to get the least legislative favor for them, even to a bare act of
+incorporation! For a quarter of a century or more, irresponsible bodies
+under the names of the sects, or even in no names but their own, have been
+fattening on the public money, our money, and no word of remonstrance has
+been uttered; but, as soon as anything is asked for our institutions, the
+cry of “sectarian appropriations” and “Romish designs” is immediately
+raised and repeated along the line. Every petty bigot who misuses a pen
+gets up a howl about the “Papists,” and “Romanism the Rock Ahead,” etc.;
+the pigeon‐holes of the _religious_ newspaper offices, and of newspapers
+the contrary of religious, are ransacked for stale calumnies against the
+church, and slanders over and over refuted are launched at the most gifted
+and reputable of our citizens. This must all be changed before we can
+consider that, as Catholics, we stand on an equality with non‐Catholic
+Americans, and before we are prepared to admit that Protestantism,
+mollified by time and distance, has lost any of its pristine love of
+persecution and proscription. We would prefer to live at peace with every
+shade of Christians, but, if they will not let us, they must take the
+responsibility.
+
+In stating our grievance in this manner, we do not address ourselves
+specially to the sense of justice or fair play of the leaders of
+Protestant opinion, but rather to the manhood and intelligence of our co‐
+religionists who, by a more determined effort, might easily remove the
+evils of which we complain. We are more confirmed in this view by a recent
+event which happened at the national capital. The force of well‐regulated
+public opinion will always be very powerful in this Republic, and we are
+satisfied that the opposition very generally expressed by the Catholics of
+the country to the scheme of compulsory education by the general
+government, some time ago introduced into Congress by some distinguished
+members, had a powerful effect in defeating, for a time at least, a
+measure fraught with the greatest danger to our rights, and to the general
+liberties of all the states.(131)
+
+We expect little from the Protestant press or pulpits. The manner in which
+the revival of religious persecutions in Europe has been looked upon by
+them precludes the faintest hope that they will listen to the appeals of
+humanity or justice where their passions, prejudices, or interests are
+concerned. Not very long since, the schismatic king of Sardinia wantonly
+levied war on the most defenceless and venerable sovereign in the world,
+and despoiled him of the larger half of his small dominions; yet there was
+not a single Protestant voice heard among us in reprobation of the foul
+act. Two years ago the same royal _filibustero_, with, if possible, less
+pretence, and without any warning, stealthily advanced his army on the
+Eternal City, took possession of its churches and their sacred furniture;
+its convents, and turned them into barracks and stables; its treasures of
+art and literature, and sold them to the highest bidder; its colleges and
+schools, and drove out the students and poor children to wander on the
+face of the earth. Then the Protestant churches and meeting‐houses rang
+with acclamations; and public assemblies were held by freedom‐loving
+American citizens to congratulate the modern vandal on his “victory”
+over—justice, religion, and civilization.
+
+Rome has again been sacked, this time not by the rude Lutheran
+_Landsknechte_, but by a more ruthless and more insidious foe, the
+Garibaldini, the enemies of all forms of revealed religion, the men who
+swear on the dagger and the bowl because they have no God to swear by. The
+sovereign pontiff is virtually a prisoner in his Vatican; monks and
+priests, passing along the streets to comfort the afflicted or administer
+the sacraments to the dying, are set upon and slain at noon‐day; weak and
+delicately nurtured ladies are turned out of their peaceful retreats into
+the highways, to be insulted and derided by a crowd of vagabonds gathered
+from every quarter of Europe; the libraries, statuary, paintings,
+castings, and all the treasures which made Rome the centre of Christian
+art, and the depository of the world’s store of classic literature, lie at
+the mercy of a horde of ruffians, the very offscourings of Italian
+society, called together to that devoted city by the hope of plunder and
+the certainty of immunity for their crimes. All this and more is matter of
+public notoriety, yet no word of execration, no wail of sorrow, at this
+worse than vandalism rises up from a country that boasts its love of
+civilization, its chivalry to women, its respect for sacred things, and
+its patronage of the arts and letters. Why? They are only priests that are
+assassinated, only helpless nuns that are jeered at, only Catholic
+treasures that are stolen, shattered, or destroyed; right, justice,
+liberty, and even ordinary humanity, can afford to suffer and be
+forgotten, so that Catholicity be thereby weakened and checked in its
+onward course. The force of bigotry can go no further.
+
+Late European mails bring us an account of a general election throughout
+“United Italy” on the universal suffrage plan—that supposed panacea for
+all political ills. The Catholics in certain portions of the country, it
+seems, who had hitherto abstained from voting, resolved this time to take
+part in the contest. As soon as this became known to the ministry, a
+circular was sent to even the local government officials, mayors of
+cities, magistrates, police captains, poll‐clerks, returning officers,
+etc., warning them of the danger, and threatening the severest penalties
+if steps were not immediately taken to prevent the Catholics from electing
+their candidates. The result was what might have been expected. The
+officials have done their duty to the government, and now feel secure in
+their places. The Catholics of one city, and that the largest, Naples,
+did, however, despite of all official precautions to the contrary, carry
+their election by an overwhelming majority; but, being only Catholic
+voters, the election has been set aside without even the mockery of an
+investigation or the least show of reason. Now, if such a thing had
+occurred in France, or any other country governed under Catholic auspices,
+we would be treated by nine‐tenths of the press of this country to a
+dissertation on the inability of the Latin nations to understand free
+institutions, and the folly of expecting an ignorant and slavish multitude
+to be able to appreciate the right of suffrage; but, as this gigantic
+fraud was perpetrated by a government in direct hostility to the head of
+the church, it is passed over in dignified silence. Not a syllable of
+remonstrance is uttered by our freedom‐shrieking friends—our Beechers,
+Fultons, and Bellowses—who are so fond of interlarding their sermons with
+political appeals against ballot‐stuffing and intimidation at the polls.
+
+Let us turn for a moment to the present sad condition of Germany, the
+cradle and the victim of religious dissent and doubt. Prussia emerged from
+the late war not only the victor of France, but the conqueror of the
+several independent states and cities of the late Germanic Confederation.
+Her capacious maw has engulfed them all. Prince Bismarck, whose absolutist
+tendencies have long been recognized, not content with his success in
+creating an empire one and indivisible, desires to found a German church,
+to be conducted on strictly military and autocratic principles. Having
+disposed of a good many of the bodies, and taken possession of a large
+share of the property of the subjects of the new empire, he is now anxious
+to take care of their souls, and, whether they will or not, guide them in
+the way of salvation and the Gospel—according to Bismarck. Obedience to
+the central civil head in Berlin is to be the leading feature in his new
+religious system, and the emperor, like his brother of Russia and the
+Grand Lama, is to unite in himself absolute political and spiritual power,
+tempered by Bismarck.
+
+A large portion of the Germans, having great doubts as to whether or not
+they have such things as souls to be saved, feel philosophically
+indifferent; the sects, being weak and without popular support, can make
+little resistance to the encroachments of the state; but the Catholic
+body, powerful not less from its intelligence and independence than from
+its numbers, utterly refuses to recognize the right or the authority of
+the chancellor to interfere in their spiritual affairs. That astute
+statesman first tried to frighten them by abolishing the denominational
+schools, then by patronizing a few dissatisfied professors who call
+themselves “Old Catholics,” but without avail; and now, like a genuine
+follower of the teachings of Luther, he is resorting to expatriation and
+persecution. He has already attacked the religious orders, and, as is
+generally known, has procured a law to be passed expelling the Jesuits and
+all religious in affiliation with them from the empire. It is not
+pretended that the members of that illustrious body, individually or
+collectively, have committed any offence against the state, nor is it even
+proposed that a semblance of a trial should be granted them before
+condemnation; but they have been guilty of opposing the designs of a
+confirmed despot, and their removal from home, country, and the sphere of
+their duties is forthwith decreed, and effected with all that mean
+malignity which subordinates who hope for future favor so well know how to
+exercise towards the victims of official oppression. The summary expulsion
+of so many learned and studious men from their schools and colleges has
+filled Europe with disgust and amazement; and even the more enlightened
+class of German non‐Catholics, who at least know the value of their
+acquirements and wonderful skill in training youth, have denounced, in the
+most forcible terms, an act so detrimental to the true interests of their
+country.
+
+In England, a meeting of prominent Catholics was lately held, to protest,
+in the name of religion and learning, against this exhibition of high‐
+handed authority; but Protestantism, true to its instincts, took the
+alarm, and, lest the Prussian Government might in the slightest degree be
+influenced, hastened to send an address to Berlin to assure Bismarck of
+English sympathy and support. This precious document was signed by fifty‐
+seven persons, including the Marquis of Cholmondeley, the Bishops of
+Worcester and Ripon, Lord Lawrence, Sir Robert Peel, Mr. Arthur Kinnaird,
+the Archbishop of Armagh, the Moderators of the Established Church of
+Scotland, of the United Presbyterian Church of Scotland, of the English
+and Irish Presbyterian Churches, and the President and Secretary of the
+Wesleyan Conference. The reply of Bismarck, who is not remarkable for his
+“religiosity,” is full of sanctimonious cant and what, under the
+circumstances, seems to us very like grim irony:
+
+
+    “Most warmly do I thank you and the gentlemen who were co‐
+    signatories of the address you were good enough to present to me
+    for this encouraging mark of approval. Your communication, sir,
+    possesses a greater value, coming as it does from a _country which
+    Europe has learnt for centuries to regard as the bulwark of civil
+    and religious liberty_. Rightly does the address estimate the
+    difficulties of the struggle which has been forced upon us
+    contrary both to the desire and expectation of the German
+    governments. It would be no light task for the state to preserve
+    religious peace and freedom of conscience, even were it not made
+    more difficult by the misuse of legitimate authority and by the
+    artificial disturbance of the minds of believers. I rejoice that I
+    agree with you on the fundamental principle that in a well‐ordered
+    community every person and every creed should enjoy that measure
+    of liberty which is compatible both with the freedom of the
+    remainder, and also with the independence and safety of the
+    country. God will protect the German Empire in the struggle for
+    this principle, even against those enemies who falsely use his
+    holy name as a pretext for their hostility against our internal
+    peace; but it will be a source of rejoicing to every one of my
+    countrymen that in this contest Germany has met with the approval
+    of so numerous and influential a body of Englishmen.”
+
+
+Now, all this simply means that the man who controls the affairs of
+Germany for the present is determined to destroy or to subject the
+spiritual order to the state; to enforce compulsory education, and
+prescribe forms of faith according to his ideas of what the “independence
+and safety of the country” demand; the penalty of resistance, as in the
+case of the Jesuits, being banishment, persecution, and perhaps worse,
+should the necessities of the case, in his individual judgment, require
+it. In this as in every other respect his word is all‐powerful in the
+empire. Still, we have yet to learn that one advocate of the higher law in
+America, one enemy of the union of church and state, one stickler for the
+rights of conscience, one believer in private judgment and religious
+freedom, has raised his voice against this violation of every right said
+to be so dear to the Protestants of the United States. Not one Protestant
+has _protested_ against this assumption of absolute power over the minds
+and consciences of forty millions of people. Why? The answer is simple:
+the blow, in this instance, is aimed at Catholicity. Yes, the Republic is
+silent when even monarchical England feels herself constrained to speak.
+In a late number of the _Manchester Examiner_, a paper, we believe,
+anything but favorable to Catholics on general grounds, we noticed a very
+pertinent article on the address alluded to, of which the following is an
+extract, and we recommend it to the serious consideration of the
+conductors of the sectarian newspapers:
+
+
+    “We cannot understand why bishops and deans of the English Church
+    should go into ecstasies over a united Germany, or why it should
+    furnish a theme for the pious applause of Wesleyan presidents and
+    Presbyterian moderators. Political changes concern politicians and
+    political societies. When the kingdoms of this world adopt a
+    different principle of grouping, all who take an interest in the
+    political concerns of mankind may find in the altered arrangements
+    abundant reason for gratulation or for dismay, but theological
+    creeds and spiritual interests have no direct concern in the
+    matter. If the unity of Germany were likely to give a great
+    impetus to Roman Catholic doctrine, and aid the extension of Papal
+    authority, Mr. Kinnaird would hardly have found in it a subject of
+    thanksgiving, though, as a political change, it might have been
+    equally desirable. Is it Prince Bismarck’s assumed hostility to
+    the dogma of papal infallibility, and the trenchant steps he has
+    taken with the Jesuits, that constitute the real merit of his
+    policy in Protestant eyes? Well, then, to begin with, it is not at
+    all clear that Prince Bismarck has any absolute aversion either to
+    papal infallibility or to the Jesuits. If the pope had only thrown
+    his influence into the scale of German unity, and employed it to
+    further the new political policy in Fatherland, he might have made
+    himself as infallible as he pleased without provoking any
+    hostility from Prince Bismarck. If the Jesuits, instead of
+    fighting against him, had fought for him, he would have made them
+    welcome to as much power as they liked to grasp. At present, he
+    finds them in his way, and he sends them off about their business;
+    but our Protestant friends must not make too sure of him. He has
+    fourteen millions of Catholics to govern, and he has no wish
+    whatever to be at variance with the Pope. Besides, the necessity
+    for getting rid of the Jesuits by depriving them of their civil
+    rights is a thing to be deplored; since, so far as it does not
+    spring from political considerations, the acts to which it leads
+    are acts of persecution, and entitled to our regret, if not to our
+    reprehension. We like the Jesuits just as little as the Germans
+    do, but we allow them to settle amongst us, feeling sure that the
+    law is strong enough to keep them in order. The thing really to be
+    deplored is that Germany cannot afford to do the same, and it is a
+    proper subject for commiseration rather than for eulogy.”
+
+
+We have said more than enough to convince the most supine Catholic that
+Protestantism in this country has lost little if any of its anti‐Christian
+renown, and, if it cannot persecute here, it is in full sympathy with
+those in Europe who can; that, while it has lost much of its capacity, it
+has given up none of its desire for proscription. Split, as it is, into so
+many antagonistic sects, and constantly losing large numbers who are
+following out its teachings logically and gliding into indifferentism and
+infidelity, it is comparatively powerless to work us new injuries; but it
+is for us, by continued harmony, labor, and self‐sacrifice, to put beyond
+peradventure the question of our right to full and unqualified religious
+liberty and perfect impartiality in the administration of the laws.
+
+
+
+
+Fleurange.
+
+
+By Mrs. Craven, Author Of “A Sister’s Story.”
+
+Translated From The French, With Permission.
+
+
+
+Part Third. The Banks Of The Neckar.
+
+
+XLV.
+
+
+Fleurange, as we have said, generally returned to Rosenheim in the
+evening, but that day she left the princess several hours earlier than
+usual, and it was not yet night when Clement, who was alone in a room on
+the ground floor, absorbed in a large volume open before him, saw her
+suddenly appear at an hour when he expected her the least. Perhaps,
+instead of reading, he had really been dreaming over his cousin’s gayety
+which made him so sad the night before. At all events, when she appeared
+so suddenly before him at this unusual hour, the same sensation contracted
+his heart. There was, however, nothing in her appearance to justify his
+presentiment. He feared in seeing Fleurange again he might behold traces
+of the tears on her face which had probably succeeded her feverish and
+causeless gayety. But now, if not smiling and gay as the evening before,
+if, on the contrary, she looked serious and grave, her brow nevertheless
+was radiant, and in her brilliant eyes it was easy to read an expression
+of almost triumphant joy. All this by no means resembled the dejection
+that usually follows a fit of factitious gayety.
+
+“You are alone!” said she immediately. “So much the better, Clement. I
+have something to tell you—you first, before any one else. You will see,”
+she continued, throwing off her cloak, “that I am faithful to my promise.
+I come to you now as to my brother and my best friend.”
+
+As Clement looked at her and listened to this preamble, his heart
+instinctively warned him more and more strongly a great trial was at hand
+and he must prepare to suffer. But when, without much circumlocution, she
+came to the point; when she clearly laid before him her design; when, with
+a simplicity fearful from the strength of affection and devotedness it
+revealed, she unfolded the plan of her projected immolation—an immolation
+longed for, embraced, and decided upon—Clement literally felt his hair
+stand on end and it seemed to him as if his reason was deserting him.
+
+What! lose one so dear, so precious, so adored!—lose her forever!—and in
+what way?—To see her voluntarily embrace a destiny too horrible for the
+imagination to contemplate. And wherefore?—wherefore?—Ah! the cry of
+Othello now resounded in Clement’s soul: “The cause—the cause!” Yes, the
+cause of this sacrifice was what added so much bitterness to his pain—and
+stung him so sharply, so cruelly, so intolerably, that, overpowered by the
+unexpected disclosure, overcome by an emotion impossible to master,
+Clement for a moment lost all control over himself. A smothered cry
+escaped him, and, leaning his head on his clasped hands, the tears he
+could not repress fell on the floor at his feet.
+
+Clement’s firmness was so habitual that Fleurange was surprised at its
+failing him now, and perhaps at the moment the hidden cause of this fit of
+despair came over her like a momentary flash! But it was no time to dwell
+on such a thought, and, besides, Clement did not give her the opportunity.
+He rose and walked around the room in silence. His manly and courageous
+heart sought to regain self‐control, by an interior appeal to Him who
+alone could save it from bursting and renew its failing strength. He soon
+approached her, having triumphed over his emotion, and his first words
+gave an explanation quiet natural.
+
+“Pardon me, Gabrielle,” said he, “I beg you, for my inconceivable
+weakness. But I could not indeed have any—any friendship whatever for you,
+to consider calmly the frightful perspective you so abruptly unfolded to
+me! You understand that, I imagine?”
+
+“Yes, I expected to see all the rest greatly terrified. But you, Clement—I
+thought you capable of listening coolly to anything?”
+
+“Well, my dear cousin, you had, you see, too high an opinion of my
+courage. However, I will endeavor to behave better in the future. Do not
+deprive me of your confidence, that is all I ask.”
+
+“Oh! no, far from that, for it is on you I rely to inform the rest of the
+family of my resolution, and especially, and before any one else, your
+mother. You may imagine, Clement, that I must have her consent, and her
+blessing likewise. And you will plead my cause with her.”
+
+Clement was silent for some moments. He was trying to command his voice,
+but it still trembled as he said: “And when do you think of starting?”
+
+“In a week, if I can.”
+
+“In a week!—That will be before the end of January! And have you thought
+of the means of making such a journey at this season?”
+
+Fleurange hesitated. “I am quite well aware,” said she, “that it will be
+difficult for me to go alone.”
+
+Clement hastily interrupted her in a terrified tone: “Alone!—I declare,
+Gabrielle, it is impossible to listen to you coolly, though I know your
+rash words must be taken seriously.”
+
+“You must, however, take them so,” said she, in the same tone of energetic
+tenderness which had struck the Princess Catherine. “You must resign
+yourself to see me set out alone, if there is no other means of joining
+him.”
+
+Oh! how willingly Clement would that moment have changed places with the
+prisoner! He was looking at Fleurange with sorrowful admiration when she
+resumed: “I thought it would not be difficult to find some one travelling
+to Russia with whom I could make the journey.”
+
+“Go with strangers on so long and tedious a journey! That is impossible,
+Gabrielle, more impossible than the rest.”
+
+“Ah!” cried Fleurange then, “with what confidence I would have had
+recourse to the kind friend Heaven once sent me. I feel his loss more now
+than ever.”
+
+“You mean Doctor Leblanc?—Yes, I render justice to his memory. I am sure
+his devotedness would not have failed you under these circumstances. But
+you try my patience indeed, Gabrielle; you are too cruel.”
+
+“Clement!—”
+
+“What! you need a friend who has the unpretending merit of being faithful,
+devoted, capable of protecting you in so difficult a journey, and ready to
+remain with you till—till he can follow you no longer! And at such a time
+you do not deign even to remember you have a brother! And do you not see
+that, in thinking of others, you overlook what is at once his privilege
+and his duty?”
+
+“Clement! my dear Clement!” said Fleurange, with tearful surprise, “what
+do you say? and what answer can I make? Assuredly I relied, and do rely,
+on you as a brother, and yet I confess I should not have ventured to ask
+you to make such a journey with me.”
+
+Clement smiled bitterly. He could not help comparing what she was ready to
+do for another with what she thought him incapable of doing for her.
+
+“Well, my cousin,” said he coldly, “you were wrong; it seems to me it was
+the very time to remember the promise you made me. As to me, I am merely
+faithful to the engagement I made the same day, that is all.”
+
+“God bless you, Clement!—bless and reward you!” said she, much affected.
+“Yes, I acknowledge I was wrong. I should have known there was no kindness
+on earth equal to yours.”
+
+She held out her hand. He pressed it in his without saying a word, and
+without looking at her; then they separated. Fleurange longed to be alone.
+Clement went to fulfil her commission to his mother.
+
+
+XLVI.
+
+
+It was the professor’s regular hour of repose in the latter part of the
+morning. Everything was quiet around him. His wife was seated at her wheel
+in the next room ready to answer the slightest call; for Madame Dornthal
+knew how to handle the spindle, and, in accordance with a custom kept up
+longer in Germany than anywhere else, had spun with her own hands the two
+finest pieces of linen for her daughter’s trousseau. She looked up as her
+son entered, and saw by his face that something agitated him. She gave him
+an inquiring look.
+
+“I wish to speak to you, mother,” said he, in a low tone. “Let us go where
+we can talk freely.”
+
+Madame Dornthal stopped spinning, immediately rose, and, ordering a young
+servant to take her place and call her if needed, she followed her son,
+softly closing the door behind her.
+
+The opposite door, on the same corridor, opened into Clement’s chamber.
+They went there. Clement began to relate the conversation he had just had.
+His first words were met by an exclamation of surprise, after which Madame
+Dornthal listened without interrupting him. Her face by turns expressed
+interest, pity, and admiration, as he spoke; and it was with tearful eyes
+and a faltering voice she finally replied:
+
+“My consent and blessing, do you say? You ask them for her? Poor child!
+how can I refuse my blessing to such devotedness! But my consent,” she
+continued gravely—“I cannot give that unconditionally.”
+
+“What! mother,” said Clement earnestly, “can you think of refusing to let
+her go?”
+
+“No, dear Clement; but I can refuse to let you accompany her.”
+
+Clement started. “Mother!” cried he with surprise.
+
+Madame Dornthal brushed back Clement’s hair with her hand, and looked him
+in the face, as we know she loved to do when moved to unusual tenderness
+towards him, then slowly said:
+
+“Alone to St. Petersburg with Gabrielle! Have you reflected on this,
+Clement?”
+
+Clement’s face slightly flushed, but his eyes met his mother’s with a
+beautiful expression of candor and purity. “Mother,” said he, “Gabrielle
+looks upon me as a brother. As for me”—he hesitated a moment and turned
+pale, but continued in a firm tone—“as for me, I regard her now as the
+wife of another. I hope you do not think it possible I can ever forget
+it!”
+
+Madame Dornthal’s eyes filled with tears, and for a moment she looked at
+her son silently. Never had she loved him so much! Never had she so fully
+comprehended how worthy of affection he was! But the hour had come—perhaps
+the only period in life when the most passionate maternal love is
+powerless, and can do nothing, absolutely nothing, to comfort her
+suffering child!
+
+She realized this; she felt she must respect her son’s secret sorrow, and
+repress the impulse of her own affection. Neither compassion nor sympathy
+could be of any avail at such a time. She therefore refrained with the
+sure instinct of a responsive heart, and Clement’s agitation soon
+subsided. He resumed in a calm tone:
+
+“If you think it indispensable on her account, or on account of others,
+that a third person should go with us, then, mother, we will try to find
+some one.”
+
+“Ah!” said Madame Dornthal, “if a cherished and paramount obligation did
+not retain me here, you would not have far to go for some one.”
+
+Clement took his mother’s hand and kissed it. “I thought so,” said he,
+smiling. Then he continued: “We shall find some one, you may be sure, if
+necessary. For the moment we will leave it; we have something else to do.”
+And so to one after another the astonishing news was announced by him and
+his mother: first to the professor, and then to all the other members of
+the family. We will not describe their feelings individually, we will not
+tell how many tears were shed, what a succession of emotions poor
+Fleurange had to pass through that day. We will only say that, on the
+whole, they were all much more affected than surprised. So pure an
+atmosphere pervaded this unpretending household that everything beautiful
+and noble was at once perceived and comprehended without difficulty. To
+lose this charming sister, who had grown dearer and dearer, was too
+painful to be concealed, but Madame Dornthal’s daughters, like her, were
+ready for any sacrifice. Therefore the young girl felt that they entered
+into her feelings, and would regret, without blaming her. This sympathy
+not only increased her affection for those she was to leave, but gave
+great support to her courage.
+
+The only person who did not at first participate in this general heroism
+was Mademoiselle Josephine. The knowledge of Fleurange’s resolution threw
+her into a state of stupefaction that would have been comical under any
+other circumstances. Her eyes wandered from one to another with a
+perplexed expression of consternation, as if imploring an explanation
+which would enable her to comprehend so extraordinary a fact. When, at her
+usual time, she joined the family circle in the evening, she was still
+speechless. She took her place among them, knitting‐work in hand, without
+saying a word or looking at any one.
+
+The professor, cautiously informed of this new separation, heard it with
+resignation—a feeling that had grown upon him with respect to everything,
+in consequence of the increasing conviction that he had a long time to
+suffer and should never be well. Fleurange was now sitting near him.
+Madame Dornthal and her daughters were at work beside the table where sat
+the silent Josephine. Clement alone sat apart, talking in a low tone with
+his little sister on his knee. She was in her turn asking an explanation
+which no one had thought of giving her. While he was replying in a
+whisper, Frida’s large eyes opened to their utmost extent, her little
+mouth contracted, and a flood of tears inundated her face; then she threw
+both her arms around her brother’s neck, and said in broken accents:
+
+“O Clement! how can I do without her?—I love her so much!—I love her so
+much!—”
+
+Clement hid his face in the child’s long curls, pressed her in his arms,
+and kissed her affectionately, but he could not succeed in calming her
+till he promised that Gabrielle should return, and that he would bring her
+back. At this assurance, the child’s tears ceased to flow, she became
+quiet, and remained serious and thoughtful in her brother’s arms.
+
+All at once Mademoiselle Josephine broke her long silence: “Siberia is a
+great way off, is it not?” said she.
+
+A general smile accompanied the reply to this question, which was the
+first‐fruit of the elderly maiden’s prolonged deliberations.
+
+“And is Clement going to Siberia, also?”
+
+“No; he is going to St. Petersburg.”
+
+“And how far is to St. Petersburg?”
+
+They replied by giving her a full account of the way Fleurange would take
+to reach the end of her first journey. Being enlightened on this point,
+mademoiselle relapsed into her former silence, but not for a long time. A
+new idea suddenly occurred to her. She snatched off her glasses hastily.
+
+“But those two children cannot travel all alone!” she exclaimed.
+
+Madame Dornthal and Fleurange looked up, and Clement gave a start which
+disturbed the sleep into which Frida had fallen: every one became
+attentive.
+
+“No, certainly not,” said the old lady earnestly. “How would that look, I
+beg to know?—Excuse me, Clement, you know how I esteem and love you; but
+then, my good friend, how old are you, pray? And as to Gabrielle, besides
+her age (which is equally objectionable), she has, as I have told her a
+thousand times, a dangerous face—a face which will not allow her to do a
+great many things permissible to others not older than she—I tell you the
+truth, and defy any one to deny it.”
+
+No one attempted it, for the thought just expressed so characteristically
+was the opinion of all.
+
+“Therefore,” continued mademoiselle, “Gabrielle must be accompanied by
+some respectable person. Once more pardon, Clement; this does not imply
+you can be dispensed with (you are a protector not to be easily replaced);
+but, my dear friend, _les convenances_ require she should have at the same
+time an elderly and reliable companion. Now, I propose that this reliable
+and elderly person be—myself!—”
+
+There was a general exclamation at these unexpected words. Every one spoke
+at once, and for some moments no one could be heard. The good Mademoiselle
+Josephine, however, comprehended at once that her proposition was
+generally approved. But before any one uttered a word, before Clement even
+had time to go and grasp her hand, Fleurange sprang forward, and, throwing
+her arms around her old friend’s neck, exclaimed: “Oh! how shall I thank
+you?—May God reward you for all it is his will I should owe you!”
+
+This signified that she accepted her generous offer without any formality.
+A few hours previous, her aunt, we know, had attached a condition to her
+consent, and this was preoccupying Fleurange when her excellent old friend
+suddenly decided the matter in so unexpected a way.
+
+From this moment, everything was plain to Mademoiselle Josephine. The
+opportunity she so greatly desired had not been long delayed. In this
+extraordinary phase of Gabrielle’s life she found an opportunity of
+manifesting the greatest devotedness, and of retarding still longer the
+hour of separation from her beloved _protégée_. She felt comforted, and
+was at once restored to her usual placid good humor. There remained,
+however, more than one misconception about the whole arrangement which she
+could not seem to clear up.
+
+“Why,” said she an hour after, when, following her servant, who had come
+for her with a lantern, she took Clement’s arm to go home—“why cannot we
+also go to Siberia with her, if not disagreeable to this M. le Comte,
+whose name I can never pronounce?”
+
+Clement could not repress a smile at this, but there was too much
+bitterness in it for him to wish to reply. She did not perceive it. She
+was only thinking aloud without regard to him, and, following the course
+of her reflections, she soon made another, which, far from exciting the
+least temptation to smile, made Clement shudder from head to foot.
+
+“If,” she said, after a few moments’ silence—“if this Monsieur George is
+only worthy of the sacrifice she is going to make for him!—If after
+leaving us all—us who love her so much—she does not hereafter discover he
+does not love her as much as we!”
+
+
+XLVII.
+
+
+Clement left Mademoiselle Josephine at her door, and hastened back,
+struggling against the new tempest excited in his breast by the words he
+had just heard. Hitherto, in consequence of the impressions left by his
+meeting with Count George, and the prestige he had acquired in his eyes
+from the very attachment of his cousin, Clement had always regarded him as
+a superior being, to whom it merely seemed right, in the unpretending
+simplicity of his heart, that his humble affection should be sacrificed.
+To doubt him worthy of her—to fear that, beloved by her, he could cease to
+love in return, had never occurred to him, and mademoiselle had quite
+unwittingly thrust a warm blade into his bleeding heart. To admit such a
+thought would absolutely shake the foundations of his devotion and add
+despair to abnegation. He therefore repelled the thought with a kind of
+terror, and by way of reassuring himself he began to recall all the
+remembrances that once were so torturing. He took pleasure in dreaming of
+the devotion of which his rival was the object, the better to persuade
+himself it was absolutely contrary to the nature of things he could ever
+be ungrateful.
+
+Fleurange’s reflections at the same hour were of a different nature.
+Somewhat recovered from the successive emotions of the day, she could now
+freely indulge in the secret joy with which her heart overflowed. She was
+at last free!—free to think of George—at liberty to love him and to
+confess it! The feeling so long repressed, fought against, and concealed,
+could now be indulged in without restraint! A few weeks more, and she
+would be with him!—She would be his!—All horror of the fate she was going
+to participate in was lost in the thought of bestowing on him, in the hour
+of abandonment and misfortune, all the treasures of her devotion and love,
+and this appeared a sweeter realization of her dreams than if united to
+him in the midst of all the _éclat_ that rank and fortune surrounded him
+with!—
+
+Ah! Madre Maddalena was right in thinking hers was not a heart called to
+the supreme honor of loving God alone, of bestowing on him that ineffable
+love which does not suffer the contact of any other affection, that unique
+love which, if it has not always been supreme, blots out, as soon as it
+springs up, all other love, as the sun causes the darkness to flee away
+and return no more to its presence!... “Whosoever loveth, knoweth the cry
+of this voice.”(132)
+
+It was this voice which spoke directly to Madre Maddalena’s heart.
+Fleurange did not hear it so distinctly, even while silently listening to
+it apart from the noise of the world, though by no means deaf to the
+divine inspirations. She was pure: she was pious and steadfast: she had a
+fervent and courageous heart—a heart shut against evil, which preferred
+nothing to God, but which was ardently susceptible to affection when she
+could yield to it without remorse. This is doubtless the appointed way for
+nearly all, even among the best, and it is the ordinary path of virtue.
+But we would observe here that it is not the path of exquisite and
+inexpressible happiness already referred to, and we moreover add that,
+when a soul is inclined to make an idol of the object of its love, and
+place it on too frail a foundation, it is not rare that
+suffering—suffering whose severity is in proportion to the beauty and
+purity of the soul—leads it back sooner or later to that point where it
+sees the true centre to which, even unknown to ourselves, we all aspire,
+and which all human passion, even the most noble and most legitimate in
+the world, makes us lose sight of.
+
+Fleurange perhaps had a confused intuition of this, and it made her look
+upon the frightful conditions on which happiness was vouchsafed her as a
+kind of expiation, which she accepted with joy, hoping thereby to assure
+the permanence of the love that overruled all other sentiments.
+
+After Gabrielle’s conversation with Princess Catherine, the state of the
+latter underwent a salutary change. Her physical sufferings, and her grief
+itself, seemed suspended. A fresh activity was aroused as soon as she
+perceived a way of exerting herself for her son, and entering into almost
+direct communication with him. Let us add to these motives the princess’
+natural taste for the extraordinary, and we shall comprehend that
+Fleurange’s heroic resolution afforded her an interesting distraction,
+and, at the same time, a source of activity which was useful and
+beneficial.
+
+She made every arrangement herself. They were forced to allow her to
+direct all the preparations for the long journey the young girl was going
+to undertake. She and her elderly companion were to go as far as St.
+Petersburg in one of the princess’ best carriages, and everything that
+would enable Fleurange to bear the severe cold on the way was anxiously
+prepared. At St. Petersburg, it was decided she should take up her
+residence in the princess’ house until the day—the terrible day of the
+departure that must follow.
+
+All this was transmitted by the princess to the Marquis Adelardi, whom she
+charged to receive and protect Gabrielle. Moreover, he must find means of
+announcing to George the unexpected alleviation Heaven granted to his
+misfortunes.
+
+As to the steps to be taken in order to obtain the necessary permission
+for the accomplishment of this strange lugubrious marriage, and for the
+newly‐made wife to accompany her condemned husband, the princess thought
+the most successful course would be to obtain for Gabrielle an audience of
+the empress.
+
+“Either I am very much deceived,” wrote the princess, “or her heart will
+be touched by such heroic devotion, by Gabrielle’s appearance, and the
+charm there is about her, and perhaps even by a remnant of pity for my
+poor George. Something tells me this pity still survives the favor he
+showed himself unworthy of, and that the day will perchance come when I
+can appeal to her with success. Obtain my son’s pardon!—behold him
+again!—Yes, in spite of everything, I hope, I believe, I may say I feel
+sure, that sooner or later this happiness will be granted me, unless so
+much sorrow shortens my life. Nevertheless, the effect of this terrible
+sentence, should he incur its penalty only for a day, will never be
+effaced. I feel it. My hopes for him have all vanished, never to return.
+How, then, could I hesitate to accept Gabrielle’s generous sacrifice—to
+accept it at first with a transport of enthusiasm which, I confess, I was
+seized with when, with indescribable words and accents, she so
+unexpectedly begged my consent on her knees, but afterwards deliberately,
+and, in consideration of the strange and painful circumstances in which we
+are situated, with sincere gratitude?”
+
+“No doubt,” she added, with an instinctive and natural feeling, never
+wholly or for a long time dormant—“no doubt, when the time comes which I
+look forward to with hope—the time when he will be restored to me, other
+regrets will revive. But then, his condemnation, only too certain, puts an
+end to all hope in that direction. The conspirator acquitted, or even
+pardoned, might win a heart in which love perhaps still pleads his cause;
+but the haughty Vera will never bestow a thought on the returned exile
+from Siberia. I resign myself, therefore—and, after all, Gabrielle is
+charming, and, as far as I know, he never loved any one else as well. You
+will perhaps say that a quick fire is soon extinguished in George’s heart.
+I know that well, but it is very certain that this young girl’s devotion
+is calculated to foster the love she has inspired, and even to revive it
+if deadened by the revolutionary tempest he has passed through. As for me,
+I know, if anything can make me endure this fearful separation, it is the
+thought that this beautiful and noble creature, who is better fitted than
+any one else to preserve him from despair, will be with him in his exile.”
+
+In the princess’ eyes, Gabrielle was, in spite of the pure generosity of
+her love, only a _pis‐aller_, or rather she was only something relatively
+to herself. She overwhelmed her to‐day with attentions and caresses as
+before she abruptly dismissed her, and as she would be quite ready to do
+again if a sudden turn of fortune brought about chances more favorable to
+her wishes. But, even if all these sentiments were evident, they could not
+change Gabrielle’s determination or diminish her courage. Her fate was
+already united in heart to George’s. Everything but this thought, and the
+anticipated joys and sacrifices connected with it, became indifferent to
+her. Calm and serene, she made all the preparations for her departure
+without haste or anxiety, and was equally mindful of her dear old friend,
+for whom she reserved the rich furs and all the other things which the
+princess had been careful to provide for herself as a protection against
+the cold.
+
+The days, however, passed rapidly away, and as the time of separation
+approached, more courage was required for those she was to leave behind
+than for herself.
+
+And when the farewell hour at length arrived, and she knelt in church with
+Clement, to utter a last prayer, the All‐Seeing Eye saw to which of the
+two belonged at that moment the palm of devotedness and sacrifice.
+
+
+
+Part Fourth. The Immolation.
+
+
+    L’amour vrai, c’est l’oubli de soi.
+
+
+XLVIII.
+
+
+Our travellers were already far away, having pursued their journey for
+more than twelve days without stopping. In spite of the increasing
+severity of the weather, Fleurange and her companion went as far as
+Berlin, and even beyond, without suffering from the cold—thanks to the
+numerous precautions taken by the princess to protect them from it. But at
+Königsberg they were obliged to leave the comfortable carriage in which
+they had travelled thus far, for they wished, above all things, to travel
+fast, and they had the Strand to cross (the only way to St. Petersburgh at
+that season), that is to say, the narrow tongue of sandy soil that extends
+along the Baltic as far as the arm of the sea which separates Prussia from
+Courland like a wide canal, and then forms the basin or inland lake of
+Kurishe Haff. This bounds the Strand at the right, whereas at the left its
+dreary coast is shut in between the sea and the high dunes of sand which
+ward off the winds from the scattered habitations of this desolate region,
+all situated so as to face the lake and turn their backs on the sea.
+
+The princess’ carriage remained, therefore, at Königsberg, to await the
+return of Fleurange’s travelling companions. She took with her, however,
+the rich furs, so warm and light, with which she had been provided, to
+wrap around Mademoiselle Josephine, in spite of her resistance. As for
+herself, she reserved a cloak of sufficiently thick material to protect
+her from the cold, not wishing to accustom herself to comforts she must
+afterwards be deprived of.
+
+The change from one carriage to another was promptly effected, and the
+small calèche in which they were closely seated was soon on its way over
+the Strand towards Memel, which they hoped to reach the same evening.
+Clement, in front, gazed with secret horror on the desolate aspect of
+nature. Everything around him seemed a fitting prelude to that Inferno of
+ice towards which he was escorting her whom he would gladly have sheltered
+from too rude a summer breeze.
+
+The weather was not as cold as on the previous day. The gray clouds
+charged with rain seemed to indicate a sudden thaw, and through them the
+sun, veiled as before a coming storm, cast a pale light over the dark
+waves and the sandy shore. The postilion, to favor his horses, rode so
+close to the water that the waves broke over their pathway. To the right
+rose the dismal sand‐hills, and on that side, as well as before them,
+nothing was to be seen but sand as far as the eye could reach; to the
+left, nothing but the tumultuous and threatening waves. Not a house far or
+near, not a tree, not a blade of grass, not a living creature, save now
+and then some sea‐birds skimming wildly over the waves, adding another
+melancholy feature to the dreariness of the scene, which with the storm
+was a sufficiently exact image of the mental condition of him who was
+regarding it.
+
+As to Fleurange, instead of looking around, she closed her eyes, the
+better to wander in imagination among the cherished scenes of the past and
+those she looked forward to. She beheld again the blue waters of the
+Mediterranean, and the radiant sky whose azure they reflect, and the
+graceful undulations of the mountains veiled in a pearly mist; then
+Florence, sparkling and poetical in the golden rays of departing light,
+and beside her she heard a voice murmuring words once dangerous to hear,
+but now delicious to recall and repeat to herself. How much she then
+suffered in struggling against her own impulses! Recalling those
+sufferings, how could she fear those she was about to brave?—sufferings
+repaid by the immense happiness of loving!—of loving without fear!—loving
+without remorse!—Besides, they were both young.—His mother’s hopes might
+be realized.—Yes, perhaps some day they would again behold, and together,
+that charming region, and then in the restored brilliancy of his former
+position, with her beside him, he would be convinced, convinced beyond
+doubt, that that was not the attraction which had won her, but really
+himself, and only him, whom she loved!
+
+Yes, she was now happy; no fears troubled her; she was full of hope; and,
+as it is said of the only great and true love that it “believes it may and
+can do all things,”(133) so earthly love which is its pale but faithful
+reflection, made every earthly happiness appear possible and certain to
+Fleurange, inasmuch as the greatest of all was in store for her.
+
+Clement was still absorbed in silent contemplation, and Fleurange in her
+sweet dreams, when Mademoiselle Josephine awoke from the drowsiness
+favored by the ample furs in which she was wrapped, which not only
+excluded the air but the sight of outward objects. She looked up and
+around for the first time that morning, and gave a sudden start of
+surprise.
+
+“Ah! mon Dieu! mon Dieu!—” she cried with alarm. “Gabrielle, what is
+that?”
+
+Fleurange, suddenly recalled from the land of dreams to what was passing
+around her, replied: “It is the sea. Did you not notice it before?”
+
+“The sea!—the sea!—” repeated Mademoiselle Josephine, as if stupefied.
+“No, I had not seen it, and never imagined we should go on the sea in a
+carriage.—What a country! What a journey!” murmured she to herself,
+endeavoring to conceal the terror she had not ceased to feel as they
+proceeded on their way and found everything so different from France, and
+consequently the more alarming. But in her way she made an act of heroism
+in trying to overcome the surprise and fear caused by so many strange
+sights. She was especially desirous of not being troublesome to her
+companions. “Besides,” thought she, “if these two children are not afraid,
+I must at least appear as brave as they.” Nevertheless, she could not help
+repeating with astonishment: “Going on the sea in a carriage—it is really
+very singular!”
+
+Fleurange laughed. “Here, dear mademoiselle, look on this side, and you
+will see we are not on the sea, but only on the shore.”
+
+“Very near it, however, for we are riding through the water.”
+
+“It is only the waves that break on the shore and then recede. There, you
+see the land, now.”
+
+Mademoiselle felt somewhat reassured. She looked to the right, she looked
+to the left, she looked before her, then turned her eyes towards the
+gloomy immensity of the sea beside which they were riding.
+
+“Oh! how dismal, how repulsive it is,” she exclaimed, at last.
+
+Fleurange now gazed around. Her thoughts were no longer wandering. “The
+scene is indeed singularly gloomy,” said she. “The leaden sky—that mock
+sun—the dark waters of that melancholy sea, and the interminable sand.
+Yes, the whole region is frightful!” And she slightly shuddered.
+
+“I have always been told,” said mademoiselle, “that the sea was glorious;
+but it seems it was a traveller’s tale for the benefit of those who never
+go from home.”
+
+“No, no,” cried Fleurange, “do not say so. The sea is really beautiful
+where it is as blue as the heavens above, and where its shores are
+luxuriant with trees, plants, and flowers; but not here, I acknowledge.”
+
+And, in spite of herself, the sweet impression of her recent dreams,
+caused by the contrast, entirely vanished. Her heart sank. She became
+silent, and for a long time none of the three travellers spoke.
+
+The Strand, about twelve or fourteen leagues in length, was divided into
+several stages by post‐stations on the other side of the sand‐hills,
+whence were brought fresh horses. A carriage could not approach the
+stations on account of the deep sand, and when they paused a few moments
+to exchange horses, the travellers were only made aware of a neighboring
+habitation by a peal of the horn which responded afar off to that of the
+postilion as he announced his approach. While they were thus halting at
+the last stage, Fleurange noticed Clement’s anxious look towards the sea
+and the threatening sky. The wind grew stronger and stronger, and the
+waves mounted higher. A violent storm was evidently at hand. She beckoned
+to him, and said in a tone inaudible to her companion: “We are going to
+have bad weather, are we not?”
+
+“Yes,” replied he, in the same tone. “It will be dark in about an hour,
+and I fear we may find the crossing rough and difficult. I do not say this
+on your account,” added he, with a somewhat forced smile. “I know well I
+am not allowed to tremble for you, however great the danger, but I fear
+you may find it difficult by‐and‐by to reassure your poor friend.”
+
+He mounted to his seat again, ordered the postilion to hurry, and the
+little calèche set off as speedily as possible to avoid the enormous waves
+which threatened to upset them. In spite of their haste, night came on,
+and the storm set in before they arrived at the ferry across the arm of
+the sea which connects the Kurische Haff with the Baltic. The passage was
+short but dangerous. They could not stop an instant, for, though well
+sheltered here, the sea rose higher and higher, and the large boat that
+was to take the carriage across was difficult to manage in bad weather.
+They therefore rapidly descended the bank to the boat, and Mademoiselle
+Josephine was roused from the drowsiness produced by the motion of the
+carriage, by a sudden and violent shock, accompanied by cries and
+vociferations mingled with the roar of the sea and the frightful howling
+of the wind.
+
+“O Jesus, my Saviour!” prayed the poor demoiselle, clasping her hands with
+terror: “the time, then, has come for us to die!”
+
+The rain fell in torrents. The waves broke over the boat. Darkness added
+its horrors to the danger, which, to her inexperienced eyes, appeared to
+be extreme. The sweet voice of her young companion vainly sought to
+encourage her. By the light of the lanterns carried from side to side to
+light the boatman, she soon distinguished Clement standing beside the
+carriage, holding up a sail with a firm hand to screen them on the side
+most exposed to the waves.
+
+“Poor Clement,” she exclaimed, “it is all over with us, then.”
+
+“No, not quite, unfortunately,” replied Clement. “It will be at least half
+an hour before we reach the shore.”
+
+“The shore!—the shore!—He imagines, then, we shall reach it alive?” said
+mademoiselle, hiding her face on Fleurange’s shoulder.
+
+“Yes, yes,” replied the latter, pressing her in her arms. “Dear friend,
+there is no danger, I assure you. Believe me, I am only alarmed to see you
+so terrified.”
+
+“Pardon me, child,” said the other, raising her head. “I resolved you
+should know nothing about it. But this time, Gabrielle, you cannot say we
+are not crossing the sea in a carriage,” continued she, with renewed alarm
+as she felt the increased motion of the waves.
+
+Fleurange embraced her, repeating the same reassuring words. The poor old
+lady made no reply, she was trying to overcome her terror by a genuine act
+of heroism. “Danger or not, it is like what I have always imagined a
+terrible tempest, destructive of human life. But then,” murmured she still
+lower, “God overrules all, and nothing happens without his consent.”
+
+Her physical nature was weak, but her soul was strong, and piety, a
+support in every trial, served now to calm her. She began to pray
+mentally, and did not utter another word till they reached the shore.
+
+
+XLIX.
+
+
+But a far greater danger awaited our travellers beyond Memel, whence they
+continued their journey the following day in sledges. The first,
+containing their baggage, preceded them several hours in advance to
+announce their arrival at the post‐stations; the second somewhat resembled
+a clumsy boat on runners, surmounted by a hood, and protected by a boot of
+thick fur. It was in this sledge Fleurange and her companion were stowed
+away. They were obliged to lie nearly down to avoid the piercing wind. The
+third vehicle, entirely uncovered, was very light, and so small that it
+barely contained Clement, in front of whom sat a young fellow wrapped in a
+caftan, strong and vigorous, but with a slender form quite adapted to the
+seat he occupied and the sledge he drove. With this light equipage Clement
+went like the wind, sometimes preceding the other sledge as a guide, and
+then returning to accompany it and watch over its safety.
+
+The cold had become as intense as ever within a few hours. The pouring
+rain of the previous night after several days of thawing weather, alarming
+at that season, caused great gullies in the road, and endangered the
+passage over the rivers, at that time of the year, on the ice. Though
+scarcely four o’clock, the short day was nearly ended, and daylight was
+declining when our travellers came to the river they were obliged to cross
+in order to reach the small town of Y——. It was a deep, rapid stream,
+which at the beginning of every winter was encumbered with thick cakes of
+floating ice before the surface of its waters was congealed, and which, at
+the approach of spring, was also the first to resume its course and break
+the icy fetters that confined its current. This river was therefore almost
+always difficult to pass over, and very often dangerous, and, when the
+travellers came to the only place where it could be crossed, they felt
+they had reason to be anxious about the thaw. As soon as Clement cast his
+eyes on the river, he thought there were really some alarming indications.
+He at once saw there was no time to be lost, and drove directly on to the
+ice. Then he stopped, and hurriedly said to the young guide: “I think we
+should let the heaviest sledge go first: we will follow, if we can.”
+
+“Yes, if we can,” said the other.
+
+The order was instantly given, and the sledge that contained Fleurange and
+her companion passed rapidly on. But it had scarcely gone ten or twelve
+feet from the shore before an ominous cracking was heard. The frightened
+driver stopped. Clement imperiously ordered him to proceed without a
+second’s delay. But, instead of obeying, the driver, seized with fear,
+jumped out on the ice and sprang back to the shore he had just left. This
+jar increased the breaking of the ice which had already commenced. That
+next the shore gave way and began to move with the current, leaving an
+open gulf between the land and the still solid ice where our travellers
+remained. Great promptness of decision was necessary at a moment of such
+sudden and extreme danger, and orders as prompt as the judgment.
+
+“Descend, Gabrielle,” said Clement, with authority.
+
+The young girl instantly sprang from the sledge. Clement took Mademoiselle
+Josephine in his arms and placed her beside Fleurange.
+
+“Get into my sledge, Gabrielle,” said he calmly, but very quickly. “As
+soon as you are safe, the sledge shall return for your friend. There is
+time, but you must not hesitate.”
+
+“I do not hesitate,” said Fleurange. “I shall remain myself: she shall be
+saved first.”
+
+Clement shuddered. But there was not time to contest the point. Besides,
+he knew from the tone of Fleurange’s voice that her decision was
+irrevocable, and he yielded without another word. He placed poor
+mademoiselle, who was incapable of comprehending what was transpiring, in
+the light sledge, gave the order—obeyed at once—and it darted off. The
+sound of the bells on the horses’ necks was heard for a few moments, and
+then died away.
+
+Fleurange and Clement were left alone. Night was gathering around them.
+Not far off could be heard the slow cracking of the ice beneath the heavy
+weight of the sledge at the edge of the first opening. The noise
+increased, and the ice broke away the second time. The huge mass, thus
+detached, quivered, then, like the first, slowly descended the river,
+carrying the sledge with it. The opening became frightfully large. Clement
+looked before him to see if he could venture, by taking Fleurange in his
+arms, to cross on foot the long interval that separated them from the
+opposite shore. But it was too dark to distinguish the path, and, if they
+left that, death was inevitable. They might lose the only chance of being
+saved—by awaiting the return of the sledge. And yet they could not remain
+long where they were. The ice was already loosening around them. In a few
+moments there was another cracking, and it gave way before them. The
+fragment on which they stood became a kind of floating island. Clement saw
+at a glance the only course to be taken. He did not hesitate. He seized
+Fleurange in his arms, and, by the uncertain light of the snow, sprang
+boldly across the opening before them. They were once more on the solid
+ice, but who could tell how long it would be so? Who knew whether the
+sledge would succeed in reaching them again? Perhaps it was swallowed up
+in the impenetrable darkness, or left on the ice broken up around it.
+Otherwise it should have returned.
+
+These thoughts crowded into Clement’s mind faster than they can be
+written. Fleurange, silent but courageous, was equally sensible of their
+danger. She bent down her head and silently prayed. Leaning thus against
+Clement, her hair brushing his very face, she might have heard the rapid
+pulsations of his heart and felt the trembling of the arm that supported
+her, and the hand that pressed her own. But he did not utter a word. His
+sensations were strange. A desire to save her doubled his strength and
+courage, and quickened all his faculties. At the same time, he was
+conscious of a transport he could not control—that she was there alone
+with him, that they were to die together, and she would never be able to
+fulfil the odious design of her journey!
+
+But this moment of selfish love and despair was short. His thoughts
+returned to her—her alone. He must save her—save her at whatever cost. But
+how? It seemed as if an hour had passed away. It was useless to hope for
+the return of the sledge.—He thought he felt the ice quiver anew beneath
+his feet.—He looked at the dark current behind. Should he jump into the
+water, and endeavor to regain the shore they had left, but now no longer
+visible?—He hesitated a moment—no, that would expose her to certain death,
+and a more speedy one than now threatened them. It would be better to
+remain where they were, and endure the fearful suspense to the end.
+
+They therefore remained motionless for some minutes more of silent agony.
+Notwithstanding her courage, the young girl’s strength began to fail. Her
+sight grew dim. There was a strange hum in her ears. Then her head fell on
+her cousin’s shoulder.
+
+“Oh! I am dying,” murmured she. “May God restore you to your mother,
+Clement!”
+
+At this moment of supreme anguish, Clement raised his eyes to heaven, and
+the cry of love and despair that rose from his heart was a prayer as
+ardent and pure as was ever uttered by childlike faith. He felt he was
+heard. Yes, almost at the same instant.—Was he mistaken? Afar off, so far
+he could hardly catch the sound, he thought he heard the jingle of bells.
+He listened without breathing.—O Divine Goodness! is it true?—Yes, yes,
+there is no longer any doubt. The sound becomes more distinct. It
+approaches.—It is really the sledge.—It is coming rapidly; it reaches
+them; it stops; it is really there!
+
+“Blessed be God! she is saved!” was Clement’s cry. But Fleurange, overcome
+by weakness and terror, was already senseless in his arms.
+
+He bore her to the sledge, and as he placed her within, but half conscious
+of what was occurring, he pressed her once more to his heart with
+unrestrained tenderness, and said: “Adieu, dear Gabrielle. Regret not that
+I die here. God is good. He spares me the sorrow of living without you.”
+And he added, in a lower tone: “Gabrielle, I have loved you more than
+anything else in the world. I can acknowledge it now, for death is at
+hand.” Then he stepped back, and ordered the young guide to hurry away.
+
+His first words had only been indistinctly heard by Fleurange, as in a
+dream; but she clearly understood this precise order. It brought her at
+once to herself.
+
+“Away!” she exclaimed. “Away without you! What do you mean?”
+
+“It must be so,” said Clement. “The sledge can only hold you and the
+guide. Any additional weight would be dangerous. Go, without an instant’s
+delay.”
+
+“Never!” said Fleurange resolutely. “Clement, we will all three die here,
+rather than leave you!”
+
+“You must go!” repeated Clement energetically. “Go, I tell you! The sledge
+will return for me.”
+
+“It will be impossible to cross a third time,” said the young conductor.
+
+Clement knew it. He only replied by imperiously ordering him to start.
+
+Fleurange, no less firm than Clement, rose and checked the hand that held
+the reins. The driver at once jumped down from his seat. “Do you know how
+to drive?” said he.
+
+“Yes.”
+
+“Well, I know how to swim. Here, get in quick.—Keep that for me,”
+continued he, hastily taking off his caftan and throwing it into the
+sledge. “Do not be uneasy. I shall get it again to‐morrow. I know the way
+and am familiar with the river.”
+
+And without hesitating he plunged into the dark current, while Clement
+sprang to his seat in the sledge.
+
+With a boldness that is the only chance of safety in such a case, he
+forced the horses into a gallop. They thus traversed with giddy rapidity
+the considerable distance that separated them from the other shore. The
+ice, jarred by the two former trips, cracked beneath the horse’s feet. To
+slacken their course an instant would have submerged them in the river,
+but the sledge flew rather than ran on the ice, and the hand that guided
+it was firm. They arrived at the goal in less than half an hour, and
+Fleurange, pale, exhausted, and chilled, fell into the arms of her dear
+old friend.
+
+The latter was quietly awaiting them in a warm, well‐lighted room at the
+post‐station, and supper had been ordered, but Fleurange was neither able
+to talk nor eat. Mademoiselle saw that instant repose was absolutely
+necessary. She only persuaded her to take some hot mulled wine before
+going to sleep, and then went to join Clement in another room, where she
+learned, for the first time, all the danger she, as well as the rest, had
+escaped.
+
+After the experience of the past day, Mademoiselle Josephine resolved
+never to manifest any astonishment at whatever might occur in this strange
+journey. She would go in a balloon without wincing, as readily as in a
+sledge, at Clement’s slightest injunction, for he seemed more and more to
+merit boundless confidence.
+
+Perhaps, at the end of this terrible day, Clement did not give himself so
+much credit. He recalled what he had dared say to Fleurange in the height
+of their danger, and anxiously wondered if she heard and understood the
+words that rose from his heart at the moment death seemed so inevitable.
+Was she conscious when he uttered that last farewell? He did not know, and
+it was natural he should await the following day with anxiety.
+
+But he was then reassured by finding his cousin as calm and frank as ever.
+She evidently had not understood, and probably not heard his words, or
+thought them sufficiently explained by the intensity of emotion naturally
+irrepressible at such a moment of extreme danger. The young girl was
+forced to rest a whole day to recover from her exhaustion. But it was
+their last halting‐place, and, when they resumed their journey, it was not
+to stop again till they arrived at its end.
+
+To Be Continued.
+
+
+
+
+Sayings Of John Climacus.
+
+
+If any one has conceived a real hatred of the world, he is emancipated by
+this very hatred from all sadness. But if he shall cherish an attachment
+to things that are visible, he carries about with him a source of sadness
+and melancholy.
+
+It is impossible that they who apply their whole mind to the science of
+salvation, should not make advancement. Some are permitted to perceive
+their progress, whilst from others, by a particular dispensation of
+Providence, it is altogether concealed.
+
+He who strenuously labors to conquer his passions, and to draw nearer and
+nearer to God, believes that every day in which he has to suffer no
+humiliation is to him a grievous loss.
+
+Repentance is the daughter of hope, and the enemy of despair.
+
+Before the commission of sin, the devil represents God as infinitely
+merciful; but after its perpetration, as inexorable and without pity.
+
+A mother will sometimes hide herself from her child, to watch its
+eagerness in seeking her, and she is exceedingly pleased to observe it
+seeking for her with sorrow and anxiety. By this means she wins its love,
+and binds it inseparably to her heart, that it may never be alienated from
+her in affection. “He that hath ears to hear,” saith our Lord, “let him
+hear.”
+
+Meekness is an immutability of soul, which ever continues the same,
+whether amidst the injuries or the applaudits of men.
+
+
+
+
+Dante’s Purgatorio. Canto Fifth.
+
+
+    [NOTE.—In this Canto, Dante introduces three other spirits, who
+    relate the manner of their departure from the body, and recommend
+    themselves to his prayers, that their penal sufferings may be
+    alleviated.
+
+    The first of these penitents is Jacopo del Cassero, a townsman of
+    Fano in Romagna, who, flying towards Padua from the vengeance of
+    one of the tyrannous Este family, was waylaid and murdered in the
+    marshes near Oriago.
+
+    The second is Buonconte, son of Guido di Montefeltro. He was a
+    fellow‐soldier with Dante in the battle of Campaldino, and there
+    slain; but what became of his body was never known until this
+    imaginary narration.
+
+    The third is the noble lady of Sienna, Pia de’ Tolommei, whose
+    story, told by Dante in three lines, has formed the subject of a
+    five‐act tragedy, recently illustrated in this country by the
+    genius of Ristori.—TRANS.]
+
+    Already parted from those shades, I went
+      Following the footsteps of my Guide, when one
+    Behind me towards my form his finger bent,
+      Exclaiming—“See! no ray falls from the sun
+    To the left hand of him that walks below!
+      And sure! he moveth like a living man.”
+    Mine eyes I turned, at hearing him say so,
+      And saw them with a gaze all wonder scan
+    Now me, still me, and now the broken light
+      My body caused. The Master then to me:
+    “Why let thy wonder keep thee from the height
+      To drag so slowly? what concerns it thee
+    What here is whispered? only follow thou
+      After my steps, and let the crowd talk on:
+    Stand like a tower, firm‐based, that will not bow
+      Its head to breath of winds that soon are gone.
+    The man o’er whose thought second thought hath sway,
+      Wide of his mark, is ever sure to miss,
+    Because one force the other wears away.”
+      What could I answer but—“I come”—to this?
+    I said it something sprinkled with the hue
+      Which, in less faults, excuseth one from blame;
+    Meanwhile across the mountain‐side there drew,
+      Just in our front, a train that as they came
+    Sang _Miserere_, verse by verse. When they
+      Observed my form, and noticed that I gave
+    No passage through me to the solar ray,
+      Into a long, hoarse “O!” they changed their stave.
+    And two, as envoys, ran up with demand,
+      “In what condition is it that ye go?”
+
+    And my Lord said—“Return ye to the band
+      Who sent you towards us, and give them to know
+    This body is true flesh. If they delayed
+      At sight,—I deem so, of the shadow here
+    Thereby sufficient answer shall be made:
+      Him let them reverence,—it may prove dear.”
+
+    I never saw a meteor dart so quick
+      Through the serene at midnight, or a gleam
+    Of lightning flash at sunset, through a thick
+      Piled August cloud, but these would faster seem
+    As they retreated; having joined the rest,
+      Back like an unreined troop towards us they sped.
+    “This throng is large by whom we thus are pressed,
+      And come to implore of thee,” the Poet said—
+    “Therefore keep on, and as thou mov’st attend.”
+
+    “O soul who travellest, with the very frame
+      Which thou wert born with, to thy blessed end,
+    Stay thy step somewhat!”—crying thus they came.
+      “Look if among us any thou dost know,
+    That thou of him to earth mayst tidings bear.
+      Stay—wilt thou not? ah! wherefore must thou go?
+    We to our dying hour were sinners there:
+      And all were slain: but at the murderous blow,
+    Warned us an instant light that flashed from heaven,
+      And all from life did peacefully depart,
+    Contrite, forgiving, and by Him forgiven
+      To look on Whom such longing yearns our heart.”
+    “None do I recognize,” I answered, “even
+      Scanning your faces with mine utmost art;
+    But whatsoe’er, ye blessed souls! I may
+      To give you comfort, speak, and I will do;
+    Yea, by that peace which leads me on my way
+      From world to world such guidance to pursue.”
+
+    JACOPO DI FANO.
+
+    “Without such protestation,” one replied,
+      “Unless thy will a want of power defeat,
+    In thy kind offices we all confide;
+      Whence I, sole speaking before these, entreat
+    If thou mayst e’er the territory see
+      That lies betwixt Romagna and the seat(134)
+    Where Charles hath sway, that thou so courteous be
+      As to implore the men in Fano’s town
+    To put up prayers there earnestly for me
+      That I may purge the sins that weigh me down.
+    There I was born; but those deep wounds of mine
+      Through which my life‐blood issued, I received
+    Among the children of Antenor’s line,(135)
+      Where most secure my person I believed:
+    ’Twas through that lord of Este I was sped
+      Who past all justice had me in his hate.
+    O’ertook at Oriaco, had I fled
+      Towards Mira, still where breath is I might wait.
+    But to the marsh I made my way instead,
+      And there, entangled in the cany brake
+    And mire, I fell, and on the ground saw spread,
+      From mine own veins outpoured, a living lake.”
+
+    BUONCONTE DI MONTEFELTRO.
+
+    Here spake another: “O may that desire
+      So be fulfilled which to the lofty Mount
+    Conducts thy feet as thou shalt bring me nigher
+      To mine by thy good prayers. I am the Count
+    Buonconte: Montefeltro’s lord was I.
+      Giovanna cares not, no one cares for me;
+    Therefore with these I go dejectedly.”
+      And I to him: “What violence took thee,
+    Or chance of war, from Campaldino then
+      So far that none e’er knew thy burial‐place?”
+    “O,” answered he, “above the hermit’s glen(136)
+      A stream whose course is Casentino’s base,
+    Springs in the Apennine, Archiano called.
+      There, where that name is lost in Arno’s flood,
+    Exhausted I arrived, footsore and galled,
+      Pierced in my throat, painting the plain with blood.
+    Here my sight failed me and I fell: the last
+      Word that I spake was Mary’s name, and then
+    From my deserted flesh the spirit passed.
+      The truth I tell now, tell to living men;
+    God’s Angel took me, but that fiend of Hell
+      Screamed out: ’Ha! thou from heaven, why robb’st thou me?
+    His soul thou get’st for one small tear that fell,
+      But of this offal other work I’ll see.’
+    Thou know’st how vapors gathering in the air
+      Mount to the cold and there condensed distil
+    Back into water. That Bad Will which ne’er
+      Seeks aught but evil joined his evil will,
+    With intellect, and, from the great force given
+      By his fell nature, moved the mist and wind
+    And o’er the valley drew the darkened heaven,
+      Covering it with clouds as day declined
+    From Pratomagno far as the great chain,(137)
+      So that the o’erburdened air to water turned:
+    Then the floods fell, and every rivulet’s vein
+      Swelled with the superflux the soaked earth spurned.
+    When to large streams the mingling torrents grew
+      Down to the royal river with such force
+    They rushed that no restraint their fury knew.
+      Here fierce Archiano found my frozen corse
+    Stretched at its mouth, and into Arno’s wave
+      Dashed it and loosened from my breast the sign,
+    Which when mine anguish mastered me I gave,
+      Of holy cross with my crossed arms: in fine,
+    O’er bed and bank my form the streamlet drave
+      Whirling, and with its own clay covered mine.”
+
+    PIA DE’ TOLOMEI.
+
+    “O stay! when thou shalt walk the world once more,
+      And have repose from that long way of thine,”—
+    Said the third spirit, following those before,
+      “Remember Pia! for that name was mine:
+    Sienna gave me birth: Maremma’s fen
+      Was my undoing: he knows that full well
+    Who ringed my finger with his gem and then,
+      After espousal,—_took me there to dwell_.”
+
+
+
+
+Sanskrit And The Vedas.(138)
+
+
+    “But in justice, I am bound to say that Rome has the merit of
+    having first seriously attended to the study of Indian
+    literature.”—CARDINAL WISEMAN: _Connection between Science and
+    Revealed Religion_.
+
+    “The first missionaries who succeeded in rousing the attention of
+    European scholars to the extraordinary discovery (Sanskrit
+    literature) that had been made were the French Jesuit
+    missionaries.”—MAX MÜLLER: _Lectures on the Science of Language_.
+
+
+What manner of language is the Sanskrit?
+
+By what people or nation was it spoken?
+
+When? and where?
+
+What are its literary monuments?
+
+Whence comes it—granting it to be as ancient a tongue as is
+represented—that neither in Greek, Roman, nor, indeed, in any ancient
+literature, is it ever mentioned, and that we only read of it in modern
+works, scarce a century old?
+
+Such questions as these are frequently asked, even at the present day.
+Forty years ago, it is doubtful if there were ten persons in this country
+able to reply to them satisfactorily, and more than doubtful if a single
+scholar could have been found capable of translating the simplest Sanskrit
+sentence. Within that period, however, philological science in general,
+and Sanskrit in particular, have made long and rapid strides among us, and
+we now have scores of scholars fully awake to the importance of
+cultivating the resources of this wonderful tongue, as the origin or
+common source of the European family of languages, in which our own
+English is included.
+
+At the head of these scholars stands, without dispute, Prof. William
+Dwight Whitney, whose, linguistic acquirements and philosophical treatment
+of difficult philological problems have earned for him a very high and
+well‐merited reputation. Nor is this opinion a merely patriotic and
+partial estimate. Prof. Whitney’s merits as a Sanskrit scholar and
+comparative philologist are fully acknowledged, not only in this country,
+but by the eminent Orientalists of Europe. The first periodical of Germany
+and of the world for the comparative study of languages (_Zeitschrift für
+vergleichende Sprachforschung auf dem Gebiete des Deutschen, Griechischen
+und Lateinischen_, Berlin, 1872), in a late number recognizes, in the most
+flattering manner, Prof. Whitney’s high rank in the philological republic
+of letters, and refers in complimentary terms to the fact that he is well
+known in Germany as the editor of the Sanskrit text of the _Atharva Veda_.
+
+We may here incidentally note, in the same number of the _Zeitschrift_,
+another gratifying recognition of advanced American scholarship. We refer
+to a review of Prof. March’s _Comparative Grammar of the Anglo‐Saxon_,
+from the pen of Moritz Heyne, the well‐known author of the _Brief
+Comparative Grammar of the Old German Dialects_, and editor of the
+celebrated editions of the Mœso‐Gothic Bible of Ulphilas, and of the
+Anglo‐Saxon poem of Beowulf. The German reviewer credits Prof. March’s
+work with extensive and original investigation, great erudition in the
+Anglo‐Saxon texts, and valuable contributions to the grammar of the
+language. He adds, that the study of Anglo‐Saxon is pursued with more zeal
+and success in the United States than in England. Solid commendation like
+this, from such a source, speaks well for American progress in the field
+of philological science.
+
+During the past twenty years, Prof. Whitney has published numerous essays
+on Sanskrit literature which, limited to the special circulation of
+scientific or literary periodicals, have not fallen under the notice of
+the general reading public. Many of these articles he has now collected
+and published in a volume,(139) edited by himself. Four of the essays are
+on the Vedas and Vedic literature, one on the Avesta (commonly called the
+Zend‐Avesta), and seven upon various philological topics, including two
+reviews of Max Müller’s _Lectures on Language_, which are admirable
+specimens of temperate and careful criticism, guided by sound scholarship.
+
+Prof. Whitney’s first paper on the Vedas (originally published in the
+_Journal of the American Oriental Society_, vol. iii., 1853) opens thus:
+
+
+    “It is a truth now well established, that the Vedas furnish the
+    only sure foundation on which a knowledge of ancient and modern
+    India can be built up. They are therefore at present engrossing
+    the larger share of the attention of those who pursue this branch
+    of Oriental study. Only recently, however, has their paramount
+    importance been fully recognized: it was by slow degrees that they
+    made their way up to the consideration in which they are now held.
+    Once it was questioned whether any such books as the Vedas really
+    existed, or whether, if they did exist, the jealous care of the
+    Brahmans would ever allow them to be laid open to European eyes.
+    This doubt dispelled, they were first introduced to the near
+    acquaintance of scholars in the West by Colebrooke.”
+
+
+Not stopping to raise a question as to just reclamation in favor of Sir
+William Jones for a portion at least of the credit of the introduction of
+the Vedas to the “acquaintance of scholars in the West,” which, perhaps
+Professor Whitney means to solve in advance by a distinction between
+acquaintance and “near acquaintance,” we would observe that this
+comprehensive statement as to the introduction of the Vedas to European
+scholars takes for granted the previous interesting history of the modern
+discovery of the existence of the Sanskrit and of Vedic literature. We use
+the expression “takes for granted” in no invidious sense.
+
+The author was writing for scholars who, he had a right to assume, were
+already acquainted with the objective history of his subject‐matter, and
+were probably informed as to the details of the gradual steps by which the
+certainty of the existence of a great language and a rich literature long
+buried in darkness was at length brought to light. His concern was with
+the internal, not the external, history of Sanskrit. Now, it is upon this
+external history that we propose to say something, returning to Prof.
+Whitney’s work when we reach the subject of the Vedas.
+
+It is not necessary that our readers should, to any extent, be linguists
+or philologists in order to become deeply interested in the relation of
+the modern discovery of a language so old that it had ceased to be spoken
+and was a dead language hundreds of years before the Christian era—a
+language to which cannot with any certainty be assigned the name of the
+nation or people who spoke it, and which is at once the most ancient of
+all known tongues, living or dead, and, despite all modern research, still
+prehistoric.
+
+To our Catholic readers, the narration of this discovery is full of
+interest; for in it they will recognize an additional version of the
+familiar story of the enlightened intelligence, piety, and self‐sacrifice
+of our devoted missionaries who, combining active zeal for knowledge with
+apostolic zeal for souls, amid privation and suffering, even in distant
+and savage lands, with one hand built up the walls of Zion, while with the
+other they erected temples to science.
+
+In order fully to appreciate the bearing and importance of the revelation
+of Sanskrit to Europe, it is essential that we should first look a moment
+upon the condition of European comparative philology at the end of the
+XVIth and commencement of the XVIIth centuries. A short digression will
+suffice for this.
+
+The Hebrew language was, from the earliest period of Christianity, settled
+upon by almost common consent of the learned as the primitive tongue. It
+was generally admitted by scholars that the sole great and essential
+linguistic problem to be solved was this:
+
+
+    “As Hebrew is undoubtedly the mother of all languages, how are we
+    to explain the process by which Hebrew became split into so many
+    dialects, and how can these numerous dialects, such as Greek and
+    Latin, Coptic, Persian, Turkish, be traced back to their common
+    source, the Hebrew?”
+
+
+Upon this hopelessly insoluble problem an amazing amount of remarkable
+ingenuity and solid erudition were, for hundreds of years, hopelessly
+wasted, for, at this day, instead of Hebrew, Sanskrit is recognized as
+being the oldest of all known languages. How came this about? Reply to
+this inquiry will at the same time answer the questions proposed at the
+outset of this article.
+
+The result of labor on the problem, “How could all languages be traced
+back to the Hebrew?” was of course unsatisfactory. No solution could be
+obtained. None indeed was possible.
+
+At last it was suggested, why _should_ all languages be derived from the
+Hebrew? and with investigation thus taken off its false route, the
+question was in a fair way to be successfully treated. Leibnitz vigorously
+denied the claims set up for Hebrew, and said: “There is as much reason
+for supposing Hebrew to have been the primitive language of mankind, as
+there is for adopting the view of Goropius, who published a work at
+Antwerp in 1580 to prove that Dutch was the language spoken in Paradise.”
+More than this, he indicated the necessity of applying to language as well
+as to any other science the principle of a sound inductive process, and in
+this he was greatly aided by the Jesuit missionaries in China.
+
+
+    “It stands to reason,” he said, “that we ought to begin with
+    studying the modern languages which are within our reach, in order
+    to compare them with one another, to discover their differences
+    and affinities, and then to proceed to those which have preceded
+    them in former ages, in order to show their filiation and their
+    origin, and then to ascend step by step to the most ancient
+    tongues, the analysis of which must lead to the only trustworthy
+    conclusions.”
+
+
+But Leibnitz, while properly disputing the justice of the claims of Hebrew
+as the mother‐tongue, knew of none other for which a similar claim might
+be advanced. It is doubtful if he ever heard of Sanskrit, although he
+lived until 1716, a full century after one, at least, of our missionaries
+had mastered Sanskrit and all the Vedas.
+
+
+
+Sanskrit
+
+
+is the ancient language of the Hindus, and had ceased to be a spoken
+language three centuries before the Christian era. The sacred Vedas, the
+oldest literary productions of the Hindus, and even the laws of Manu and
+the Purânas, later works, are written in a dialect still older than the
+Sanskrit, of which it is the parent, and are assigned by different
+scholars to periods varying from twelve hundred to two thousand years B.C.
+Thus, the dialects of Sanskrit spoken by the people of India three hundred
+years B.C. may be said to have been to the Vedic Sanskrit what Italian now
+is to the Latin. These dialects, modified by admixture with the languages
+of the various conquerors of India, the Arabic, Persian, Mongolic, and
+Turkish, and changed also by grammatical corruption, yet survive in the
+modern Hindí, Hindustání, Mahratta, and Bengálée.
+
+Specimens of the dialects spoken by the people of the northern, eastern,
+and southwestern regions of India have come down to us in the inscriptions
+of the Buddhist King Piyadasi (third century B.C.), and in the account of
+the victory over Antiochus which King Asoka (206 B.C.) had graven on the
+rocks of Dhauli, Girnar, and Kapurdigiri. These inscriptions have been
+deciphered by Burnouf, Norris, Wilson, and others, and are found to be in
+the Prakrit (common), not the Sanskrit (perfect) or exclusive dialect.
+From these facts the best Oriental scholars draw the conclusion that, at
+the periods of Piyadasi and Asoka, the Sanskrit, if spoken at all, was
+then already confined to the educated caste of Brahmans, having been a
+living language at some remote previous period (most probably between the
+VIIIth and IVth centuries B.C.), spoken by all classes of that race which
+emigrated from Central India into Asia, and the language so spoken is that
+to which modern Orientalists give the name of Aryan. For it will be borne
+in mind that the term Sanskrit is no indication of the people or race who
+originally spoke the language so called: it merely indicates the
+estimation in which it is held by their successors, and signifies “the
+perfect language.”
+
+Meantime, during all these centuries, Sanskrit continued to be preserved
+as the classic tongue and literary vehicle of Brahmanic thought and study,
+and we are told on good authority that, “even at the present day, an
+educated Brahman would write with greater fluency in Sanskrit than in
+Bengálée.” It is now well established that Sanskrit is certainly not the
+parent, but the eldest brother or _chef de famille_ of the large groups of
+Greek, Latin, Celtic, Slavonic, Teutonic, and Scandinavian families from
+which all the modern European tongues (Basque excepted) are derived (we
+omit mention of the Oriental branches). When we write the Sanskrit words
+_mader_, _pader_, _dokhter_, _sunu_, _bruder_, _mand_, _lib_, _nasa_,
+_vidhuva_, _stara_, we very nearly write the corresponding English terms,
+and see in them their English descendants through Mœso‐Gothic and German.
+The Sanskrit and Greek equivalents of _I am_, _thou art_, _he is_, are
+almost identical:
+
+
+    _Sanskrit_:      asmi, asi, asti.
+    _Greek_:         esmi, eis, esti.
+
+
+We find the Sanskrit _dinâra_ in the Latin _denarius_; _ayas_ in
+Sanskrit—passing through the Gothic _ais_ to English _iron_; and _plava_,
+in Sanskrit, a ship appearing in the Greek _ploion_ (ship), Slavonic
+_ploug_, and English _plough_; for the Aryans said the ship ploughed the
+sea, and the plough sailed across the field. In like manner, similar
+illustrations might be multiplied indefinitely to the extent of volumes,
+showing not hazardous and doubtful etymological similarities, but clear,
+distinct, and sharp‐cut affinities by clearly traceable descent.
+
+“Who was the first European that knew of Sanskrit, or that acquired a
+knowledge of Sanskrit, is difficult to say,” remarks Prof. Max Müller.
+Very true. But it is not at all difficult to reach the certainty that that
+European, whatever might have been his name, was a Catholic missionary.
+
+Soon after S. Francis Xavier began to preach the Gospel in India (1542),
+we hear of our missionaries acquiring not only the current dialects of the
+country, but also the classical Sanskrit language; of their successfully
+studying the theological and philosophical literature of the exclusive
+priestly class; and of their challenging the Brahmans to public
+disputations. If the example of their labors, humility, sufferings, and
+piety were not sufficient to win souls, they always, where it was needed,
+had science at their command, and were at once scholars, linguists,
+mathematicians, and astronomers as well as lowly messengers of the glad
+tidings of salvation.
+
+Prominent among the most remarkable of these men stands
+
+
+
+Robert De’ Nobili.
+
+
+A nephew of Cardinal de’ Nobili and a relative of Pope Julius the Third
+and of the great Bellarmine, he was nobly born and tenderly reared. He
+went a missionary to the Indies in 1603, and began his public labors at
+Madura in 1606. Being a man of superior education, cultivation, and
+refinement, he soon perceived the reasons which kept all the natives of
+high caste—especially the Brahmans—from joining the communities of
+Christian converts formed by the common people of the country. He saw that
+the Brahmans could be successfully met and argued with only by a Brahman,
+and he at once resolved on the heroic project of fitting himself by long
+study and almost incredible labor to become a Brahman in outward
+appearance, language, and accomplishments, and thus obtain access to the
+noblest, most learned, and most accomplished men in India. The task was
+full of difficulty. For years he devoted himself to his silent work,
+acquiring in secret the dialects of Tamil and Telugu, and the language and
+literature of Sanskrit and the Vedas. When in time he felt himself strong
+enough in Brahmanic learning and accomplishments to meet them in argument
+and debate, he publicly appeared arrayed in their costume, wearing the
+cord, bearing the exclusive frontal mark, and submitting to the rigid
+observance of their diet (eating nothing but rice and vegetables) and
+their complicated requirements of caste. So exhaustive had been his
+studies, so thorough was his preparation, and so admirable his talent,
+that his success was perfect. The Brahmans whom he met found in him their
+master even in their own exclusive field of literature, philosophy, and
+religion. Müllbauer (_Geschichte der katholischen Missionen Ostindiens_)
+says they were afraid of him. As a devoted and successful missionary, his
+life is full of interest; but we have to do with him here only as the
+first known European Sanskrit scholar. After forty‐two years of missionary
+labor in that exhausting climate, worn out, infirm, and blind, Robert de’
+Nobili died, aged eighty years, at Melapour, on the coast of Coromandel.
+The distinguished Professor of Sanskrit at the English university of
+Oxford, Max Müller, pays the following earnest tribute to the acquirements
+of this admirable missionary and scholar:
+
+
+    “A man who could quote from Manu, from the Purânas, and even from
+    such works as the Apastamba‐sûtras, which are known even at
+    present to only those few Sanskrit scholars who can read Sanskrit
+    MSS., must have been far advanced in a knowledge of the sacred
+    language and literature of the Brahmans; and the very idea that he
+    came, as he said, to preach a new or a fourth Veda, which had been
+    lost, shows how well he knew the strong and weak points of the
+    theological system which he came to conquer.”
+
+
+Religious bigotry has sought to fix upon de’ Nobili the forgery of the
+Ezour‐Veda; but the examination of the charge by distinguished English
+(Protestant) Orientalists has only resulted in bringing out into brighter
+relief that devoted missionary’s remarkable acquirements and admirable
+virtues. Francis Ellis, Esq., a distinguished Orientalist, discovered the
+Sanskrit original of the Ezour at Pondicherry, and made an elaborate
+report upon it, which was published at the time, in the _Asiatick_ (_sic_)
+_Researches_ (vol. xiv., Calcutta, 1822), from which we cite the following
+short extract:
+
+
+    “Robertus de Nobilibus is well known both to Hindus and
+    Christians, under the Sanskrit title of Tatwa‐Bodha Swami, as the
+    author of many excellent works in Tamil, on polemical theology. In
+    one of these, the _Atma‐Nirnaya‐vivecam_, he contrasts the
+    opinions of the various Indian sects on the nature of the soul,
+    and exposes the fables with which the Purânas abound relative to
+    the state of future existence, and in another, _Punergeuma
+    Acshepa_, he confutes the doctrine of the metempsychosis. Both
+    these works, in style and substance, greatly resemble the
+    controversial part of the Pseudo Vedas; but these are open attacks
+    on what the author considered false doctrines and superstitions,
+    and no attempt is made to veil their manifest tendency, or to
+    insinuate the tenets they maintain under a borrowed name or in an
+    ambiguous form. The style adopted by Robertus de Nobilibus is
+    remarkable for a profuse admixture of Sanskrit terms; those to
+    express doctrinal notions and abstract ideas he compounds and
+    recompounds with a facility of invention that indicates an
+    intimate knowledge of the language whence they are derived; and
+    there can be no doubt, therefore, that he was fully qualified to
+    be the author of those writings. If this should be the fact,
+    considering the high character he bears among all acquainted with
+    his name and the nature of his known works, I am inclined to
+    attribute to him the composition only, not the forgery, of the
+    Pseudo Vedas.”
+
+
+But the result of further examination has decided that the Ezour‐Veda was
+not even written by de’ Nobili, but by one of his native converts. It is
+plain, from the testimony of Mr. Ellis, that he was not a man to seek the
+cover of the anonymous or the ambiguous, in order to attack the
+superstitions of Buddhism. This he did openly and boldly. Max Müller
+decides that “there is no evidence for ascribing the work to Robert.”
+
+The example of Robert de’ Nobili was sedulously followed up by other
+members of his Order.
+
+Roth, another Jesuit, appeared in 1664, master of Sanskrit, and
+successfully disputed with the Brahmans. Yet another, Hanxleder, who went
+to India in 1669, labored for more than thirty years in the Malabar
+mission, composed works of instruction, compiled dictionaries, and wrote
+works in prose and verse. Many of his writings are preserved at Rome.
+Among the most prominent of the Jesuit missionaries in the field of modern
+Oriental and Sanskrit literature was Father Constant Beschi, who went out
+to India in 1700. He made himself master of Sanskrit, Tamil, and Telugu,
+and wrote moral works in Sanskrit which are still preserved and highly
+prized by the Brahmans. The natives called him the great Viramamouni.
+Scores of other missionaries might be named, equally devoted, equally
+learned. But they acquired science, Sanskrit, and Oriental erudition as a
+means, not an end. They sought no worldly distinction, no literary
+reputation. They had but one engrossing object and thought here
+below—their mission of charity and of love.
+
+Nevertheless, the day of
+
+
+
+Sanskrit For Europe,
+
+
+long delayed, was now fast approaching. Its revelation to the West is
+generally ascribed to Sir William Jones. This assumption may be stated to
+be incorrect without in the slightest degree detracting from the merits of
+that distinguished English scholar. For more than a century before Sir
+William Jones went to India, the published letters of the Jesuit
+missionaries had established the existence and general characteristics of
+that remarkable tongue, the Sanskrit; and in 1740 (November 23), Father
+Pons, then at Karikal [Madura], addressed a letter to Father Duhalde,
+giving what Professor Max Müller describes as “a most interesting and, in
+general, a very accurate description of the various branches of Sanskrit
+literature; of the four Vedas, the grammatical treatises, the six systems
+of philosophy, and the astronomy of the Hindus. _He anticipated, on
+several points, the researches of Sir William Jones._”
+
+The letter in question was, in fact, an essay; and Father Pons so speaks
+of it. It fills sixteen closely printed octavo pages, and refers to the
+fact, not mentioned by Prof. Müller, that it is one of a succession of
+communications upon the same subject, inasmuch as he mentions a treatise
+written by himself on Sanskrit versification, transmitted to Europe the
+previous year, and specifies a Sanskrit grammar (_Kramadisvar_) which he
+sent two years before. Although Adelung, in his _Mithridates_, mildly
+censures both Father Pons and Sir W. Jones for exaggerating the value of
+Sanskrit, the exposition made by the former of the wealth of the Sanskrit
+language and literature is, to this day, held by distinguished scholars to
+be “very accurate.”
+
+The Pons‐Duhalde letter is often referred to, but seldom quoted. We will
+therefore here cite a few short passages from it, which may give the
+reader some idea of the nature of the communication and an early estimate
+of the value of Sanskrit. We translate: “The Brahmans have always been,
+and still are, the only class who devote themselves to the cultivation of
+the sciences as a matter of hereditary descent. They originally descend
+from seven illustrious penitents, whose progeny, in course of time, was
+multiplied infinitely, etc. They are exclusively consecrated to learning,
+and a Brahman who strictly adheres to the rule of his order should devote
+himself solely to religion and study; but, in course of time, many have
+fallen into a very lax life.
+
+“These sciences are inaccessible to all the other castes of people, to
+whom it is permitted to communicate certain compositions, grammar, poetry,
+and moral sayings.”
+
+“The grammar of the Brahmans may fairly be classed in the rank of works of
+science. Never were analysis and synthesis more happily employed than in
+their grammatical works on the Sanskrit language. I am satisfied that this
+language, so admirable in its harmony, its wealth, and its energy, was at
+some remote period the spoken tongue of the country inhabited by the first
+Brahmans.”
+
+Parenthetically, and also by way of comparison, let us look for a moment
+at the impression made by Sanskrit upon two other distinguished scholars
+from among those who were earliest in the field—Sir William Jones and
+Frederick von Schlegel.
+
+At the outset of his researches, the first declared that, whatever its
+antiquity, it was a language of most wonderful structure, more perfect
+than the Greek, more copious than the Latin, and more exquisitely refined
+than either, yet bearing to both of them a strong affinity. “No
+philologer,” he adds, “could examine the Sanskrit, Greek, and Latin,
+without believing them to have sprung from some common source, which,
+perhaps, no longer exists. There is a similar reason, though not quite so
+forcible, for supposing that both the Gothic and Celtic had the same
+origin with the Sanskrit. The old Persian may be added to the same
+family.” And Frederick von Schlegel (_Essay on the Language and Philosophy
+of the Indians_) says: “The similarity between Sanskrit, on the one hand,
+and Latin and Greek, Teutonic and Persian, on the other, is found not only
+in a great number of roots possessed by them in common, but it also
+extends to the inner structure and grammar. The remarkable coincidence is
+not merely such an accidental one as may be explained by an admixture of
+language, but an essential one which points distinctly to a common
+descent. Comparison further shows that the Indian (Sanskrit) tongue is the
+more ancient, the others younger and derived from it.”
+
+But to return to our missionaries. The interest excited in Europe by the
+remarkable letter of Father Pons was purely one of surprise and
+speculation, inasmuch as Western scholars were without the means of
+testing the value of the great linguistic discovery. Sanskrit grammars,
+dictionaries, and even vocabularies were then unknown in any European
+tongue. This want, however, was soon supplied by another missionary, John
+Philip Wesdin, more widely known as Father Paulinus a Santo‐Bartolomeo. He
+spent thirteen years in India, and subsequently published (1790) at Rome,
+under the auspices of the Propaganda, several works on Sanskrit grammar
+and upon the history, theology, and religion of the Hindus.
+
+Referring to his numerous publications (_vielen Schriften_), no less an
+authority than Adelung qualifies them as indispensable to a knowledge of
+Sanskrit as also to the other languages of India (welche zur Kentniss
+sowohl dieser Sprache als auch Indiens überhaupt unentbehrlich sind); and
+he adds (writing in 1806): “Peradventure has no European up to this time
+so deeply penetrated into this language as he.”(140) Of his first Sanskrit
+grammar, published at Rome in 1790,(141) Prof. Max Müller says: “Although
+this grammar has been severely criticised, and is now hardly ever
+consulted, it is but fair to bear in mind that the first grammar of any
+language is a work of infinitely greater difficulty than any later
+grammar.”
+
+In this connection we must not omit some mention of that prodigy of
+linguistic industry and erudition, the Spanish Jesuit, Don Lorenzo Hervas
+y Pandura, who, in the midst of his missionary labors, collected specimens
+of more than three hundred languages.(142) This of itself was a gigantic
+work, and its rich results furnished to Adelung an important portion of
+the material of his _Mithridates_. Hervas, moreover, prepared grammars for
+more than forty languages, and is the founder of the true method of
+ascertaining lingual affinity by grammatical analysis, rather than by
+etymology, always more or less deceptive. Klaproth’s enunciation of this
+principle established by Hervas is so felicitous that we cannot refrain
+from citing it here: “Words are the stuff or matter of language, and
+grammar its fashioning or form.”
+
+Concerning Hervas we need say no more than to add the noble tribute to his
+memory and his merits to be found in the pages of Max Müller’s _Lectures
+on the Science of Language_, p. 140:
+
+
+    “He proved by a comparative list of declensions and conjugations
+    that Hebrew, Chaldee, Syriac, Arabic, Ethiopic, and Amharic are
+    all but dialects of one original language, and constitute one
+    family of speech, the Semitic. He scouted the idea of deriving all
+    the languages of mankind from Hebrew. He had perceived clear
+    traces of affinity in Hungarian, Lapponian, and Finnish—three
+    dialects now classed as members of the Turanian family. He had
+    proved that Basque was not, as was commonly supposed, a Celtic
+    dialect, but an independent language, spoken by the earliest
+    inhabitants of Spain, as proved by the names of the Spanish
+    mountains and rivers. Nay, one of the most brilliant discoveries
+    in the history of the science of language, the establishment of
+    the Malay and Polynesian family of speech, extending from the
+    Island of Madagascar east of Africa, over 208° of longitude, to
+    the Easter Islands west of America, _was made __ by Hervas long
+    before it was announced to the world by Humboldt_.”
+
+
+English literature has made us familiar with the name of Sir William Jones
+as the European originator of the cultivation of Sanskrit. The merits of
+Sir William Jones are not a subject of doubt or contest. Full justice has
+been done them. But when we come to settle the question of priority of
+successful and distinguished labor in the field of Sanskrit, the names and
+transcendent services of the humble and self‐sacrificing missionaries,
+Robert de’ Nobili, Roth, Hanxleder, Beschi, Pons, Paulinus a Santo‐
+Bartolomeo, Hervas, and scores of others, their predecessors and
+companions, must ever be gratefully remembered.
+
+
+
+The Triumph Of Sanskrit.
+
+
+Through the publications of the Asiatic Society at Calcutta, European
+scholars were now furnished with facilities for the study of Sanskrit, and
+it would be difficult to say which of the two, the language or the
+literature, excited the deeper or more lasting interest.
+
+The absolute identity of grammatical forms of Greek and Latin with
+Sanskrit was at once recognized, and it was evident that these three
+languages sprang from one common source. The revelation created one of the
+greatest literary sensations ever known in Europe. The theory that upheld
+Hebrew as the mother tongue—already seriously damaged—now received its
+death‐blow. Classical scholars shook their heads sceptically. Theologians
+were troubled. Ethnographers were all at sea. Etymologists and
+lexicographers were dumfounded. The philosophers of the day, each one of
+whom had his own little system of the universe to take care of, saw their
+theories ruthlessly upset; and Lord Monboddo, who had just finished his
+great work in which he derives mankind from a couple of apes, and all the
+dialects of the world from the language of the Egyptian gods, was
+petrified with astonishment. His Egyptian theory, his men with tails, and
+his monkeys without tails, were all equally doomed to destruction. To his
+credit, though, it must be said that he soon afterward accepted the
+situation with commendable intelligence and alacrity.
+
+Other pet theories and other deeply ingrained prejudices of many scholars
+of the best education were shocked and scandalized at the claims set up
+for Sanskrit. The idea that the classical languages of Greece and Rome
+could be intimately related to a jargon of mere savages—as they supposed
+the natives of India to be—was to the last degree repugnant to these
+gentlemen, and they went great lengths in assertion, absurd argument,
+irony, and ridicule, to escape the, alas! too inevitable and horribly
+unpleasant conclusion that Greek and Latin were of the same linguistic
+kith and kin as the language of the black inhabitants of India. The
+distinguished Scotch philosopher, Dugald Stewart, by way of protest
+against the claims set up for Sanskrit, even went so far as to deny that
+any such language existed or ever had existed, and wrote his famous essay
+to prove that those arch forgers and liars, the Brahmans, had manufactured
+the dialect on the model of the Greek and the Latin, and that the whole
+thing, language, literature, and all, was a piece of daring invention and
+bold imposture.
+
+How deeply rooted were the prejudices, and how stubborn the ignorance,
+even among scholars and men of literary pursuits, in favor of the Hebrew
+and against the reception of Sanskrit in its place, may be judged from the
+representative fact, that so late as the ninth day of August, 1832, we
+find no less a man than Coleridge making this entry in his note‐book: “The
+claims of the Sanskrit for priority to the Hebrew as a language are
+ridiculous.”
+
+The first European scholar of distinction who dared boldly accept the
+facts and conclusions of Sanskrit scholarship was Frederick von Schlegel.
+He began his study of the language with verbal tuition from Sir Alexander
+Hamilton, continued it at Paris with the aid of M. Langles, custodian of
+Oriental MSS. in the Imperial Library at Paris, and subsequently had the
+advantage of the rich collection in the British Museum. The result was his
+_Language and Wisdom of the Indians_, published in 1808. It embraced in
+one glance the languages of India, Persia, Greece, Italy, and Germany,
+riveted them together by the name of Indo‐Germanic (by common consent of
+scholars since changed to Indo‐European), and became the foundation of the
+science of language. Appearing only two years after the publication of the
+first volume of Adelung’s _Mithridates_, “it is separated from that work,”
+says Prof. Müller, “by the same distance which separates the Copernican
+from the Ptolemæan system,” and this work of Schlegel, he adds, “has truly
+been called the discovery of a new world.”
+
+Omitting mention of the labors of many distinguished French and German
+laborers in the same field, we may close our record of the services
+rendered by Catholic scholars to the cause of Sanskrit literature by
+reference to the remarkable course of lectures on “Science and Revealed
+Religion,” delivered by the Reverend (afterwards Cardinal) Wiseman, at
+Rome, in 1835,(143) only two years and six months after the memorable
+entry of Coleridge in his note‐book.
+
+
+
+Sanskrit Literature And The Vedas.
+
+
+It was perfectly natural that the fresh enthusiasm of the earliest
+Sanskrit scholars should have carried them into what is now looked upon as
+an undue estimate and hyperbolic praise of their new discovery and
+acquisition. And this early enthusiasm was neither short in duration nor
+limited in extent.
+
+A tidal wave of admiration swept over European scholarship with the
+appearance of _Sacontala, or The Fatal Ring_ (Calcutta, 1789), certainly a
+beautiful specimen of dramatic art and admirable poetry by Kalidasa, the
+Indian Shakespeare, who is assigned to the period of Vikrama the Great
+(B.C. 56). Sir William Jones very judiciously selected this masterpiece of
+Indian literature for translation as a first specimen, and, although in
+prose, it so delighted a French scholar, Chézy, that it induced him first
+to learn Sanskrit and then to publish a French version of it. This was
+followed by no less than four German translations, prose and verse, a
+Danish translation, and an additional English translation (the best) in a
+mingling of verse and prose (following the original) by Monier Williams.
+Goethe was enraptured with the _Sacontala_, and it drew from him the
+celebrated verse:
+
+
+    “Willt Du die Blüthe des Frühen, die Früchte des Späteren Jahres,
+      Willt Du, was reizt und entzückt, willt Du was sättigt und
+                  nährt,
+    Willt Du den Himmel, die Erde mit einem Namen begreifen,
+      Nenn ich, Sacontala, Dich, und so ist Alles gesagt.”(144)
+
+
+A. W. von Schlegel finds in it so striking a resemblance to our romantic
+drama that we might, he says, be inclined to suspect we owe this
+resemblance to the predilection for Shakespeare entertained by Sir William
+Jones, if the fidelity of his translation were not confirmed by other
+learned Orientalists. And Alex. von Humboldt says of Kalidasa that
+“tenderness in the expression of feeling, and richness of creative fancy,
+have assigned to him his lofty place amongst the poets of all nations.”
+
+Voltaire went into ecstasies over a French translation of the Ezour‐Veda,
+a Sanskrit poem in the style of the Purânas, quite an inferior production,
+written in the XVIIth century by a native convert of Robert de’ Nobili.
+This French translation was published by Voltaire under the title,
+“L’Ezour‐Vedam, traduit du Sanscritam par un Brame,” and he stated his
+belief that the original was four centuries older than Alexander, and that
+it was the most precious gift for which the West had been indebted to the
+East.
+
+Adelung, as we have seen, found fault with Sir William Jones and Father
+Pons for overrating the claims of Sanskrit, and subsequent critics have
+gone so far as to assert that its literary and scientific value is very
+slight. Among the latest of these are M. Jules Oppert(145) and Prof. Key
+of University College, London. Their objections and arguments are met and
+discussed by Prof. Whitney in the seventh essay of his volume, in a tone
+so moderate and a treatment so thorough as to present a more than
+satisfactory vindication of the claims of Indo‐European philology and
+ethnology to the serious attention and close study of every scholar. We
+are not aware that either Prof. Key or M. Oppert has cited the fact that,
+when the Indian rajah Rammohun Roy found the distinguished Sanskrit
+scholar Rosen at work in the British Museum upon an edition of the hymns
+of the Veda, he expressed his surprise at so useless an undertaking. It
+was not that the Indian philosopher looked upon all Vedic literature as
+worthless. On the contrary, he was of the opinion that the Upanishads were
+worthy of becoming the foundation of a new religion. The rajah most
+probably did not also consider the fact that, whatever might be the
+intrinsic literary merit of the Vedic hymns, they were none the less
+valuable to the comparative grammarian and philologist. For the purposes
+of grammatical construction, it is perfectly immaterial whether or not a
+text has the fire of genius or the inspiration of poetry.
+
+And here it may be mentioned that Rammohun Roy, the descendant on both the
+paternal and maternal side of the highest caste Brahmans, and familiar
+with the whole body of Vedic and Sanskrit literature, indirectly bears
+high testimony to one of the grandest results obtained by European study
+of Sanskrit literature. _That result is the exposure of Brahmanism as a
+gross imposture._ Against any attack on its social and religious errors,
+the Brahmans formerly entrenched themselves in the pretended warrant of
+high antiquity and the authority of the sacred works. “Thus say the Vedas”
+was a sufficient justification for any claim, and “That is not in the
+Vedas” an unanswerable argument against any objection. Although they threw
+every possible obstacle in the way of Europeans who strove to obtain a
+knowledge of Sanskrit and access to the Vedas, by refusing to teach them
+and by withholding the sacred books, these difficulties were finally
+overcome, and when the Vedas were read and understood it became apparent
+that fully one‐half of the social and religious institutions of
+Brahmanism, as it existed down to the commencement of the present century,
+were not only without a shadow of authority in the Vedas, but absolutely
+opposed to the spirit and letter of its law. Thus, it is certain that
+nothing of the great characteristic feature of Brahmanism—the system of
+castes—can be found in the Vedas. The belief in the transmigration of
+souls and in the doctrines flowing from it has no existence there. And the
+Suttee, or system of widow immolation, the singular mingling of
+pantheistic philosophy with gross superstition, and the worship of the
+triad Brahma, Vishnu, and Civa, are all equally without Vedic foundation.
+
+Robert de’ Nobili discovered all this at an early period, and it was only
+when he first fought the Brahmans with their own weapons—the Vedas—that
+they were, for the first time, silenced. Rammohun Roy had his eyes opened
+at an early age to the idolatrous system of the Hindus, came out from
+among them, and openly attacked its pretensions. “I endeavored to show,”
+he says, “that the idolatry of the Brahmans was contrary to the practice
+of their ancestors, and to the principles of the ancient works and
+authorities which they profess to revere and obey.”
+
+Prof. Whitney, referring to the same subject, says: “Each new phase of
+belief has sought in them (the sacred texts) its authority, has claimed to
+found itself upon them, and to be consistent with their teachings; and the
+result is that the sum of doctrine accepted and regarded as orthodox in
+modern India is incongruous beyond measure, a mass of inconsistencies”: a
+summing up that might, we regret to say, be truthfully made of a Christian
+country of far higher civilization than that of India.
+
+Not stopping to discuss what has been called the “standing reproach”
+against Indian literature, that it is barren of historical and
+geographical results, nor to point out much that is of high value and
+interest to every scholar, we will close by an inquiring comment as to the
+following statement made by Prof. Whitney at p. 22. He is speaking of the
+Vedic texts, and says: “So thorough and religious was the care bestowed
+upon their preservation that, notwithstanding their mass and the thousands
+of years which have elapsed since their collection, _hardly a single
+various reading, so far as yet known, has been suffered to make its way
+into them after their definite and final settlement_.”
+
+We have italicized the passage which we wish to make the subject of our
+inquiry, for, unless we are mistaken, two instances may be pointed out in
+which the texts in question have been garbled or seriously tampered with.
+
+We find the first instance in the developments growing out of the
+discussion as to whether there are three Vedas or four Vedas (Goverdhan
+Caul on the “Literature of the Hindus,” _Asiatic Researches_, Calcutta,
+1788, vol. i., p. 340, and Sir William Jones’ _Works_, vol. iv. p. 93
+(edition of 1807)). Even down to the present day, Indian scholars
+sometimes speak of three Vedas, sometimes of four. According to Indian
+tradition, Brahma has four mouths, each of which uttered a Veda. Yet most
+ancient writers speak of but three Vedas, Rig, Yajush, and Sama, from
+which it is inferred that the Atharva was written after the three first.
+The Atharva is spoken of and called the Veda of Vedas in the eleventh book
+of Manu, and the designation affirms the assertion of Dara Shecuh, in the
+preface to his Upanishad, that the first three Vedas are named separately,
+because the Atharvan is a corollary from them all, and contains the
+quintessence of them all. But this verse of Manu, which occurs in a modern
+copy of the work brought from Benares, is entirely omitted in the best
+copies, so that, as Manu himself in other places names only three Vedas,
+_we must believe this line to be an interpolation_ by some admirer of the
+Atharva.
+
+The second instance to be specified is furnished by Prof. Whitney himself,
+at pages 53, 54, and 55, where he gives a translation of a hymn from the
+concluding book of the Rig‐Veda (x. 18), describing the early Vedic
+funeral services. When the attendants leave the bier, the men go first,
+while the director of the ceremony says:
+
+
+    “Ascend to life, old age your portion making, each after each,
+                advancing in due order;
+    May Twashtar, skilful fashioner, propitious, cause that you here
+                enjoy a long existence.”
+
+
+The women next follow, the wives at their head:
+
+
+    “These women here, not widows, blessed with husbands,
+    May deck themselves with ointment and perfume;
+    Unstained by tears, adorned, untouched with sorrow,
+    The wives may first ascend unto the altar.”
+
+
+The wife of the deceased is then summoned away the last:
+
+
+    “Go up unto the world of life, O woman!
+    Thou liest by one whose soul is fled; come hither!
+    To him who grasps thy hand, a second husband,
+    Thou art as wife to spouse become related.”
+
+
+In commenting upon this hymn, Prof. Whitney notes its “discordance with
+the modern Hindu practice of immolating the widow at the grave of her
+husband,” and adds: “Nothing could be more explicit than the testimony of
+this hymn against the antiquity of the practice. It finds, indeed, no
+support anywhere in the Vedic scriptures.” And now we come to the “various
+reading,” for Prof. Whitney concludes the passage with this statement:
+“Authority has been sought, however, for the practice, in a fragment of
+this very hymn, rent from its natural connection, and a little altered; by
+the change of a single letter, the line which is translated above, ‘The
+wives may first ascend unto the altar,’ has been made to read, ‘The wives
+shall go up into the place of the fire.’ ”
+
+We heartily welcome this work of Prof. Whitney, and thank him for it as a
+solid contribution to literature and to philological science, honorable to
+himself, and reflecting credit on American scholarship.
+
+
+
+
+The House That Jack Built.
+
+
+By The Author Of “The House Of Yorke.”
+
+In Two Parts.
+
+Part II.
+
+It was late before Aunt Nancy felt the approach of sleep that night. She
+turned restlessly from side to side, thinking over Bessie’s strange
+behavior, and trying to find a solution for it. The appearance of a
+mystery disturbed all calculations based upon her plain and outspoken
+experience.
+
+But the habits of years are not easily broken, and sleep, that for more
+than six decades had been wont to settle over this woman’s head as
+regularly as darkness settled on the earth, began now to dim her senses.
+She was about losing consciousness, when the vague sense of pain and
+perplexity which still clung to her mind strengthened and took a new form.
+It was no longer a woman who laughed bitterly when she should have wept,
+but a woman sobbing violently, she knew not why.
+
+The sound continued, and before its dreary persistence Aunt Nancy’s
+hovering sleep took flight. She started up and listened, not yet quite
+recalled to recollection. It was indeed a woman’s voice sobbing
+uncontrollably. For one moment, the listener’s blood chilled with a
+superstitious fear; the next, she recollected that she was not alone in
+the house. It was Bessie who mourned. “_Rachel weeping for her children,
+because they were not_,” the old woman thought pityingly.
+
+Poor Bessie had forgotten how thin the walls were in her old home, and,
+when the door opened and a tall figure clad in white entered her room, she
+uttered a cry of affright.
+
+“You poor child! I couldn’t stand it to hear you cry so,” Aunt Nancy said,
+going to her bedside and bending down to put a caressing arm around her.
+“Don’t cry! Try to remember that you have not lost everything.”
+
+“I’m sorry I disturbed you, Aunt Nancy,” Bessie said faintly, sinking back
+on the pillow. “You had better leave me to have it out alone. I don’t
+often get a chance to have a good cry, and you have no idea what a relief
+it is.”
+
+“I know all about it!” Aunt Nancy replied, and her voice, low and deep,
+had a sound like a tolling bell. “I have seen ’em all go and leave me, one
+after another, father and mother, brothers and sisters, husband and
+children, till every earthly hope was covered over with dust, and it
+seemed as though there was dust on the very bread I ate. Yes, I know what
+it is better than you, for you have your husband and one child left yet,
+and I have nothing on earth!”
+
+“I have not!” Bessie cried out passionately, with the jealousy of one
+whose grief is underestimated. “John and the boy are further away from me
+than my dead children are!”
+
+The barrier was down. She had betrayed herself, and must tell the whole,
+though she might be sorry afterward for having spoken. Concealment and
+self‐control were no longer possible.
+
+It was a tale too often true, though not so often told. The husband,
+engrossed in business, and missing no home care which the love and duty of
+his wife could bestow, had forgotten, or did not care, or did not believe,
+that any return was due from him save a pecuniary support, or that he
+could be guilty of any sin of omission toward his wife, save the omission
+to provide her with food and shelter.
+
+Perhaps no woman ever saw the heart she had once possessed slipping away
+from her, without making a mistake in her efforts to retain it.
+Indifference is her surest means of success, but indifference the loving
+heart can never affect. As well might flame hope to hide itself, living,
+in ashes.
+
+The reserve and gravity of wounded feeling, when at length the husband
+noticed them, he named sulkiness, and the meanness of the causes to which
+he ascribed that were felt as an insult. The few timid reproaches and
+petitions the wife had brought herself to utter he listened to with
+surprise and annoyance, or with ridicule. Why, what in the world did she
+want?—to begin their courting days over again? In order to do that, they
+must first be divorced. What had he done? Had he beaten, or scolded, or
+starved her? Had he gone gallivanting about with other women? Nonsense! He
+had his business to attend to. Of course he loved her, but she mustn’t
+bother him.
+
+What reply is possible to such arguments? How small seem all our sweetest
+human needs when they are put into words, simply because words can never
+express them! In such a controversy, hard natures have always the
+advantage over sensitive ones, and seem to triumph by their very
+inferiority.
+
+Bessie was silent, and her husband thought that she was convinced, and
+dismissed the subject from his mind. If he observed that she grew pale, he
+supposed that city air did not agree with her. He missed no home comfort,
+heard no complaint, and therefore took for granted that all was right. He
+frequently absented himself from home on business, never asking his wife
+to accompany him, women being in the way on such occasions, and she seemed
+satisfied to see nothing beyond her own fireside. He brought home his
+plans and studies at evening, and, when the children’s play and caresses
+disturbed him, their mother took them away and amused them elsewhere.
+When, later, her little ones asleep, as she sat by her husband silently
+working, he found that the snip of her scissors and the rattle of her
+spools fretted him, Bessie said not a word, but went off to bed, and wet
+her pillow with bitter and unavailing tears, finding no comfort.
+
+The thought of seeking comfort and help in her religion had not once
+entered her mind. She was dead to its obligations. They had never been
+impressed on her, and her heart had been engrossed by other interests. Her
+children had been baptized, and she usually went to an early Mass on
+Sunday, but never heard a sermon, and never read a religious book. She
+prayed often, but it was the outcry of pain, the petition for an earthly
+good, not the prayer for resignation and wisdom.
+
+Of his wife’s real life John Maynard knew no more than he did of life at
+the antipodes. His profession engrossed his heart. His happiness was to
+work and study over polished metals, to fit cylinder, crank, and valve
+with nicety into their places; and at last, when that exquisite but
+irresistible power of steam, so delicate in its fineness, yet so terrible
+in its strength, began to steal into his work, to see the creature of
+brass and iron grow alive, and become more mighty than an army of giants,
+how tenderly could he handle, how carefully arrange, how patiently study
+out, the parts of his work! For the problem of that infinitely more
+exquisite mechanism—his wife’s heart—he had no time.
+
+The boy, as boys will, followed in the footsteps of his father. He
+emulated the slighting of which the father was himself unconscious, and
+treated his mother with that intolerable mixture of patronizing kindness
+and impatient superiority so often witnessed in the presumptuous children
+of our time.
+
+When Bessie Maynard had poured out her complaint, with many an
+illustration of which a woman could well understand the bitterness, Aunt
+Nancy was silent a moment.
+
+“It’s pretty hard, dear,” she said then, embarrassed what to say. “Some
+men have that way of not caring anything about their wives, as soon as
+they have got them; but I never thought John would act so. And you know,
+Bessie, that, if it is hard, still he is your husband, and you can’t leave
+him for that. Try to be patient, and don’t lose courage. I’m sure he loves
+you, though he doesn’t show it; and he’ll come round by‐and‐by.”
+
+The reply almost broke in on this trite advice: “I did not mean to leave
+him. I came down here to think. I can’t think there. I wanted to see again
+this place where I was a child, and where I was so happy. I thought that
+perhaps some of the old feelings might come back. I have been afraid of
+some things. Aunt Nancy, I was afraid I should grow to hate John!”
+
+“Oh! no, Bessie,” the old woman exclaimed. “Never let yourself hate your
+own husband! It would be a dreadful sin; and, besides, it wouldn’t mend
+matters. It is better for a woman to love one who cares nothing for her
+than not to love anybody. I don’t believe but John is fond of you still,
+if he’d only stop to think of it.”
+
+There was no reply.
+
+“What else were you afraid of?” Aunt Nancy asked presently. “You said you
+were afraid of some things?”
+
+Bessie did not answer.
+
+That other fear that, shunned at first, then glanced upon, then brooded
+over silently till it had grown almost a probability, flashed out again on
+her in all its original hatefulness when she found herself about to
+explain it to a listener like this.
+
+“If you don’t want to tell, I won’t ask you,” Aunt Nancy said, with almost
+childlike timidity. “But, may be, since you have begun, you would feel
+better not to keep anything back. You know, Bessie, I am on your side,
+though I am John’s own aunt.”
+
+The younger woman crept nearer into the arm that half held her, and said,
+in a hurried whisper, “Every one is not so indifferent to me as John is!”
+
+“I’m glad of it, child,” was the calm reply. “I don’t like to praise
+people to their faces, but you always had a sweet, winning way. I am glad
+that other people are good to you.” She waited again for the explanation,
+not dreaming that it had been given.
+
+Bessie Maynard drew a breath, like one who plunges into water. “There’s
+some one who thinks me worth watching and sympathizing with, if John
+doesn’t,” she said.
+
+“You don’t mean a man!” exclaimed Aunt Nancy.
+
+“Of course I do,” answered Bessie almost pettishly.
+
+The words were scarcely out of her mouth, before she was flung back on to
+the pillow by the arms that had held her so tenderly, and Aunt Nancy stood
+erect by the bedside. “Aren’t you ashamed of yourself, Bessie Maynard?”
+she cried out indignantly.
+
+“No, I am not!” was the dogged answer. “I have nothing to be ashamed of.”
+
+The flash of the old woman’s eyes could be seen in the dim light. “What!
+you, a married woman, not ashamed to let a man who is not your husband
+talk love to you!”
+
+“He never spoke a word of love to me,” said Bessie, still sulky.
+
+Aunt Nancy was utterly puzzled. “How do you know, then?” she asked.
+
+Neither by nature nor education was this woman fitted to understand that
+subtile manner by which impressions and assurances are conveyed without a
+word having been spoken. A man would have been obliged to use plain
+language indeed, if he would have had her, a wife, understand that he
+loved her.
+
+While Bessie described some of the delicate kindnesses of this dangerous
+friend of hers, Aunt Nancy listened attentively, and presently resumed her
+seat by the bed. She really could not see that the child had done, or
+meant, or wished any real harm.
+
+“But, still, you must look out for the fellow, dear,” she said. “He
+wouldn’t hang round you so if he was what he ought to be. You never know
+what these city gentlemen are.”
+
+“He isn’t a bad man!” Bessie exclaimed. “I won’t have him called so. I’m
+afraid; but, for all that, I respect him. I wish John were half as good.”
+
+The story was ended; but with the feeling of relief which followed the
+disburdening of her heart came also the uneasiness and half regret we
+always experience when we have been led unawares to confide a secret to
+one whom we have not deliberately chosen as a confidant. Conscious of this
+new uneasiness, Bessie wished to close the conversation.
+
+“Don’t let me keep you any longer,” she said. “Go to bed now, and forget
+all the nonsense I have been talking. I am sorry I disturbed you.”
+
+Aunt Nancy paid no attention to this request. She sat a few moments in
+deep thought, then spoke abruptly: “Bessie, did you ever go to any of your
+priests about this business?”
+
+“To a priest!” repeated Bessie, astonished at such a question from a rigid
+Puritan like her aunt, and doubtful in what spirit it was asked. “What
+made you think of that?”
+
+“I am not a Catholic,” the old woman said, “but you are. And I like to see
+people live up to their religion, whatever it is. A religion that won’t
+help you in a strait like this isn’t worth having.”
+
+Bessie was silent, knowing not what to say. Her faith was sleeping. That
+religion would help as really as the trials of earth can hurt she had not
+thought. Like many others, she invoked the aid of the church on the great
+events, the births, the marriages, and the deaths, but let the rest of
+life fight its own battles.
+
+“Now, you listen to me,” Aunt Nancy said earnestly. “I’m not very wise,
+but I’m going to give you the best advice that you can get anywhere. Just
+you write to old Father Conners, the priest that married you and John, and
+tell him what a trouble you are in. I’ve seen him, and I believe he’s a
+good Christian, if he is a priest, and a sensible man, too. He comes three
+or four times a year up to a Mr. Blake’s, over on the railroad, and says
+Mass in his house. There are a good many Catholics round there now. It’s
+about time for him to come again. You write to him, and you won’t be sorry
+for it. There’s nothing else for you to do. Will you write, Bessie? I want
+you to promise.”
+
+The promise was given hesitatingly, doubtingly, more to get rid of the
+subject than from any conviction of its wisdom.
+
+But a promise is a promise, and next morning Bessie wrote the letter, not
+because she wished to, but because she must; and a very dry, cold letter
+it was. She was a little helped to the writing of it by the pleasant
+prospect of carrying it to mail. That would give her a long, solitary walk
+and a whole afternoon quite to herself; for the post‐office was in a desk,
+in a corner of the sitting‐room of a farm‐house four miles distant. This
+house was at the end of postal and stage accommodations in that direction.
+Three times a week a double‐seated open wagon was driven there from a
+seaport town thirty miles to the southward, passing through several small
+villages on its way. This stage had brought Bessie up, and was to return
+the next morning.
+
+She set out on her walk soon after their early dinner, and reached the
+post‐office just at the high tide of that country afternoon leisure, when,
+their noon dinner quite cleared away, the women of the house are
+ordinarily free from everything that they would call labor. At this time
+the housewife smooths her hair and ties on a clean apron. One hears the
+snap of knitting‐needles through the silence, or the drowsy hum of the
+spinning‐wheel, or the sound of the loom where the deep‐blue woollen web
+grows, thread by thread, while the weaver tosses her shuttle to and fro.
+
+Bessie had dreaded the gossip which she must expect to encounter; but, as
+she approached, the sight of blue and pink sun‐bonnets out in the field,
+where the women were raking, hay, relieved her fear. Not a soul was in the
+house. The watch‐dog, recollecting her, gave no alarm, only walked gravely
+by her side, and looked on while she slipped her letter into the bag left
+to receive the mail. All the doors and windows stood open, and the
+sunshine lay bright and clear on the white bare floors. Large, stupid
+flies bumped their heads against the panes of glass, and a bumble‐bee flew
+in at the front door, wandered noisily about the rooms, and out again by
+the back door. The painted wooden chairs stood straightly against the
+yellow‐washed walls, and a large rocking‐chair, with a chintz cushion,
+occupied one corner. A braided cloth mat covered the hearth, and the
+fireplace was filled with cedar boughs, through which glittered the brass
+andirons. On the high mantel‐piece stood a pair of brass candlesticks, and
+a tumbler filled with wild roses.
+
+Bessie glanced hurriedly about, then stole out, trembling lest she should
+be discovered and pounced upon by some loud‐voiced man or woman from whom
+escape would be impossible. But no one appeared, and in a few minutes she
+was out of sight of the house.
+
+Loud would be their exclamations of wonder and regret when they should
+discover that letter, knowing who must have brought it. How curiously
+would they handle it over, and examine it, and try to peep into it while
+they speculated and guessed concerning its contents!
+
+“One comfort,” said Bessie to herself, as she glanced over her shoulder,
+and saw the last sun‐bonnet disappear, “I sealed it so that not even a
+particle of air could get in; and they can’t see a word without committing
+felony.”
+
+The June day was passing away in a soft glory. All the world was green,
+all the sky was blue, and all the air was golden. But the green was so
+various, from a verdant blackness, through many tints, to a vivid green
+that was almost yellow, it seemed many‐colored as it was many‐shaped.
+There was every shape and size, from the graceful plume of ferns to the
+square‐topped oak with its sturdy, horizontal branches. Through it all
+wound the narrow brown road, with a line of grass in the middle between
+the wagon‐wheels where the horses feet spared it. The birds were singing
+their evening song, and a brook at the roadside lisped faintly here and
+there, then lay still and shone, then suddenly laughed outright.
+
+On such an evening one does long to be happy; and, if happy, then one
+feels that it is not enough. Bessie walked on slowly, taking long breaths
+of the clear, perfumed air that had now an evening coolness. She would
+fain have stayed out till night fell. The house was near, so she stepped
+aside, sat down on a mossy rock, and looked at the sunset. The last, thin,
+shining cloud there melted in the fervid light, grew faint, and
+disappeared. Bessie’s eyes, so tearful that all this universe of green and
+gold swam before them, were fixed on the sky, and she thought over, with a
+clearer mind now, the last feverish, miserable years of her life.
+
+It seemed to her that, if she had been less exclusively devoted to her
+husband, and had interested herself in other people and in the events of
+the day, she would have been wiser and happier. She had made herself as a
+slave, and had received a slave’s portion. It would be better to stand on
+a more equal footing, and, since works of supererogation, instead of
+winning his gratitude and affection, only fostered his selfishness and
+lowered her, to confine herself to the duties she was bound to perform.
+
+“But it is my nature to love something with my whole strength, so that all
+else seems small in comparison,” she said, sighing. “How can I help it?”
+
+While she gazed fixedly at the sky, at first without seeing, she presently
+became aware of a red‐gold crescent moon that had grown visible under her
+eyes, curved like a bow when the arrow is just singing from the string,
+like the new moon whereon Our Lady stands, a tower of ivory.
+
+The tears in Bessie’s eyes made the shining curve tremble in the sky as
+though a hand held it; and, as though it were a bent bow, an arrowy
+thought flew from it, and struck quivering into her heart:
+
+“Love God, and all will be well!”
+
+She sat a minute longer, then rose and went quietly homeward. Aunt Nancy
+would be anxious about her; and the desire for solitude was gone. She was
+glad now that she had written to Father Conners, though the letter might
+have shown a gentler spirit. It was a comfort to have done something that
+was right, though it was not much.
+
+One does not ordinarily become pious in a moment. We may recognize the
+voice of God, and be startled at the clearness and suddenness of the
+summons, but our sluggish faith has ever an excuse for a little more
+folding of the hands to sleep. But though not obedient at once, Bessie
+Maynard felt, rather than saw, that there was a refuge which made it no
+longer possible for her to despair.
+
+Within a few days she received an answer to her letter. The priest was
+coming to that neighborhood by the last of the week, and would see her.
+The letter was brief and to the point, and contained not one word of
+sympathy or exhortation; but the tremulous characters, that told of age or
+infirmity touched the heart of the reader. This old man gave her no soft
+words, but he was hastening to her relief. For the first time, she
+anxiously asked herself if it had not been possible for her to avoid all
+her trouble, and if there was any element in her story which could
+reasonably be expected to call forth anything but reproof for herself from
+a man whose whole life had been one of charity and self‐denial. She wished
+to see him indeed, but she awaited his coming with a feeling little short
+of terror.
+
+Bessie had not written to her husband. She could not bring herself to do
+that, for she did not wish to write coldly to him, and she would not use
+expressions of affection which had no echo in her heart. But she wrote to
+her son a gentle and tender letter, of which he was neither old nor
+sensitive enough to feel the pathos. Only one reproach found a place
+there: “I thought you might like to hear from me, though you cared more
+for your play than you did to say good‐by to me when I came here, and left
+me to go to the depot alone.” She did not intimate, though she thought,
+that the business which had called her husband away at the same time might
+as easily have been postponed.
+
+Father Conners came. His open buggy was driven to the door one morning,
+and the boy who sat with him held the horse while the priest slowly
+alighted. He was a large, powerful‐looking man, still vigorous, though
+slightly bent and stiff with age. Snow‐white hair framed his expressive
+face, in which sternness and benevolence were strangely mingled. His color
+was fresh, perfect teeth gave a brilliancy to his infrequent smile, and
+his pale‐blue eyes were almost too penetrating to be met with ease. He
+walked with his head slightly bent down and his gaze fixed upon the ground
+till he reached the door, then looked up to see Bessie standing on the
+threshold.
+
+She was a pretty creature still, in spite of troubled years, and her
+manner and expression would have propitiated a sterner judge. Blushes
+overspread her face, and she trembled; yet an impulse of joyful welcome
+broke through and brightened her, as a sunbeam brightens the cloud.
+
+The priest stopped short, with no ceremony of greeting, and regarded her a
+moment, while she waited for him to speak.
+
+The scrutiny satisfied him apparently.
+
+“You did well to come back here,” he said then, and made a motion to
+enter. She stood aside for him to pass, and followed him into the little
+parlor which she had spent all the morning in preparing for him. An arm‐
+chair had been improvised out of a barrel, some pillows, and a shawl, the
+rude fireplace was filled with green, and there were dishes of flowers
+about.
+
+Her visitor did not appear to notice these simple efforts to do him honor.
+Almost before seating himself, he began to speak of what had brought him
+there.
+
+“Now, my child, though I have time enough to say and hear all that is
+necessary, though it should take a week, I have no time to waste. Tell me
+the meaning of your letter?”
+
+No time for gradual approach, for timid intimations, or delicate reserves
+till, warming with the subject, she could show plainly all that was in her
+heart. She must make the “epic plunge” without delay. Stimulated by the
+necessity, Bessie called up her wits and her courage, and, without being
+aware of it, told everything in a few words.
+
+When she paused and expected him to question her, to her surprise he
+seemed already to know the whole. And, to her still greater pleasure,
+those points on which she had touched lightly, fearing that they might
+seem trivial in his eyes, he spoke of with sympathy.
+
+“It is those little attentions and kindnesses which sweeten human life, my
+child, and help to sustain us under its heavier trials,” he said.
+
+Bessie lifted her grateful, tearful eyes, and thanked him with a sad
+smile.
+
+“And now,” he continued, “I want you to go to confession.”
+
+Her eyes dilated with astonishment. She was confused and distressed, and a
+painful blush rose to her face.
+
+“I have not confessed for years,” she stammered. “I am not prepared. When
+I have time to think, I will go to confession in a church. It seems
+strange to confess here.”
+
+The priest was by nature and habits peremptory, and he knew that this was
+the proper time to exercise that quality. “Any place is proper for
+confession, if a better one is not to be had,” he said. “As to being
+prepared, let us see. You tell me that you have been thinking this all
+over this week, to see wherein you may have done wrong. There, then, is an
+examen of your conscience as to your duties toward your husband and,
+indirectly, toward God. You say that you have not practised your religion,
+but mean to do so in future. There is attrition, at least, and a purpose
+of amendment. You say that you know all you have committed of serious
+wrong in these years, don’t you?”
+
+“Yes,” was the answer.
+
+“You know humanly, as far as you can know, without the illumination of the
+Holy Spirit?” the priest corrected.
+
+“Yes,” said Bessie again. “But I want to think it over, and make sure of
+my sorrow and good resolutions.”
+
+“In short, you wish to reform and convert yourself, then go to God,” said
+Father Conners. “That is not the way. It is God who is to convert you. You
+need not stay to try to conquer your feelings, and hesitate for fear you
+may not be able to. Your reason is convinced. It is enough. Go to God, and
+ask him to help you to do the rest. While you are thinking the subject
+over in the woods here, you may die, or the devil may come and tempt you
+in the shape of this friend of yours. I will give you half an hour. While
+I have gone out to read my office under the trees, you kneel down here,
+and first ask the Holy Spirit to enlighten you, and reveal all your sins.
+Then say, and mean, that you are sorry, and plan how you may do better
+with God’s help in the future.”
+
+He had risen while speaking, and was going toward the door. Refusal was
+impossible. Bessie carried her shawl‐covered arm‐chair out, and set it
+under a thick old pine‐tree on the slippery brown pine‐needles, through
+which tiny ants were running in every direction, very busy about some
+buildings of their own, carrying sticks larger than themselves.
+
+Father Conners seated himself, set his hat on the ground by his side,
+spread a red silk handkerchief over his head, and took out his Breviary.
+He had but little time to attend to the beauties of nature, but the
+situation brought an expression of pleasure to his face. He gave one
+glance up into the overshadowing branches that spread their fragrant
+screen between him and the sun, then a kindlier glance to the young woman
+who stood looking wistfully at him.
+
+“Come here for your confession when you are ready, child,” he said, “and
+don’t be afraid. See how peaceful the skies are. Is God less gentle? And
+here! take my watch, and come back in twenty‐five minutes. You have lost
+five minutes already.”
+
+Bessie took the large silver watch on its black ribbon, and hastened to
+shut herself in her room, and Father Conners became absorbed in his
+office. So much absorbed was he, he did not observe that the silk
+handkerchief slipped slowly from his head, and that a large spider let
+itself down by a thread from the tree above, stopped within a few inches
+of that silvery hair, which it contemplated curiously, then ran up its
+silken ladder again as a young woman came out of the house, walked with
+faltering steps across the sward, and sank on her knees by the priest’s
+side.
+
+An hour later, Father Conners climbed laboriously into his carriage, and
+drove away, and Bessie leaned on the bars, and watched him as long as he
+was in sight. She felt strong and peaceful. She counted over the promises
+she had made him, and resolved anew that they should be kept.
+
+She stood there so long that Aunt Nancy, after having kept her dinner
+waiting out of all reason, came down to speak to her. She came with
+anxiety and hesitation, not knowing whether her niece was better or worse
+for this visit.
+
+“You gave me good advice, Aunt Nancy,” Bessie said, turning at the sound
+of her step.
+
+The old lady was delighted. “So you’re all right?” she said.
+
+“I have got into the right track, at least,” Bessie answered, as they
+walked up toward the house. “I have been to confession.”
+
+Aunt Nancy’s face clouded again on hearing this avowal. That was all the
+priest’s visit had amounted to, then—that John’s wife had been induced to
+go to confession! How could people be so superstitious, so subjected, to
+their priests? She had hoped that Bessie might have received some good
+sound advice and instruction.
+
+This she thought, but said nothing.
+
+How was she to know that in that one word confession was included advice,
+instruction, good resolution, and sorrow for sin, as well as the mystical
+rite which she abhorred?
+
+To Be Continued.
+
+
+
+
+S. Peter’s Roman Pontificate.
+
+
+The history of mankind presents us innumerable facts that strike the
+reader with astonishment, and tax his ingenuity to its utmost to explain.
+The sudden fall of nations from the height of prosperity to misery and
+subjection, the invasion of hordes of barbarians to substitute their
+uncouthness and ferocity for the polish and civilization of centuries, the
+apparent vocation of some one nation, at different epochs, to assume a
+preponderance over all others in the government of the world, the
+appearance of some one great mind that shone like a sun amid the galaxy of
+intellect, revolutionizing his time, and then setting, without leaving any
+one to continue his work; all these facts confuse the mind, and, when man
+has lost the light that was sent into this world to guide him, seem to him
+but the bitter irony of destiny. Not so, however, are they viewed by him
+to whom revelation has imparted its illumining rays. He sees Providence
+everywhere, and, knowing some wise end has been intended by the Creator
+whose power conserves and directs the evolutions of the planets and the
+vicissitudes of human life, he is encouraged to inquire into the end for
+which such wonderful events have been brought about. ’Twas by this light
+the great Bishop of Hippo saw the providential disposition of the changes
+that took place in the world; looked on all history but as the preparation
+and continuation of the master‐work of God—his church. ’Twas by this light
+that, following in the footsteps of S. Augustine, Bossuet understood the
+relations of such different facts, and showed their connection in his
+_Universal History_. These men, and those who, like them, have studied the
+history of the nations of the earth, had no difficulty in realizing the
+relation of all these facts, and in looking on them as so many
+confirmations of the truth of Christianity; but those who are without
+faith stand aghast at the inexplicable phenomena they see before them, and
+of all none so sets at naught their judgment and defies their explanation
+as the greatest, the most persistent, the most important of all historical
+facts—the existence of the Catholic Church. They see it everywhere;
+modifying everything; setting at defiance all calculation; and when,
+according to human judgment, it should cease to exist, coming forth from
+the ordeal purer, stronger, more brilliant and powerful than before. Yet,
+they are not willing to learn by experience, but look forward to a future
+day when an expedient or a means will be discovered to destroy in its turn
+this gigantic fabric that appears to scorn the ravages of time and the
+fury of tempest, just as the Jews look forward to the Messiah who is to
+deliver them from captivity among the nations. In their useless hope, they
+leave nothing untried, and often scruple not at what in their private
+capacity they might scorn—distortion of history and downright calumny. No
+human institution could ever have withstood the array of powerful enemies
+the church of Christ has had since she first went forth from Mount Sion.
+No age has ever seen her without them; sometimes fierce persecutors,
+sometimes insidious plotters, sometimes open impugners of her dogmas; at
+other times dangerous foes, cloaking their hostility under the garb of
+devotion that they might better strike deep into her bosom the poison with
+which, in their foolish hate, they fancied they were to deprive her of
+life. But the spouse of Christ has always cast them from her, and walked
+majestically over the ruins they themselves had brought about, and this
+she will ever do. And why? Because she does not lean on a broken reed nor
+put her trust in an arm of flesh. She bears about her a charm that defies
+all attack—the protection of the Most High—and presents to all the proof
+of her holy character, those motives of credibility, that as they were
+intended for all time, so now as on the day of Pentecost, accompany her
+wherever she goes, invincibly proving to the mind of man her own divine
+origin and her claim to his obedience. As she was one, in the union of all
+her children in one faith and in one baptism; as she was holy in the lives
+of those that obeyed her; as she was catholic and universal, embracing
+peoples of _all_ climes and of _all_ ages; as she was apostolic in her
+origin and in the succession of her ministry, so is she now, one, holy,
+catholic, and apostolic in the succession of her priesthood and in the
+infallibility of her head. As she was able to point to the wonders wrought
+by the apostle in the name of her divine founder, so now can she point to
+the miracles of her chosen servants: an Alphonsus de Liguori, a Paul of
+the Cross, a Ven. Pallotta, a Maria Taigi, a Maria Moerl, and a host of
+others, down to the martyred victims of communistic fury. She can show in
+the XIXth century, as she did in the first, a host of martyrs; old men and
+youths, matrons and tender virgins, who, when arraigned for their faith
+before the Chinese mandarin, fulfilled the promise of Christ, and gave
+inspired answers, as did the glorious children of the early church, and
+sealed, too, with their blood the belief they held dearer than life.
+
+We can understand, then, how the church can look fearlessly at the storms
+that ever and anon burst upon her, because, built on the solidity of her
+belief, she knows the waves can but break harmless at her feet. She has no
+need of human means to secure her existence, for that has a promise of
+perennial duration. The condition, too, of her being is one of struggle
+and warfare, and, when it comes upon her, her only act is to oppose the
+shield of faith and the sword of the word of God—her only arms the truth.
+And as it is written that truth will prevail, so in every battle in which
+she has been engaged she has come forth at last with victory inscribed on
+her banner—victory through the truth.
+
+We have said that the condition of her being is struggle and warfare.
+This, therefore, is never wanting; as all the world knows, she is called
+on to defend herself just now against the fiercest attacks she has perhaps
+ever suffered—perhaps even beyond what she underwent in that fearful
+persecution, in which her enemies directed against her every engine of
+destruction, and in their mad rejoicing recorded the inscription,
+_Christiano nomine deleto_. To‐day the openly declared foes of her faith
+are seated in triumph in her stronghold, and strain every nerve to uproot
+from the mind and heart of her children the faith of their fathers. Not
+content with attacking the dogmas she teaches, they assail every fact
+which in any way may favor her, no matter how clearly the history of past
+ages may proclaim its truth. An instance of this we have had but recently,
+but a few months ago, when an attempt was made to prove that the fact upon
+which the whole jurisdiction of the church is grounded never occurred—that
+S. Peter forsooth never came to Rome, and never founded the church there!
+With what success the champions of this assertion advocated their cause is
+known; and it may still further be judged of from the fact that a person
+who came to the discussion, doubting of the fact of S. Peter’s having been
+in Rome, left the hall after hearing the Catholic speakers, convinced that
+such an historical personage as S. Peter had lived and been in Rome, and
+he recorded his belief in one of the leading journals of Italy not
+favorable to the Catholic cause.
+
+It may be said to be a strange phenomenon that a fact of history so
+notorious, and for which so great an amount of proof exists, which has at
+its command every fount of human certitude, as that of the coming of S.
+Peter to Rome, ever should have been called in question. But what will not
+party spirit attempt? It is not the first time nor will it be the last
+that partisans will seek to rid themselves of troublesome facts by
+downright denial of them. This spirit, however, is a dangerous one, and
+especially unbecoming the sincere student of history. We know what Bacon
+has said about the _idola_, and it is incumbent on every one who is
+searching after historic truth to lay aside prejudice or even the desire
+that facts may favor him. He must look at them merely as they are, take
+them on their proof, without, striving to lessen them or give them other
+proportions than are inherent in them. If the scope of all research is to
+find out the truth, it is our duty to seek it only, and not mar its beauty
+by adding to or detracting from it. In the present case the remark is
+highly applicable. Catholics have nothing to fear in examining the
+historic proofs on which the coming of S. Peter to Rome rests; while those
+who differ from them, in so far as they love truth, should be equally glad
+to look well into the claims to truth which this same fact puts forward.
+We propose to go briefly over the ground. We say briefly because it seems
+almost presumptuous, since so many able pens have dedicated themselves to
+this task, that we should undertake it anew. There seems to us, however, a
+want to be supplied, on this subject, something succinct and not too
+learned or too lengthy for the ordinary reader, engrossed in pursuits that
+do not allow time for more extended studies. This must be our excuse as
+well as our reason for the present undertaking.
+
+In the discussion that took place in Rome on the 9th and 10th February,
+1872, the chief speaker on the negative side ended his discourse by saying
+that, no matter what weight of testimony could be brought to sustain S.
+Peter’s coming to Rome, the silence of Scripture was for him an
+unanswerable argument; the Scripture should have spoken of the fact had it
+existed; it said nothing about it, therefore it had never existed. Were it
+not that the subject is too serious for such quotations, we should say
+with Gratiano, “We thank thee for teaching us that word!” This was the
+feeling that came over us as we heard the expression from the lips of the
+speaker, and now, after so much has been written, we have it still. It is
+needless to say that such an expression betrays anxiety with regard to
+positive argument, if not a suspicion of weakness in one’s own cause. We
+shall endeavor to show that there was reason both for this suspicion and
+this anxiety.
+
+And, first, the opinion which is least probable concerning the death of S.
+Peter satisfactorily accounts for the silence of the Acts and of the
+Epistle to the Romans, the portions of Scripture on which our adversaries
+lay most stress in this matter. According to this opinion, S. Peter was
+martyred in Rome, _Nerone et Vetere Consulibus_, _i.e._, according to the
+Bucherian Catalogue, in the second year of Nero, the year 54 of the
+Christian era, this leaving S. Peter twenty‐five years of pontificate,
+from the year 29 to the year 54. S. Linus succeeded him, and ruled the
+church twelve years, dying after S. Paul, who was put to death before Nero
+went into Greece. S. Peter was therefore, according to this chronology,
+dead before S. Paul reached Rome. It is not strange, then, the Acts does
+not speak of his being there. As for the Epistle to the Romans, if it was
+written in the year 53, or two years before S. Paul came to Rome according
+to Eusebius, the reasons we adduce further on will explain the silence
+with regard to S. Peter. If, as the ordinary opinion has it, the Epistle
+was written from Corinth, in the year 58, S. Peter being already four
+years dead, the omission of his name is easily accounted for.
+
+We say, secondly, that, in the belief that S. Peter and S. Paul died at
+the same time in Rome, sufficient reason can be found for the silence both
+of the Acts and of the Epistle to the Romans.
+
+We beg particular attention to what we are going to say. Those portions of
+Scripture do not prove by their silence that S. Peter _never_ came to
+Rome, first, because the Acts and the Epistle to the Romans are not
+adequate witnesses in the case; secondly, because neither the Acts nor the
+Epistle to the Romans was called on by circumstances to allude to S.
+Peter’s being in Rome.
+
+And, first, the Acts and Epistle to the Romans are not adequate witnesses
+that S. Peter _never_ came to Rome. We call attention to the fact that the
+Epistle to the Romans was written two years before S. Paul came to Rome.
+What therefore we are going to say under this first head regarding the
+Acts applies with greater force to the Epistle to the Romans. We shall
+then confine our remarks wholly to the Acts in this connection. We say,
+then, that, in order that the Acts should be received as an adequate
+witness, it should cover the whole period from the time S. Peter first
+left Judæa to that of his death as fixed by received historical data, for
+we cannot arbitrarily determine the period of his death. Now, it is well
+known that history indicates the date of S. Peter’s death as that of S.
+Paul’s. They are represented as dying on the same day and in the same
+year, one by the sword, the other on the cross; such are the words of the
+Roman Martyrology. This being so, we call attention to the fact that the
+chief disputant on the negative side of the question fixed on the year 61,
+from the _Fasti Consulares—atti consolari_, as that in which S. Paul came
+to Rome, this being the year in which Portius Festus went to take
+possession of his province.(146) The Acts tells us that after S. Paul came
+to Rome he dwelt for two years in his own hired house. Here the narration
+ceases, leaving Paul alive and in the year 63 of the Christian era. From
+that time to his death, according to historical data, occurs a period,
+according to different computations, of from two to four years. About this
+period of time no mention is made in the Acts for the simple reason that
+it is not embraced there; the narrative breaks off just as it begins. What
+was to prevent S. Peter’s coming to Rome during this period of from two to
+four years? If he had, the Acts could have said nothing about it, nor
+could it if he had not. The conclusion is simple, the Acts, and, _a
+fortiori_, the Epistle to the Romans, written prior to it, are no
+competent or adequate witnesses to prove S. Peter _never_ came to Rome,
+nor died there.
+
+We come to the second head: neither the Acts nor the Epistle to the Romans
+was called on to mention the fact of S. Peter’s being in Rome. With regard
+to the Acts, any one who will carefully read it will see that S. Luke
+narrates the acts of S. Paul. It was necessary to begin with some account
+of the commencement of the church to show S. Paul’s connection with it.
+This S. Luke does, speaking of the descent of the Holy Ghost, of the
+instantaneous and marvellous results of the preaching of S. Peter, of his
+admission of the Gentiles after the vision of the cloth containing all
+manner of animals, and then passes on to speak of S. Paul, of his
+persecution of the church, of the martyrdom of S. Stephen, of the
+wonderful conversion of S. Paul. Here S. Paul is brought into contact with
+S. Peter; but after the Council of Jerusalem, when S. Paul sets out to
+evangelize the heathen, S. Peter is no more heard of, not even when S.
+Paul returns to Jerusalem, as narrated in chapter xxi. Was he dead? Had
+this been so ere S. Paul left Judæa, from his intimate contact with S.
+Peter, it is probable S. Luke would have mentioned a fact so important as
+the death of the first of the apostles. He was not dead. He and the other
+apostles no longer appear in the narration of S. Luke, if we except S.
+James, Bishop of Jerusalem, whom S. Paul saw (chapter xxi.), because S.
+Luke did not propose to give a complete history of the church at that
+time, or of the apostles, but only of S. Paul and his acts. The Acts are
+contained in twenty‐eight chapters. In chapter vii., v. 57, Saul the
+persecutor is spoken of for the first time; in the next four chapters he
+is frequently mentioned. In the xv., S. Peter is mentioned for the last
+time; and from this to the xxviii. S. Paul is the theme of the inspired
+writer. In the 15th verse of chapter xxviii. the Christians go out to meet
+Paul at Forum Appii, and in verse 16 he is in Rome a prisoner; verse 7
+shows him to us calling together not the Christians, but the chief men of
+the Jews, to explain that he has not appealed to Cæsar because he had
+anything against his people. After these words, at verse 21, the Jews
+reply to him, and he instructs or upbraids them as far as verse 29, which
+represents the Jews going away incredulous. Verse 30 says: “He remained
+two years in his own hired house, and received all who came unto him; 31,
+Preaching the kingdom of God, and teaching with all confidence, and
+without prohibition, the things that are of the Lord Jesus Christ.” Here
+the Acts ends. Does there seem to the reader any place in these two verses
+for a mention of Peter? Ought the inspired writer to have added more to
+his account? It seems to us not, for the end he had in view was gained. He
+had been a companion of S. Paul, he had told those who knew it not what
+had happened in their travels, and now S. Paul was in Rome, and dwelling
+there, in the centre of the world, he did not deem it needful to say any
+more, otherwise he would have told us some of the actions of S. Paul, for
+wonders and conversions he certainly wrought in those two years. But as S.
+Luke says nothing about these, nor about the flourishing Church of Rome to
+which S. Paul two years before had addressed his Epistle from Corinth, it
+is not strange he says nothing about S. Peter.
+
+The silence of S. Paul in regard to S. Peter, in his Epistle to the
+Romans, is not only of no avail to our adversaries, but the Epistle itself
+contains matter for strong argument that S. Peter was permanently in Rome,
+and in fact founded the church there.
+
+First, with respect to the silence of S. Paul in regard to S. Peter. It is
+a received canon of criticism that the silence of authors does not affect
+the existence of a fact, when that fact is proven from documents of
+weight; and this all the more when no valid reason can be put forward to
+show the author or authors should have mentioned the fact in question.
+Now, this is precisely the case with regard to S. Paul’s silence about S.
+Peter. We have documentary and monumental evidence, as we shall see
+hereafter, that S. Peter did come to Rome, while there was no practical
+reason why S. Paul should mention S. Peter:—not for the sake of commending
+him, for that was neither becoming, as S. Peter was head of the apostolic
+college, nor necessary, as S. Peter’s works bore the stamp of divine
+sanction; not for the purpose of asking permission to labor in Rome, as
+the apostles were equal in the ministry, and united in a bond of perfect
+harmony and mutual understanding, though with subjection to the centre of
+unity, S. Peter, without, however, the distinctions of the various rights
+and duties afterwards introduced by ecclesiastical custom; not for the
+purpose of salutation, for he could not address S. Peter as head of the
+church in a tone of authoritative teaching; and salutations, if, contrary
+to what is generally held, Peter were in Rome at the time the letter was
+written, could be made privately by the messenger who carried the letter,
+and thus the duty of urbanity or charity, the only one that could require
+express notice of S. Peter, may have been fulfilled. In fact, propriety
+itself required this latter mode of salutation, lest it should be said
+that S. Paul, instead of having directly addressed S. Peter, had saluted
+him publicly through those to whom he wrote—the Christians of Rome, the
+spiritual subjects of S. Peter. The silence, then, of S. Paul is of no
+weight to prove S. Peter never was in Rome.
+
+The argument of silence, therefore, falls to the ground.
+
+We said the Epistle to the Romans contains matter to show S. Peter was in
+Rome, and founded the church there.
+
+Let us bear in mind who S. Peter was—the Apostle of the Gentiles. Why was
+it he did not go at once to the centre of the Gentile world? Could any
+more potent means have been adopted to spread Christianity? There centred
+the civilization of the known world; there the Ethiopian met the Scythian,
+the swarthy men from the banks of the Ganges were face to face with those
+who first saw light by the waters of the Tagus, and the Numidian horseman
+and the German warrior strolled through the Forum, admiring the temples of
+the gods of Rome. Nowhere was there more certainty of success in spreading
+abroad novelty of any kind than in this Babylon, receiving into its vast
+enclosure men of all the nations over which it ruled, and sending them
+forth again filled with wonder at what they saw, and eager to impart to
+their less fortunate countrymen what they had learned in their sojourn in
+the great city. Thither, however, S. Paul did not go, and why? Because
+some one was there already—some one of power and authority; some one whose
+labors had been crowned with success, and who had built up a church, the
+faith of which at the time this epistle was written was known throughout
+the whole world. S. Peter tells us himself he desired to go to the Romans
+to impart to them something of spiritual grace to strengthen them, that
+is, to be comforted in them “by that which is mutual—your faith and mine.”
+The mode of expression of S. Paul in this place, vv. 11 and 12, is worthy
+of notice. He says to the Romans he longs to see them to _strengthen
+them_, and, as if he might be misunderstood, he adds immediately, “_that
+is to say_, that I may be comforted together in you.” Evidently he speaks
+here as one who is careful lest he seem to usurp the place of another, or
+assume a right of teaching with authority which belonged to another. He
+would not have the Romans think he considers that the one who rules them
+is inferior to himself or stands in need of his support. In verse 18 he
+says: “I do not wish you to be ignorant, brethren, that I have often
+proposed to come unto you (and I have been prevented hitherto) that I may
+have some fruit among you as among other peoples.” It is manifest here
+that S. Paul’s duties with the Greeks kept him from going to Rome, and
+this, as we said before, because, the Romans being already provided with
+one who could teach them, there was not the pressing need of him that
+would make him leave those who had none to preach to them.
+
+What we have said with regard to the tone of the first chapter of the
+Epistle is confirmed by the words of the apostle in chapter xv. 19‐26.
+Here S. Paul says why he had not gone to Rome—because he was preaching to
+those _who had no one to preach to them_. Had the Romans had no apostle
+preaching to them, this would not have been a reason to put forward,
+because the superiority of an apostle over any other preacher of the word
+was such as to do away with the necessity of any comparison, and to make
+all desirous in an eminent degree of seeing and hearing the chosen men the
+sound of whose voice was to be heard throughout the whole world. S. Paul
+then continues: “When I shall begin to take my journey into Spain, I hope
+_that as I pass_, I shall see you, and be brought on my way thither by
+you, if first, in part, I shall have enjoyed you.” From this it results,
+first, that S. Paul had no intention of remaining in Rome; and, secondly,
+that what he desired was to enjoy, in meeting the Romans, the consolation
+of seeing their faith, and of sharing with them the spiritual gifts he
+himself had received, which should serve to make them yet more steadfast
+in their fidelity to the Gospel, precisely as, to use an example, the
+preaching of the same doctrine they have heard from their own bishop, by a
+bishop who is his guest, strengthens the faithful in their religious
+belief.
+
+The fact, then, stands that a flourishing church existed in Rome at the
+time S. Paul wrote his Epistle, and this is still further shown by the
+salutations in the last chapter. Who founded it? History is silent
+regarding any one but S. Peter. As Alexandria claims S. Peter and S. Mark;
+as Ephesus, S. John; as innumerable other cities and countries their
+respective apostles, so does Rome claim S. Peter as its first evangelizer.
+It would be absurd to say that all these other cities and nations could
+retain the memory of him who first preached to them the word of God, and
+Rome—the greatest of all, where so notorious a fact as the preaching of
+Jesus Christ could not pass by unnoticed, especially when its effects were
+so luminously conspicuous as S. Paul tells us they were—this Rome should
+alone be ungratefully forgetful of her best benefactor. The thing is
+absurd on the face of it. But history is silent about any other founder
+except S. Peter; therefore we are justified in concluding that S. Peter,
+and S. Peter alone, was the original founder of the Church of Rome, and
+that Rome is right in holding her tradition that such was the fact.
+
+This tradition of S. Peter’s having been in Rome, having founded the
+church there, and having died there, gives strength to the conclusion
+which Scripture has aided us to form. To any one who is at all conversant
+with Rome, it must always have appeared a very remarkable fact that the
+discoveries made by the zeal of her archæologists have, as a rule,
+confirmed the traditions existing among the people both with regard to
+localities and facts. It would seem as if Providence, in these days of
+widespread scepticism, were unearthing the long‐hid monuments of the past
+to put to confusion those who would fain treat the history of early ages
+as a myth. The monuments stare them in the face, while their value is
+understood by men of sound practical sense. This is the reason of the
+reaction that is taking place against the sceptical style of writing
+history which Niebühr and Dr. Arnold adopted, and made to a certain extent
+fashionable. The words of a well‐informed writer, whose works have been
+deservedly well received—Mr. Dyer—are an excellent reply to authors of
+that stamp, based, as they are, on sound sense and the experience of
+mankind—the safest guides we can possibly follow; for it is folly to think
+that those who have gone before us blindly received everything that was
+told them. Whatever may have happened with regard to individuals, such
+certainly never was the case with regard to all. As well might we say
+that, because some writers of to‐day speak in a spirit of scepticism, all
+writers adopt the same style. Men in general never were sceptical, and
+never will be; they will use their senses and their intellect, and judge
+of things on their merits, and not according to the extravagant ideas of
+any one, however brilliant he be. Mr. Dyer, though speaking of ancient
+Roman history, makes remarks that are applicable in our case. He says, in
+the Introduction to the _History of the City of Rome_, p. xvi.: “It would,
+of course, be impossible to discuss in the compass of this Introduction
+the general question of the credibility of early Roman history. We can
+only state the reasons which have led us to doubt a few of the conclusions
+of modern critics about some of the more prominent facts of that history,
+and about the existence or the value of the sources on which it professes
+to be founded. If it can be shown that the attempts to eliminate or to
+depreciate some of these sources can hardly be regarded as successful, and
+that the general spirit of modern criticism has been unreasonably
+sceptical and unduly captious with respect to the principal Roman
+historian, then the author will at least have established what, at all
+events, may serve as an apology for the course he has pursued.” And at
+page lxii.: “There is little motive to falsify the origin and dates of
+public buildings; and, indeed, their falsification would be much more
+difficult than that of events transmitted by oral tradition, or even
+recorded in writing. In fact, we consider the remains of some of the
+monuments of the Regal and Republican periods to be the best proofs of the
+fundamental truth of early Roman history.” If this author could justly
+speak in this manner of a period regarding which there is certainly not a
+little obscurity, what are we to say when we are speaking of so well‐known
+an epoch as that of the Roman Empire under Claudius and Nero, and of a
+fact so luminous as that of the foundation of Christianity in the capital
+of the world? The certainty of the traditions concerning this fact
+undoubtedly acquires a strength proportionally greater, and this all the
+more because we have the monuments around which these traditions centre,
+and the existence of these monuments in the IId century is attested by the
+Roman priest Caius writing against Proclus, apud Eusebium, _Hist. Eccl._,
+c. xxv.: “I can,” he writes, “show you the trophies (tropæa) of the
+apostles. For, whether you go to the Vatican or to the Ostian Way, the
+trophies of those who founded the church will present themselves to your
+view.” These monuments are the place of imprisonment of S. Peter, the
+place of his crucifixion, that of the martyrdom of S. Paul, the place of
+their burial, that in which their remains were deposited for a time, and
+their final resting‐place, over which the grandest temple of the earth
+rises in its majesty—a witness of the belief of all ages.
+
+The tradition of S. Peter having founded the church in Rome receives
+additional force from the fact that but a short period elapsed before
+writers whose genuine works have come down to us recorded them, and thus
+transmitted them to us. Not to speak of S. Clement of Rome, of S. Ignatius
+of Antioch, of Papias, we take the words of S. Irenæus, Bishop of Lyons,
+who was martyred in the year 202 of the Christian era. We omit speaking of
+the other Fathers, not because we consider their testimony without great
+value, for it is impossible, in our judgment, for any one who takes up
+their works with an unprejudiced mind, and reads them in connection with
+later and more precise writers on this subject, not to feel that they
+refer to a matter so universally and thoroughly known as not to need any
+further dwelling on than would a fact well known to a correspondent,
+demand details from the person who writes him the letter. S. Irenæus, we
+said, died in the year 202. He had been for a long time Bishop of Lyons,
+whence he wrote to S. Victor, Pope, on the subject of the controversy
+regarding the celebration of Easter, dissuading him from harsh measures
+with respect to the Christians of the East. S. Victor was Pope from the
+year 193 to 202, and succeeded Eleutherius, who became pope in the year
+177. To this latter Irenæus was sent by the clergy of Lyons in the case of
+the Montanist heresy, he having been received and ordained priest of the
+diocese of Lyons by the Bishop Photinus, and it was during the pontificate
+of the same pope that he wrote his celebrated work against heresies. He
+was at this time not a young man, and we shall not be wide of the mark if
+we put his birth some years before the middle of the second century, and
+this all the more because he himself in the above‐mentioned book speaks of
+his early studies as gone by. According to the best authorities, S. John
+the Apostle was ninety years old when he was thrown into the caldron of
+boiling oil, under Domitian, in Rome. He lived several years longer at
+Patmos, and at Ephesus, where he died in the year 101, during the reign of
+Trajan. We have thus a period of from thirty to forty years between the
+death of S. John—the witness of what SS. Peter and Paul did, and who was
+fully acquainted with all that had occurred at Rome—and Irenæus.
+Independent of the means of information this proximity to the apostles
+gave him, both because in his youth he must have known many who had in
+their own youth seen and heard S. Peter, and because he had himself
+visited Rome, the interval between him and S. John is filled up by the
+link that unites them in an unbroken tradition, by the celebrated martyr
+and Bishop of Smyrna, S. Polycarp, the disciple of S. John and the master
+of S. Irenæus. We ask the reader to say, in all candor, whether this link
+be not all that can be desired to secure belief in the testimony handed
+down through it, from the apostles, especially with regard to such a thing
+as the chief theatre of the life, labors, and death of the head of the
+apostolic college. Anticipating a favorable answer, we proceed to give the
+words of S. Irenæus—of undoubted authenticity. In his work, _Contra
+Hæreses_, l. iii. c. i., he writes: “Matthew among the Hebrews composed
+his Gospel in their tongue, while Peter and Paul were evangelizing at Rome
+and founding the church. After their decease, Mark, the disciple and
+interpreter of Peter, committed to writing what had been preached by
+Peter.” In the same book, c. iii. § 3, S. Irenæus says: “But since it is
+too long to enumerate in a volume of this kind the successions of all the
+churches, pointing to the tradition of the greatest, most ancient and
+universally known, founded and constituted at Rome, by the two most
+glorious Apostles Peter and Paul, to that which it has from the apostles,
+and to the faith announced to men, through the succession of bishops
+coming down to our time, we put to confusion all who in any manner, by
+their own self‐will, or through empty glory, or through blindness, or from
+malice, gather otherwise than they should. For to this church, by reason
+of its more powerful headship (principalitatem), it behooves every church
+to come, that is, those who are faithful everywhere, in which (in qua) has
+always been preserved by men of every region the tradition which is from
+the apostles.” He goes on to say: “The holy apostles, founding and
+building up the church, gave to Linus the episcopate of administration of
+the church. Paul makes mention of this Linus in his letters to Timothy. To
+him succeeded Anacletus; after him, in the third place from the apostles,
+Clement (who also saw the apostles, and conferred with them) obtained the
+episcopate, while he yet had the preaching of the apostles sounding in his
+ears and tradition before his eyes; not he alone, for there were many then
+living who had been taught by the apostles. Under this Clement, therefore,
+a not trifling dissension having arisen among the brethren who were at
+Corinth, the church which is at Rome wrote a very strong letter etc.... To
+this Clement succeeded Evaristus, and to Evaristus Alexander, and
+afterwards the sixth from the apostles was Sixtus, and after him
+Telesphorus, who also gloriously suffered martyrdom; and then Hyginus,
+next Pius, after whom Anicetus. When Soter had succeeded Anicetus, now
+Eleutherius has the episcopate in the twelfth place from the apostles. By
+this order and succession, that tradition which is from the apostles in
+the church, and the heralding of the truth, have come down to us. And this
+is a most full showing that one and the same is the life‐giving faith
+which from the time of the apostles down to the present has been preserved
+and delivered in truth. And Polycarp, not only taught by the apostles, and
+conversing with many of those who saw our Lord, but also constituted by
+the apostles bishop in Asia, in the church which is at Smyrna, _whom we
+also saw in our early youth_, taught always the things he had learned from
+the apostles, which also he delivered to the church, and which are alone
+true. To these things all the churches, which are in Asia, and those who
+up to to‐day have succeeded to Polycarp, bear witness.” And in his letter
+to Florinus, S. Irenæus says more explicitly that he was a disciple of
+Polycarp, that he had a most vivid recollection of his master, of his ways
+and words, which he cherished more in his heart even than in his
+memory.(147) Eusebius, in the _Chronicon_, says that Polycarp was martyred
+in the year 169, the seventh of Lucius Verus.
+
+Nothing clearer, more explicit, or of greater value than a tradition with
+such links as S. John the Evangelist, S. Polycarp, and S. Irenæus could be
+desired to establish beyond a doubt that S. Peter came to Rome and founded
+the church there.
+
+This fact having been shown to rest on a solid basis, we have now to say a
+word with regard to the time at which S. Peter came to Rome. On this point
+there is a difference of opinion; but this very difference of opinion as
+regards the epoch is a new proof of the fact. The most probable opinion,
+that which seems to have found most favor, fixes it at the year 42 of the
+Christian era, the second year of Claudius. This is what S. Jerome,
+following Eusebius, records. The learned Jesuit Zaccaria puts it at the
+year 41, in the month of April, the 25th of which was kept as a holyday,
+in the time of S. Leo the Great, in honor of S. Peter. This writer bears
+witness to the very remarkable unanimity among the Fathers with respect to
+the twenty‐five years’ duration of the pontificate of S. Peter in Rome,
+which according to S. Jerome would fix the date of his death as the
+fourteenth year of Nero, the 67th of the present era. The words of S.
+Jerome are: “Simon Peter went to Rome to overthrow Simon Magus, and had
+there his sacerdotal chair for twenty‐five years, up to the last year of
+Nero, that is, the fourteenth; by whom also he was crowned with martyrdom
+by being affixed to the cross.”(148) S. Jerome, we know, was well versed
+in the history of the church, had dwelt for a long time at Rome, and may
+consequently be presumed to have been excellently well informed with
+regard to the general belief and tradition of the people of Rome. The
+manner of the death of both apostles is mentioned by Tertullian, in his
+book _De Præscriptionibus_, c. 126, where, after bidding those he
+addresses have recourse to the apostolic churches, he says: “If you be
+near to Italy, you have Rome, whence also we have authority. How happy is
+this church, for which the apostles poured forth all their doctrine with
+their blood, where Peter equals his Lord’s Passion, where Paul is crowned
+with the end of John (the Baptist), where the Apostle John, after
+suffering no harm from his immersion in the fiery oil, is banished to an
+island.” Origen, too, says: “Peter is thought to have preached to the Jews
+throughout Pontus, Galatia, Bythinia, Cappadocia, and Asia; who, when he
+came to Rome, was finally affixed to the cross with his head down.”(149)
+
+Before concluding what we have undertaken to say on the subject of S.
+Peter’s coming to Rome, we wish to notice the objection against this fact,
+and the duration of his pontificate, which must naturally appear to those
+not well acquainted with antiquity one of not a little strength. How could
+S. Peter hold the primacy at Rome, when the Acts represents him
+continually as in Judæa, among those of his nation to whom he had, as S.
+Paul says, a peculiar mission, the apostleship of circumcision? We reply,
+first: that the apostleship of S. Peter to the Jews did not exclude his
+labors with the Gentiles; in fact, we know from the Acts that S. Peter had
+a vision which led him to work for the latter, and that vision was
+immediately followed by the admission, by S. Peter himself, of the
+centurion Cornelius. Moreover, it is well known that there were Jews
+dispersed throughout the world, to whom S. Peter is said to have gone, as
+we have shown—in Pontus and the other countries of Asia Minor; and also in
+Rome they were numerous. Duty therefore, both to the Jew and Gentile,
+could and did lead S. Peter to Rome.
+
+We say, secondly: there is no difficulty in the fact of S. Peter having
+been often in Judæa. The apostles, from their very charge, were obliged to
+travel much; and the sound of their voice was heard in every land. As is
+narrated of them, they divided the nations among them; and, burning with
+the fire of zeal sent down upon them on the day of Pentecost, they went
+about, everywhere kindling in others the flame that burned within
+themselves. As for the difficulties or facilities of travel, especially in
+the case of S. Peter, we cannot do better than to cite the words of the
+learned Canon Fabiani in his _Discussion_ with those who impugned the
+coming of S. Peter to Rome. In the authentic report of this discussion,
+page 52, he says: “How many days were required for a journey from Cæsarea
+to Rome? Little more than fifteen days.... Lately very learned men among
+Protestants, and at the same time men thoroughly skilled in what regards
+the seafaring art, Smith and Penrose, have calculated from the very voyage
+of S. Paul, and from the narrations in the Acts, the time that vessels
+took to come from Cæsarea to Rome. They went at the rate of seven knots an
+hour, so that it took one hundred and seventy‐seven hours, or seven days
+and a third, to came from Cæsarea to Pozzuoli; and Pliny himself assures
+us that vessels came from Alexandria to Pozzuoli in nine days, from
+Alexandria in Egypt in nine days, and from Alexandria to Messina in seven
+days. Cæsarea and Jerusalem, you know, differ but little in distance to
+Rome, from Alexandria in Egypt. The journey from Messina and Pozzuoli to
+Rome was made in about two or three days, so that the whole time required
+to go from Rome to Jerusalem was not more than half a month.” It is easy,
+then, to understand how S. Peter could be often in Judæa, though he had
+fixed his permanent residence in Rome.
+
+To sum up what we have been saying, no argument can be had from the
+silence of Scripture to prove S. Peter never came to Rome, because the
+Acts and Epistle to the Romans do not cover the whole epoch of S. Peter’s
+apostleship. Moreover, the silence of Scripture does not prove that S.
+Peter did not rule the Church of Rome twenty‐five years, because, as we
+have shown, there was no reason why either the Acts or the Epistle to the
+Romans should speak of S. Peter’s going to Rome and being there. What we
+have here asserted is all the more true because we have positive testimony
+not only with regard to S. Peter’s coming to Rome, but also respecting the
+date of his coming, the period of his ruling the church there, the time
+and the manner of his death there, and because we have the monuments
+recording the memory of the Apostles Peter and Paul, the trophies of the
+apostles, as Caius calls them, _tropæa apostolorum_, which exist to this
+day, surrounded by the marks of veneration and the pious traditions of the
+people of Rome. Against all these proofs difficulties of history and
+chronology are of no avail; for, in the first place, the very difficulties
+and discussions only serve to confirm the fact, especially since these
+difficulties and discussions have lasted for fifteen centuries without
+bringing about the rejection of the main fact; in the next place, we know
+there are many well‐established facts regarding which there exist
+difficulties to clear up, and this nowhere more than in past history. When
+we have proved by one solid, unanswerable argument a fact, we should not
+trouble ourselves much regarding what may be brought against it. The
+elucidation of knotty points may delight us and reward the labors of the
+erudite; for common practical use the matter is settled; and any one who
+rises up against it must not wonder if he be looked on as either not well
+informed, or, to say the least, eccentric.
+
+
+
+
+Sayings.
+
+
+“Rejoice not in riches or other transient gifts, for thou shalt be
+deprived of them like the actor, who, after finishing his part, lays aside
+his costume,”—_S. Chrysostom._
+
+“God has implanted in us conscience, and by this he acts in a manner more
+loving than our natural father; for this latter, after he has warned his
+son ten and a hundred times, expels him from his home; but God ceases not
+to warn us by conscience even to the latest breath.”—_Ibid._
+
+“To restrain anger assimilates man to his Creator.”—_Ibid._
+
+“The man who forgives his enemy is like God.”—_S. Augustine._
+
+“He is a true Christian who carries with him the whole belief of Christ,
+who acts virtuously through the spirit of Christ, and who dies to sin
+through the following of Christ.”—_S. Thomas._
+
+“No one is lost without knowing it; and no one is deceived without wishing
+to be deceived.”—_S. Thomas._
+
+
+
+
+The Progressionists.
+
+
+From The German Of Conrad Von Bolanden.
+
+
+
+Chapter VII. An Ultramontane Son.
+
+
+Greifmann and Gerlach had driven to the railway station. The express train
+thundered along. As the doors of the carriages flew open, Seraphin peered
+through them with eyes full of eager joy. He thought no more of the fate
+that threatened him as the sequel of his father’s arrival; his youthful
+heart exulted solely in the anticipation of the meeting. A tall, broad‐
+shouldered gentleman, with severe features and tanned complexion, alighted
+from a _coupé_. It was Mr. Conrad Gerlach. Seraphin threw his arms around
+his father’s neck and kissed him. The banker made a polite bow to the
+wealthiest landed proprietor of the country, in return for which Mr.
+Conrad bestowed on him a cordial shake of the hand.
+
+“Has your father returned?”
+
+“He cannot possibly reach home before September,” answered the banker. The
+traveller stepped for a moment into the luggage‐room. The gentlemen then
+drove away to the Palais Greifmann. During the ride, the conversation was
+not very animated. Conrad’s curt, grave manner and keen look, indicative
+of a mind always hard at work, imposed reserve, and rapidly dampened his
+son’s ingenuous burst of joy. Seraphin cast a searching glance upon that
+severe countenance, saw no change from its stern look of authority, and
+his heart sank before the appalling alternative of either sacrificing the
+happiness of his life to his father’s favorite project, or of opposing his
+will and braving the consequences of such daring. Yet he wavered but an
+instant in the resolution to which he had been driven by necessity, and
+which, it was plain from the lines of his countenance, he had manhood
+enough to abide by.
+
+Mr. Conrad maintained his reserve, and asked but few questions. Even Carl,
+habitually profuse, studied brevity in his answers, as he knew from
+experience that Gerlach, Senior, was singularly averse to the use of many
+words.
+
+“How is business?”
+
+“Very dull, sir; the times are hard.”
+
+“Did you sustain any losses through the failures that have recently taken
+place in town?”
+
+“Not a farthing. We had several thousands with Wendel, but fortunately
+drew them out before he failed.”
+
+“Very prudent. Has your father entered into any new connections in the
+course of his travels?”
+
+“Several, that promise fairly.”
+
+“Is Louise well?”
+
+“Her health is as good as could be wished.”
+
+“General prosperity, then, I see, for you both look cheerful, and Seraphin
+is as blooming as a clover field.”
+
+“How is dear mother?”
+
+“Quite well. She misses her only child. She sends much love.”
+
+The carriage drew up at the gate. The young lady was awaiting the
+millionaire at the bottom of the steps. While greetings were exchanged
+between them, a faint tinge of warmth could be noticed on the cold
+features of the land‐owner. A smile formed about his mouth, his piercing
+eyes glanced for an instant at Seraphin, and instantly the smile was
+eclipsed under the cloud of an unwelcome discovery.
+
+“I am on my way to the industrial exhibition,” said he, “and I thought I
+would pay you a visit in passing. I wish you not to put yourself to any
+inconvenience, my dear Louise. You will have the goodness to make me a
+little tea, this evening, which we shall sip together.”
+
+“I am overjoyed at your visit, and yet I am sorry, too.”
+
+“Sorry! Why so?”
+
+“Because you are in such a hurry.”
+
+“It cannot be helped, my child. I am overwhelmed with work. Harvest has
+commenced; no less than six hundred hands are in the fields, and I am
+obliged to go to the exhibition. I must see and test some new machinery
+which is said to be of wonderful power.”
+
+“Well, then, you will at least spare us a few days on your return?”
+
+“A few days! You city people place no value on time. We of the country
+economize seconds. Without a thought you squander in idleness what cannot
+be recalled.”
+
+“You are a greater rigorist than ever,” chided she, smiling.
+
+“Because, my child, I am getting older. Seraphin, I wish to speak a word
+with you before tea.”
+
+The two retired to the apartments which for years Mr. Conrad was
+accustomed to occupy whenever he visited the Palais Greifmann.
+
+“The old man still maintains his characteristic vigor,” said Louise. “His
+face is at all times like a problem in arithmetic, and in place of a heart
+he carries an accurate estimate of the yield of his farms. His is a cold,
+repelling nature.”
+
+“But strictly honest, and alive to gain,” added Carl. “In ten years more
+he will have completed his third million. I am glad he came; the marriage
+project is progressing towards a final arrangement. He is now having a
+talk with Seraphin; tomorrow, as you will see, the bashful young
+gentleman, in obedience to the command of his father, will present himself
+to offer you his heart, and ask yours in return.”
+
+“A free heart for an enslaved one,” said she jestingly. “Were there no
+hope of ennobling that heart, of freeing it from the absurdities with
+which it is encrusted, I declare solemnly I would not accept it for three
+millions. But Seraphin is capable of being improved. His eye will not
+close itself against modern enlightenment. Servility of conscience and a
+baneful fear of God cannot have entirely extinguished his sense of
+liberty.”
+
+“I have never set a very high estimate on the pluck and moral force of
+religious people,” declared Greifmann. “They are a craven set, who are
+pious merely because they are afraid of hell. When a passion gets
+possession of them, the impotence of their religious frenzy at once
+becomes manifest. They fall an easy prey to the impulses of nature, and
+the supernatural fails to come to the rescue. It would be vain for
+Seraphin to try to give up the unbelieving Louise, whom his strait‐laced
+faith makes it his duty to avoid. He has fallen a victim to your
+fascinations; all the Gospel of the Jew of Nazareth, together with all the
+sacraments and unctions of the church, could not loose the coils with
+which you have encircled him.”
+
+In this scornful tone did Carl Greifmann speak of the heroism of virtue
+and of the energy of faith, like a blind man discoursing about colors. He
+little suspected that it is just the power of religion that produces
+characters, and that, on this very account, in an irreligious age,
+characters of a noble type are so rarely met with; the warmth of faith is
+not in them.
+
+“Mr. Schwefel desires to speak a word with you,” said a servant who
+appeared at the door.
+
+The banker nodded assent.
+
+“I ask your pardon for troubling you at so unseasonable an hour,” began
+the leader, after bowing lowly several times. “The subject is urgent, and
+must be settled without delay. But, by the way, I must first give you the
+good news: Mr. Shund is elected by an overwhelming majority, and Progress
+is victorious in every ward.”
+
+“That is what I looked for,” answered the banker, with an air of
+satisfaction. “I told you whatever Cæsar, Antony, and Lepidus command,
+must be done.”
+
+“I am just from a meeting at which some important resolutions have been
+offered and adopted,” continued the leader. “The strongest prop of
+ultramontanism is the present system of educating youth. Education must,
+therefore, be taken out of the hands of the priests. But the change will
+have to be brought about gradually and with caution. We have decided to
+make a beginning by introducing common schools. A vote of the people is to
+be taken on the measure, and, on the last day of voting, a grand barbecue
+is to be given to celebrate our triumph over the accursed slavery of
+religious symbols. The ground chosen by the chief‐magistrate for the
+celebration is the common near the Red Tower, but the space is not large
+enough, and we will need your meadow adjoining it to accommodate the
+crowd. I am commissioned by the magistrate to request you to throw open
+the meadow for the occasion.”
+
+The banker, believing the request prejudicial to his private interests,
+looked rather unenthusiastic. Louise, who had been busy with the teapot,
+had heard every word of the conversation, and the new educational scheme
+had won her cordial approval. Seeing her brother hesitated, she flew to
+the rescue:
+
+“We are ready and happy to make any sacrifice in the interest of education
+and progress.”
+
+“I am not sure that it is competent for me in the present instance to
+grant the desired permission,” replied Greifmann. “The grass would be
+destroyed, and perhaps the sod ruined for years. My father is away from
+home, and I would not like to take the responsibility of complying with
+his honor’s wish.”
+
+“The city will hold itself liable for all damages,” said Schwefel.
+
+“Not at all!” interposed the young lady hastily. “Make use of the meadow
+without paying damages. If my brother refuses to assume the
+responsibility, I will take it upon my self. By wresting education from
+the clergy, who only cripple the intellect of youth, progress aims a
+death‐blow at mental degradation. It is a glorious work, and one full of
+inestimable results that you gentlemen are beginning in the cause of
+humanity against ignorance and superstition. My father so heartily concurs
+in every undertaking that responds to the wants of the times, that I not
+only feel encouraged to make myself responsible for this concession, but
+am even sure that he would be angry if we refused. Do not hesitate to make
+use of the meadow, and from its flowers bind garlands about the temples of
+the goddess of liberty!”
+
+The leader bowed reverently to the beautiful advocate of progress.
+
+“In this case, there remains nothing else for me to do than to confirm my
+sister’s decision,” said Greifmann. “When is the celebration to take
+place?”
+
+“On the 10th of August, the day of the deputy elections. It has been
+intentionally set for that day to impress on the delegates how genuine and
+right is the sentiment of our people.”
+
+“Very good,” approved Greifmann.
+
+“In the name of the chief‐magistrate, I thank you for the offering you
+have so generously laid upon the shrine of humanity, and I shall hasten to
+inform the gentlemen before they adjourn that you have granted our
+request.” And Schwefel withdrew from the gorgeously furnished apartment.
+
+Meanwhile a fiery struggle was going on between Seraphin and his father.
+He had briefly related his experience at the Palais Greifmann; had even
+confessed his preference for Louise, and had, for the first time in his
+life, incurred his father’s displeasure by mentioning the wager. And when
+he concluded by protesting that he could not marry Louise, Conrad’s
+suppressed anger burst forth.
+
+“Have you lost your senses, foolish boy? This marriage has been in
+contemplation for years; it has been coolly weighed and calculated. In all
+the country around, it is the only equal match possible. Louise’s dower
+amounts to one million florins, the exact value of the noble estate of
+Hatzfurth, adjoining our possessions. You young people can occupy the
+chateau, I shall add another hundred acres to the land, together with a
+complete outfit of farming implements, and then you will have such a start
+as no ten proprietors in Germany can boast of.”
+
+Seraphin knew his father. All the old gentleman’s thought and effort was
+concentrated on the management of his extensive possessions. For other
+subjects there was no room in the head and heart of the landholder. He
+barely complied with his religious duties. It is true, on Sundays Mr.
+Conrad attended church, but surrounded invariably by a motley swarm of
+worldly cares and speculations connected with farming. At Easter, he went
+to the sacraments, but usually among the last, and after being repeatedly
+reminded by his wife. He took no interest in progress, humanity,
+ultramontanism, and such other questions as vex the age, because to
+trouble himself about them would have interfered with his main purpose. He
+knew only his fields and woodlands—and God, in so far as his providence
+blessed him with bountiful harvests.
+
+“What is the good of millions, father, if the very fundamental conditions
+of matrimonial peace are wanting?”
+
+“What fundamental conditions?”
+
+“Louise believes neither in God nor in revelation. She is an infidel.”
+
+“And you are a fanatic—a fanatic because of your one‐sided education. Your
+mother has trained you as priests and monks are trained. During your
+childhood piety was very useful; it served as the prop to the young tree,
+causing it to grow up straight and develop itself into a vigorous stem.
+But you are now full‐grown, and life makes other demands on the man than
+on the boy; away, therefore, with your fanaticism.”
+
+“To my dying hour I shall thank my mother for the care she has bestowed on
+the child, the boy, and the young man. If her pious spirit has given a
+right direction to my career, and watched faithfully over my steps, the
+untarnished record of the son cannot but rejoice the heart of the father—a
+record which is the undoubted product of religious training.”
+
+“You are a good son, and I am proud of you,” accorded Mr. Conrad with
+candor. “Your mother, too, is a woman whose equal is not to be found. All
+this is very well. But, if Louise’s city manners and free way of thinking
+scandalize you, you are sheerly narrow‐minded. I have been noticing her
+for years, and have learned to value her industry and domestic virtues.
+She has not a particle of extravagance; on the contrary, she has a decided
+leaning towards economy and thrift. She will make an unexceptionable wife.
+Do you imagine, my son, my choice could be a blind one when I fixed upon
+Louise to share the property which, through years of toil, I have amassed
+by untiring energy?”
+
+“I do not deny the lady has the qualities you mention, my dear father.”
+
+“Moreover, she is a millionaire, and handsome, very handsome, and you are
+in love with her—what more do you want?”
+
+“The most important thing of all, father. The very soul of conjugal
+felicity is wanting, which is oneness of faith in supernatural truth. What
+I adore, Louise denies; what I revere, she hates; what I practise, she
+scorns. Louise never prays, never goes to church, never receives the
+sacraments, in a word, she has not a spark of religion.”
+
+“That will all come right,” returned Mr. Conrad. “Louise will learn to
+pray. You must not, simpleton, expect a banker’s daughter to be for ever
+counting her beads like a nun. Take my word for it, the weight of a wife’s
+responsibilities will make her serious enough.”
+
+“Serious perhaps, but not religious, for she is totally devoid of faith.”
+
+“Enough; you shall marry her nevertheless,” broke in the father. “It is my
+wish that you shall marry her. I will not suffer opposition.”
+
+For a moment the young man sat silent, struggling painfully with the
+violence of his own feelings.
+
+“Father,” said he, then, “you command what I cannot fulfil, because it
+goes against my conscience. I beg you not to do violence to my conscience;
+violence is opposed to your own and my Christian principles. An atheist or
+a progressionist who does not recognize a higher moral order, might insist
+upon his son’s marrying an infidel for the sake of a million. But you
+cannot do so, for it is not millions of money that you and I look upon as
+the highest good. Do not, therefore, dear father, interfere with my moral
+freedom; do not force me into a union which my religion prohibits.”
+
+“What does this mean?” And a dark frown gathered on the old gentleman’s
+forehead. “Defiance disguised in religious twaddle? Open rebellion? Is
+this the manner in which my son fulfils the duty of filial obedience?”
+
+“Pardon me, father,” said the youth with deferential firmness, “there is
+no divine law making it obligatory upon a father to select a wife for his
+son. Consequently, also, the duty of obedience on this point does not rest
+upon the son. Did I, beguiled by passion or driven by recklessness, wish
+to marry a creature whose depravity would imperil my temporal and eternal
+welfare, your duty, as a father, would be to oppose my rashness, and my
+duty, as a son, would be to obey you. Louise is just such a creature; she
+is artfully plotting against my religious principles, against my loyalty
+to God and the church. She has put upon herself as a task to lead me from
+the darkness of superstition into the light of modern advancement. I
+overheard her when she said to her brother, ‘Did I for an instant doubt
+that Seraphin may be reclaimed from superstition, I would renounce my
+union with him, I would forego all the gratifications of wealth, so much
+do I detest stupid credulity.’ Hence I should have to look forward to
+being constantly annoyed by my wife’s fanatical hostility to my religion.
+There never would be an end of discord and wrangling. And what kind of
+children would such a mother rear? She would corrupt the little ones,
+instil into their innocent souls the poison of her own godlessness, and
+make me the most wretched of fathers. For these reasons Miss Greifmann
+shall not become my wife—no, never! I implore you, dear father, do not
+require from me what my conscience will not permit, and what I shall on no
+condition consent to,” concluded the young man with a tone of decision.
+
+Mr. Conrad had observed a solemn silence, like a man who suddenly beholds
+an unsuspected phenomenon exhibited before him. Seraphin’s words produced,
+as it were, a burst of vivid light upon his mind, dispelling the
+multitudinous schemes and speculations that nestled in every nook and
+depth. The effect of this sudden illumination became perceptible at once,
+for Mr. Gerlach lost the points of view which had invariably brought
+before his vision the million of the Greifmanns, and he began to feel a
+growing esteem for the stand taken by his son.
+
+“Your language sounds fabulous,” said he.
+
+“Here, father, is my diary. In it you will find a detailed account of what
+I have briefly stated.”
+
+Gerlach took the book and shoved it into the breast‐pocket of his coat. In
+an instant, however, his imagination conjured up to him a picture of the
+Count of Hatzfurth’s splendid estate, and he went on coldly and
+deliberately: “Hear me, Seraphin! Your marriage with Louise is a favorite
+project upon which I have based not a few expectations. The observations
+you have made shall not induce me to renounce this project
+unconditionally, for you may have been mistaken. I shall take notes myself
+and test this matter. If your view is confirmed, our project will have
+been an air castle. You shall be left entirely unmolested in your
+convictions.”
+
+Seraphin embraced his father.
+
+“Let us have no scene; hear me out. Should it turn out, on the other hand,
+that your judgment is erroneous, should Louise not belong to yon crazy
+progressionist mob who aim to dethrone God and subvert the order of
+society, should her hatred against religion be merely a silly conforming
+to the fashionable impiety of the age, which good influences may
+correct—then I shall insist upon your marrying her. Meanwhile I want you
+to maintain a strict neutrality—not a step backward nor a step in advance.
+Now to tea, and let your countenance betray nothing of what has passed.”
+He drew his son to his bosom and imprinted a kiss on his forehead.
+
+The millionaires were seated around the tea‐table. Mr. Conrad playfully
+commended Louise’s talent for cooking. Apparently without design he turned
+the conversation upon the elections, and, to Seraphin’s utter
+astonishment, eulogized the beneficent power of liberal doctrines.
+
+“Our age,” said he, “can no longer bear the hampering notions of the past.
+In the material world, steam and machinery have brought about changes
+which call for corresponding changes in the world of intellect. Great
+revolutions have already commenced. In France, Renan has written a _Life
+of Christ_, and in our own country Protestant convocations are proclaiming
+an historical Christ who was not God, but only an extraordinary man. You
+hardly need to be assured that I too take a deep interest in the
+intellectual struggles of my countrymen, but an excess of business does
+not permit me to watch them closely. I am obliged to content myself with
+such reports as the newspapers furnish. I should like to read Renan’s
+work, which seems to have created a great sensation. They say it suits our
+times admirably.”
+
+The brother and sister were not a little astonished at the old gentleman’s
+unusual communicativeness.
+
+“It is a splendid book,” exclaimed Louise—“charming as to style, and
+remarkably liberal and considerate towards the worshippers of Christ.”
+
+“So I have everywhere been told,” said Mr. Conrad.
+
+“Have you read the book, Louise?”
+
+“Not less than four times, three times in French and once in German.”
+
+“Do you think a farmer whose moments are precious as gold could forgive
+himself the reading of Renan’s book in view of the multitude of his urgent
+occupations?” asked he, smiling.
+
+“The reading of a book that originates a new intellectual era is also a
+serious occupation,” maintained the beautiful lady.
+
+“Very true; yet I apprehend Renan’s attempt to disprove to me the divinity
+of Christ would remain unsuccessful, and it would only cause me the loss
+of some hours of valuable time.”
+
+“Read it, Mr. Gerlach, do read it. Renan’s arguments are unanswerable.”
+
+“So you have been convinced, Louise?”
+
+“Yes, indeed, quite.”
+
+“Well, now, Renan is a living author, he is the lion of the day, and
+nothing could be more natural than that the fair sex should grow
+enthusiastic over him. But, of course, at your next confession you will
+sorrowfully declare and retract your belief in Renan.”
+
+The young lady cast a quick glance at Seraphin, and the brim of her teacup
+concealed a proud, triumphant smile.
+
+“Our city is about taking a bold step,” said Carl, breaking the silence.
+“We are to have common schools, in order to take education from the
+control of the clergy.” And he went on to relate what Schwefel had
+reported.
+
+“When is the barbecue to come off?” inquired Mr. Conrad.
+
+“On the 10th of August.”
+
+“Perhaps I shall have time to attend this demonstration,” said Gerlach.
+“Hearts reveal themselves at such festivities. One gets a clear insight
+into the mind of the multitude. You, Louise, have put progress under
+obligations by so cheerfully advancing to meet it.”
+
+After these words the landholder rose and went to his room. The next
+morning he proceeded on his journey, taking with him Seraphin’s diary. The
+author himself he left at the Palais Greifmann in anxious uncertainty
+about future events.
+
+
+
+Chapter VIII. Faith And Science Of Progress.
+
+
+Seraphin usually took an early ride with Carl. The banker was overjoyed at
+the wager, about the winning of which he now felt absolute certainty. He
+expressed himself confident that before long he would have the pleasure of
+going over the road on the back of the best racer in the country. “The
+noble animals,” said he, “shall not be brought by the railway; it might
+injure them. I shall send my groom for them to Chateau Hallberg. He can
+ride the distance in two days.”
+
+Seraphin could not help smiling at his friend’s solicitude for the horses.
+
+“Do not sell the bear’s skin before killing the bear,” answered he. “I may
+not lose the horses, but may, on the contrary, acquire a pleasant claim to
+twenty thousand florins.”
+
+“That is beyond all possibility,” returned the banker. “Hans Shund is now
+chief‐magistrate, has been nominated to the legislature, and in a few days
+will be elected. Mr. Hans will appear as a shining light to‐morrow, when
+he is to state his political creed in a speech to his constituents. Of
+course, you and I shall go to hear him. Next will follow his election,
+then my groom will hasten to Chateau Hallberg to fetch the horses. Are you
+sorry you made the bet?”
+
+“Not at all! I should regret very much to lose my span of bays. Still, the
+bet will be of incalculable benefit to me. I will have learned concerning
+men and manners what otherwise I could never have dreamed of. In any
+event, the experience gained will be of vast service to me during life.”
+
+“I am exceedingly glad to know it, my dear fellow,” assured Greifmann.
+“Your acquaintance with the present has been very superficial. You have
+learned a great deal in a few days, and it is gratifying to hear you
+acknowledge the fact.”
+
+The banker had not, however, caught Gerlach’s meaning.
+
+But for the wager, Seraphin would not have become acquainted with Louise’s
+intellectual standpoint. He would probably have married her for the sake
+of her beauty, would have discovered his mistake when it could not be
+corrected, and would have found himself condemned to spend his life with a
+woman whose principles and character could only annoy and give him pain.
+As it was, he was tormented by the fear that his father might not coincide
+in his opinion of the young lady. What if the old gentleman considered her
+hostility to religion as a mere fashionable mania unsupported by inner
+conviction, a girlish whim changeable like the wind, which with little
+effort might be made to veer round to the point of the most unimpeachable
+orthodoxy? He had not uttered a word condemning Louise’s infatuation about
+Renan. On taking leave he had parted with her in a friendly, almost
+hearty, manner, proof sufficient that the young lady’s doubtful utterances
+at tea had not deceived him.
+
+Upon reaching home, Gerlach sat in his room with his eyes thoughtfully
+fixed upon a luminous square cast by the sun upon the floor. Quite
+naturally his thoughts ran upon the marriage, and to the prospect of
+having to maintain his liberty by a hard contest with his inflexible
+parent. He was unshaken in his resolution not to accede to the projected
+alliance, and, when a will morally severe conceives resolutions of this
+sort, they usually stand the hardest tests. So absorbing were his
+reflections that he did not hear John announcing a visitor. He nodded
+mechanically in reply to the words that seemed to come out of the
+distance, and the servant disappeared.
+
+Soon after a country girl appeared in the entrance of the room. In both
+hands she was carrying a small basket made of peeled willows, quite new. A
+snow‐white napkin was spread over the basket. The girl’s dress was neat,
+her figure was slender and graceful. Her hair, which was wound about the
+head in heavy plaits, was golden and encircled her forehead as with a
+_nimbus_. Her features were delicate and beautiful, and she looked upon
+the young gentleman with a pair of deep‐blue eyes. Thus stood she for an
+instant in the door of the apartment. There was a smile about her mouth
+and a faint flush upon her cheeks.
+
+“Good‐morning, Mr. Seraphin!” said a sweet voice.
+
+The youth started at this salutation and looked at the stranger with
+surprise. She was just then standing on the sunlit square, her hair
+gleamed like purest gold, and a flood of light streamed upon her youthful
+form. He did not return the greeting. He looked at her as if frightened,
+rose slowly, and bowed in silence.
+
+“My father sends some early grapes which he begs you to have the goodness
+to accept.”
+
+She drew nearer, and he received the basket from her hands.
+
+“I am very thankful!” said he. And, raising the napkin, the delicious
+fruit smiled in his face. “These are a rarity at this season. To whom am I
+indebted for this friendly attention?”
+
+“The obligation is all on our side, Mr. Seraphin,” she replied trustfully
+to the generous benefactor of her family. “Father is sorry that he cannot
+offer you something better.”
+
+“Ah! you are Holt’s daughter?”
+
+“Yes, Mr. Seraphin.”
+
+“Your name is Johanna, is it not?”
+
+“Mechtild, Mr. Seraphin.”
+
+“Will you be so good as to sit down?” And he pointed her to a sofa.
+
+Mechtild, however, drew a chair and seated herself.
+
+He had noted her deportment, and could not but marvel at the graceful
+action, the confiding simplicity, and well‐bred self‐possession of the
+extraordinary country girl. As she sat opposite to him, she looked so
+pure, so trusting and sincere, that his astonishment went on increasing.
+He acknowledged to himself never to have beheld eyes whose expression came
+so directly from the heart—a heart whose interior must be equally as sunny
+and pure.
+
+“How are your good parents?”
+
+“They are very well, Mr. Seraphin. Father has gone to work with renewed
+confidence. The sad—ah! the terrible period is past. You cannot imagine,
+Mr. Seraphin, how many tears you have dried, how much misery you have
+relieved!”
+
+The recollection of the ruin that had been hanging over her home affected
+her painfully; her eyes glistened, and tears began to roll down her
+cheeks. But she instantly repressed the emotion, and exhibited a beautiful
+smile on her face. Seraphin’s quick eye had observed both the momentary
+feeling, and that she had resolutely checked it in order not to annoy him
+by touching sorrowful chords. This trait of delicacy also excited the
+admiration of the gentleman.
+
+“Your father is not in want of employment?” he inquired with interest.
+
+“No, sir! Father is much sought on account of his knowledge of farming.
+Persons who have ground, but no team of their own, employ him to put in
+crops for them.”
+
+“No doubt the good man has to toil hard?”
+
+“That is true, sir; but father seems to like working, and we children
+strive to help him as much as we can.”
+
+“And do you like working?”
+
+“I do, indeed, Mr. Seraphin. Life would be worthless if one did not labor.
+Man’s life on earth is so ordered as to show him that he must labor. Doing
+nothing is abominable, and idleness is the parent of many vices.”
+
+Another cause of astonishment for the millionaire. She did not converse
+like an uneducated girl from the country. Her accurate, almost choice use
+of words indicated some culture, and her concise observations revealed
+both mind and reflection. He felt a strong desire to fathom the mystery—to
+cast a glance into Mechtild’s past history.
+
+“Have you always lived at home, or have you ever been away at school?”
+
+She must have detected something ludicrous in the question, for suddenly a
+degree of archness might be observed in her amiable smile.
+
+“You mean, whether I have received a city education? No, sir! Father used
+to speak highly of the clearness of my mind, and thought I might even be
+made a teacher. But he had not the means to give me the necessary amount
+of schooling. Until I was fourteen years old, I went to school to the nuns
+here in town. I used to come in of mornings and go back in the evening. I
+studied hard, and father and mother always had the satisfaction of seeing
+me rewarded with a prize at the examinations. I am very fond of books, and
+make good use of the convent library. On Sundays, after vespers, I wait
+till the door of the book‐room is opened. I still spend my leisure time in
+reading, and on Sundays and holidays I know no greater pleasure than to
+read nice instructive books. At my work I think over what I have read, and
+I continue practising composition according to the directions of the good
+ladies of the convent.”
+
+“And were you always head at school?”
+
+“Yes,” she admitted, with a blush.
+
+“You have profited immensely by your opportunities,” he said approvingly.
+“And the desire for learning has not yet left you?”
+
+“This inordinate craving still continues to torment me,” she acknowledged
+frankly.
+
+“Inordinate—why inordinate?”
+
+“Because, my station and calling do not require a high degree of culture.
+But it is so nice to know, and it is so nice to have refined intercourse
+with each others. For seven years I admired the elegant manners of the
+convent ladies, and I learned many a lesson from them.”
+
+“How old are you now?”
+
+“Seventeen, Mr. Seraphin.”
+
+“What a pity you did not enter some higher educational institution!” said
+he.
+
+A pause followed. He looked with reverence upon the artless girl whom God
+had so richly endowed, both in body and mind. Mechtild rose.
+
+“Please accept, also, my most heartfelt thanks for your generous aid,” she
+said, with emotion. “All my life long I shall remember you before God, Mr.
+Seraphin. The Almighty will surely repay you what alas! we cannot.”
+
+She made a courtesy, and he accompanied her through all the apartments as
+far as the front door. Here the girl, turning, bowed to him once more and
+went away.
+
+Returning to his room, Seraphin stood and contemplated the grapes.
+Strongly did the delicious fruit tempt him, but he touched not one. He
+then pulled out a drawer, and hid the gifts as though it were a costly
+treasure. For the rest of the day, Mechtild’s bright form hovered near
+him, and the sweet charm of her eyes, so full of soul, continually worked
+on his imagination. When he again went into Louise’s company, the grace
+and innocence of the country girl gained ground in his esteem. Compared
+with Mechtild’s charming naturalness, Louise’s manner appeared affected,
+spoiled; through evil influences. The difference in the expression of
+their eyes struck him especially. In Louise’s eyes there burned a fierce
+glow at times, which roused passion and stirred the senses. Mechtild’s
+neither glowed nor flashed; but from their limpid depths beamed goodness
+so genuine and serenity so unclouded, that Seraphin could compare them to
+nothing but two heralds of peace and innocence. Louise’s eyes, thought he,
+flash like two meteors of the night; Mechtild’s beam like two mild suns in
+a cloudless sky of spring. As often as he entered the room where the
+grapes lay concealed, he would unlock the drawer, examine the fragrant
+fruit, and handle the basket which had been carried by her hands. He could
+not himself help smiling at this childish action, and yet both great
+delicacy and deep earnestness are manifested in honoring objects that have
+been touched by pure hands, and in revering places hallowed by the
+presence of the good.
+
+Next morning the banker asked his guest to accompany him to the church of
+S. Peter, where Hans Shund was to address a large gathering.
+
+“In a church?” Gerlach exclaimed, with amazement.
+
+“Don’t get frightened, my good fellow. The church is no longer in the
+service of religion. It has been _secularized_ by the state, and is
+customarily used as a hall for dancing. There will be quite a crowd, for
+several able speakers are to discuss the question of common schools. The
+church has been chosen for the meeting on account of the crowd.”
+
+The millionaires drove to the desecrated church. A tumultuous mass swarmed
+about the portal. “Let us permit them to push us; we shall get in most
+easily by letting them do so,” said the banker merrily. Two officious
+progressionists, recognizing the banker, opened a passage for them through
+the throng. They reached the interior of the church, which was now an
+empty space, stripped of every ornament proper to a house of God. In the
+sanctuary could yet be seen, as if in mournful abandonment, a large
+quadrangular slab, that had been the altar, and attached to one of the
+side walls was an exquisite Gothic pulpit, which on occasions like the
+present was used for a rostrum. Everywhere else reigned silence and
+desolation.
+
+The nave was filled by a motley mass. The chieftains of progress, some
+elegantly dressed, others exhibiting frivolous miens and huge beards,
+crowded upon the elevation of the chancel. All the candidates for the
+legislature were present, not for the purpose of proving their
+qualifications for the office—progress never troubled itself about
+those—but to air their views on the subject of education. There were
+speakers on hand of acknowledged ability in the discussion of the
+doctrines of progress, who were to lay the result of their investigations
+before the people.
+
+Seraphin also noted some anxious faces in the crowd. They were citizens,
+whose sons were alarmed at the thought of yielding up the training of
+their children into the hands of infidelity. And near the pulpit stood two
+priests, irreverently crowded against the wall, targets for the scornful
+pleasantries of the wits of the mob. Leader Schwefel was voted into the
+chair by acclamation. He thanked the assembly in a short speech for the
+honor conferred, and then announced that Mr. Till, member of the former
+assembly, would address the meeting. Amid murmurs of expectation a short,
+fat gentleman climbed into the pulpit. First a red face with a copper‐
+tipped nose bobbed above the ledge of the pulpit, next came a pair of
+broad shoulders, upon which a huge head rested without the intermediary of
+a neck, two puffy hands were laid upon the desk, and the commencement of a
+well‐rounded paunch could just be detected by the eye. Mr. Till, taking
+two handfuls of his shaggy beard, drew them slowly through his fingers,
+looked composedly upon the audience, and breathed hotly through mouth and
+nostrils.
+
+“Gentlemen,” he began, with a voice that struggled out from a mass of
+flesh and fat, “I am not given to many words, you know. What need is there
+of many words and long speeches? We know what we want, and what we want we
+will have in spite of the machinations of Jesuits and the whinings of an
+ultramontane horde. You all know how I acquitted myself at the last
+legislature, and if you will again favor me with your suffrages, I will
+endeavor once more to give satisfaction. You know my record, and I shall
+remain staunch to the last.”
+
+Cries of “Good!” from various directions.
+
+“Gentlemen! if you know my record, you must also be aware that I am
+passionately fond of the chase. I even follow this amusement in the
+legislative hall. Our country abounds in a sort of black game, and for me
+it is rare sport to pursue this, species of game in the assembly.”
+
+A wild tumult of applause burst forth. Jeers and coarse witticisms were
+bandied about on every side of the two clergymen, who looked meekly upon
+these orgies of progress.
+
+“Gentlemen!” Till continued, “the _blacks_ are a dangerous kind of wild
+beast. They have heretofore been ranging in a preserve, feeding on the fat
+of the land. That is an abuse that challenges the wrath of heaven. It must
+be done away with. The beasts of prey that in the dark ages dwelt in
+castles have long since been exterminated, and their rocky lairs have been
+reduced to ruins. Well, now, let us keep up the chase in both houses of
+the legislature until the last of these _black_ beasts is destroyed.
+Should you entrust to me again your interests, I shall return to the seat
+of government to aid with renewed energy in ridding the land of these
+creatures that are enemies both of education and liberty.”
+
+Amid prolonged applause the fat man descended. The chieftains shook him
+warmly by the hand, assuring him that the cause absolutely demanded his
+being reelected.
+
+Gerlach was aghast at Till’s speech. He hardly knew which deserved most
+scorn, the vulgarity of the speaker or the abjectness of those who had
+applauded him. Their wild enthusiasm was still surging through the
+building, when Hans Shund mounted the pulpit. The chairman rang for order;
+the tumult ceased. In mute suspense the multitude awaited the great speech
+of the notorious usurer, thief, and debauchee. And indeed, progress might
+well entertain great expectations, for Hans Shund had read a pile of
+progressionist pamphlets, had extracted the strong passages, and out of
+them had concocted a right racy speech. His speech might with propriety
+have been designated the Gospel of Progress, for Hans Shund had made
+capital of whatever freethinkers had lucubrated in behalf of so‐called
+enlightenment, and in opposition to Christianity. The very appearance of
+the speaker gave great promise. His were not coarse features and goggle
+eyes like Till’s; his piercing feline eyes looked intellectual. His face
+was rather pale, the result, no doubt, of unusual application, and he had
+skilfully dyed his sandy hair. His position as mayor of the city seemed
+also to entitle him to special attention, and these several claims were
+enhanced by a white necktie, white vest, and black cloth swallow‐tail
+coat.
+
+“Gentlemen,” began the mayor with solemnity, “my honorable predecessor in
+this place has told you with admirable sagacity that the kernel of every
+political question is of a religious character. Indeed, religion is linked
+with every important question of the day, it is the _ratio ultima_ of the
+intellectual movement of our times. Men of thought and of learning are all
+agreed as to the condition to which our social life should be and must be
+brought. The friends of the people are actively and earnestly at work
+trying to further a healthy development of our social and political
+status. Nor have their efforts been utterly fruitless. Progress has made
+great conquests; yet, gentlemen, these conquests are far from being
+complete. What is it that is most hostile to liberalism in morals, to
+enlightenment, and to humanity? It is the antiquated faith of departed
+days. Have we not heard the language of the Holy Father in the Syllabus?
+But the Holy Father at Rome, gentlemen, is no father of ours—happily he is
+the father only of stupid and credulous men.”
+
+“Bravo! Well said!” resounded from the audience. Flaschen nudged
+Spitzkopf, who sat next to him. “Shund is no mean speaker. Even that
+fellow Voelk, of Bavaria, cannot compete with Shund.”
+
+“Gentlemen, our good sense teaches us to smile with pity at the infallible
+declarations of yon Holy Father. We are firmly convinced that papal
+decrees can no more stop the onward march of civilization than they can
+arrest the heavenly bodies in their journeys about the sun. ’Tis true, an
+œcumenical council is lowering like a black storm‐cloud. But let the
+council meet; let it declare the Syllabus an article of faith; it will
+never succeed in destroying the treasures of independent thought which
+creative intellects have been hoarding up for centuries among every
+people. Since men of culture have ceased to yield unquestioning
+submission, like dumb sheep, to the church, they have begun to discover
+that nowhere are so many falsehoods uttered as in pulpits.”
+
+Tremendous applause, clapping, and swinging of hats, followed this
+eloquent period. A distinguished gentleman, laying his hand upon Till’s
+shoulder, asked: “What calibre of ammunition do you use in hunting _black_
+game?”
+
+“Conical balls of two centimetres,” replied Till, with no great wit.
+
+“Yon fellow in the pulpit fires shells of a hundredweight, I should say.
+And if in the legislative assembly his shells all explode, not a man of
+them will be left alive.”
+
+Till thought this witticism so good that he set up a loud roar of
+laughter, that could be heard above the general uproar.
+
+Stimulated by these marks of appreciation, Shund waxed still more
+eloquent. “Gentlemen,” cried he, “no body of men is more savagely opposed
+to science and culture than a conventicle of so‐called servants of God.
+Were you to repeat the multiplication table several times over, there
+would be as much prayer and sense in it as in what is designated the
+Apostles’ Creed.”
+
+More cheering and boundless enthusiasm. “Gentlemen!” exclaimed the
+speaker, with thundering emphasis and a hideous expression of hatred on
+his face, “the significance of religious dogmas is simply a sort of
+homœopathic concoction to which every succeeding age contributes some
+drops of fanaticism. Subjected to the microscope of science, the whole
+basis of the Christian church evaporates into thin mist. We must shield
+our children against religious fables. Away with dogmas and saws from the
+Bible; away with the Trinity; the divinity and humanity of Jesus, and
+other such stuff! Away with apothegms such as this: _Christ is my life, my
+death, and my gain_. Such things are opposed to nature. Children’s minds
+are thereby warped to untruthfulness and hypocrisy. In this manner the
+child is deprived of the power of thinking; loses all interest in
+intellectual pursuits, and ceases to feel the need of further culture. The
+times are favorable for a reformation. Our imperial and royal rulers have
+at length realized that minds must be set free. For this end it was as
+unavoidable for them to break with the church and priesthood as it is
+necessary for us. If we cherish our fatherland and the people, we must
+take the initiative. We are not striving to effect a revolution; we want
+intellectual development, profounder knowledge, and healthier morality.
+
+
+    “Shall peace be seen beneath our skies,
+    The spirit’s freedom first must rise,”
+
+
+concluded the orator poetically, and he came down amidst a very hurricane
+of applause.
+
+There followed a lull. In the audience, heads protruded and necks were
+stretched that their possessors might obtain a glimpse of the great Shund.
+In the chancel, the chiefs and leaders crowded around him, smiling,
+bowing, and shaking his hand in admiration.
+
+“You have won the laurels,” smirked a fellow from amidst a wilderness of
+beard.
+
+“Your election to the Assembly is a certainty,” declared another.
+
+“You carry deadly weapons against Christ,” said a professor.
+
+Mr. Hans smiled, and nodded so often that he was seized with a pain in the
+muscles of the face and neck. At length, the chairman’s bell came to the
+rescue.
+
+“The Rev. Mr. Morgenroth will now address the meeting.”
+
+The clergyman mounted the rostrum, but scarcely had he appeared there,
+when the crowd became possessed by a legion of hissing demons.
+
+“Gentlemen,” began the fearless priest, “the duty of my calling as well as
+personal conviction demands that I should enter a solemn protest against
+the sundering of school and church.”
+
+Further the priest was not allowed to proceed. Loud howling, hissing, and
+whistling drowned his voice. The president called for order.
+
+“In the name of good‐breeding, I beg this most honorable assembly to hear
+the speaker out in patience,” cried Mr. Schwefel.
+
+The mob relaxed into unwilling silence like a growling beast.
+
+“Not all the citizens of this town are infected with infidelity,” the
+reverend gentleman went on to say. “Many honorable gentlemen believe in
+Jesus Christ, the Son of God, and in his church. These citizens wish their
+children to receive a religious education; it would, therefore, be
+unmitigated terrorism, tyrannical constraint of conscience, to force
+Christian parents to bring up their children in the spirit of unbelief.”
+
+This palpable truth progress could not bear to listen to. A mad yell was
+set up. Clenched fists were shaken at the clergyman, and fierce threats
+thundered from all sides of the church. “Down with the priest!” “Down with
+the accursed black‐coat!” “Down with the dog of a Jesuit!” and similar
+exclamations, resounded from all sides. The chairman rang his bell in
+vain. The mob grew still more furious and noisy. The clergyman was
+compelled to come down.
+
+“Such is the liberty, the education, the tolerance, the humanity of
+progress,” said he sadly to his colleague.
+
+To Be Continued.
+
+
+
+
+Christian Art Of The Catacombs.
+
+
+By An Anglican.
+
+
+        “I do love those ancient ruins:
+    We never tread upon them but we set
+    Our foot upon some reverend history.”—_Webster_ (1620).
+
+    “Quamlibet ancipites texant hinc inde recessus,
+    Arcta sub umbrosis atria porticibus;
+    Attamen excisi subter cava viscera montis
+    Crebra terebrato fornice lux penetrat;
+    Sic datur absentis per subterranea solis
+    Cernere fulgorem luminibusque frui.”
+
+    —_Prudentius, Peristephanon_, Hymn iv.
+
+
+The Catacombs of Rome were the birthplace of Christian art as well as the
+sepulchre of the children of the early church. It is only within a few
+years that the modern traveller has been induced, through the careful
+study which the Catacombs have received, to visit these subterranean homes
+of the persecuted Christian, so filled with the symbolism of his faith.
+From 1567, the year in which Father Bosio began his investigations in the
+Catacombs, till the present century, some minds of kindred interest in
+these burial‐places of the martyrs have been fascinated with their
+Christian archæology, and from time to time have appeared works upon
+subjects connected with the Catacombs. F. Bosio spent thirty years in
+making explorations, and left for posthumous publication his _Roma __
+Sotterranea_, which F. Severano issued from the press in Rome in 1632.
+Seventy years later came _Inscriptionum antiquarum explicatio_ by the
+learned Fabretti, and eighteen years later still, F. Boldetti, who had
+devoted the greater part of his life to the examination of the monuments,
+inscriptions, and paintings of the Catacombs, embodied the results of his
+patience and industry in the great work _Osservazioni sopra i Cimiterii
+dei Santi Martiri, etc., di Roma_. Then came Bottari’s wonderful studies
+on the Christian art of the Catacombs entitled _Sculture e pitture sagre,
+estratte dai Cimiteri di Roma_. Following in the paths opened by these
+zealous Italian students, M. D’Agincourt, M. Raoul Rochette, Abbé Gaume,
+and the eminent artist M. Perret, have contributed to the archæological
+literature of France several important works on the Roman Catacombs.
+
+To the pontificate of Pius IX. belongs the honor of producing the two
+greatest antiquarian scholars of our age. The one, the Cavaliere Canina,
+has treated with remarkable acuteness and judgment of the Appian Way from
+the Capenian Gate to Bovillæ;(150) the other, the Cavaliere de Rossi, of
+the Catacombs,(151) and it is of the latter that we propose to speak. It
+is impossible, in the brief space that is allotted to us, to do more than
+select one of the interesting subjects with which his works on the
+Catacombs abound, and as an Anglican student of the Catholic Church, its
+doctrines, its discipline, and its literature, there is none which so
+enkindles our enthusiasm as the Christian art of the early ages, and the
+symbolism with which it is clothed. We approach these pictures in the dark
+crypts and amid the countless tombs of the first martyrs of the faith with
+no little reverence. We lay aside our shoes, for the ground consecrated to
+the early dead is sacred, and the earnest wish of our heart is to put away
+the prejudice of ecclesiastical education and association. With this view
+before us, we make the noble words of Montesquieu our own: “Ceux qui nous
+avertissent sont les compagnons de nos travaux. Si le critique et l’auteur
+cherchent la vérité, ils out le même intérêt; car la vérité est le bien de
+tous les hommes: ils seront des confédérés, et non pas des ennemis.”(152)
+
+From the early ages of the church till the close of the Vth century, the
+Christians of Rome were driven by the sword of persecution to seek a
+hiding‐place wherein to exercise the holy mysteries of their religion, and
+to inter the remains of their dead. The vast subterranean caverns, now
+known as Catacombs, but more anciently called _Areæ_, _Cryptæ_, and
+_Cœmeteria_, afforded a shelter for the living and sepulture for the
+faithful departed. These Catacombs doubtless had their origin in the sand‐
+pits, or _arenariæ_, _arenifodinæ_, which the pagans had excavated to
+procure materials for building purposes.(153) Suetonius(154) describes how
+Phaon exhorted Nero to enter one of these caverns made by excavations of
+sand, and Cicero alludes to the _arenariæ_, outside of the Porta
+Esquilina.(155) In the admirable essay by Michele Stefano de Rossi,
+entitled _Analisi Geologica ed Architettonica_, and annexed to the work of
+his brother, it is stated that the Catacombs, with perhaps the exception
+of two that are Jewish, are the work of the early Christians.(156)
+
+By singular perseverance and careful discrimination in the study of
+documents running far back into the centuries, the Cavaliere de Rossi
+transferred the situation of the Catacombs of S. Callistus from the church
+of S. Sebastian, where they had erroneously been located, to a place a
+half mile nearer Rome, between the Via Appia and the Via Ardeatina; on the
+left of the road was the cemetery of S. Prætextatus, and on the right that
+of S. Callistus. The discovery of these hallowed crypts and sarcophagi of
+the early saints and popes, is of inestimable value in elucidating
+intricate questions of doctrine and practice, of history and tradition,
+which have vexed the theological world for centuries. We can scarcely
+resist the temptation to follow M. de Rossi through these dim cathedrals
+of our Christian ancestors, and reproduce a part, at least, of his
+masterly elucidation of their general topography, together with the
+history of heroic suffering and Christlike courage which the sites and
+names of those dark ages of danger suggest. But we must forbear, and
+proceed to the pictures and emblems in order to draw from them some
+lessons of that early fortitude, which the child of the church of the
+first centuries learned, as he knelt by the tomb of his companion in the
+faith, and looked up to the ceilings of crypts and semicircular
+compartments to catch by the glimmering light of smoking lamps the
+lineaments of some design of the religion which he professed.
+
+The paintings of the Catacombs represent the cardinal truths of
+Christianity, and their types are taken from both the Old and New
+Testament Scriptures, as also, in rare instances, from heathen mythology.
+The picture, perhaps most common to the eye of the worshipper at those
+shrines of the martyred dead, was the representation of the Saviour in
+that character which exhibits the tenderest attributes of his sacred
+humanity, and appeals to the sympathetic element in man. Christ as the
+Good Shepherd conveys in its fulness of meaning what perhaps no other type
+of our Lord does. It is variously represented, and under different forms
+may refer to the foreshadowing of the Messiah’s coming in the Old
+Testament and its fulfilment in the New. King David had been a shepherd,
+and understood the needs and labors of the shepherd life, and it may be
+that in the days of his pastoral innocence, when the lion and the bear
+were the destroyers of his flock, he wrote that psalm whose tone is one of
+quiet and trustfulness: “The Lord is my shepherd; therefore can I lack
+nothing. He shall feed me in a green pasture, and lead me forth beside the
+waters of comfort. Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of
+death, I will fear no evil; for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff
+comfort me.”(157) Thus, in the days of persecution, the Christian of the
+Catacombs might read the sacred legend of our Lord under the figure of a
+shepherd—bearing the sheep upon his shoulders. The Good Shepherd was
+pictured again as bearing a goat, and in the Catacombs of S. Callistus he
+stands between a goat and a sheep; the former occupies the more honorable
+place, the right hand, and the latter the left. Often the Good Shepherd
+leans on his pastoral crook, and bears in his hand a pipe. All these
+typical allusions refer to his character as exhibited in the Gospels. They
+teach the merciful watchfulness of our Lord, and the readiness with which
+he takes back into his fold, the church, yea, to the more honorable place
+by his side, the wayward and the erring. “I am the good shepherd, and know
+my sheep, and am known of mine. And other sheep I have which are not of
+this fold: them also I must bring, and they shall hear my voice; and there
+shall be one fold and one shepherd.”(158) Protestant critics have not been
+wanting in an attempt to trace the symbolism of this figure of the Good
+Shepherd to a heathen origin, and adduce as an argument in behalf of their
+theory that its prototype is in the Tombs of the Nasones. Even in
+questions of Christian archæology is exhibited the same polemical spirit
+which animated the accomplished English scholar, Conyers Middleton, who
+lent all the resources of his vast learning in classical history to prove
+the resemblance and identity of pagan and Catholic rites. But a more
+learned and reverent critic in the field of antiquities is the
+incomparable Marangoni, whose splendid work, _Cose Gentilesche trasportate
+ad Uso delle Chiese_, sets at rest for ever many problems which Mr.
+Poynder, a shallow pretender to scholarship, revived in the _Alliance of
+Popery and Heathenism_.
+
+While the ancient heathen lived in the atmosphere of a religion which
+incited to cheerfulness and pleasure in the present life, it portrayed but
+faintly any idea of immortality. The world around him was peopled with
+unseen spirits. They inhabited woods and streams, and he was ever watchful
+to interpret the slightest signs or omens which might yield him some token
+to enlighten the spiritual darkness of his soul. The mythological system
+of the pagan was a vital reality. It accompanied him not only to the
+solemn festival in the temple, but on the march, in the camp, and in the
+market‐place. It was with him in hours of joy and of sorrow; but it
+penetrated not beyond the boundaries of this world. It offered no _cross_
+here, and knew nothing of the _crown_ hereafter. There were no bright
+pictures of the rewards of eternity. This life was the narrow limit of his
+hope and his labor. Hades or the grave was dreaded because of its
+sunlessness. Iphigenia entreats her father for life in an impassioned
+appeal, which sums up the heathen’s belief:
+
+
+                        “To view the light of life,
+    To mortals most sweet; in death there is
+    Nor light nor joys; and crazed is he who seeks
+    To die; for life, though full of ills, has more
+    Of good than death.”
+
+
+Occasionally the ancient philosophers and poets give intimation of a
+belief in immortality, but not in resurrection, as Cicero in that eloquent
+longing for the day when he shall meet his illustrious friend Cato.(159)
+But, as we have said, of the great doctrine of the resurrection, which
+solved the dark enigmas of humanity, they were ignorant. The hold which
+classical mythology had upon the human mind was relaxed before this august
+mystery of the Catholic faith. Pagan temples were deserted, and the
+sacrificial fires on their altars extinguished.
+
+
+    “The intelligible forms of ancient poets,
+    The fair humanities of old religion,
+    The power, the beauty, and the majesty,
+    That had her haunts in dale, or piny mountain,
+    Or forest by slow stream, or pebbly spring,
+    Or chasms and wat’ry depths; all these have vanished.
+    They live no longer in the faith of reason!”(160)
+
+
+It is not remarkable, therefore, that delineations of the doctrine of the
+resurrection should not have been unusual in the church of the Catacombs.
+Two such representations, one from the Old Testament, and the other from
+the New, will exhibit the forms under which it was presented. Jonas as a
+type of the resurrection of our Lord has its authority from S.
+Matthew.(161) “For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale’s
+belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart
+of the earth.” Four scenes from the history of Jonas are found in the
+chapels and on the tombs of the Catacombs, sometimes represented singly,
+sometimes all compressed under one type. The first is the prophet being
+thrown into the deep, the second as swallowed by the great fish which “the
+Lord had prepared,” the third as “vomited out upon dry land,” the fourth
+as lying under the shadow of a gourd. As we have seen, according to the
+Gospel of S. Matthew, the swallowing of Jonas by the whale, and being cast
+forth in safety after three days, was typical of the burial and the
+resurrection of our Lord himself; and may not the pictures of the fourth
+series denote not only the sufferings of the individual Christian, and the
+care which his risen Master bestows upon him, but also the vicissitudes of
+the Church Catholic in every age of the world? “Sometimes she gains,
+sometimes she loses; and more often she is at once gaining and losing in
+different parts of her history.... Scarcely are we singing Te Deums, when
+we have to turn to our Misereres; scarcely are we in peace, when we are in
+persecution; scarcely have we gained a triumph, when we are visited by a
+scandal. Nay, we make progress by means of reverses; our griefs are our
+consolations; we lose Stephen to gain Paul, and Matthias replaced the
+traitor Judas.”(162) When the eye of the early Christian rested upon this
+fourth representation from the prophet’s life, it caught another and a
+more subtle signification, which is read perhaps oftener in the night of
+affliction and persecution than in the day of joy and prosperity. Our
+century, Catholic and Protestant alike, needs to study its outlines as
+much as the first century and the worshippers in the Catacombs. “Should
+not I spare Nineveh, that great city, wherein are more than sixscore
+thousand persons that cannot discern between their right hand and their
+left?”(163) Here is a beautiful symbolism of the tender mercy of our God
+for all who are in error and in sin. It opposes the spiritual Pharisaism
+of our day, and exacts meekness and charity from all men. It is the
+destroyer of malevolence and anger and strife.(164)
+
+Another picture, taken from the New Testament, and of frequent
+representation, is the “man sick of the palsy.” It is generally regarded
+by Protestant writers as belonging to that series of symbolical
+illustrations which embody the doctrine of the resurrection; and, to give
+greater force to their interpretation of the painting, they place much
+stress upon the words of the sacred text: “Arise, take up thy bed, and go
+unto thine house.” So far as we have examined copies of this picture, we
+are inclined to believe that it is connected with these which refer to the
+resurrection, except in one remarkable instance, in which it clearly
+symbolizes the sacrament of penance as it is taught in the Roman
+communion. In the Catacombs of S. Hermes is a representation of a
+Christian kneeling before another, which seems from its close proximity to
+the series of pictures of the Paralytic to point more directly to that
+other passage of the Gospel narrative: “Son, be of good cheer; thy sins be
+forgiven thee.” If our Lord delegated “such power unto men”—and the only
+logical and intelligent interpretation of the words of S. John(165)
+conveys this doctrine or it conveys nothing—here is a clear illustration
+of the power of the priesthood, which admits of no evasive contradiction,
+of no complicated and artificial hypothesis for the sake of escaping the
+recognition of the belief of the early Christians in the doctrine of
+sacerdotal absolution.
+
+As resurrection is the portal of the church triumphant, so is baptism to
+the church militant. The former is but the complement and fulfilment of
+the latter. “Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus
+Christ were baptized into his death? Therefore we are buried with him by
+baptism into death.”(166) The blessedness of the final consummation of the
+faithful departed was pictured in the symbols of the resurrection, and, as
+baptism is the foreshadowing of that glorious change which shall come over
+our vile bodies, it became a common subject of Christian art in the
+Catacombs. Its types are somewhat complex, and often susceptible of a
+twofold explanation. From the four scenes in the life of Moses, which are
+constantly repeated in the different Catacombs, we select _that_ which
+prefigures Christian baptism—the miraculous supply of water in Kadesh. Art
+critics who have bestowed any attention upon the sacred pictures of the
+early ages place the representation of this miracle of Moses in the
+Catacombs of S. Agnes among the finest specimens of primitive delineation.
+Moses is pictured as bearing a rod, the emblem of power, with which “he
+smote the rock twice, and the water came out abundantly.” It is worthy of
+remark in passing that on vases found in the Catacombs, and on the
+sarcophagi as early, perhaps, as the IVth century, this same scene is
+depicted, and the rod, instead of being in the hand of Moses, is in that
+of S. Peter, and, in a few instances, the two are represented together,
+but the person who smites with the rod has inscribed over his head the
+name of S. Peter. Catholic writers on subterranean symbolism draw from it
+an artistic argument, which, coupled with the historical, seems an
+unanswerable statement of the question of the primacy of S. Peter. _Quando
+Christus ad unum loquitur, unitas commendatur; et Petro primitus, quia in
+Apostolis Petrus est primus._(167) S. Peter bears the same relation to the
+Christian church that Moses did to the Israelitish. The one received from
+God the decalogue, which was to govern the actions of the Jews; the other,
+the keys, which were to open the kingdom of heaven. _Nam et si adhuc
+clausum putas cœlum, memento claves ejus hic Dominum Petro, et per eum
+Ecclesiæ reliquisse._(168) Another type of baptism taken from the Old
+Testament, and capable of two expositions, is Noah in the ark. Here again,
+on the authority of an apostle, the church in the early ages read the
+history of Noah by the light of the new revelation made through the
+institutions founded by Christ. S. Peter, speaking of the small number
+saved by water at the deluge, adds: “The like figure whereunto, even
+baptism, doth now also save us,... by the resurrection of Jesus
+Christ,”(169) The ark is generally represented by a small box in which
+Noah sits or stands, receiving from the dove the olive branch of peace.
+Some writers on Christian archæology find in it a secondary meaning,
+regarding it as typical of the church, and the danger of those who are
+without the ark of safety.
+
+Among favorite Old Testament subjects familiar to art students of the
+Catacombs are—Daniel in the lions’ den, and the three children of Israel
+in the fiery furnace at Babylon. Both are types of persecution, and of
+final deliverance through the miraculous interposition of God. In the
+cemetery of S. Priscilla, each of these pictures is to be seen, varying
+but slightly in the details of the portraiture. The three children appear
+clothed, and standing on the furnace. In a compartment beneath, the figure
+of a man is represented as feeding the fire with fresh fuel. Daniel, in
+the same cemetery, stands with outstretched arms between lions. The
+attitude in both these scenes from Jewish history appears to exhibit the
+ancient posture of the suppliant when in the act of prayer. A late writer
+on the Roman catacombs, the Rev. J. Spencer Northcote, D.D., formerly of
+Corpus Christi College, Oxford, spent much time, in company with the
+Cavaliere de Rossi and M. Perret, the French artist, in collecting
+materials for his small work on the burial‐places of the early Christians
+in Rome. He is so trustworthy a guide in everything that appertains to
+their archæology, that we gladly accept the explanation which he suggests
+of the position of Daniel and the three children of Israel. Speaking of
+the ancient attitude of Christian prayer—the hands extended in the form of
+a cross—he says:(170) “This form, which, as we learn from the Fathers, was
+universal among the early Christians, is still retained in some measure by
+the priests of the present day in the celebration of Mass, by Capuchins
+and others in serving Mass, and by numbers among the poor everywhere; it
+is worth noticing that S. Gregory Nazianzen expressly speaks of Daniel
+overcoming the wild beasts by stretching out his hands, meaning, of course
+by the power of prayer; but the explanation might almost seem to show that
+S. Gregory himself was familiar with this usual way of representing him.”
+
+The publication of the Cavaliere de Rossi, which has so greatly alarmed
+the Protestant controversialist, is _Immagine Scelte della B. Vergine
+Maria, tratte dalle Catacombe Romane_. It is most beautifully illustrated
+with chromo‐lithographic engravings, and reflects great honor on the
+present state of art in Rome. The purpose of the work is to exhibit the
+veneration with which the Christians of the Catacombs esteem the Mother of
+our Lord. At a period of time in the history of the church, almost
+apostolic, that purest of human feelings, maternal love, subdued the soul
+of the artist, and kindled his imagination to trace with the brush or
+carve with the chisel the Blessed Virgin and her Divine Son.
+
+The Virgin Mother,
+
+
+    “Who so above
+      All mothers shone,
+    The Mother of
+      The Blessed One,”
+
+
+is depicted by the artist with a tender and devout affection. The scenes
+are taken from the sacred narrative of the Evangelists, and an examination
+of them, simply from an æsthetical point of view, will more than repay the
+connoisseur of art. But to the conscientious archæologist and the sober
+inquirer, they occupy a grave relation. They throw additional light on the
+writings of S. Justin, S. Irenæus, S. Cyril, S. Jerome, and Tertullian, in
+regard to that dogma which, of all others, has perplexed the minds of
+earnest men outside the Roman communion. The honor paid to the Blessed
+Virgin is to‐day the especial “crux” of Dr. Pusey,(171) as it is, perhaps,
+of many not so learned as he, but as thoroughly dispassionate in the
+temper of their souls toward the attainment of divine truth. The poet of
+_The Christian Year_ reached a lofty strain in behalf of a long‐forgotten
+doctrine in the Anglican Church when he gave in his verses for the
+Annunciation:
+
+
+      “Ave Maria! blessed Maid!
+      Lily of Eden’s fragrant shade,
+        Who can express the love
+    That nurtured thee so pure and sweet,
+    Making thy heart a shelter meet
+        For Jesus’ holy dove?
+
+      “Ave Maria! Mother blest!
+      To whom, caressing and caress’d,
+        Clings the Eternal Child;
+    Favor’d beyond Archangel’s dream,
+    When first on thee with tenderest gleam
+        Thy new‐born Saviour smil’d.”(172)
+
+
+But Keble caught from an excursion to Ben Nevis, as his biographer
+conjectures, the hints of that beautiful poem, “Mother out of Sight,”
+which was intended for the _Lyra Innocentium_, but through the influence
+of two friends, Dyson and Sir John Coleridge, was withheld by the author,
+and only saw the light as one of his posthumous pieces. It has a clearer
+doctrinal ring than the stanzas for the Feast of the Annunciation, which
+foreshadow something of the intercessory power of the Mother of God. It
+merits the high praise which Keble’s ever‐faithful friend and, for years,
+his gifted ally bestows upon him. We more than regret that space forbids
+us giving the entire poem. It loses much of its beauty and continuity by
+fragmentary quotation, yet, from the fourteen stanzas, we are only able to
+reproduce four:
+
+
+        “Yearly since then with bitterer cry
+        Man hath assailed the throne on high,
+        And sin and hate more fiercely striven
+        To mar the league ’twixt earth and heaven.
+        But the dread tie that pardoning hour,
+        Made fast in Mary’s awful bower,
+    Hath mightier prov’d to bind than we to break;
+    None may that work undo, that Flesh unmake.
+
+        “Thenceforth, whom thousand worlds adore,
+        He calls thee Mother evermore;
+        Angel nor saint his face may see
+        Apart from what he took of thee;
+        How may we choose but name thy name,
+        Echoing below their high acclaim
+    In holy creeds? since earthly song and prayer
+    Must keep faint time to the dread Anthems there.
+
+        “Therefore, as kneeling day by day,
+        We to our Father duteous pray,
+        So unforbidden we may speak
+        An Ave to Christ’s Mother meek
+        (As children with ‘good morrow’ come
+        To elders, in some happy home),
+    Inviting so the saintly host above
+    With our unworthiness to pray in love.
+
+        “To pray with us, and gently bear
+        Our falterings in the pure, bright air.
+        But strive we pure and bright to be
+        In spirit. Else how vain of thee
+        Our earnest dreamings, awful Bride!
+        Feel we the sword that pierced thy side;
+    Thy spotless lily‐flower, so clear of hue,
+    Shrinks from the breath impure, the tongue untrue.”(173)
+
+
+Another poet, once an Anglican, then a Catholic priest, and now passed
+into the land where the mists of controversy are cleared away, attained a
+higher plane of truth in regard to the Mother of our Lord:
+
+
+    “But scornful men have boldly said
+      Thy love was leading me from God;
+    And yet in this I did but tread
+      The very path my Saviour trod.
+
+    “They know but little of thy worth
+      Who speak these heartless words to me;
+    For what did Jesus love on earth
+      One‐half so tenderly as thee?
+
+    “Get me the grace to love thee more;
+      Jesus will give, if thou wilt plead;
+    And, Mother, when life’s cares are o’er,
+      Oh! I shall love thee then indeed.
+
+    “Jesus, when his three hours were run,
+      Bequeathed thee from the cross to me;
+    And oh! how can I love thy Son,
+      Sweet Mother, if I love not thee?”
+
+
+We return to these pictures of the Catacombs, and we will content
+ourselves with an allusion only, preferring that the reader who is
+interested in them should examine them through his own, rather than
+through another’s eyes. From a lunette in an _arcosolio_ in the cemetery
+of S. Agnes is a picture which of late years has been frequently copied.
+It represents the Blessed Virgin with uplifted hands, seemingly in the act
+of intercession, with the Infant Jesus in her lap. In the cemetery of
+Domitilla is a picture of the Mother and Son, and four Magi offering their
+oblations. It may be well to remark that the Gospel history of the
+Adoration of the Wise Men from the East does not limit their number. We
+have somewhere seen it suggested that the restriction to three had its
+rise from the offerings presented—gold, frankincense, and myrrh. Another
+scene of the Adoration of the Magi is given with some difference of
+detail. The Virgin Mother is seated holding the Divine Son in her lap,
+above her head appears the star which guided the wise men to where the
+Infant lay. To the left is a somewhat youthful person, supposed to be S.
+Joseph. He holds in his hand a book, which the Cavaliere de Rossi very
+wisely and ingeniously interprets to be the writings of the evangelical
+prophet Isaiah, whose prophecies concerning the Messiah had now their
+fulfilment in the Infant Jesus.
+
+Such are some of the many beautiful pictures which Roman art, through the
+indefatigable industry of de Rossi, has given us of the Blessed Virgin as
+represented in early ages. To other than jaundiced eyes, calmly and
+candidly studying them, they reveal the light in which they were so often
+viewed by the suffering children of the church amid the persecutions which
+attended the conflict between paganism and Christianity. In teaching us to
+honor the Mother of our Lord—Θεότοκος—they impress us with more distinct
+and more tangible thoughts of the incarnation of her Son.(174) With his
+usual discrimination and mastery of style, Dr. John Henry Newman has well
+said: “The Virgin and Child is _not_ a mere modern idea; on the contrary,
+it is represented again and again, as every visitor to Rome is aware, in
+the paintings of the Catacombs. Mary is there drawn with the Divine Infant
+in her lap, she with hands extended in prayer, he with his hand in the
+attitude of blessing. No representation can more forcibly convey the
+doctrine of the high dignity of the Mother, and, I will add, of her power
+over her Son. Why should the memory of his time of subjection be so dear
+to Christians and so carefully preserved? The only question to be
+determined is the precise date of these remarkable monuments of the first
+age of Christianity. That they belong to the centuries of what Anglicans
+call the ‘undivided church’ is certain, but lately investigations have
+been pursued which place some of them at an earlier date than any one
+anticipated as possible.”(175)
+
+One other topic remains to be considered before we pass on to some general
+reflections which early Christian art suggests. It was not uncommon for
+the artist in the first ages of the church to take subjects of heathen
+mythology, and invest them by his art with a Christian symbolism. The
+genius of Michael Angelo, so truly Catholic in taste and devout in
+expression, transplanted pagan forms from the broken temples of the elder
+civilization to the Christian churches of the new. He retouched them under
+the aureate light shed upon them by the reverent imagination of the
+Fathers. On the magnificent ceiling of the Sistine Chapel are painted by
+this master‐hand the Sibyls, who in early times were regarded as the
+unconscious prophets of divine truth, uttering in their blindness crude
+intimations of the glory of him who was to be the fulfilment and
+completion of all shadows and of all types.(176) In the Catacombs may be
+seen a representation of Orpheus playing upon his lyre, and subduing by
+his melodious strains the ferocity of man and beast, and drawing even from
+inanimate creation by the power of music the subjects of his sway. Rocks
+and trees yielded to his lyric sweetness, the region of Plato opened to
+the sound of his “golden shell,” the wheel of Ixion ceased its
+revolutions, and Tityus forgot for the nonce the vulture that preyed on
+his vitals. The Thracian bard was the representative of the civilizer of
+savage men.
+
+
+    “Silvestres homines sacer interpresque Deorum
+    Cædibus et victu fœdo deterruit Orpheus;
+    Dictus ob hoc lenire tigres, rabidosque leones.”(177)
+
+
+The symbolism of the picture seems to be this, that as Orpheus drew the
+whole creation to him by the music of his lyre, and called from the realms
+of Hades his beloved Eurydice to the regions of light, so Christ by his
+compassion commanded the love of all men, as well by his divine power the
+hidden forces of nature. Hades, or the grave, opened to him on that first
+Easter morning, as it will open to us on the last.
+
+
+    “Prisoner of Hope thou art—look up and sing
+          In hope of promised spring.
+    As in the pit his father’s darling lay
+          Beside the desert way,
+    And knew not how, but knew his God would save
+          Even from that living grave;
+    So, buried with our Lord, we’ll close our eyes
+    To the decaying world, till angels bid us rise.”(178)
+
+
+The late Dean of S. Paul’s, Dr. Milman, remarks, with an air of triumph,
+in his _Ecclesiastical History_,(179) that “the Catacombs of Rome,
+faithful to their general character, offer no instance of a crucifixion.”
+For the absence of the crucifix in the Catacombs, we as a Protestant can
+conceive of two causes, either of which would to our mind be sufficient to
+account for it. First, in the early ages it was highly important for the
+growth of the church, especially in the Roman Empire, to guard against the
+introduction of any symbol which would suggest pain or repugnance to
+Jewish converts; secondly, it was essential to clothe truth under a type
+which would not inspire mockery on the part of pagans, and so assist in
+keeping alive the persecuting spirit of the times. This in a measure no
+doubt led the early artists to use the heathen symbol of Orpheus as
+typical of Christ. A beautiful passage in the work of D’Agincourt affords
+still another general cause: “Entirely occupied with the celestial
+recompense which awaited them after the trials of their troubled life, and
+often of so dreadful a death, the Christians saw in death, and even in
+execution, only a way by which they arrived at this everlasting happiness;
+and, so far from associating with this image that of the tortures or
+privations which opened heaven before them, they took pleasure in
+enlivening it with smiling colors, or presenting it under agreeable
+symbols, adorning it with flowers and vine‐leaves; for it is thus that the
+asylum of death appears to us in the Christian Catacombs. There is no sign
+of mourning, no token of resentment, no expression of vengeance; all
+breathes softness, benevolence, charity.”(180)
+
+Many emblems denoting the cardinal virtues are sculptured on the walls of
+the chapels and on the tombs of the Catacombs. Flowers, garlands, and
+grapes intertwine each other and embellish these ancient crypts. The
+laurel speaks of victory, the olive of peace and reconciliation, and the
+palm of final triumph. The lyre is significant of the æsthetical element
+of religion, and the anchor of hope for the heavenly port. The dove
+represents the Holy Spirit, the lamb the adorable Saviour—the Agnus
+Dei—the stag the thirsting of the soul for the paradise of God, and the
+peacock the belief in immortality. Among these general symbols so familiar
+to the saints of old, none is more prominent than the fish. Its history is
+ingenious, and, therefore, we will tarry for a moment ere we conclude. It
+naturally calls to mind the solemn parting of our Lord with the apostles
+by the Sea of Tiberias, when their nets were filled with fish, and Jesus
+“taketh bread and giveth them, and fish likewise.” In the church of the
+Catacombs this tender scene from the Evangelic record is always associated
+with the Holy Eucharist. As ΙΧΘΥΣ, the Greek word for a fish, contains the
+initial letters of the name and title of Christ—Ἰησοῦς Χριστὸς Θεοῦ Υἱὸς
+Σωπὴρ—Jesus Christ, the Son of God, the Saviour—the figure was constantly
+used as a symbol of the divinity of Christ. In his _Iconographie
+Chrêtienne_, M. Didron assumes that this emblem on the sarcophagi of the
+Catacombs is simply indicative of the fact that the person buried beneath
+was by trade a fisherman. Certainly the numberless instances proving the
+falsity of this position render the opinion utterly worthless.
+
+We must take leave of the Cavaliere de Rossi and the Christian art of the
+Roman Catacombs. Feeble as may be the execution of these pictures, crude
+in conception, and often colorless through the lapse of time, yet they
+speak of the ardor of the early Christian artists, and of the devotion and
+doctrine of the children of that church which is the mother of us all. In
+parting with the Cavaliere de Rossi, we say with all sincerity, that we
+have found nothing in his volumes unworthy of the reverential regard of
+honest and candid minds. Passages there are, which the timidity of
+Anglican churchmen would regard as dealing too freely with the symbolism
+of the Catacombs. Without accepting his conclusions in detail, we
+gratefully acknowledge that the Cavaliere de Rossi has shown English
+writers in what spirit all the grave questions of theology connected with
+subterranean art should be treated. His has been a great subject, and he
+has written with humility and ripeness of learning and clearness of
+apprehension, which well become the Christian scholar and the sacred
+theme. In closing his masterly work, we seem again bidding adieu to Rome,
+the reflection of whose classic greatness and Christian glory mellows hill
+and plain, pagan ruin and Catholic shrine.
+
+
+              “Gran Latinà
+    Città di cui quanto il sol aureo gira
+    Ne altera più, nè più onorata mira.”
+
+
+And because of the house of the Lord our God, we utter from the depths of
+our heart the wish of the Psalmist of old: “_Fiat pax in virtute tua: et
+abundantia in turribus tuis. Propter fratres meos, et proximos meos,
+loquebar pacem de te_.”
+
+
+
+
+Beating The Air.
+
+
+“I can call spirits from the vasty deep,” says Owen Glendower, the great
+magician.
+
+“So can I,” replies the sturdy, incredulous Hotspur. “But will they come?”
+
+We are living in a sterner age than that in which Hotspur is supposed to
+have put this poser to the Welshman. Great declamations and fine promises
+will not do for any length of time, at least. We are hard, and prosy, and
+practical. We must have facts, and figures, and something clear before we
+are asked to choose a policy, or a system, or take a stand on a platform.
+Love of country, homes and altars, and all the old watchwords, serve no
+longer; they come down to a vulgar question of taxes, of custom‐house
+duties, of imports and exports, of pauperism, and the increase of crime.
+This hard, practical spirit has been carried with all the keenness of, if
+not an intellectual, at least a very intelligent age, into the sanctuary
+of religion, and men and women are no longer content to follow a sect or a
+creed because they happened to be born in it, or because their friends
+belong to it, or because as Giles has it, “Payrson says so, and Payrson’s
+daughter be married to Squoire.” They will have the why and wherefore: why
+they must take this creed and reject that; why they must take a part and
+not the whole; why it is necessary to be bothered with any form of belief
+at all, when, as they say, and many of them truthfully, they can get on
+well enough without it, and live happily, and play their part, and die out
+of the world without having committed any special faults against society,
+leaving behind them children whose rule in life shall be the truth and
+honor which they have bequeathed them as a last legacy. They have saved
+themselves infinite trouble by not mingling in the clashing of the sects,
+where each one claims to be _the_ one, the only one, the church of Christ.
+One would imagine that Christ came only to set the world on fire and all
+good people by the ears; that, in fact, it would be better had he not come
+at all if this is to be the result, this wrangling and jangling and
+eternal jargon about what one must do to be saved, as though good people,
+who do no earthly harm must join one or other of these conflicting
+parties, who can never agree among themselves, and use the name of the God
+of peace as a firebrand to stir up dissension and the worst of strife.
+Influenced by thoughts such as these, we find so many of the most
+intelligent people, what we might call Nothingarians, believing in nothing
+but the law of the land, that is, of expediency—a class that is growing
+wider every day in proportion as the sects are loosening and parting
+asunder; which embraces the ablest writers on the ablest secular journals;
+which sees only one religious body in the world endowed with a
+consistency, and a uniqueness, and years, and a glorious history, and a
+strange unity that will not be broken; a church which takes to‐day, as it
+has always taken, the bold stand before the world—we are the one church
+founded by Jesus Christ, in this church and in this church alone is
+salvation, not because we say it, but because he has said it: a stand in
+their eyes outrageous, so utterly opposed, as it is, to the dictates of
+human reason, with its doctrines of infallibility and what not; yet, after
+all, logical and strangely consistent throughout; so bold, so logical, so
+strangely consistent and united, that if there were a church at all it
+would be this, for all else is uncertainty. And as the _Nation_ said the
+other day in an article on the Old Catholics, written evidently by one of
+the class we have been describing: “The great strength of the Church of
+Rome lies now in the fact that he who quits her knows not whither he is
+going, and can find no man to tell him.” Schism and heresy and persecution
+have tried her in turn, and exhausted their efforts in vain; she stands
+today as she stood on the morning of the Christian era, full and fair in
+the light of God, not a dint in the rock, not a loosening in the edifice,
+though the ages have washed over her, and washed all other landmarks away;
+and the dove that leaves the ark finds no resting‐place over the barren
+waters; and the olive branch of peace is not yet found to tell us that the
+waters have subsided, and the earth is again as God made it.
+
+Religious unity has been the dream of earnest seekers ever since Jesus
+Christ gave the final mandate to the apostle to go forth and convert the
+world; and it would seem that the dream is as far from fulfilment to‐day
+as it ever was; that it is likely to be so till the end of time. The
+Catholic Church is denounced as the great stumbling‐block in the way of
+the much‐desired unity. The sects say to her each in turn: You will not
+come to us; you will not join us. We are ready to make some sacrifices,
+but you will not budge an inch. You are false; you are absurd; you are
+mysterious; you are superstitious; you are everything that is bad—but only
+give up infallibility, says one, and we are with you; surrender the
+doctrine of the Immaculate Conception of the Mother of God, says another,
+and we will join you; only let your priests marry, says a third; give up
+the sacraments, says a fourth. To these, and all and many more, the church
+replies now as always: “_Non possumus_.” We cannot; God gave the laws to
+his church. They are his laws; they are irrevocable; more fixed than those
+of nature; it is not for us to change them. There again, say her
+adversaries: the old cry. You will not change; you will not concede; you
+are perverse and implacable. How can we ever have unity? They forget that
+they ask the church to dismember herself; to destroy her own identity; to
+break up, and come down to their level. Suppose she were to do so, what
+would the result be? She would be lost and absorbed in the sea of
+sectarianism. The one object to which all eyes look, whether faithfully or
+maliciously, as at least fixed and united to‐day as to‐morrow, as
+yesterday, would be blotted out of the sight of man. Even humanly
+speaking, much would be lost; nothing would be gained; and union would be
+farther off than ever.
+
+The best example of the truth of this is given in the history of the last
+great departure from the Catholic Church—the Protestant Reformation.
+Though this movement never reached to the proportions of Arianism, yet it
+was a movement that captivated nations, and was eminently adapted to favor
+the revolutionary spirit then breaking out among men, to throw off all
+constraint of whatever nature, and stand upon the false notion of
+unbridled liberty of thought and action. The new doctrine of private
+interpretation spread rapidly, because it pandered to the age. Nations
+broke away from the church; a new faith, a new creed, grander, larger,
+fuller, purer than the old, was to be built up. And what was the result?
+What is the result? A multiplication of sect upon sect; a fresh departure;
+a new interpretation of the Gospel of God day after day; a breaking out
+into the wildest and most erratic courses of belief and conduct,
+oftentimes so utterly subversive to all government that it was obliged to
+be forcibly repressed by the law of the lands which at first favored it
+for its own purposes. This tower of faith that men would build from earth
+to heaven, like the old tower of pride, ended in nothing—crumbled away and
+caused a Babel—a confusion of beliefs. Such is the inevitable end of all
+religions that men make for themselves; vain efforts; uncertainty; good
+perverted or rendered useless; disagreement and religious anarchy.
+
+No wonder that men cry out for something fixed. No wonder that so many
+turn infidel. Protestantism has proved an utter failure as a guidance and
+a religion to men. So much so that, if one asked for a definition of the
+Protestant _religion_ today, it could not be given him; and the only right
+answer would be not a faith or a system, but the opposition of non‐
+Catholic Christians to the Roman Catholic Church. Perhaps the most
+striking proof of this is exemplified in the late meeting at Cologne.
+There were assembled delegates from several rival sects and churches, in
+the endeavor to bring order out of chaos, to plant a new church and a new
+faith which all men might accept. If the Protestant bishops who attended
+there were satisfied that their religion or form of religion was true and
+all‐sufficient, why not stay at home? Why did they go at all? While
+Döllinger and the rest, satisfied of the failure of Protestantism, cling
+fast to the torn shred of the Roman Catholic faith, and proclaim loudly
+and absurdly that they are Catholic still, it is a deep and bitter lesson
+to Protestants of the hopelessness of their efforts to create a unity such
+as they see alone in the Catholic Church.
+
+In the midst of this general and growing dissatisfaction, a pamphlet has
+been put into our hands which promises to settle the vexed question once
+for all. It is written by a Baptist minister, the Rev. James W. Wilmarth,
+pastor at Pemberton, N. J. Who he is, beyond the fact stated on the cover,
+we do not know. His pamphlet has no claim to our attention beyond the
+thousand‐and‐one such thrust upon our notice day after day. But as it is
+somewhat pretentious, and has received the sanction of no less
+distinguished a body than the West New Jersey Baptist Association, which
+body, by vote, requested its publication (the substance of it having been
+delivered in the “doctrinal sermon” preached September 13, 1871), it may
+be taken to represent the orthodox Baptist doctrine, and may, therefore,
+be glanced at just to see what that doctrine is, or is supposed to be, for
+we have no doubt many Baptists would disagree with it. The author takes a
+bold line, “The True Idea of the Church: Baptist _vs._ Catholic,” for he
+recognizes(181) no logical middle position between Baptist and Catholic
+ground, and, therefore, salvation lies in one of the two bodies, as it
+cannot lie in both. What Methodists, Anglicans, Presbyterians, and the
+rest may think of this high‐handed mode of dealing with their several
+pretensions to truth, we may imagine. But they can scarcely complain, as
+all in turn adopt precisely the same line of argument: the haven of
+salvation resting not between Presbyterian and Baptist or Methodist and
+Episcopalian, but between each of these sects and Rome. They slide by each
+other, and confront us. The only similar example we can call to mind at
+present of such union out of disunion, is that of the fallen spirits.
+
+It is unnecessary to observe that, in a contest of this nature between an
+individual Baptist minister and the whole Catholic Church, the church,
+notwithstanding her rather formidable array of theologians and
+philosophers, gets decidedly the worst of the battle. And, though the
+author, as he tells us in his preface, “has endeavored to ‘speak the truth
+in love,’ ” perhaps it was only natural to find, particularly towards the
+end, his temper proving a little too much for his “love,” so that we must
+not be astonished, though “in no partisan spirit has he discussed his
+theme,” at meeting little phrases scattered here and there of a decidedly
+unlovable nature. Thus, the Holy Father is mentioned as “the bigoted Pope
+of Rome” who “sits cursing modern civilization and freedom, and sighing
+for the return of the dark ages and the inquisition”; the whole Catholic
+system “a diabolical imposture,” italicized; “Catholics appeal chiefly to
+sentiment,” “undervalue the importance of Scriptures,” “may be good
+Catholics, and yet profane, immoral, untruthful, and regardless of the
+will of God, and that millions notoriously are so.” If this be our
+author’s mode of asking for his views “the candid consideration of every
+reader of whatever religious persuasion,” we should strongly recommend him
+for the future to alter his tone; if it be “speaking the truth in love,”
+we wonder what his notions of speaking the truth in wrath would be.
+Catholic writers are habitually accused of intolerance in tone and
+controversy: we humbly submit that, when we have to encounter—as we are
+compelled to do every day—adversaries of this stamp, we may be reasonably
+pardoned for not using studious phrases with men on whom politeness is
+thrown away.
+
+A year has now flown by since this “discourse was prepared and delivered
+under a profound conviction of the importance and timeliness of the vital
+truths therein set forth, and it is now given to the public with the same
+conviction.” As to its timeliness, we have nothing to object, it was
+probably meant for Baptists rather than Catholics, and with an eye to the
+dissensions that seem racking and threatening to rend that body at
+present. In fact, from its whole tone and the round rating he gives
+members of his community who “would give up their vantage‐ground by
+concealment or compromise of truth,” and his insisting on their
+“maintaining their Baptist attitude” (whatever that may be precisely he
+fails to explain), the pamphlet sounds very much like a warning‐note—like
+the weak cry of “No surrender!” when surrender follows immediately, like
+Mr. Winkle’s “all right” when Mr. Winkle felt satisfied that it was all
+wrong. With regard to its “importance,” notwithstanding the writer’s
+“conviction” on the point, we may be permitted to entertain some slight
+doubt. Authors are sometimes apt to overrate the importance of their
+productions. At all events, after a year of trial, we have heard of no
+very wonderful result following the launching of this pamphlet on the
+troubled waters of controversy. Catholics are Catholics still. The church
+stands precisely at its first starting‐point of some nineteen centuries
+ago, while the Baptists stand at theirs—a point involved still in a region
+of mist, and apparently rapidly dissolving into it. So that, with regard
+to this closing of the controversy generally, we are compelled to arrive
+at the painful conclusion that it has either been very greatly undervalued
+by the public at large, or is absolutely good for nothing.
+
+The author proposed to himself to place the only two ideas of the church,
+Baptist and Catholic, which he acknowledges, in such juxtaposition, in so
+clear a light, that all who read must be compelled to adopt either the one
+or the other. In other words, be purposed ending forever all the
+controversies that have ever raged between church and church, in a
+pamphlet of forty‐two pages. And his mode of setting about it is at least
+original.
+
+“I do not propose to discuss this question of ‘true church’ after the
+common method. I shall not raise questions of apostolic or of historic
+succession, of ‘legality’ or ‘validity’ or ‘regularity.’ I propose to go
+deeper than that into the heart of the subject.”
+
+Now, with all due respect to the reverend author, these little items,
+which he finds it so convenient to throw overboard in such an arbitrary
+fashion, constitute, for his readers at least, the heart of the subject.
+He tells us that “all the Christian ages with one consent acknowledge the
+church to be a divine society”—human‐divine, Catholics would say—“governed
+by divine law, established by Jesus Christ.”
+
+Here we have, then, according to the author’s own words, a society,
+established by a person, at a certain date, which has come down from that
+person to to‐day. Men say that it has altered from its original. Two
+societies claim to be the original, the Baptist and the Catholic. It lies
+in one or the other, not between. We want to find out which it is. In this
+inquiry, history is nothing, legality is nothing, succession is nothing,
+validity is nothing. That is not the true method of going to work to find
+out what this society is; whether it has ever been broken, whether it
+contains and carries out what Christ its founder gave it, whether its
+members practise to‐day what they practised at the beginning—all that is
+nothing. The question is “the idea which underlies it all. What then is
+the true idea of the church? This is the great question.”
+
+If the author proposed to argue in this style, he should have stated at
+starting his definition of the true idea of the church. He should have
+defined the term in order to explain clearly what he was seeking. But he
+does nothing of the kind. In fact, he soon loses the very word “idea,” and
+substitutes for it in one place “view,” in another “theories.” So that
+after all it comes down in plain English to what is your opinion on the
+subject, or what is your notion about it, despite his trite “challenges of
+the Catholic idea of the church at the bar of reason,” and so forth.
+
+In fact, there is just that show of shallow learning sprinkled throughout
+the whole pamphlet which a preacher endowed with more words than weight
+generally uses to a thick‐headed congregation, who take his words for
+wisdom from the very fact that they cannot understand them. There are the
+divisions and subdivisions: the 1, 2, 3, in large and small figures, and
+occasionally in Roman characters; the appeals to this, that, and the
+other; the citing of “well‐known facts” and “notorious things” without
+substantiating them by any references, as in p. 17. “Witness the Baptist
+originators of the British and Foreign Bible Society; Carey, Judson, and
+their successors” in support of the view that with Baptists originated the
+desire for the revision of the Bible. Again, speaking of Catholic
+doctrine: “If men leave the church, they part from grace and are lost.”
+_Apropos_ of which telling fact he informs us in the next sentence that
+“the history of Augustinianism is an instructive illustration. Augustine,
+Bishop of Hippo, was, in many respects, what would now be termed a high
+Calvinist. His fervid eloquence and mental power made a deep impression
+upon the theology of the Catholic (not then _Roman_ Catholic) Church of
+the Latin world.” And that is all he says about him. As far as any
+evidence he furnishes to support it goes, he might just as well have
+substituted the name of S. Thomas Aquinas for S. Augustine, or Pius IX.,
+or, as far as the majority of his readers know to the contrary, Tippoo
+Sahib. And in the very opening of the pamphlet the same shallowness is
+strikingly exemplified. He chooses the text, Acts ii. 47, “And the Lord
+added to the church daily those who are saved,” which, as he observes,
+reads in the version of King James, “Such as should be saved.” This
+text—his own rendering—“is one of those passages in which an incidental
+statement, as by a flash of lightning, reveals a whole body of doctrine.”
+In what it involves we find the true idea of the church, that is, the
+Baptist doctrine that we are regenerated in Christ by his death, and that
+baptism is, as it were, only a symbol, a sort of mark, by which we are
+known as belonging to the church, but not necessary for salvation,
+inasmuch as we are _saved_ before we receive it. He alleges, with
+reference to the Greek version, that “should be saved” is wrong and “are
+saved” is right. And there the matter rests. Now, while on this very
+important point, whereon indeed rests his theory, he might as well have
+been a little more exact and explicit. A Greek reference is such a vague
+thing to build on. We agree with him that “should be saved” is a wrong
+rendering; as “are saved” happens also to be. The verse runs: Ο δε κυριος
+προσετιθει τους σωζομενους καθ᾽ ημεραν τη Εκκλησια. The present participle
+σωζομενους means being saved; but a present participle following a verb in
+the imperfect or aorist tense must be rendered imperfect, and therefore
+the passage should run, “And the Lord added daily to the church such as
+_were being_ saved,” that is, such as were in the act or state of coming
+into the church through the merit of the death of Christ and the movements
+of his divine grace; a fact which throws altogether another light on the
+author’s fixed starting point. These things we mention to show how little
+trust can be placed on men who talk so loudly and pretentiously in this
+loose style. It shows also how very weak and treacherous is this absolute
+dependence on the private interpretation of the word of the Bible, whereon
+the Baptists stake their doctrine and salvation; and how insufficient the
+absolute creed which hangs for life or death on the possibly dubious
+rendering of a passage in a dead language.
+
+But let us examine this doctrine, which all, whether Catholic or Anglican,
+Methodist or Jew, are bound to accept if they would be saved. We Catholics
+are asked to surrender for it the faith which we have held through the
+centuries of the Christian era, in defence of which we have poured out our
+blood so lavishly, tracing the martyr stream down through the long vista
+of ages, from the death on the cross to the stoning of Stephen, to the
+massacre of the nuns in China but yesterday. We are told to‐day that all
+our history, our sacraments, our doctrine, the faith on which we are
+built, our succession of pontiffs, the sacred orders of our priests, the
+church itself, which we define as the union of all the faithful under one
+head, which head is Jesus Christ, whose successor is the pope, are one and
+all “a diabolical imposture,” and that if we hope for salvation we must
+surrender them for the true doctrine as explained by this author.
+
+“The Baptist holds that men receive salvation directly from Christ, and by
+virtue of an independent transaction with him; that a believer’s salvation
+is secured by a personal union with Christ; and that he is divinely
+commanded, after being thus saved, to unite with the church for the sake
+of personal profit and of usefulness; and that the church so constituted
+is to be governed by the law of Christ. He makes doctrine and conversion
+come first. Out of doctrine and out of conversion proceeds the church. And
+the saved man, already saved, comes into the church for training, for
+work,” etc.
+
+Now, this passage is the author’s exposition of the true idea of a church,
+and on this everything else hangs. We may be obtuse, but we confess the
+exposition is somewhat misty to us; at all events, it does not captivate
+our intellect so completely as we would wish in a matter all‐
+important—eternal salvation. We are told here that salvation is a personal
+matter between the individual and Christ; that there is no person or
+nothing intermediate. In plain English, that a man’s own conscience is his
+rule and guidance; that it instructs and satisfies him on all points of
+doctrine and conduct as a Christian. Now, it is Catholic doctrine that
+salvation is an entirely personal affair between the individual soul and
+Jesus Christ. The individual is not saved or condemned on the merits or
+demerits of the society, the church of which he is a member: in exactly
+the same way that a prisoner at the bar is held answerable to the law of
+the land for his wrong actions, and judged on them, and it avails him
+nothing to speak of the respectability of his relations, or of their evil
+behavior which may have partly led him into crime; such evidence may
+constitute to an extent extenuating circumstances, but a man is condemned
+finally on his own act. If the prisoner, on the verdict being given
+against him, pleads: But you condemn me; you do not take into
+consideration my relations; you tell me that all that has nothing to do
+with it; that I knew myself what was right and what was wrong; that, in
+fact, I was the best and only judge in the matter; well, I acknowledge it,
+I am the only judge, and if I am the only judge, and I make a mistake, you
+cannot punish me, there is nothing between you and my conscience. The
+court would respond: There is the law written plain for all men to read.
+The government made the law, you are judged by that. And this is precisely
+the Catholic doctrine of salvation. Though it be a final question between
+the individual soul and Jesus Christ, the law of Christ comes between
+them, as the law of Moses came between God and his people, and that law
+being made for the whole world, for the universal society of human beings,
+rests in the hands of the government duly constituted and appointed from
+that society by Jesus Christ himself, who no longer abides among us
+visibly, and is only known to us by faith.
+
+Well, then, faith is enough; faith saves us, say the Baptists. If this be
+true, then, are the devils saved since they must have a far more vivid
+faith—belief in God—than the generality of human beings? If faith is
+enough to save a man, why not stop there? Why be baptized? Why join a
+church at all? “For the sake of personal profit” (a phrase apt to be
+misunderstood), “and of usefulness,” replies our author. After all, this
+idea of the church reduces itself to that of Mr. Beecher, which the author
+stigmatizes—a church of “expediency.” Later, on page 22, in “challenging
+the Catholic idea of a church at the bar of reason,” he says: “Now, in the
+case before us, what is the effect? Salvation.” Well, here we have it; the
+effect; the thing that the whole world is looking for—salvation. Why, that
+is everything; that is all we want, no matter how it comes. You are saved
+before entering the church. Then, what more is necessary? There is no need
+to go beyond that. Stay outside; live and let live; our safety is
+attained; let people wrangle as they may, there is no further fear. There
+is no need of a _church_ at all, of communion, and the rest, if we are
+saved before entering it. That is all God asks of us, to save ourselves.
+It is already accomplished by regeneration and faith in him. There we
+stop, happy and contented, without any more quarrelling with our
+neighbors.
+
+Then comes the further and final question: After all, who is Christ? How
+do we know him? Where do we find him? When and how does he speak to us? Of
+course, to “regenerate persons,” it is unnecessary to put these questions:
+But our author proposed going deeper into the matter than the common
+method, and, if the world is to become Baptist, it must know why. The
+regenerate enjoy “a personal union” with him, says the Baptist, and know
+when he speaks; when the Spirit impels them. This will never do for human
+nature. We must have something stronger than assertion, however strong.
+Christians can believe and understand S. Paul, when he tells them that he
+was caught up into paradise, and heard secret words which it is not
+granted to men to utter. The great apostle excuses himself for bringing
+this to the knowledge of the faithful, and only mentions it as a single
+act in his life, and one that affected his salvation in no wise. If the
+Baptists hold that they are continually in the third heavens, well and
+good. That at least has the merit of a clear, defined ground to stand on;
+but they will scarcely win many converts. Who is Christ, then, with whom
+you have this personal union? He is the founder of the Baptist Church, our
+author would respond; of what is known as Christianity? That is to say, of
+the system or systems of religion held by all people of the present day
+who call themselves Christians, but among whom the Baptists only hold the
+true church. Then we will work backwards to the foundation of your society
+and the others, and see which reaches to Jesus Christ. Oh! no, says our
+author; that is one of the common methods; they are poor. “Read the New
+Testament. You will find the Baptist doctrine of salvation, and the
+resulting Baptist idea of the church, taught or implied on every
+page,(182) and you will not find a trace of the Catholic doctrine of
+salvation, or of the Catholic idea of the church. If you doubt, search for
+yourselves the Scriptures, like the noble Bereans, and see whether these
+things are so.”
+
+In support of this loose, sweeping assertion, this author contorts his
+text into a puny quibble, which any well‐instructed child might see
+through at once. He says: “We do not read the priests or the apostles
+added sinners to the church in order to save them,” but we do read: “The
+_Lord_ added to the church daily those who are saved.” _Ergo_, “salvation
+was dealt with as a personal matter.”
+
+If the Baptist Church rests on no better foundation than this, and if its
+teachers can only support its truth and doctrine on distorted meanings and
+texts of this description, we fear it will not hold together much longer,
+and we feel half inclined to apply to it a few of the “truths spoken in
+love” of which our author is so lavish in dealing with the Catholics. This
+very use of the word “Lord” is eminently Catholic. When we speak of a
+conversion, of a mercy gained, or a favor bestowed from heaven, though all
+these things happen through the hands and sometimes ministry of
+individuals, we always say, “The Lord did it; God Almighty wrought it; No
+man converted me, but the grace of God; No medicine saved my sick child,
+but the favor of God which accompanied its workings,” as the child answers
+to the first question of the catechism, Who made you? God. But for all
+this God works through human instruments. His priests are an ordination of
+his own for the government of his church, and by a worthy probation and
+preparation receive certain graces of God necessary for their state
+involved in the reception of what the church calls the sacrament of Holy
+Orders: a certain form to be gone through which Christ ordained for the
+reception of the special powers and graces conferred on that particular
+office, as in human governments a judge receives his insignia, a minister
+his portfolio, a doctor his diploma, in order to prevent everybody taking
+the administration of the law into his own hands, or every quack
+practising as he pleases. And so with the other sacraments.
+
+But apart from appeals to texts, which we are almost weary of producing in
+favor of Catholic doctrine, and of the church who watched over and
+preserved those texts from destruction, the mutilation of which was
+wrought, as our author himself complains, not by us, but by the
+Protestants in the version of King James, and because we know that version
+to be mutilated, we appeal against its use in the schools which our
+children frequent: let us look at the broad Christian system, how it would
+stand as built up by this writer.
+
+People who believe in Christ at all, and indeed all who acknowledge, as
+they must, Christianity to be a fact, a vast social system, existing under
+our eyes, looking back, see a time when it did not exist. A man came into
+the world at the point of time in its history which we fix upon as the
+beginning of the Christian era. At that time religion, speaking largely,
+consisted of the Hebrew and the pagan. The Hebrews were the chosen of God,
+and preserved the only true system which corresponds to the rational idea
+of the foundation and aim of humanity. This it kept to itself and did not
+seek to spread. Christ came, the man‐God, and founded a new order,
+enlarging upon the old, which was to embrace in its bosom the universe,
+and lead all nations back and up to God. The change contemplated was the
+vastest that could possibly be conceived, the union of the discordant
+elements of human nature in a system entirely above the capabilities of
+that nature. Men were to be chaste, to be humble, to love poverty, to
+speak no evil, to obey, to mortify themselves always, to pray always, to
+acknowledge the nothingness of their nature. This man, Jesus Christ, came,
+and, before he had converted people enough to form a single city even, was
+crucified, rose from his grave, and ascended into heaven, leaving twelve
+poor ignorant, timid men, and a few others to spread this new doctrine,
+this new and all‐absorbing social system, throughout the world and through
+all time. What did he leave to guide them in this tremendous work; a
+system, an order perfect in all its details, and capable of spreading with
+the contemplated growth of the church? or did he leave each to follow his
+own will and do what he could, by means of what is called personal union
+with himself, a being who no longer was present, visibly and palpably,
+before the eyes of men? As he chose men to do his work, to build up
+Christianity, he let them accomplish it after a human fashion, assisted by
+the saving fact that he would allow them never to err in the doctrines
+which he bade them preach: and to this end he gave them an order which was
+to be handed down forever: the apostleship. That was his government, and
+at this government was a head, Peter. And Peter, like all other human
+governors, at his departure handed his authority down to the next chosen
+to fill his place, the promise of the abiding Spirit passing to all, or
+the system must have broken down; and so to‐day Catholics recognize in
+infallibility nothing more than the apostles recognized in the decisions
+of Peter at Antioch. And so this author is correct in saying that the
+church with Catholics comes first, and not the Bible; for the church
+embraces the Bible, which is only the written document of the laws and
+ordinances of God to man, the letter of the law resting in the hands of
+the government which has charge of it, but that government itself subject
+to the law. The government existed among the Hebrews before the law was
+ever written. This system which we have endeavored faintly to sketch here
+is denied by the Baptist. He says: Christianity comes this wise: Christ
+came, died, and thus regenerated us. All who believed in him were saved.
+“The apostles preached the Gospel. Men were pierced to the heart and asked
+what they must do.” They must be immersed, not as a necessity, for they
+were saved by the fact of believing; but this act of immersion gave them
+the entry to the church of Christ. Then the New Testament was written, not
+by Christ, though inspired by him, and left in the hands of everybody to
+interpret the law as he pleased.
+
+Now, we ask, can this system commend itself to the human reason as rounded
+and complete enough to fulfil the Christian idea of a church, which should
+receive and embrace the whole world in one union of religious harmony? A
+book thrown into the world—for so it must look to human eyes who knew
+nothing of its divinity—which each one was to take up and interpret as he
+pleased; a book subject to more or less of change in transmission from
+language to language, and in the absolute loss of the living tongue in
+which it was originally written, and the verdict of its genuineness, the
+verdict for or against the teachings of a living God, resting upon the
+dictum of a grammarian.
+
+If Christianity hangs on this, for we have not misrepresented the
+writer—then we refuse to be Christian at all; for such a system does not
+and cannot, as he alleges, “sustain the test of sound reason, of stern
+experience, and of infallible Scripture, which ordeal the Baptist idea of
+the church endures.”
+
+We need trouble ourselves with this writer no further. There is a great
+deal more in the pamphlet that might be touched on as showing the either
+absolute or wilful ignorance under which writers of this stamp labor when
+speaking of Catholics. He speaks of the Catholic doctrine with regard to
+sacraments in this loose way: “They are useful to infants and the dying.
+Men come to them for grace apart from the state of their own hearts.” Now,
+Catholics will perceive the utter absurdity of such a statement at once.
+The sacrament of baptism is necessary to infants, who of course are
+unconscious recipients of it, as they are unconscious of the sin in which
+they are born. This stain which they inherit, but do not incur by any act
+of their own, is washed away by the sacrament ordained by Christ, which
+admits them into the society of the church at the same time that their
+birth admits them to human society, its privileges as well as its trials.
+Extreme unction is administered to the dying person, even though he be
+unconscious, and is the most touching token of the love of the universal
+Mother for her children, who at the last moment will, although the dying
+man cannot ask it, administer the sacrament which God has ordained for
+that occasion, because she _knows_ that his heart desires such aid at its
+passage from the world. But all sacraments given to adults give grace only
+in proportion as the recipient receives them worthily.
+
+“If the priest refuses to come, then the sufferer, infant or adult, must
+die unbaptized and unsaved.”
+
+If this gentleman had only taken the trouble to consult a Catholic
+catechism, he would have been spared the trouble of putting this further
+absurdity into print. He would have found little children taught at school
+that “in a case of necessity, when a priest cannot be had, any one may
+baptize,” and the instructions for administering the sacrament; and
+furthermore, that, if a person were placed in such a position that even
+this means could not reach him, the very desire is sufficient, as
+sometimes happens in the case of sudden conversions and martyrdoms.
+
+As for Catholicity necessitating a ritual, all religions must more or
+less. Do men object to the old law because of its glorious ritual? Is not
+the very Baptist‐act of immersion a ritual, and their singing in common?
+So much so that, for neglect of this observance, Baptists cut off the
+whole Christian body from community with them. Which is harder to
+believe—the Catholic doctrine which teaches that we must obey the church
+which we believe to be the only church of Christ, and in support of which
+teaching we bring forward some very substantial proofs, or this? You may
+interpret God’s Word as you please; that alone is sufficient; but you are
+not in communion with his church unless you are immersed; a fact which it
+is very difficult to twist out of the Scriptures.
+
+Again, he shows his weakness in saying that “Francis Xavier, working on
+the Catholic idea, baptized millions of Asiatics, and believed that in so
+doing he had saved their souls. But the heathen remained heathen still.
+There is no evidence, so far as I am aware, that under his labors one
+solitary soul was transformed into the image of Jesus Christ.” Not one,
+but millions, so that Sir James Stephens, a Protestant lecturer on history
+in a Protestant university, calls him a saint, not only of the Catholic
+Church, but of the world. Colleges were founded by him, and thousands of
+Christians suffered martyrdom for the faith. But “Judson” is the apostle
+after our author’s heart. Judson “lived to see thousands of civilized and
+christianized disciples in that dark Burman land; and the work still goes
+on, self‐sustained by the power of a true hidden life.” This latter is a
+very saving clause; so truly hidden is the work that our author can point
+to no fruit resulting from it. And as for those “thousands of civilized
+and christianized disciples,” we took the trouble to look for them, and we
+regret to say, for our author’s veracity, found them all “wanting.” Judson
+did not succeed in converting one either in Burmah or anywhere else; and
+his own sufferings seem to have been reduced to the martyrdom of marrying
+successively three wives.
+
+If then, as our author says, “Logically there is no middle position
+between the high rock ground of Baptist truth and the low marsh ground of
+Catholic error; all things follow their tendencies, and it is easier to go
+down an inclined plane than to go up,” we fear that, for all he can do to
+prevent them, people will follow their natural tendencies. As a last word,
+we would strongly recommend him, before undertaking to set a church in its
+true colors before the eyes of men, to consider a little whether he knows
+anything of the subject he is writing about, and not stultify himself by
+an ignorance which looks like malice, though he calls it truth spoken in
+love.
+
+
+
+
+A Retrospect.
+
+
+And it fell out, says the chronicle, that Childebert, hunting one day in
+the forest of Compiègne in company with his wife Ultragade, was suddenly
+accosted by S. Marcoul, a holy man who stood in great repute of sanctity
+even during his lifetime; he seized the king’s bridle, and boldly
+petitioned alms for his poor and his church of Nanteuil, which was in a
+state of shameful unrepair. While he was yet speaking, a hare, pursued by
+the hounds, flew to the spot and took refuge under his mantle. S. Marcoul,
+letting go the bridle to place his hand protectingly on the trembling
+refugee, the king’s horse broke away, seeing which his piqueur rushed
+forward, and in tone of arrogance exclaimed:
+
+“Miserable cleric! how durst thou interrupt the king’s chase? Give back
+that hare, or I will strike thee for thine insolence!”
+
+The saint, humbly unfolding his cloak, set free the hare; it bounded away,
+and the dogs dashed after it. But lo! they had not made three strides,
+when they were struck motionless, rooted to the ground as if turned to
+stone. The piqueur, infuriated, flew after the hare, but he had not taken
+many strides, when he fell fearfully wounded by a large stone that had
+been hurled at him, no one saw whence, and laid his head open. The
+huntsmen, seized with terror, fell upon their knees, and implored the holy
+man to forgive them and intercede for the life of their companion. S.
+Marcoul forgave them, and then, going towards the prostrate body of the
+piqueur, he touched it and prayed over it, and presently the stricken man
+rose up healed. Childebert, being quickly informed of the two miracles,
+hastened after the man of God and knelt for his blessing, and took him
+home that night to the shelter of the castle, and dismissed him the
+following day loaded with presents for his church and rich alms for his
+poor. So stands the legend.
+
+A witty Frenchman once said to a sceptic who sneered at the story of
+Mucius Scævola: “My friend, I would not put my hand in the fire that
+Mucius Scævola ever put his in it, but I should be desolated not to
+believe it.” How much wiser was that Frenchman than the dull criticism of
+our XIXth century, that goes about with a broomstick sweeping away all the
+lovely fabrics that less prosaic ages have raised to mark their passage on
+the road of history—a vicious old fairy, demolishing with her Haussmann
+wand the storied, moss‐grown monuments of the past, giving us naught in
+their stead but ugly, rectangular blocks built with those stubborn bricks
+called facts, statistics, and such like! Why try to prove to us that
+François I.’s heroic _Tout est perdu fors l’honneur!_ was only the
+poetized essence of a rigmarole letter written not even from the field of
+Pavia, but from Pissighittone? Why insist that Philip Augustus never said
+to his barons, gathered with him round the altar, before the battle of
+Bouvines, “If there be one among you who feels that he is worthier than I
+to wear the crown of France, let him stand forth and take it”? True,
+Guillaume le Breton, who wrote the history of the campaign and never left
+Philip throughout, makes no mention of it, but what of that? The story is
+far too beautiful not to be true. Let us turn a deaf ear, then, to this
+old hag called Criticism, or deal with her and her bricks and mortar as
+the Senate of Berne did with a man who wrote a book to prove that William
+Tell never shot the apple, and, in fact, that it was doubtful whether he
+and the apple were not both a myth. The Senate burnt the book by the hand
+of the hangman publicly in the market‐place. We will deal in like manner
+with any profane mortal who questions the authenticity of the legend of S.
+Marcoul’s hare, which furnishes the first mention we find in history of
+the château of Compiègne.
+
+The forest was its chief attraction to the kings of old Gaul, as it has
+been in later days to their successors. Clotaire I. met with an accident
+while hunting there in 561, and died of it; he was interred at Soissons,
+whither his fourteen sons accompanied him, bearing torches and singing
+psalms all the way. Fredegonda made the merry hunting‐lodge the scene of
+atrocities never surpassed even by her, fertile as she was in inventive
+cruelties. Her infant son fell ill of a fever at Compiègne and died, while
+the son of the prefect, Mumondle, who was taken ill with the same illness
+at the same time, recovered. The courtiers, thinking to allay the despair
+of the terrible mother by giving it an outlet in revenge, whispered to her
+certain stories that were current in the village about a witch who had
+sacrificed the royal infant to secure the potency of her charms in favor
+of the life of the other. Fredegonda caught at the bait like a tiger at
+the taste of blood. She scoured the country for decrepit old women, and,
+afraid of missing the right one, caused the entire lot to be seized and
+put to death before her eyes. The details of the tortures inflicted on
+them by the ruthless mother are too terrible to be described.
+
+Clotaire II. lived many years at Compiègne, much beloved for his gentle
+and benevolent disposition, but nothing particular marks that period. King
+Dagobert made it likewise his principal residence, and enriched the
+surrounding country with many fine churches and noble monasteries. The
+most celebrated of these was the Abbey of S. Ouen’s Cross. The king was
+out hunting, one hot summer’s day in the year of grace 631, and emerging
+from the forest to the open road, he suddenly saw before him a gigantic
+cross of snow. Marvelling much at the unseasonable apparition, he sent for
+S. Ouen, who dwelt in the wood hard by, and bade him interpret its meaning
+to him. The saint replied that he saw in the sign a command to the king to
+build a church on the site of the miraculous cross. No sooner had he said
+this, than the cross began to melt, and presently vanished like a shadow.
+Dagobert at once set about obeying the mandate uttered in the peaceful
+symbol, and raised on the road from Compiègne to Verberie the stately pile
+called the Abbaye de la Croix de S. Ouen.
+
+Many other foundations followed, but no event of note took place at
+Compiègne till Louis le Debonnaire appeared on the scene in 757—unless,
+indeed, we may record as such the arrival there of the first organ ever
+seen in France. It was sent as a present to Pepin by the Emperor
+Constantine, and the first time it was played a woman is said to have
+swooned, and awoke only to die. Louis le Debonnaire lived chiefly at
+Verberie, the magnificent palace of Charlemagne, a right royal abode,
+befitting the greatest monarch of France. Bronze, and marble, and precious
+stones, and stained glass, and all costly and beautiful materials were
+lavished with oriental prodigality on this wonderful Verberie, whose
+colossal towers and frowning battlements and elaborately wrought gates and
+gables were the marvel of the age and the theme of many a troubadour’s
+song. But what monument built by the hand of man can withstand the ravages
+of man’s ruthless passions? The palace of the Gallic Cæsar was not proof
+against the successive wars and sieges that battered its massive walls,
+till not even a vestige of the wonderful pile remains to mark where it
+stood.
+
+The sons of Louis le Debonnaire, Louis, Pepin, and Lothair, rebelled
+against their father; Lothair got possession of his person, stripped him
+of all the ornaments of royalty, clothed him in sackcloth, and in this
+unseemly plight exhibited the old king to the insults and mockeries of the
+people. After this he compelled him to lay his sword upon the altar, and
+sign his abdication in favor of the unnatural son, who presided in cold‐
+blooded triumph at the impious ceremony. As soon as this was done he sent
+his father, bound hand and foot, to Compiègne, where he was kept a close
+prisoner. Lothair’s brothers, however, hearing of this, were moved to
+indignation, and, stimulated perhaps not a little by jealousy of the
+successful rival who had started with them, but secured all the winnings
+for himself, they set out for Compiègne, stormed the fortress, and set
+free the king. But the unhappy father was not to enjoy long the freedom he
+owed to these filial deliverers. Louis again rose up in arms against him,
+and the king was forced to take the field once more in defence of his
+crown; he fell fighting against his three sons on the frontiers of the
+Rhine, and expired with words of mercy and forgiveness on his lips.
+
+In 866, Charles the Bald held a splendid court at Compiègne to receive the
+ambassadors whom he had sent on a mission to Mahomet at Cordova, and who
+returned laden with costly presents from the Turkish prince to their
+master. Charles did a great deal to improve Compiègne; the old château of
+Clovis, which was no better than a hunting‐lodge grown into a fortress, he
+threw down and rebuilt, not on its old site, in the centre of the town,
+but on the banks of the Oise. Louis III. and Charles the Simple spent the
+greater part of their respective reigns at Compiègne, and added to the
+number of its institutions—primitive enough some of them—for the
+instruction of the people. “Good King Robert” comes next in the progress
+of royal tenants (1017): his name was long a household word among the
+people to whom his goodness and liberality had endeared him. One day at a
+banquet, where he was dispensing food to a multitude of poor and rich, a
+robber stole unobserved close up to him, and, under pretence of doing
+homage to the king, clung to his knees, and began diligently cutting away
+the gold fringe of his cloak. Robert let him go on till he was about
+halfway round, and then, stooping down, he whispered discreetly: “Go, now,
+my friend, and leave the rest for some other poor fellow.” Like many
+another wise and good man, Robert was harassed by his wife; she was a hard
+and haughty woman, who, while professing great love for him, made his home
+wretched to him by her quarrels and her domineering temper. The people
+knew it, and hated Constance; but, like the king, they bore it rather than
+quarrel with the shrew. “Let us have peace, though it cost a little high!”
+the henpecked husband was for ever repeating; and his people seemed to
+have been of one mind with him, for Constance ruled both him and them with
+her rod of nettles to the end, and had her own way in everything.
+
+Philip II.’s occupation of Compiègne, which in those days of simple faith,
+when religious fervor ran high, had a significance that can hardly be
+appreciated in our own chill twilight days, so slow to see beyond the
+material world, so reluctant to recognize the supernatural as an aim or a
+motive power in the great movements that enlist men’s energies and direct
+them, changing the face of nations. This was the translation of the holy
+winding‐sheet from the casket of carved ivory—in which it had been given
+to Charlemagne, along with many other relics of the same date,(183) by
+Constantine II. and the King of Persia, as a reward for his services in
+expelling the Saracens from the Holy Land—into a reliquary of pure gold,
+inlaid with jewels. The holy shroud, when it was taken by Charles the Bald
+to the Abbey of S. Corneille at Compiègne, is thus described in the
+_procès‐verbal_ of the translation, given at full length in the _Grandes
+Chroniques_: “It was a cloth so ancient that one could with difficulty
+discern the original quality of the stuff, being two yards (_aunes_) in
+length and a little more than one yard in width.... The liquors and
+aromatic ointments used in the embalmment had rendered it thicker than
+ordinary linen, and prevent one from discerning the color of the stuff,
+esteemed by the greater number of the spectators to be of pure flax, woven
+after the manner of the cloth of Damascus.” There are old pictures still
+extant, representing Charles amidst a vast concourse of prelates and
+nobles, accompanying the relic with prayer and solemn ceremonial.
+
+In 1093, Matilda of England, on rising from an illness which had been
+considered mortal, sent as a thank‐offering for her recovery a costly
+shrine of gold and precious stones to Philip II., with a request that the
+holy shroud might be placed in it. Philip, in a charter drawn up and
+signed by himself, thus testifies to the gift and the translation: “It has
+pleased us to place in a shrine (_chasse_) of gold, enriched with precious
+stones, and given to this church by the Queen of England, the relics of
+our Saviour; we have beheld this cloth (_linge_), in which the body of our
+Lord reposed, and which we call shroud (_suaire_), according to the holy
+evangelist, and which has been withdrawn from the ivory vase.” We cannot
+realize, we say, how an event like this would stir the hearts of men in
+those days. Peter the Hermit was preaching the first crusade; his burning
+eloquence, like a lever, uplifting the arm of Christendom, and compelling
+every man who could draw a sword to shoulder the cross and go forth to
+fight and die for the deliverance of the tomb, where for three days their
+Lord had lain wrapped in this winding‐sheet. The union of mystical
+devotion and enthusiastic service which characterized the crusaders was
+fed by every circumstance that tended to embody to their senses those
+mysteries which had their birth in that remote eastern land towards which
+they were hastening, and the transfer of this sacred memento of the
+Passion from its simple ivory casket to a sumptuous one of gold and gems,
+the offering of a powerful sovereign, occurring at such a moment, was
+calculated to arouse a more than ordinary interest. They hailed the honors
+so apportioned paid to the holy shroud as a symbol and a promise; their
+faith, already quickened by the renunciation of all that made life dear,
+home, kindred, nay, life itself, for the deliverance of the Sepulchre, was
+stimulated to more heroic sacrifice; their hope was intensified to
+prophecy, by what appeared like a typical coincidence, a manifestation of
+divine approval that must ensure beyond all doubt the success of their
+enterprise. We should not be astonished, then, at the paramount importance
+assigned by the historians of that time to this event, but recognize
+therein the sign of our own condemnation, and of a spirit that is no
+longer of our day, but belongs, like those glorious relics, to a bright
+and glowing past.(184)
+
+Philip’s son, Louis le Gros, like his father, lived principally at
+Compiègne; while he was away carrying on the second crusade, his
+incomparable minister, Suger, took up his abode there, and, dividing his
+time between prayer and the business of the state, governed wisely during
+the king’s absence.
+
+When another crusading hero, Philip Augustus, offered his hand and his
+crown to the fair Agnes de Méranie, destined to expiate in tears and exile
+the ill‐fated love of the king and her own short‐lived happiness, it was
+at Compiègne that he presented her to the court and the people; it was
+here that amidst pomp and popular rejoicing the marriage was celebrated.
+
+But the most curious episode in the whole range of the annals of Compiègne
+is perhaps that of a claimant whose story opens at this date. Baldwin IX.,
+Count of Flanders and Hainaut, usually called Baldwin of Constantinople,
+before starting for the Holy Land came to Compiègne to swear fealty to the
+King of France, who invested him with knighthood on the same day that
+Agnes, like a softly shining star of peace and love, rose upon the
+troubled horizon of the kingdom. At Constantinople Baldwin was proclaimed
+emperor, and solemnly crowned by the pope’s legate at S. Sophia (1204). He
+immediately sent off his crown of gold to his beloved young wife, Marie de
+Champagne, desiring her to hasten to rejoin him, and share his new‐found
+honors. The countess obeyed the command and set sail for Constantinople,
+but, overcome by the unexpected news of her husband’s election to the
+throne, she died upon the journey. Baldwin’s grief was inconsolable; he
+laid her to rest in S. Sophia, the scene of his recent honors, and swore
+upon her tomb never to marry again, but to devote himself henceforth to
+the sole business of war: he kept his vow, and began that series of
+brilliant feats which culminated in his triumphant entry to Adrianople.
+Such was the fame of his prowess that powerful chiefs trembled at his very
+name: Joanice, the formidable king of the Bulgarians, sent a message to
+“the great French warrior,” humbly praying for his friendship. But the
+warrior mistrusted these overtures, and haughtily repulsed them. Whereupon
+Joanice, full of wrath, vowed vengeance, and in due time kept his vow. He
+raised an army, made war on Baldwin, whom he took prisoner after a fearful
+slaughter of his army at the battle of Adrianople. When the news of the
+disaster reached Flanders, Henri of Hainaut, brother of Baldwin, was at
+once proclaimed regent; he continued the war against Joanice, but without
+success, nor could he by bribes, concessions, or threats obtain the
+emperor’s release; Joanice would not even vouchsafe to reply to any of his
+overtures on the subject. All else failing, the pope interfered, and
+besought the conqueror not to sully his triumph by revenge, worthy only of
+a savage, but to treat magnanimously, or at least according to the rules
+of civilized warfare, for the ransom of his captive. To this appeal
+Joanice condescended to reply that, alas! it was no longer in his power,
+or any man’s, to comply with the desires of his holiness. The answer was
+taken for an announcement of Baldwin’s death, and universally accepted as
+such. Stories soon began to eke out concerning the horrible tortures
+practised on the unfortunate prince by his cruel captor; some accredited
+eye‐witness declared that he had been barbarously mutilated, his hands and
+arms cut off, and in this state thrown to the wild beasts, his skull being
+afterwards made into a drinking‐cup for the brutal Joanice, who had stood
+by gloating over the spectacle of his victim’s agony. Years went by and
+nothing transpired to throw the least doubt on the fact of Baldwin’s
+death, though the accounts as to the manner of it were somewhat
+conflicting. Henri of Hainaut was proclaimed sovereign of Flanders; after
+reigning ten years he died, and was succeeded by Jeanne, eldest daughter
+of Baldwin. She was not long in possession of the throne when the report
+was bruited about that her father was alive; he had been seen by some
+pilgrims journeying through Servia, who having lost their way in the
+forest of Glaucon came upon the grotto of a hermit, and were taken in and
+restored by him and sheltered for the night. This hermit, they recognized
+as their former prince, Baldwin; he was much altered by suffering, and his
+long white beard and uncouth garb were calculated to disguise him from any
+eyes but such as had known him well, but the pilgrims recognized him at
+once; they, however, discreetly forebore announcing the fact till they
+brought other witnesses to corroborate their own assurance. They returned
+soon with several trustworthy persons who had known Baldwin too well to
+mistake his identity after any lapse of years, and these declared
+unhesitatingly that the hermit was no other than the hero of Adrianople.
+
+Baldwin, finding his secret discovered, fled to a distant and more
+inaccessible part of the forest; he was tracked thither, and again fled;
+but the pursuers finally got possession of him, and dragged him by main
+force into the neighboring town; the people flocked eagerly to see him,
+and with one voice they proclaimed him their long‐lost Baldwin, welcoming
+him with joyful acclamations as a father returned from the dead. Whether
+this popular welcome merely emboldened the real Baldwin to confess his
+identity and, as a necessary consequence, claim his rights, or whether it
+suggested to the false one the idea of simulating the person whom he
+resembled and was taken for, it is impossible to say, but at any rate from
+this period we no longer see him dragged, but marching forth, of his own
+free‐will, from town to town, and surrounded by all the paraphernalia of
+an injured claimant. His march was not, however, one of unbroken triumph;
+the town of Flanders refused to believe in him, and indignantly scouted
+himself and his followers as a band of impostors. The daughters of the
+dead man, Jeanne and Marguerite, refused to believe in him, and denounced
+him as a malefactor whose aim was to stir up disorder in the state for his
+own ambitious purposes. But Jeanne’s government was odious to the people;
+to escape from her harsh and cruel rule they would have willingly adopted
+any claimant who came with a fair show of right to enlist their credulity.
+Jeanne knew this, and at once took strong measures to put down the
+movement. It proved more difficult than she anticipated. Before many
+months the country was in a blaze, divided into two camps, one of
+believers, the other disbelievers, but both ready to devour each other to
+prove and disprove their special theories. A witness whose testimony went
+hard against the claimant was that of the old bailiff of Quesnoy; he had
+known Baldwin from a child, and mourned over him like a father, and, when
+he now appeared at the castle gates and demanded admittance, the old man
+refused to open to him, and vowed solemnly that he was not his master, but
+a base impostor. The conduct of this stubborn sceptic drew forth a
+pathetic appeal from the claimant. “I find,” he says, “more cruel enemies
+in my own house than in the land of strangers. Flanders, my mother, dost
+thou repulse thy son whom Greece and Macedonia received with open arms! I
+escaped from Adrianople through the carelessness of my guards; I fell into
+the hands of barbarians, who dragged me to the distant plains of Asia;
+there, like a vile slave, I, who had wielded the sceptre, was condemned to
+dig the earth; I dug until some German merchants, to whom I confided my
+story, ransomed me, and sent me back to my country, and lo! I arrive and
+show myself, and you repulse me! My daughter Jeanne refuses to own me in
+order not to resign her rank and subside into the subject of a court!”
+Unmoved by this touching denunciation, Jeanne persisted in disowning him,
+but, failing to prove her case, she referred it to Louis VII. of France.
+Louis, much interested in the extraordinary story, willingly undertook the
+arbitration. The claimant, on his side, testified great satisfaction on
+hearing that his fate was placed in the hands of a wise and powerful
+monarch, who was sure to prove a just and discerning judge; he set out in
+high spirits to Compiègne, where the king was then residing. Attired in
+the violet robes of a hermit, and bearing a white wand in his hand, he
+entered the august assembly with a countenance full of unblushing
+assurance, saluted the King of France with an air of proud equality, and
+noticed the barons and knights by a courtly inclination of the head.
+Louis, who had carefully studied the case, conducted the examination
+himself; he put many subtle and perplexing questions to the supposed
+Baldwin concerning events which had passed in his youth, and which it was
+thought impossible he could have learned from any one he had seen since
+his return, and the claimant answered accurately with an assurance that
+carried conviction with it. The examination lasted several hours, and, the
+closer it pressed him, the more triumphantly it established his identity.
+The witnesses who boasted of being able to confound the imposture in the
+twinkling of an eye were themselves confounded; they withdrew covered with
+confusion, and vowing inwardly that “this man was sold to the devil,” as
+only the father of lies could have told him so many hidden things, and
+borne him to success through such a quagmire of difficulties. There was,
+indeed, much conflicting evidence forthcoming. Henri, his brother, was
+dead, but the Dukes of Brabant and Limbourg, cousins and contemporaries of
+Baldwin’s, swore that the claimant was the real man; on the other hand,
+sixteen knights of unimpeachable honor swore to having seen the real man
+dead on the field of Adrianople. The king, after hearing with great
+patience, and weighing most impartially what was said on both sides,
+declared in favor of the claimant. The excitement was indescribable when
+he rose to pronounce the verdict; but at this point the Bishop of Beauvais
+stepped from his seat, and, holding up his right hand, adjured Louis to
+suspend for one moment the final words while he put a few short questions
+to the hermit. The king consented; a deathlike silence fell upon the
+assembly, and the bishop, going close up to the hermit, who was seated on
+a chair in the centre of the great hall, addressed him thus in a loud
+voice:
+
+“Answer me three questions: 1st, In what place did you render homage to
+King Philip Augustus? 2d, By whom were you invested with the order of
+knighthood? 3d, Where did you marry Marie de Champagne?”
+
+The claimant stammered, grew pale, and, after a vain attempt to fence with
+the questions, broke down. Extraordinary as it may seem, he had never
+given a thought to these prominent events in the life of Baldwin of
+Constantinople, or foreseen that he would be questioned concerning them.
+The enthusiastic sympathy of the court was changed in an instant to rage
+and scorn. Sentence of death was pronounced on the hermit of Glaucon on a
+charge of high treason, conspiring, fraud, perjury, and the long list of
+iniquities that make up the sum of a claimant’s budget. But having thus
+far acquitted himself of his office, the king handed over the criminal to
+Jeanne to be dealt with as she thought fit. In those rough and ready days
+there were no back‐stairs for a plucky claimant to escape by, no counsel
+to save him with a nonsuit, or such like modern convenience; the make‐
+believe Baldwin was without more ado hung up between two dogs on the
+market‐place of Flanders. Some chroniclers throw uncomfortable doubts on
+the justice of the execution; a few maintain that this was the true man,
+and anathematize Jeanne as a parricide who sacrificed her own father to
+the love of power. Père Cahour, who is certainly a conscientious writer,
+speaks of her, on the other hand, as a just and upright woman, utterly
+incapable of so diabolical a crime, and stoutly vindicates the evidence of
+the sixteen knights, though how he adapts it to the belief in Baldwin’s
+capture by Joanice, which appears to have been general after the battle of
+Adrianople, it is difficult to see. The _Chronique de Meyer_, again,
+denounces Jeanne as an execrable monster, and declares that the man who
+was hanged was the real Baldwin. Clearly claimants have been always a
+troublesome race to deal with; even hanging does not seem to make an end
+of them, for their claims outlive them, and leave to historians a legacy
+of doubt and discord that is exceedingly difficult to settle.
+
+The passage of S. Louis at Compiègne is marked by an event characteristic
+of him and of his time. He had ransomed from the Venetians at at an
+enormous price the crown of thorns of our Saviour. To do it public honor
+he carried it bare‐headed and bare‐footed from the wood of Vincennes to
+the Cathedral of Notre Dame, and thence to the Sainte Chapelle, that
+gemlike little shrine which had been raised expressly to receive the
+priceless relic, and whose beauty is invested with a fresh interest since
+it escaped the fire of the Communists; the Conciergerie and the Palais de
+Justice were burning so close to it that the flames might have licked its
+walls, yet not even one of its wonderful stained‐glass windows was
+injured.
+
+Other monuments S. Louis left behind him, not built of stone or precious
+metals, but which have nevertheless endured and come down to us unimpaired
+by the lapse of ages, while houses and castles of stony granite have
+crumbled away, leaving no record on the hearts of men. Compiègne in the
+days of the saintly king was the refuge of God’s poor, of the sick and the
+sorrowing; S. Louis gave up to them all the rooms he could spare from his
+household, and devoted to tending and serving them with his own hands what
+time he could steal from the affairs of state.
+
+To Be Continued.
+
+
+
+
+The Russian Clergy.
+
+
+We have heard nothing new of late about the project of certain zealous
+Anglicans and members of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United
+States to establish communion between their churches and the schismatic
+Oriental Christians in the empire of Russia. It seemed fitting enough at
+first glance that the special variety of Christianity introduced by Henry
+VIII. should agree with the methods of ecclesiastical discipline
+prescribed by an equally autocratic sovereign at the opposite extremity of
+Europe; and there were, of course, abundant reasons why the Anglicans and
+their American descendants should covet a recognition from a branch of the
+church which, whatever its corruptions and irregularities, can at least
+make good its connection with the parent stem. Our readers have not
+forgotten, however, how coldly the overtures of these ambitious
+Protestants were received. The Russian clergy ridiculed the hierarchical
+pretensions of their English and American friends. They denied their
+apostolical succession. They questioned their right to call themselves
+churchmen at all; and, in short, looked upon them as no better than
+heretics, and not very consistent heretics either. The movement for union
+was a foolish one, begun in utter misconception of the radical differences
+between the two parties, and sure from the first to end in discomfiture
+and irritation.
+
+Indeed, it was even more foolish than most of us still suppose. Not only
+was it impossible for the Russian Church to make the concessions required
+of it, but there is no reason to believe that the Episcopalians would have
+been very well satisfied with their new brethren had the alliance been
+effected. The Russian Church is an organization which stands far apart
+from every other in the world, presenting some monstrous features which
+even Protestantism cannot parallel. The Jesuit Father Gagarin has
+published a very curious work on the condition and prospects of the
+Russian clergy,(185) which would perhaps have modified the zeal of the
+English and American petitioners for union and recognition if they could
+have read it before making their recent overtures. We see here the
+rottenness and uselessness into which a national church falls when it is
+cut off from the centre of Christian unity and the source of Christian
+life.
+
+The Russian priests are divided into two classes, the white and the black
+clergy, or seculars and monks. The great difference between them is, the
+white clergy are married, and the black are celibates. Whatever learning
+there is in the ecclesiastical order is found among the monks. The bishops
+are always chosen from the monastic class; and the two classes hate each
+other with remarkable heartiness. The marriage of priests is an old custom
+in the East, which antedates the organization of the Russian schism. It
+prevails in some of the united Oriental churches to this day. But in
+Russia it exists in a peculiarly aggravated form. Peter I. and his
+successors, by a multitude of despotic ukases, succeeded in erecting the
+white clergy into a strict caste, making the clerical profession
+practically hereditary, and marriage a necessary condition of the secular
+clerical state. The candidate for orders has his choice between matrimony
+and the monastery; one of the two he must embrace before he can be
+ordained.
+
+The rule seems to have originated in an attempt to improve the education
+of the white clergy. The deplorable ignorance of the order led the
+government to establish ecclesiastical schools. But the schools remained
+deserted. The clergy were then _ordered_ to send their children to them,
+and sometimes the pupils were arrested by the police and taken to school
+in chains. The Czar Alexander I. ordered, in 1808 and 1814, that all
+clerks’ children between six and eight years of age should be at the
+disposal of the ecclesiastical schools; and, that there might be no lack
+of children, the candidate for the priesthood was compelled to take a wife
+before he could take orders. Once in the seminary, the scholar has no
+prospect before him except an ecclesiastical life. He cannot embrace any
+other career without special permission, which is almost invariably
+refused. At the same time, the seminaries are closed against all except
+the sons of the clergy. The son of a nobleman, a merchant, a citizen, a
+peasant, who wanted to enter, would meet with insurmountable obstacles,
+unless he chose to become a monk.
+
+Thus the paternal government of the czar secures first an unfailing supply
+of pastors for the Russian Church, which otherwise might be insufficiently
+served; and, secondly, a career for the children of the clergy, free from
+the competition of outside candidates. And, indeed, the priests might very
+well say: Since you compel us to marry, you are bound, at least, to
+furnish a support for our offspring. But the system does not stop here.
+What shall be done with the priests’ daughters? In the degraded condition
+of the Russian Church, where the white clergy or popes are popularly
+ranked lower in the social scale than petty shopkeepers or noblemen’s
+servants, these young women could not expect to find husbands except among
+the peasantry, and they might not readily find them there. The obvious
+course is to make them marry in their own order. The seminarian,
+therefore, by a further regulation of the paternal government, is not only
+obliged to marry, whether he will or no, but he must marry a priest’s
+daughter, and some bishops are so careful of the welfare of their subjects
+that they will not suffer a clerk to marry out of his own diocese. Special
+schools are established for these daughters of the church; and we could
+imagine a curious course of instruction at such institutions, if the
+Russian ecclesiastical schools really attempted to fit their pupils for
+the life before them; but, as we shall see further on, they do nothing of
+the kind.
+
+Sometimes it happens that a priest has built a house on land belonging to
+the church. He dies, leaving a son or a daughter. His successor in the
+parish has a right to the use of the land, but what shall be done with the
+house? The law solves this difficulty by providing that the living shall
+either be saved for the son (who may be a babe in arms), or given to any
+young Levite who will marry the daughter. Thus the clerical caste is made
+in every way as compact and comfortable as possible, and, for a man of
+mean extraction, moderate ambition, and small learning, becomes a
+tolerable, if not a brilliant career.
+
+The clergy of a fully supplied parish consists of a priest, a deacon, and
+two clerics, who perform the duties of lector, sacristan, beadle, bell‐
+ringer, etc. The deacon has little to do, except to share on Sunday in the
+recitation of the liturgy, which, being inordinately long, is sometimes
+divided into sections and read or chanted by several persons concurrently,
+each going at the top of his speed. The clerks of the lower ranks,
+however, may pursue a trade, but they are all enrolled in the same caste,
+out of which they must not marry. The number of parish priests in Russia
+is about 36,000; of deacons, 12,444; of inferior clerics, 63,421. One‐half
+the revenue of the parish belongs to the priest, one‐quarter to the
+deacon, and one‐eighth to each of the two clerics. The prizes of the
+profession are the chaplaincies to schools, colleges, prisons, hospitals,
+in the army, in the navy, about the court, etc., most of which are
+liberally paid. The parochial clergy are supported by: 1. Property
+belonging to the parish, chiefly in the towns, yielding about $500,000 per
+annum; 2. A government allowance of $3,000,000 per annum; 3. About
+$20,000,000 per annum contributed by parishioners; 4. Perpetual
+foundations, with obligation to pray for the departed, invested in
+government funds at four per cent., say $1,075,000. The average income of
+a priest is thus about $341. In addition to this, however, each parish has
+a glebe, of which the usufruct belongs to the clergy. The minimum extent
+of this church domain is about eighty acres, and it is divided after the
+same rule as the revenues, namely, one‐half to the priest, one‐quarter to
+the deacon, and the remainder to the inferior clerks. When there is no
+deacon, the priest’s share is, of course, proportionately larger. In many
+parishes, the glebe is much more extensive than eighty acres. In Central
+Russia, it amounts sometimes to 250, 500, even 2,500 acres; and, in those
+fertile provinces known as the Black Lands, the share of the priest alone
+is sometimes as much as 150 acres. At St. Petersburg, the church provides
+the parish priest a comfortable and elegant home. “The furniture is from
+the first shops in Petersburg. Rich carpets cover the floors of the
+drawing‐room, study, and chamber; the windows display fine hangings; the
+walls, valuable pictures. Footmen in livery are not rarely seen in the
+anteroom. The dinners given by these curés are highly appreciated by the
+most delicate epicures. Occasionally their salons are open for a soirée or
+a ball; ordinarily it is on the occasion of a wedding, or the birthday of
+the curé, or on the patron saint’s day. The apartments are then
+magnificently lighted up; the toilettes of the ladies dazzling; the
+dancing is to the music of an orchestra of from seven to ten musicians. At
+supper the table is spread with delicacies, and champagne flows in
+streams. A Petersburg curé, recently deceased, loved to relate that at his
+daughter’s nuptials champagne was drunk to the value of 300 roubles
+(£48).”
+
+Considering the education and social standing of a Russian priest, this is
+not bad. In the rural districts there is much less clerical luxury; there
+is even a great deal of poverty and hardship. But we must not forget that
+the rustic clergy is but a little higher in culture than the rudest of the
+peasantry, and a life which would seem intolerable to an American laborer
+is elysium to a Russian hind. Most, even of country priests, have
+comfortable houses, well furnished with mahogany and walnut; and, though
+they do not eat meat every day that the church allows it, they have their
+balls and dancing parties, at which their daughters dance with the young
+men from the neighboring theological seminaries. The wives and daughters
+of the reverend gentlemen, to be sure, have to labor sometimes in the
+fields; but “they are dressed by the milliner of the place; you will
+always see them attired with elegance; they do not discard crinoline, and
+never go out without a parasol”—except, of course, when they are going to
+hoe corn and dig potatoes.
+
+The voluntary contributions of the parishioners are collected, or
+enforced, in a variety of ways, and paid in a variety of forms. Towards
+the feast of S. Peter each house gives from three to five eggs and a
+little milk. After the harvest, each house gives a certain quantity of
+wheat. When a child is born, the priest is called in to say a few prayers
+over the mother, and give a name to the baby; the fee for this is a loaf
+and from 4 to 8 cents. Baptism brings from 8 to 24 cents more. For a
+second visitation and prayers at the end of six weeks there is a fee of a
+dozen eggs. At betrothals the priest gets a loaf, some brandy, and
+sometimes a goose or a sucking‐pig. For a marriage he is paid from $1 60
+to $3 20; for a burial, from 80 cents to $1 60; for a Mass for the dead,
+from 28 to 64 cents; for prayers for the dead, which are often repeated, 4
+or 8 cents each time; for prayers read at the cemetery on certain days
+every year, some rice, a cake, or some pastry. The peasants often have a
+Te Deum chanted either on birthday or name‐day, or to obtain some special
+favor; the fee for that is from 8 to 16 cents. The penitent always pays
+something when he receives absolution; but as confession is not frequent
+in the Russian Church, the income from this source must be small. In the
+towns the fee is often as high as $1, $2, $4, and even more. Among the
+peasantry it sometimes does not exceed a kopec (one cent); but if the
+penitent wishes to receive communion, he must renew his offering several
+times. At Easter, Christmas, the Epiphany, the beginning and end of Lent,
+and on the patron saint’s day, which sometimes occurs two or three times a
+year, it is customary to have prayers chanted in every house in the
+parish, for which the charge varies in the rural districts from 4 cents to
+60 cents each visit, according to the importance of the occasion. In the
+large cities the fees are much more considerable. Father Gagarin cites the
+case of a parishioner in St. Petersburg to whom the clergy presented
+themselves in this manner twenty‐seven times in a single year, and at each
+call he had to give them something. This, however, was an exception.
+Generally the visits are only fifteen a year. “Sometimes it happens,”
+continues our author, “that the peasant cannot or will not give what the
+priest asks. Hence arise angry disputes. One priest—so runs the
+story—unable to overcome the obstinacy of a peasant refusing to pay for
+the prayers read in his house, declared that he would reverse them. He had
+just before chanted, ‘_Benedictus Deus noster_’; he now intoned, ‘NON
+_Benedictus_, NON _Deus_, NON _noster_’ thus intercalating a _non_ before
+each word. The affrighted peasant, the chronicle says, instantly complied.
+Often enough, too, in spite of all the prohibitions of the synod, the
+wives and children of the priests, deacons, and clerks accompany their
+husbands and fathers, and stretch out _their_ hands also. The worst of all
+this is that the Russian peasant, while long disputing merely about a few
+centimes, will think himself insulted unless the priest accept a glass of
+brandy. And when the circuit of all the houses in the village has to be
+made, though he stay only a few minutes in each, this last gift is not
+without its inconveniences.” It must be an edifying round certainly. But
+then the reverend gentleman has a wife to help him home.
+
+The black clergy is not in a much better condition than the white. All the
+monasteries are supposed to be under the rule of S. Basil; but they are
+not united in congregations, each establishment being independent of all
+the rest. Most of them do not observe the great religious rule of poverty
+and community of goods, but each monk has own purse, and the superiors are
+often wealthy. One hundred years ago, the number of convents, not
+reckoning those in Little and White Russia, was 954. The ukase of
+Catharine II., which confiscated the property of the clergy, suppressed
+all but 400. Since then the number has increased.
+
+The great increase in the number of monks between 1836 and 1838 is
+accounted for by the forcible incorporation of the United Greeks. This was
+not formally effected until 1839, but the United Greeks were reckoned as
+part of the Russian Church in 1838, and many of their monks were
+transferred from their own to the non‐united monasteries earlier than
+that. It will be seen, however, that the increase thus obtained was not
+permanent.
+
+The curious discrepancy between the number of monks and the number of nuns
+has an equally curious explanation. Women are forbidden, by a decree of
+Peter the Great, to take the vows under forty years of age. Hence the
+convents are crowded with postulants who must wait sometimes twenty years
+before they can take the veil. Some persevere, some return to the world,
+and many continue to live in the convent without becoming professed. If we
+reckon the whole population of the convents—monks, nuns, novices, and
+aspirants—we shall find the number of the two sexes more nearly agree.
+
+It is interesting to see from which classes of society these monks and
+nuns are drawn. F. Gagarin distinguishes five classes: I. The clergy,
+including priests, deacons, and clerks, with their wives and children; II.
+The nobility, embracing not only the titled nobility, but government
+functionaries and members of the learned professions; III. The urban
+population, comprising merchants, artisans, citizens, etc.; IV. The rural
+population, consisting of peasants of all conditions; V. The military. The
+monks are recruited from these five classes in the following ratio:
+
+Clergy:             54.3 per cent.
+Urban population:   22.3    "
+Rural population:       16.3    "
+Military:            3.4    "
+Nobility:            3      "
+
+The immense preponderance of the clerical element is owing primarily, of
+course, to the regulation of caste, which virtually compels the children
+of the clergy to follow the profession of their fathers. For the
+ambitious, the monastery alone offers an alluring prospect, since it is
+from the black clergy that the bishops are taken. The religious calling,
+therefore, in Russia is not so much a vocation as a career. If there were
+really an unselfish devout tendency towards the monastic life among the
+children of the clergy, we should expect to find it stronger with the
+daughters than with the sons. But the case is far otherwise. There are no
+bishoprics for the women; their career is to marry priests, go with them
+from house to house collecting alms, and help them home when they have
+taken too much brandy. Hence we find the following ratio among the
+population of the nunneries:
+
+Urban population:    38.8 per cent.
+Rural population:       31      "
+Clergy:              13      "
+Nobility:            12      "
+Military:             4      "
+
+The number of recruits supplied to monasteries by the clerical profession
+averages 140 a year. These comprise a curious variety of persons. First,
+there are priests or deacons who have committed grave crimes; they are
+sentenced to the convent, as lay convicts are sentenced to the galleys.
+Next there are seminarists who have failed in their studies; if they quit
+the ranks of the clergy altogether, they are forced into the army; if they
+remain among the white clergy, they have no prospect of becoming anything
+better than sacristans or beadles; by entering a convent they will at
+least live more comfortably and may aspire to become deacons or priests.
+Then there are deacons and priests who have lost their wives; they cannot
+marry again; the Russian government hesitates to entrust a parish to a
+wifeless priest; the wife indeed, as we have just seen, has some very
+important functions to perform in the administration of parochial rites;
+so the unfortunate widower is not only advised but sometimes compelled to
+go to a convent. Again, there are seminarists who after completing their
+studies act as professors for some time before they are ordained. Suppose
+such a man has been married and his wife dies. He cannot be ordained if he
+marry again. He cannot be ordained a secular priest without a wife. He
+must either go to the convent or seek some career outside the clerical
+profession, and that, as we have seen, it is almost impossible to find.
+Ambition draws many to the monastery. A student of any one of the four
+great academies of St. Petersburg, Moscow, Kasan, and Kieff, who embraces
+the monastic life during his academical course, is morally certain on
+quitting the academy of being named inspector or prefect of studies in a
+seminary; at the end of a few years he becomes rector; and if he do not
+impede his own advancement he can hardly fail to be a bishop after a
+while. Still there is difficulty in obtaining from the academies a
+sufficient number of educated monks, and according to F. Gagarin some
+extraordinary devices are resorted to in order to supply the demand. When
+persuasion has failed, the student whom the convent wishes to capture is
+invited to pass the evening with one of the monks. Brandy is produced and
+it is not difficult to make the young man drunk. While he is insensible
+the ceremony of taking the habit and receiving the tonsure is performed on
+him, and he is then put to bed. When he awakes, he finds by his side,
+instead of the lay garments he wore the night before, a monastic gown. All
+resistance is useless. He is told that what is done cannot be undone, and
+after a while he submits angrily to his fate. This at any rate was the
+method of impressment into the religious state adopted fifty years ago.
+Now, says our author, it is unnecessary, inasmuch as a shorter way has
+been found of reaching the same result. The students of the academies
+(these are students of theology, be it remembered—equivalent to our
+seminarians) are in the habit of frequenting public‐houses and getting
+drunk. They are carried home on hand‐barrows, and this proceeding is known
+as the “Translation of the Relics.” When a young man has been fixed upon
+as a desirable recruit for the monastery, the superior has only to watch
+until he is brought home on a barrow; the next morning, while his head and
+his stomach are rebuking him, he is informed that he has been expelled for
+his disgraceful conduct; but, if he will give a proof of his sincere
+repentance by making a written request to be received as a monk, he may be
+forgiven.
+
+There is no novitiate in the Russian convents. The neophyte makes his vows
+at once—provided he has reached the age prescribed by the law—and
+instances are not wanting of monks who have even attained the episcopate
+without ever having lived in a convent. According to the Russian law,
+academy pupils may make the religious profession at 25; other men at 30.
+It often happens that a youth has finished his studies before reaching 25;
+in that case, instead of applying for a dispensation, he makes a false
+statement of his age. Others who fail at their books wait for their
+thirtieth year, and are placed meanwhile each one under the care of some
+monk, who is supposed to form him for the monastic state. But he receives
+no religious training. He does not learn to pray, to meditate, to examine
+his conscience. He waits upon his master; he joins in the long service in
+the church; and the rest of the time he spends in amusement within or
+without the convent. His pleasures are not always of the most edifying
+character, and his excursions are not confined to the day.
+
+What sort of monks can be formed by such training? The asceticism
+prescribed by S. Basil is rarely observed. Meat is forbidden, but it is a
+common dish on the convent tables. Drunkenness is so prevalent that it
+hardly causes surprise. “After that,” says our author, “one can imagine
+what becomes of the vow of chastity.” There is, as we have already said,
+no pretence of observing holy poverty. Every monk has a certain share of
+the convent revenues, proportioned to his rank, and this share is
+sometimes large. The average income of the black clergy is not easily
+ascertained. There are two sorts of convents—those which receive aid from
+the state, as compensation for confiscated estates, and those which depend
+entirely upon private resources. Those of the first kind are divided into
+monasteries of the first, second, and third classes, receiving from the
+government respectively 2,000, 1,600, and 670 roubles a year ($1,680,
+$1,344, $563). There are 278 of these convents, receiving 259,200 roubles,
+or about $217,728 from this source. In former years, each convent was
+entitled to the compulsory services of a certain number of peasants. Since
+the emancipation of the serfs the government has commuted this privilege
+by paying an annual sum of 307,850 silver roubles, or $258,594. Endowments
+with an obligation to pray for the departed yield in addition $2,150,400
+to white and black clergy together. Let us suppose that the monks get one‐
+half; that would be $1,075,200 per annum. Then the convents possess large
+properties in arable lands, woodlands, meadows, fisheries, mills, etc. One
+convent is mentioned which has derived an income of $10,000 merely from
+the resin collected in its forests. The greater part of the revenues,
+however, are derived from the voluntary contributions of the people. These
+seem to be enormous. Russians prefer to be buried within the precincts of
+the monasteries, and the monks not only ask an exorbitant price for the
+grave, but make the deceased a permanent source of profit by charging for
+prayers over his remains. Images famous for miracles, churches enriched
+with the relics of saints, have multitudes of visitors who never come
+empty‐handed. How much can be made from this concourse of the faithful may
+be imagined when it is remembered that a single laura, that of S. Sergius
+at Moscow, is visited every year by a million pilgrims. Begging brothers
+traverse all Russia, gathering alms. A very pretty trade is driven in wax
+tapers. The various arts resorted to by the white clergy to collect money
+are well known to the monks also. The Laura of S. Sergius is said to have
+a revenue all told of at least 2,000,000 roubles ($1,680,000), and a
+single chapel in Moscow yields to the convent to which it is attached an
+annual income of about $80,000. These princely revenues are not devoted to
+learning, education, charity, religion. A large part is misappropriated by
+the persons appointed to gather them. A third is the property of the
+superiors. The rest is divided among the monks. The annual income of the
+superior of one of the great lauras is from $33,600 to $50,400; of the
+superior of a monastery of the first class, from $8,400 to $25,200; second
+class, $4,200 to $8,400; third class, $840 to $4,200. All this is for
+their personal use; the monastery gives them lodging, food, and fuel, and
+they have to buy nothing but their clothing.
+
+The seminaries, governed by the state, teach successfully neither piety
+nor learning. The tendency of the courses of instruction is to become
+secular rather than ecclesiastical. A proposal has recently been made that
+each bishop shall choose for his diocesan seminary a learned and pious
+priest to hear the confessions of the pupils, and excite them to devout
+practices; but it is objected that no secular priest can be found who is
+fit to discharge such important functions, while those monks who are fit
+are already employed in more important duties; besides, if one could
+discover among the white clergy the right sort of man, so much virtue
+would come very expensive, and the bishops could not or would not pay the
+salary he would be in a condition to demand. The seminarians are required
+to confess twice a year, namely, during the first week of Lent and during
+Holy Week. In reality, most of them omit the second confession; they go
+home to their families at Holy Week, and rarely approach the sacraments,
+though they always bring back a certificate from the parish priest that
+they have done so. A new regulation prescribes two additional confessions
+and communions, namely, at Christmas and the Assumption, and attempts
+another reform by ordaining that seminarians shall say their prayers
+morning and evening, and grace before and after meat.
+
+The bishops are appointed by the czar, and transferred, promoted,
+degraded, imprisoned, knouted, or put to death at the imperial pleasure.
+Until very recently, no bishop could leave his diocese without the
+permission of the synod, so that consultations among the episcopacy were,
+of course, impossible. Now, however, a bishop may absent himself for eight
+days, on giving notice to the synod. It is the synod at St. Petersburg
+that exercises, under the czar, the whole ecclesiastical authority of the
+empire. The bishop has no power, and nothing to do but to sign reports.
+All the business of his diocese is really transacted by a lay secretary,
+appointed not by the bishop, but by the synod. Under the secretary is a
+chancery of six or seven chief clerks, with assistant clerks and writers.
+This office superintends all the affairs of the clergy, and transacts no
+business without drink‐money. It is the most venal and rapacious of all
+Russian bureaus, and such a mine of wealth to the officials that recently,
+when the chancery of a certain town was abolished on account of the
+destruction of its buildings by fire, the employees petitioned to be
+allowed to restore them at their own expense. The secretary is the one
+all‐powerful person of the diocese. From 12,000 to 15,000 files of
+documents are referred to the chancery every year for decision, and it is
+he who passes upon them, asking nothing of the bishop except his
+signature. He is almost invariably corrupt, and as he possesses, through
+his relations with the synod, the power to ruin the bishop if he chooses,
+there is no one to interfere with him.
+
+The synod consists of the metropolitan of St. Petersburg and a number of
+other bishops chosen by the czar and changed every now and then, and of
+two or three secular priests, one of whom is the czar’s chaplain, and
+another the chief chaplain of the army and navy. But in reality, the whole
+power of the synod is held by an imperial procurator, who sits in the
+assembly, watches all its proceedings, stops deliberations whenever he
+sees fit, is the intermediary between the church and the state, and
+formulates decisions for the signature of the synod. Most of these
+decisions are signed without reading, and sometimes they are made to
+express the direct contrary of the sense of the assembly. The procurator,
+in a word, is to the synod what the secretary is to the bishop—the
+representative of the civil power ruling the enslaved and submissive
+church. The czar speaks through the procurator, the procurator speaks
+through the lay secretaries of the bishop, and so the church is governed
+practically without troubling the clergy at all.
+
+The “Old Catholics” of Germany, and the new and improved Catholics who are
+(perhaps) going to be made under the patent of Father Hyacinthe and wife,
+are understood to be looking eagerly for connections in various parts of
+the world. Let them by all means go to Russia. They will see there how
+much liberty a church gains when it cuts itself off from its obedience to
+the See of Peter, and what kind of a clergy is constructed when men try to
+improve upon the models of Almighty God.
+
+
+
+
+The Cross Through Love, And Love Through The Cross.
+
+
+Maheleth Cristalar was the daughter of a Spanish Jew. Her father had once
+been very wealthy, and indeed until the age of sixteen she had lived in
+princely splendor. The beauties of her Spanish home were very dear to her;
+she had many friends, and as much time as she chose to spend in study.
+
+But one day, her mother, a stately, handsome matron, came into her little
+sitting‐room, looking pale and worn.
+
+“Maheleth, my child,” she began, in faltering tones, “we have had some bad
+news this morning. I am afraid we are in danger of being totally ruined.”
+
+The young girl looked up; she was very beautiful, and the spiritual
+expression on her face intensified and heightened her beauty in a singular
+degree.
+
+“Ruined, dear mother? Is my father very unhappy about it?”
+
+“He is more angry than unhappy; it has happened through the dishonesty of
+persons he trusted.”
+
+“Shall we have to leave home?” asked Maheleth.
+
+“I fear we shall; it is a heavy trial.”
+
+“It will be for our good in the end, mother darling. I am so sorry for you
+and my father, because you have always been used to riches.”
+
+“So have you, my poor child.”
+
+“But not for so long a time; and it is easier to root up a sapling than a
+full‐grown tree.”
+
+“Ah! you hardly know what may be before you, Maheleth; your sisters are
+mere children; we have but few relations; with fortune, so also friends
+will forsake us; the shock will be very sudden, and we shall have to bear
+it alone.”
+
+“You forget our God,” said the girl gently.
+
+A shade of impatience passed over the elder woman’s face.
+
+“We do not hope for miracles now, child,” she answered; “your father has
+worked hard for his wealth, but God will not treat him as he treated Job.”
+
+“Depend upon it, if he does not, mother mine, it is because he knows what
+is best for us. You would not have us lose our hopes of the hereafter for
+the sake of more or less comfort in the earthly present?”
+
+“My child, you should have been a boy; such sayings would tell well in a
+sermon, but in practical business matters they are but cold comfort.”
+
+“Oh! they _are_ comfort sufficient, believe me; besides, they do not debar
+us from prudent measures and precautions in a temporal point of view.”
+
+“Well, child, you are a visionary, I always knew that; it remains to be
+seen if you can be a stoic.”
+
+“What need of that, dear mother? Stoicism is not obedience nor
+resignation.”
+
+Here a light step was heard, and the half‐open door was pushed quickly
+back. A little girl, about nine years old, ran in with flushed face, and,
+holding in her hands a velvet casket, cried out in gleeful voice:
+
+“O mother! sister! see! I got leave to bring this in myself. It has just
+come from the jeweller’s, just as my father ordered it!”
+
+And she opened the casket, displaying a wonderful _parure_ of opals and
+diamonds, exquisitely and artistically wrought. Señora Cristalar turned
+away impatiently, saying to the child:
+
+“Thamar, I am engaged; don’t come fooling here about these jewels; put
+them down, and go into the next room.”
+
+The child, hurt and astonished, looked blankly at her sister. Maheleth
+reached out her hand for the casket, and half rose from her seat.
+
+“I will come to you presently, little sister, if you wait in there; never
+mind the pretty gems just now.”
+
+And so saying, she kissed the little eyes that were ready to overflow with
+childish tears, and, setting the jewels on a table out of sight of her
+mother, resumed her seat.
+
+“There are the first‐fruits of our circumstances,” said the mother
+bitterly. “The man expects to be paid for those to‐day, and I shall have
+to tell him to take them back!”
+
+“Come! if there were nothing worse than that! Now, mother, we will both go
+to my father, and pray together, and then consult among ourselves.”
+
+Maheleth’s father was very fond and very proud of his eldest daughter, and
+this indeed was his best trait. Shrewd and clever in worldly affairs, yet
+strictly honest in his dealings, he was not devoid of that hardness that
+too often accompanies mercantile success, and as often turns to weakness
+when that success disappears.
+
+One thing seemed to sustain him, but it was only a hollow prop after
+all—his pride of race. For generations his family had been well known and
+honored: he could trace his ancestry back in an unbroken line of descent
+from one of the exiles from devastated Jerusalem. Rabbis and learned men
+had borne his name, and though in later times no opening save that of
+trade and banking had been available to those of his race, yet his blood
+yielded it in nothing to that of the proverbially haughty nobles of Spain.
+It mattered little that by some he was shunned as of an inferior
+extraction or lower social status; his own wealth, his wife’s beauty, his
+lavish hospitality, his daughter’s charms, were strong enough, he knew, to
+break the barriers of prejudice, at least as far as appearances went. As
+to marriages, he did not covet for his children the alliance of a poor
+foreigner, and poor most of the proud families were whom he daily
+entertained at his splendid house—poor in brains, poor in beauty, poor in
+energy and strong will.
+
+And yet, though he almost despised his neighbors, this shock was very
+galling to him. _They_ now would turn from him, would forget his open‐
+handedness, and remember only his race and creed; would pity him perhaps,
+but with the pity that is almost contempt. And this seemed to paralyze
+him, for all his fiercely expressed consciousness of superiority to his
+friends.
+
+Maheleth tried to persuade him to take the trial calmly; for even in a
+temporal aspect calmness would sooner show him how to retrieve his
+fortunes.
+
+“For,” she said, “you know that, with your abilities, you can, if you
+will, gain enough for my little sisters’ dowry by the time they will be
+grown up; and that is the first thing to be considered, and after that we
+shall even have enough to live in comfort.”
+
+“And what is to become of you, Maheleth?” asked her father fondly.
+
+“Oh! you and I will be co‐workers. I will look after those two until you
+can marry them well, and so we will both have a definite object in life.
+We can keep my mother in some degree of comfort from the very beginning,
+if we only look things in the face.”
+
+The opals and diamonds had to be returned to the jeweller’s; the pleasant
+home was broken up, and what with the sale of his property, and various
+other legal arrangements, Ephraim Cristaler was able to pay all his
+creditors, with a few trifling exceptions, for which he bound himself by
+solemn promise to provide shortly.
+
+Then the banker and merchant disappeared, and the nine days’ wonder was
+forgotten by his former circle of acquaintances.
+
+One day, a young Englishman, travelling or rather sauntering about Europe
+in a way unlike the usual useless rush of tourists from one point to
+another of Murray’s _Guide‐Book_, arrived at Frankfort and settled
+there—for how long, he, least of all, could have told.
+
+At the hotel, nothing was known of him but his name, Henry Holcombe, and
+that he had come with a black portmanteau containing a number of books. He
+went slowly to see the sights, one by one, as if he had plenty of leisure
+and wanted to enjoy it; and, when he _did_ go, he never measured the
+length and breadth of saloons, the height of towers, the number of statues
+in the cathedral‐niches; nor did he ever disgrace his name by carving it
+side by side with the ambitious Joneses or the heaven‐soaring Smiths on
+the pinnacle of a temple, or the bark supports of a summer‐house; when he
+went out with a book in his hand, it was neither the obtrusive _Murray_
+nor the ostentatious _Byron_; and, in fact, he departed altogether from
+the standard of the regulation British tourist.
+
+He was walking one day down the _Juden‐Strasse_, the picturesqueness of
+whose mediæval‐looking houses had a special attraction for him, when it
+came on to rain very suddenly, and the sky seemed to threaten a storm in
+good earnest; the street was soon deserted, and the narrow roadway became
+a miniature stream. Presently he heard a step behind him, and a slight
+figure, half‐hidden by a large umbrella, pressed quickly past him. It was
+a woman, and, he thought, a very young one, but more than that he could
+not tell, because she was veiled and muffled, and held the dripping
+umbrella very close down upon her head. She had not gone a dozen paces
+beyond him before she dropped something white like a roll of music, and
+stooped slowly to pick it up. The cloak and long skirt she was holding
+fast to keep them from the mud embarrassed her, and the young Englishman
+had time to spring forward and restore the white roll of paper to her hand
+before she had grasped it.
+
+“Oh! thank you, _mein Herr_!” said a low, rich voice, in very soft German.
+And, as Henry took off his hat in silence, the girl made a pretty sweeping
+inclination, and left him, walking as quickly as before.
+
+But he had seen more this time, and he knew she was beautiful, and had a
+dainty, graceful hand. Curious and interested, he watched the dark‐clad
+figure down the street, quickened his own steps as it hastened on,
+slackened them as it paused to clear a crossing without splashing the long
+and rather inconvenient garments. He saw it stop at last, and ring a bell
+at an old forlorn‐looking door, where he might have expected to see the
+face of a gnome appear, as guardian of unsuspected treasures within.
+
+He was dreadfully romantic, this young Englishman, but in a subdued, quiet
+way that seldom showed itself in words, and was specially repelled by the
+_gushing_ style too much followed just then by some of his fair
+countrywomen.
+
+The door was opened and shut, and, except through his notice of the number
+over it, 25, his relation with the beautiful stranger was cut off.
+
+He thought of it day after day, got a directory, and found out that in the
+house No. 25 there lived three families of the names of Zimmermann,
+Krummacher, and Löwenberg. The occupations of the heads of the families
+were given thus: “money‐lender,” “banking‐clerk,” and “lace‐merchant,”
+respectively; no clue whatsoever, of course; and, unless in a regular and
+received manner, Mr. Holcombe could not think of entering the house.
+Still, the face he had seen veiled under the prosaic tent of a wet
+umbrella kept between him and his thoughts, and would not be driven away.
+Then, too, what business was it of his to go and throw himself in the way
+of a girl who most likely was a Jewess? Yet, reason as he might, the
+mysterious face _would_ visit him, and it seemed to him as the face of an
+angel. Very often he passed the house, and once or twice even made a
+pretence of sketching it; but he never saw the figure again. Once a young
+face looked out over the flowers in the window of the ground‐floor room, a
+merry face full of health and mischief—not _his_ dream. The blinds were
+always drawn on the first floor, even when the windows were open, and he
+began to fancy _she_ must be hidden behind those discreet shrouders of
+privacy. A friend of his met him at his hotel one day when he came home
+from the _Juden‐Strasse_, and surprised him by telling him he was going
+home in a fortnight to get married.
+
+“I’ve been half over the world, my dear fellow,” he said, “and enjoyed
+myself immensely. And I’ve got such a pile of things going home to my
+_fiancée_, for our house. She _will_ be delighted, she is so fond of
+queer, foreign things, not like what other people have, you know. I’ll
+show you some, but most are gone in packing cases through agents from the
+different parts of the world I’ve been in.”
+
+And the two young men went upstairs to examine the bridal gifts.
+
+“Look here,” said Ellice to his quieter friend, “it was a pasha’s wife
+sent me these,” dragging out a handful of Eastern jewelry, golden fillets,
+and embroidered jackets and slippers. “A cousin of mine is the wife of the
+consul at Smyrna, and she got them for me, for of course I was not allowed
+to go near the Eastern lady! And look here, these are carved shells, and
+mother‐of‐pearl crucifixes from Jerusalem, and boxes made from Olivet
+trees and cedars of Lebanon; you should value those.”
+
+“I hope your future wife will,” gravely said young Holcombe; “the wood of
+the olives of Gethsemani is almost a relic in itself.”
+
+“Oh! Miss Kenneth will appreciate them just as much as you do, Holcombe,
+she is very reverential. See, here is some alabaster, Naples coral, and
+Byzantine manuscripts, and marble ornaments from the Parthenon. Ah! here
+is the filigree silver of Genoa; that is one of my last purchases, except
+these pictures on china from Geneva; see the frames, too, they are Swiss.”
+
+Then he turned out a huge tiger‐skin, and said: “All my Indian things
+except this were sent from Bombay, and a year ago I sent home all kinds of
+jolly things from North America—furs and skins, antlers, and other
+curiosities. By the bye, I have some old _point_ from Venice, but some
+people had been there before me and cleaned the shop out pretty nearly, so
+I shall have to get some more. Belgium is a good place, isn’t it?”
+
+Holcombe looked thoughtful; his truant mind was at No. 25 again, and he
+did not answer. His friend went on:
+
+“I’ll just ask the landlady, she’ll be likely to know if there is any
+place here, just for a souvenir of Frankfort.”
+
+“Yes,” said Holcombe, “I suppose she knows.” And, as he spoke, the phantom
+face was directly in his mind’s eye, and he could not drive the vision
+away.
+
+“And now, old fellow, suppose you show me the lions here,” said Ellice;
+“you have been here longer than I have.”
+
+So they walked out, and of course in due time came to the high, irregular
+houses bordering the curious _Juden‐Strasse_. It was Friday evening, and
+the street was full of people hurrying to one spot; the air was balmy, and
+told of summer; the scene was very striking. The stream of people
+disappeared under the archway of a splendid Moorish‐looking building, with
+Hebrew characters carved above the portal. It was the new synagogue. The
+two friends followed the men; the women were lost to view in the stair‐
+cases leading to the galleries. A gorgeous lattice‐work defended these
+galleries, and the assemblage in the main part of the temple were men with
+their hats on and light veils or shawls across their shoulders.
+
+The service began; low, plaintive chants resounded through the building;
+sometimes the congregation joined. It was very solemn, and Henry Holcombe
+seemed fascinated. Some one passed him a book and found the place for him.
+And now came the prayer for the mourners, the mourner’s _Kaddisch_, as he
+saw it printed before his eyes. There was a stir among the people, and he
+could hear the women’s clothes rustling in the gallery. Those who had
+recently lost friends and relations stood up during the intercession, and
+then another prayer was offered up in German. Holcombe thought the sound
+of the old Hebrew was like the passing of water through a narrow rocky
+channel; it was soothing and flowing, sad and majestic, and he wondered if
+the girl he had seen once thought and felt about it as he did.
+
+When the crowd dispersed, he tried to linger at the entrance, watching the
+women as they passed out. His friend was hardly so patient, and reminded
+him of the _table d’hôte_ they had most likely already missed.
+
+“I am afraid,” he said, “your people would scarcely approve your
+admiration of the pretty Jewesses.”
+
+Holcombe blushed and moved away, and, just as he came out on the sidewalk,
+a girl in black passed him slowly, with an anxious, absent look.
+
+“By jove! that _is_ a pretty face!” exclaimed Ellice; but the other said
+nothing. For the second time, he had seen the face he was always dreaming
+of, “She looks like an angel,” he thought, “and yet she is not even a
+Christian.”
+
+“I never saw a German Jewess like that,” his friend went on to say. “She
+looks like a Spaniard.”
+
+The next day, Ellice had got an address written down, and said to
+Holcombe:
+
+“If you care to go with me, we will go and look after this lace‐merchant
+this morning.”
+
+Holcombe’s heart gave a great throb as he asked carelessly to see the
+address: “Jacob Zimmermann, 25 _Juden‐Strasse_.”
+
+“I don’t know much about laces,” he answered, “but I will go with
+pleasure.”
+
+“It feels like going on an adventure, like something you read of in a
+book,” said Ellice, “this penetrating into the privacy of those tumble‐
+down dens of the _Juden‐Strasse_.”
+
+“Well,” returned Holcombe quietly, “it does give one the idea.”
+
+They rang at the door No. 25, and the merry, mischievous face he had seen
+once at the window greeted Henry as he entered. They inquired for Herr
+Zimmermann.
+
+“Oh!” said the girl, laughing and looking astonished, “he is up on the
+third floor. Shall I show you the way? But he is ill, and, as he lives all
+alone, he has got into very queer ways.”
+
+They went up, guided by the laughing girl, who rattled on as she preceded
+them.
+
+“Gentlemen like you most often inquire for _us_, for my father, I mean,
+and no one ever comes to see old Zimmermann except some wrinkled old
+ladies, and heaven knows how they find him out; and as to Herr Löwenberg,
+he is a stranger and has no friends.”
+
+The two young men then knew that she was the money‐lender’s daughter, and
+Holcombe thought his dream companion must bear the name of Löwenberg.
+
+“But is not Zimmermann a rich old merchant, and is he not well‐known in
+the town?” asked Ellice. “My landlady named him at once when I asked for
+laces.”
+
+“Oh! yes; _rich_ he is; so rich he won’t sell generally; but then an
+Englishman is another thing! He lives like a rat in a hole, and starves
+himself.”
+
+By this time, they had reached the door of the miser’s room; a low,
+subdued voice was heard within reading.
+
+Their knock was answered by a noise of light footsteps, and the door was
+drawn ajar by some one inside.
+
+“Rachel, what is it? You know Herr Zimmermann is ill.”
+
+Holcombe knew that voice _must_ belong to the girl he had never forgotten.
+Just then the light from the door fell upon the men in the darkened,
+narrow passage, and the slight figure drew back a little.
+
+“They are English gentlemen,” said Rachel. “They want to buy.”
+
+“_To‐day_, Rachel? It is the Sabbath.”
+
+Rachel shrugged her shoulders, and Ellice stepped forward.
+
+“I beg your pardon. I forgot that. But since we are here, perhaps you will
+let us _see_ the laces, and we can come back and choose on Monday.”
+
+The girl looked uneasily back into the room, and then said, in a very low
+voice:
+
+“No; please do not ask to come in to‐day; he is hardly conscious, and he
+might forget it was the Sabbath in his excitement.”
+
+“Very well,” said Ellice politely, and Holcombe whispered to him: “Come
+away; don’t you understand?”
+
+The door was closed gently, and Henry said:
+
+“She was afraid he could not resist the temptation of a good offer, if it
+were made to him, and she wanted to prevent his doing anything wrong.”
+
+“How stupid I am!” said Ellice. “Of course that’s it. But, I say, is she
+not pretty?”
+
+“Beautiful!” answered Holcombe very quietly.
+
+“Is that Fraulein Zimmermann?” asked Ellice of Rachel.
+
+“No; Fraulein Löwenberg,” said the girl. “She is very kind to the old man.
+Her own father is ill and can’t work, and she is very good to him. She
+reads to old Zimmermann, and looks after him, too, when he is ill. She has
+two little sisters also.”
+
+“And how do they live?” asked Ellice.
+
+“_She_ keeps them, I think. The father used to be clerk in Hauptmann’s
+bank; but he has been laid up six months now, and the mother died two
+months after they came here.”
+
+“Are they Germans?” said Ellice, really interested.
+
+“Their name is, but I fancy they are foreigners. Maheleth speaks like a
+foreigner.”
+
+“Maheleth! A curious name.”
+
+“Yes, an unusual one; so is her sister’s—Thamar.”
+
+They were at the street‐door now, and Ellice bade the girl good‐morning,
+saying they would come again on Monday.
+
+“What a curious chance!” he went on. “It is the same girl we saw coming
+out of the synagogue last night. Did you notice?”
+
+“Yes,” said Holcombe.
+
+“You don’t seem very much interested, anyhow.”
+
+“My dear fellow, I never could get up an ecstasy!”
+
+“Still waters run deep, Holcombe. I suspect that is the case with you, you
+sly fellow.”
+
+Monday came, and the two friends were again at No. 25. Rachel admitted
+them as before, and showed them into the old lace‐merchant’s den. He was
+alone, and looked very eager; but his wasted, wrinkled hands and dried‐up
+face spoke his miserly character, and froze the sympathy he so little
+cared to receive. He laid out his precious wares with trembling fingers,
+and it was curious to see these cobweb treasures drawn from common drawers
+and boxes, and heaped on a rickety deal table near the stove that was just
+lighted, because he was still so ill. Everything about the room looked
+cold and hungry; the floor was bare; the paint on the walls dirty and
+discolored; and an untidy assortment of tin pans and cheap crockery
+littered the neighborhood of the stove. The window looked into a back‐
+yard, and what panes were not broken were obscured by dirt. In strange
+contrast to all this was a bouquet of fresh flowers on a chair.
+
+While Ellice and the old man were bargaining, Holcombe fastened his eye on
+the flowers, conjecturing well whose present they were.
+
+The old Jew asked enormous prices for his laces, and gave marvellous
+accounts of the difficulties he had sustained in procuring them as an
+excuse for his exorbitant demands. So the time seemed long to Henry, who
+knew little or nothing about such things, when suddenly Rachel appeared at
+the door with a basin of soup. “Fraulein Löwenberg sent you this,” she
+said to the old man, and then to the strangers: “You must excuse us; he is
+too weak to do without this at the accustomed time, and the fraulein is
+gone out.”
+
+“Gone out!” querulously said the miser. “Gone out without coming to see
+me!”
+
+“She knew you were engaged,” retorted Rachel. “You will see her again to‐
+night.” She spoke as to a spoiled child.
+
+“Well, well, business must be first, and she has business as well as I
+have.” And he went on with his flourishing declamations over his lovely
+laces.
+
+Holcombe understood why she had omitted her morning’s visit to her old
+_protégé_, and, indeed, it would have been unlike his ideal of her had she
+acted otherwise.
+
+“Have you nearly done, Ellice?” he said, coming up to the table.
+
+“Yes; all right. See, I have chosen the nicest things I could find, as far
+as I know; but the fellow asks such confounded prices.”
+
+“Well, you had only that to expect,” was the smiling answer, and then the
+young man turned to the lace‐merchant.
+
+“Have you been ill long?”
+
+“Only a month, and I should be dead if it were not for Maheleth. I cannot
+do without her.”
+
+“But she is poor herself; she cannot bring you what you want, can she?”
+
+“No, she cannot; she is poor, and her father is poor, and so am I. I sell
+nothing now; I have no customers.”
+
+Holcombe smiled slightly, but he went on:
+
+“Are you fond of flowers?”
+
+“Yes, but I cannot afford them.”
+
+“Then it would be cruel of me to ask a violet hearts‐ease of you; but, if
+you would give me that, I will send you more flowers, and bring you
+something you will like to‐morrow.”
+
+“Yes, you may take one; but, if you want flowers, Maheleth can give you
+some; she has some growing in her room.”
+
+“No, this one is enough. Good‐by, and I will try and see you again.”
+
+As they left the house, Ellice said to his friend:
+
+“Well, Holcombe, you _are_ green! You don’t mean to say you believe he is
+poor?”
+
+“No, I don’t believe it; but he will be none the worse off for a few
+flowers and some good food, if he won’t get them for himself.”
+
+“I suppose you remember that there is another invalid in the house, and
+the same person nurses both?”
+
+“I know what you mean, Ellice, and I wish you wouldn’t joke; it is not
+fair.”
+
+“Very well, old fellow; but, if you were anybody but yourself, I should
+say ‘take care.’ You always were the steadiest old chap going.”
+
+A day or two afterwards, Holcombe was left alone again; he had sent things
+to Zimmermann as he had promised; but as yet he had not revisited the
+_Juden‐Strasse_. On Friday, there was a special service at the Catholic
+cathedral, at eight o’clock, and the young man, hardly knowing why,
+determined to go.
+
+The church was only partially lighted, except the chancel, which was
+dazzling. The music was good, the congregation devout, and the German
+sermon as interesting as could be expected. The whole effect was very
+beautiful, and seemed to Henry a peace‐giving and heart‐soothing one. A
+rush of voices came breaking in upon his reverie at the _Tantum Ergo_, and
+the surging sound was like a mighty utterance of his own feelings. As the
+priest raised the Host, he bowed his head low, and prayed for peace and
+guidance; and when he lifted it again the first object his eye fixed on
+was a slight, dark‐robed figure, standing aside in the aisle, drooping her
+head against one of the columns. He knew the figure well; but, with a
+strange thrill, he asked himself why was she here? For the music? For the
+beauty of the sight? For love of a creed she was half ashamed to embrace?
+Or from the curiosity of a chance passer‐by?
+
+He watched her as she moved behind the shadow of the pillar, and waited
+till she was enticed from her hiding‐place by the quick desertion of the
+once crowded church. Now the light from a lamp streamed down on her; the
+face was anxious and troubled, as if weary with thought.
+
+“Friday, too!” he said to himself. “And she has come here on the very
+Sabbath. Perhaps she has been to her own service first. But what can it
+mean, if she only were what this would point to?”
+
+To Be Continued.
+
+
+
+
+Odd Stories. IV. The White Shah.
+
+
+If thou wouldst hear a choice history of princes, go into the garden of
+the shah’s pleasure‐house, and hearken to what the humming‐birds tell thee
+in sleep. How else could thy servant have learned the memory of Shah
+Mizfiz, the forgotten? Was it not he who built the palace of a hundred
+towers in the valley of groves? Beautiful beyond compare was that valley’s
+lake which presented itself like a mirror before the pavilion of the shah;
+and magnificent as a house in the sky were the hundred delicate towers
+that rose one above the other, amid gardens and fountains, and half lost
+in groves of venerable height and shade. High hills whose sides were
+covered with woods and flowers, and watered with streams and fountains,
+shut out the valley from the world save where it was entered through a
+great gate crowned with towers; and a long colonnade of loftiest trees
+pranked with beds of tulips, hyacinths, and roses, and intertwined with
+flowering vines that here and there made curious arbors. From the windows,
+or from the balconies, or from the pavilions of his palace, the shah could
+see the lords and ladies who, dressed in gold‐broidered silks of all
+colors, shook their plumes as they rode up to his gate, or, listening to
+the song of minstrels, sailed upon the bosom of the lake.
+
+Naught now could the shah do but dream. Surrounded by hills that fenced
+him from mankind, by waters that mirrored the skies or leaped into the
+sunlight, by flowers whose odors inspired the sense, by trees which
+everywhere made repose for him, and by towers, the intricacies and
+ingenuities of which rendered his palace ever new to him, he forgot all
+common things. The cares of state he left to his ministers at the gate of
+the valley; while in one or other of the innumerable courts of his palace,
+or among its unknown and invisible gardens, he retired from the intrusion
+of mortals. “I went to seek the rose‐king,” said or sang a poet of the
+court; “so I stripped a great rose of all its leaves, one by one, and in
+its heart of hearts I found the Shah Mizfiz.” Now, having captured the
+tenth of a number of white elephants, the like of which was never seen,
+except in the woods and by the lake of the imperial valley, where they
+roamed in romantic innocence and tameness, the Shah Mizfiz betook himself
+to his dreams as others do to their books.
+
+At times, seated high on his favorite white elephant, the old shah rode in
+state through his grounds. Thence it came to pass that, seeing his beard
+like almond‐blossoms, and the milky color of his throne‐bearer, they who
+visited the gardens of the lake remembered him as the White Shah. Leaning
+on the cushions of his vine‐encircled pavilion, his silken beard and
+silvery locks floating in the breath of the zephyr, how often have the
+minstrels passed by beneath him over the mirror of the lake, singing under
+their gorgeous sails or to the time‐beat of their oars those songs which,
+with a tinkling and rippling melody, lingered in his ear. Less was it
+known how looked and fared the shah when he retired to the inmost bowers
+of the interior gardens of the hundred towers. But what wonder if in one
+of those fine day‐dreams so celebrated by the poet Bulghasel the flower‐
+fairies themselves did him veritable honor, and, circling gardens of
+roses, tulips, and lilies, danced at his feet and round about him, an
+illusion of humor and beauty?
+
+Ah! the deep‐eyed, far‐gazing White Shah! What dreams he dreamed of green
+ages in the youth of the world, of far‐off golden centuries to come, of
+ships navigating the air of sunset, of adventures in the stars, and of
+nights with the great moon‐shah! They were not to be told or counted; the
+number and wonder of them would have tasked a hundred scribes, and put as
+many dreamers to sleep. Howbeit, the shah’s visions persuaded him to
+become an oracle for all his empire. Statesmen consulted his dreams, and
+poets made themes of them, and doubtless the humane spirit of his visions
+found its way into the laws. Thanks to them, the people had abundant
+feast‐days, and, if a mine of precious stones were discovered, or the
+caravans were richer than usual, or the lords were moved to more than
+wonted bounty, or new fountains were built on the dry roads, or new
+temples set up here and there, the shah’s dreams were praised. When he had
+completed the thousandth of a line of dreams, the smallest of which would
+have made a paradise on earth again, he dreamed that his people were
+prosperous like none other under the sun; for his prime minister had
+artfully omitted to report that his eastern provinces were suffering the
+horrors of a famine, and those of the west were threatened by war. But on
+neither of these facts did the White Shah lay the blame for that final
+eclipse which ruined his dreams. In a fatal hour, having too long slept
+among the poppies, and drunk too much wine and coffee, he dreamt that the
+demon Sakreh had caught him up in a storm on the desert of Lop, out of
+which he let him drop into the Lake of Limbo, whence, fishing him up by
+the hair of his head, he banged him against the Caucasus and set him down
+to cool on the Himalaya, ere, taking him to the topmost height of the
+palace of the hundred towers, he allowed him to fall through the many‐
+colored glasses of the dome of delights. His displeasure with the effects
+of this dream was heightened and consummated when the poet Bulghasel, in a
+moment of malediction, trod on his particular corn. From that moment,
+peace forsook the couch of the White Shah, and dreams of glory visited not
+his slumbers.
+
+Henceforward what had been dreamland to the too happy shah became the
+saddest reality. In a white age he had lost his visions as old men lose
+their teeth. He wandered about the valley—no longer seated high on the
+pride of his white elephant, but crownless and on foot—murmuring from hour
+to hour: “I have lost my dream—I have lost my dream.” One day, leaving
+palace and throne, he passed out of his gate liked one crazed, to seek, as
+he said, his dream. Far away among the Parsees the poet Bulghasel found
+him after many pilgrimages: “And O my white‐haired sire,” cried the
+affectionate poet, “hast thou found the object of thy search?” “Yea, son,”
+rejoiced the White Shah, “I have found that which I never lost, but would
+that I had possessed; for then my dream was a fiction, and now truth is a
+sufficient dream for me. If the new shah would sleep well, let him have
+this dream.”
+
+
+
+
+Signs Of The Times.
+
+
+In Europe, of late, meetings have been the order of the day. There have
+been meetings of emperors and Internationalists; of “Old Catholics” and
+Catholics; of church congresses and congresses to disestablish the church;
+of “Home‐Rulers” and Dilkites. The voluntary expatriation of the Alsace‐
+Lorraine population has followed close on the heels of the violent
+expulsion of the Jesuits, both influenced by the same motive power;
+trades‐unions have called together a society of German professors, who, by
+dint of powerful speeches of an explosive nature, succeeded finally in
+showing, in a very conclusive manner, that they knew little or nothing of
+what they were talking about. Gambetta has found his voice again; Russia
+has mildly but decidedly objected to its inflammable utterances, and in
+the midst of all the hubbub the eyes of the world have been attracted to
+the strange spectacle in these days of a nation, by a sudden and
+spontaneous movement, turning its steps to an humble shrine of the Blessed
+Virgin.
+
+As for the meeting of the emperors, we were _not_ present at the council,
+and had no secret emissary concealed in the cup‐board. What was effected,
+or what was intended to be effected, is an utter mystery to us. We very
+much doubt if anything were effected at all; that is, anything real,
+lasting, and permanent. The composing elements were in themselves as
+incapable of mingling as oil and water. If people looked to permanent
+peace or peace for any length of time from it, we fear they will be sadly
+mistaken in view of what we have since seen. The effective forces of
+Austria are fixed at 800,000 men. The government, actuated doubtless by
+peaceful motives; finds it necessary to keep on hand a peace effective of
+250,000; and, that this force may be in fighting order at any moment, the
+recruits must be kept for three years under colors. To supply this
+contingency, 30,000 more men are required, which draws a sum of $1,850,000
+out of the national chest, a chest neither very deep nor very safe. The
+measure was objected to, whereupon Count Andrássy spurred them up by
+informing the astonished members that, notwithstanding the imperial
+exhibition of brotherly love at Berlin, the speeches, manœuvrings,
+fireworks, and the rest, he would not venture to answer for the
+continuance of peace even to the end of the present year. As an echo of
+the truth of this, Prussia has just given an order for 3,000,000 rifles of
+a new pattern, on the strength, doubtless, of the discharge of the French
+debt. Russia is increasing her already vast army steadily and surely,
+while France hopes by her new scheme of raising forces to show at the end
+of five years an active army of 715,000, and a territorial force of
+720,000 men. So much for the effects of the imperial conference as regards
+peace.
+
+The _Internationale_, true to the discordant elements of which it was
+composed, adjourned without effecting anything or coming to any
+conclusion. This was only to be expected; but we should not judge from
+this that it is dead, as has been too hastily done by many journals. Its
+life is disorder, and, if it can catch the trades‐unions, its influence
+would be paramount.
+
+As for the meeting of the “Old Catholics”—we presume they call themselves
+“Old” Catholics as the Greeks called the furies _Eumenides_—it will soon
+have passed out of memory. We rejoice that it did occur, in order to show
+the “movement” in its true light. Luther himself had not half the chance
+which Döllinger and the rest enjoyed. The strongest of governments at
+their back, the whole anti‐Catholic world looking with eager eyes on this
+mountain in travail—_parturiet_; and not even the _ridiculus mus_ is born
+in recompense for all this labor, storm, fuss, and anxiety. We forget;
+there issued a long string of resolutions, which one or two newspapers
+published, the generality very sensibly finding them of too great length
+and of too little importance to burden their leaders with them. The whole
+affair was utterly ridiculous even to the _ménu_, which, as became a solid
+dinner, composed for the most part of German professors with a few
+Episcopal waifs and strays from England and America, was in Latin, and
+commenced thus:
+
+Symposium. _Gustatio_: Pisciculi oleo perfusi et salmones fumo siccati ad
+cibi appetentiam excitandam. Mensa prima, etc.
+
+And this is the way in which the “Old Catholics” meet to found or reform a
+church! The effect of it all is shown in the comments of the secular
+press. The cleverest journals in England and America, those who expected
+much from it, generally express themselves to the effect that, though far
+from saying that the meeting was without significance, it did not succeed
+in erecting a platform whereon a body could stand. The fact is this: We
+are far from denying to the majority of the men there assembled abundance
+of intellect and that sort of talent that can make a fine speech or
+perhaps compose a readable book, but the world, if it must be changed,
+wants something more solid than this.
+
+Prince Bismarck’s measures are what Strafford would call “thorough”; and
+he is carrying out this “thorough” policy with far greater effect than the
+vacillating Stuart. The latter lost his head for too much heart; the
+German chancellor is not likely to imitate him in that. The Jesuits had
+small respite. We presume they are all out of Germany by this time. How
+much the country at large will gain in peace, solidity, and security by
+their expulsion it is impossible for us to say. Oddly enough, in Prince
+Bismarck’s stronghold, Prussia itself, we find that the new order is not
+destined to run quite smoothly. The diet is dissolved because the Upper
+House refused to pass the country reform bill in the face of the emperor
+and an official intimation from the minister of the interior that if the
+measure were defeated the government would dissolve the diet and convoke a
+new one. Whether the members of the Upper House will continue the fight,
+and come into direct collision with the power which they so helped to make
+supreme, we do not know yet, but we expect not.
+
+Meanwhile, the Jesuits have not gone out of their fatherland alone. The
+sympathy of the whole Catholic world has gone out with them, and its
+expression is gaining volume daily. Addresses of condolence and
+protestations against the legal violence which expelled them are rising up
+day after day from the hearth‐stones of the land they have quitted, as
+well as from lands and multitudes to whom they as individuals are utterly
+unknown. Perhaps the most noticeable of the many which are continually
+appearing in their own land is that of the society of German Catholics
+recently assembled at Cologne, which passed a series of resolutions
+protesting strongly:
+
+1. Against the assertion that the Catholic population is indifferent to
+the interests of fatherland, and hostile to the empire. 2. Against the
+laic laws which would control the affairs of the churches. 3. Against the
+state direction of the schools. 4. Against the expulsion of the Jesuits.
+5. Against the encroachment of the state on the jurisdiction of the
+bishops. 6. Against the suppression of the temporal power of the Pope.
+
+Such is the Catholic voice all the world over. If rulers can respect this
+voice, they will have no more faithful, earnest, or devoted children than
+the children of the Catholic Church. If they cannot respect it, they have
+only to expect an unfailing legal opposition until they are compelled to
+respect it, as Ireland, speaking in O’Connell, compelled England to do; as
+Germany, by lawful agitation and peaceful though unceasing and determined
+protest, will compel Prince Bismarck to do, until we see again restored to
+the country which they love and which loves them the sons who, by peaceful
+counsel and wise guidance, and religious instruction, will bring more
+glory, solid prosperity, enlightenment, and peace to the nation than a
+cycle of Bismarcks.
+
+The Bishop of Ermeland still survives the terrible threats of the
+chancellor which have been gathering over his head in deepening thunder
+this long while for excommunicating heretic priests; the bolt has not yet
+fallen. Perhaps Jove finds himself a little puzzled how to fulminate it to
+a nicety. To show the justice of the Bismarck government, and how equally
+it deals with all classes, the Consistory of Magdeburg has quite recently
+decreed the excommunication of all Protestants who by mixed marriages
+shall educate their children as Catholics; the decree has been carried
+into execution at Lippspring; the case brought before the civil courts,
+and of course the pastor, one Schneider, who wrought the excommunication
+publicly and openly in the church, was supported by the just weight of the
+law. Now, excommunication is excommunication whether you call it Catholic
+or Protestant. Why, then, threaten with impeachment? Why stop the salary
+which the government for the country bestows in the one case, and let the
+other go entirely free? And yet this is all according to law!
+
+Another anomaly according to law is displayed in the seizing of the
+schools by the government. We have not space here to go into the whole
+question, instructive though it would be, as showing the determination of
+this government to uproot the Catholic faith by every means in its power.
+But we will mention one instance. A ministerial circular accompanied the
+notice of the new arrangements, informing the teachers that it was
+desirable that their scholars should belong to no religious
+confraternities—of the Rosary, Blessed Virgin, and such like—and that if
+they persisted in belonging to them they should be dismissed. We find it
+necessary to endorse this statement by informing our readers that it is
+plain, unvarnished fact. Civil marriage is now in full sway; that is to
+say, it is no longer a sacrament according to law. What wonder that the
+German bishops assembled at Fulda gave utterance to their solemn protest,
+an extract of which we cull? It reads as though it had been penned in the
+days of Diocletian, or Julian the Apostate, or Henry VIII. But in these
+days, when mere human society has come to know its power, and dream that
+it possesses freedom, the protest jars on our ears as something out of
+tune, out of time, out of date altogether:
+
+“We demand, as a right which no one can dispute to us, that the bishops,
+the parish priests of the cathedral churches, and the directors of souls,
+be only appointed in accordance with the laws of the church and the
+agreement existing between the church and state.
+
+“In accordance with these laws and agreements, the Catholic people and
+ourselves cannot consider as legal a director of souls or a teacher of
+religion one who has not been so named by his bishop; and we, the Catholic
+people and ourselves, cannot consider as legally recognized a bishop who
+has not been named by the Pope.
+
+“We claim equally for ourselves and for all Catholics the right of
+professing throughout Germany our holy Catholic faith in all its
+integrity, at all times and in all freedom, and to rest upon the principle
+that we are in no wise constrained to suffer within the bosom of our
+religious community those who do not profess the Catholic faith, and who
+do not submit entirely to the authority of the church.
+
+“We consider as a violation of our church and of the rights which are
+guaranteed to it every attack made against the liberty of religious
+orders. We regard and vindicate, also, as an essential and inalienable
+right of the Catholic Church, the full and entire liberty which it
+possesses of elevating its servants in accordance with ecclesiastical
+laws, and we demand not only that the church exercise over the Catholic
+schools (primary, secondary, and higher) the influence which alone can
+guarantee to the Catholic people that its children shall receive in the
+schools a Catholic education and instruction, but we claim also for the
+church the freedom to found and direct in an independent manner, certain
+private establishments ordained for the teaching of the sciences in
+accordance with Catholic principles. In fine, we maintain and defend the
+sacred character of Christian marriage as that of a sacrament of the
+Catholic Church, as well as the right which the divine will has given to
+the church in connection with this sacrament.”
+
+The signatures of the bishops are affixed to this document, which is
+addressed to all the German governments, and produced a commotion and
+irritation among all the national liberal journals which were unexampled.
+We have given this extract here in order to bring home to the minds of our
+readers how hard the church is driven in Germany. When the bishops and the
+laity combined feel themselves called upon to protest in this style, the
+government which for no reason whatever can give rise to such a
+protest—signed by the saintly chiefs of a body of 14,000,000, and endorsed
+in meeting after meeting by those 14,000,000 and the countless numbers of
+their co‐religionists outside of Germany scattered through the broad
+world—must be one which does not govern, but tyrannizes.
+
+The same “thorough” policy prevailed in Alsace and Lorraine. On the very
+day, October 1, when the option of declaring for France or Germany
+arrived, all the men who remained in the countries named were enrolled in
+the Prussian service from that date. This, beyond what Mr. Disraeli would
+call a “sentimental grievance,” drove them from the country, as it must
+have been intended to do. Service under the power that annexed them, which
+they but yesterday fought against, and a service the most rigorous and
+exacting that exists, as it must be in order to retain its supremacy, was
+something that seems to have been ingeniously invented in order to drive
+the people out. The provinces are more than decimated; the Prussian army,
+if increased at all, is increased in the event of a renewed war by
+untrustworthy men, and a new drop of gall is thrown into the already
+overbitter cup which France is compelled to swallow. And yet the
+_Provinzial Correspondenz_ (official) of Berlin, in view of October 1,
+said: “The government has not hesitated an instant in calling without
+delay on the inhabitants of Alsace and Lorraine to serve in the German
+army, as the best and surest means to evoke and develop speedily among the
+population newly reunited to Germany the sentiment of an intimate
+community with the German people.”
+
+This smacks of excess of credibility. If Bismarck wanted really to annex
+the provinces in heart and soul, he adopted the very surest means of
+emptying them in the speediest manner, and letting in the Germans, who
+now, sick of war and of the rumors of war, wish to emigrate in such
+formidable numbers. Probably the chancellor proposes using the deserted
+provinces as a safety‐valve for these recreant spirits. One of the most
+significant signs of the instability of the new empire is the desire of so
+many earnest workers to leave it just when it has been established in all
+its glory and power. But glory and power do not last long in the eyes of
+men who look to a peaceful life and to which side, in a popular phrase,
+their bread is buttered. Instead of peace, they find the service more
+rigorous than ever; the money which was won by the blood of their kin and
+countrymen going to the pockets of the generals, to carry out emperors’
+fêtes, and purchase millions of rifles of a new pattern. Evidently _the_
+business of the German Empire wears a very martial look. But the artisan
+and clerk have fought well, and find no returns. Your German is of a
+logical bent, so he determines on going elsewhere, where he may live at
+peace, and let Bismarck look after his own empire.
+
+In France, we have had and are having the pilgrimages to Lourdes. Not
+alone to Lourdes, and not alone in France, but in Belgium and Germany also
+there have been numerous pilgrimages to various shrines. Of course the
+wits of the secular journals, with a few honorable exceptions, have had a
+fine time of it, and have twisted the stories of the miracles of Lourdes
+and La Salette into every possible shape in which they might squeeze a
+laugh out of it. They are at great pains to show what we were long ago
+convinced of—that they do not know what faith means.
+
+Mgr. Mermillod, after a residence of seven years in full enjoyment and
+exercise of his ecclesiastical functions, has suddenly come to be non‐
+recognized by the Swiss government, or, more properly, by the Grand
+Council of Geneva, and his pension stopped. The Grand Council of Geneva
+had already expelled the Sisters of Charity and the Christian Brothers. It
+essays the rôle of Bismarck, and where it purposes stopping we do not yet
+see. But as the population of Geneva is composed of 47,000 Catholics
+against 43,000 Protestants, we may presume that the Grand Council of
+Geneva will very speedily be brought to its senses. Its miserable pension
+of 10,000 francs was raised to 23,000  in two days by a voluntary
+contribution set on foot by M. Veuillot of the _Univers_. The Grand
+Council has incurred the contempt of all rational minds, while Mgr.
+Mermillod is supported in his action by all his fellow‐bishops, by his
+Holiness, and by the Catholic world. It may be as well to remember that
+the Protestant party in the Swiss cantons voted, but were happily
+outvoted, for union with Prussia. It is not difficult to see whence the
+persecution of Mgr. Mermillod starts.
+
+Gentlemen who have visited the Alhambra in London, or any one almost of
+the Parisian theatres, or Niblo’s in New York, are not apt to be squeamish
+on the score of the decent and moral in theatrical representations. Things
+must therefore be at a very bad pass when we find the correspondents of
+the London _Times_ and the other English newspapers, in common with those
+of our own and the Parisian press, uniting in condemning in the most
+unsparing terms the pieces which are now in vogue on the boards of the
+Roman theatres. Cardinal Patrizi addressed an official letter to Minister
+Lanza on the subject. That gentleman, who is extremely active in
+suppressing a Catholic paper which dares to caricature his majesty’s
+government, sends back an answer which, divested of its diplomatic wool,
+is cowardly, stupid, and insulting. We have been astonished to find
+“religious” newspapers in this city gleeful over these representations
+which the good sense, if nothing more, of the secular correspondents of
+all journals in all countries condemns as odious, detestable, and utterly
+unfit to be presented in any civilized, or for that matter uncivilized,
+community. These journals which are religious see in them “a new means of
+evangelizing Italy.” Another feature in “united Italy” is the utter
+insecurity of life and property in Rome, Naples, and Ravenna principally,
+though, in fact, through the length and breadth of the land. Victor
+Emanuel has held the country long enough now to give some account of his
+stewardship. The government of the Pope and of the Bourbons, we were told,
+favored brigandage and every other atrocity; yet the correspondents of the
+London _Times_, the London _Spectator_, and by this time most of the other
+anti‐Catholic journals, are furnishing articles which must rather astonish
+the upholders of the blessings which were to flow from “Italy united.”
+They picture scenes of rapine and blood before which the graphic Arkansas
+letters of the _Herald_ pale, while the doers of these deeds, the thieves
+and murderers, are “well known to the police,” in fact, on excellent terms
+with them, and walk about in the open day with any man’s life in their
+hands who dares frown on them. The government is simply afraid of them,
+afraid to use the only remedy now in its hands by proclaiming martial law,
+a proceeding which the English journals strongly advise. If such a state
+of things continues much longer, we fear the inevitable verdict must come
+to Victor Emanuel, “Now thou shalt be steward no longer.” Of his ill‐
+gotten power, indeed, it may be said, “blood hath bought blood, and blows
+have answered blows.” People are apt to be logical; if a government robs
+and kills and calls it law, why should not they do the same? Italy will
+continue in a state of chronic anarchy until religion is restored to it;
+then order will follow as it is following in France to‐day.
+
+In England, though Parliament has not been sitting, questions of moment
+have been rife. Mr. Miall has again raised the war‐cry against the
+Established Church, ably seconded by Mr. Jacob Bright. The _Times_ and
+_Saturday Review_ and other journals affect to laugh at Mr. Miall, as they
+and such as they laughed at the Reform Bill, the Act of Catholic
+Emancipation, and the disestablishment of the Irish Church. We believe Mr.
+Miall’s measure to be the logical sequence of the last of these measures,
+a fact which Mr. Disraeli in opposing it foretold. It is an anomaly—a
+church supported by a majority which does not believe in it. Mr. Miall’s
+measure is only a growth of time; in fact, it only requires the conversion
+of such organs as the _Times_ and _Saturday Review_ to bring it to pass
+to‐day.
+
+As a corollary to Mr. Miall’s movement comes the annual Church Congress
+held this year at Leeds under the presidency of the Bishop of Ripon. This
+annual congress is a curious thing; it is a meeting of everybody, high and
+low, church and lay, to compare notes and see how the church is getting
+on—a very useful proceeding, no doubt, if there were only something
+faintly approaching unanimity among its members. As it happened, unanimity
+was the one thing wanting, and certain stages of the proceedings were as
+warm as those of the “Old Catholics” at Cologne. In fact, the account of
+the whole proceedings reads like an extract from _The Comedy of
+Convocation_.
+
+
+
+
+New Publications.
+
+
+    THE HISTORY OF THE SACRED PASSION. From the Spanish of Father Luis
+    de la Palma, of the Society of Jesus. The Translation revised and
+    edited by Henry James Coleridge, of the same Society. London:
+    Burns & Oates. 1872. (New York: Sold by The Catholic Publication
+    Society.)
+
+
+This is the third volume of the Quarterly Series which the Jesuit Fathers
+are bringing out in London. The series is beautifully got up, and we wish
+it every success.
+
+The present work on the Passion has a prologue by the author, in which he
+sets forth the end he has had in view. The prologue is followed by a brief
+treatise on the method of meditation on the Passion, together with four
+sections suggestive of aids to the memory, the understanding, the will,
+and the colloquy. The whole is prefaced by the editor, from whose remarks
+we transcribe the following: “That he (the author) was a man of sound and
+deep theological learning is sufficiently proved by the work which is now
+presented to the English reader.... Everything he has written is of the
+most sterling value, and has always been very highly esteemed, especially
+by those who have labored in illustrating and explaining the _Spiritual
+Exercises of S. Ignatius_.... He tells us (in the prologue) that the book
+is designed both for simple reading and also for the purpose of furnishing
+matter to those who are in the habit of practising meditation and of
+preparing their meditation for themselves. Those who use the book for the
+first‐named purpose will hardly discover that it is intended also to serve
+the other; while those who practise meditation, and refer to these pages
+for matter pregnant with such considerations and suggestive of copious
+affections and practical resolutions, will not find it easy to exhaust the
+stores which are here so unostentatiously collected. It may be worth while
+to point out that the design of the author, that his book should thus
+serve the purpose of a storehouse for meditation on the Passion, accounts
+for the only kind of amplification which he has allowed himself. This is
+the paraphrastic commentary which he generally substitutes for or subjoins
+to the words of our blessed Lord in the various scenes of the Passion. The
+meaning of these sacred words is often very fully and lovingly brought
+out, although the narrative form in which the whole work is cast might
+less naturally suggest this method of treatment, so valuable to those who
+desire to feed on the sayings of our blessed Saviour in all their rich
+fertility and meaning.”
+
+The editor expresses a fear “that the translation will be found to be, at
+least in parts, rugged and unpolished”; but says he has “tried, on the
+other hand, to make it as faithful as possible; and to that object has
+been well content to sacrifice smoothness of style, though the original
+deserves the most careful rendering in matter and in form.” “Palma
+belongs,” he adds, “to what I believe is the best age of Spanish religious
+literature—the age of Louis of Grenada, John of Avila, Louis of Leon, S.
+Teresa; S. John of the Cross, Louis da Ponte, and other famous writers. In
+point of style he is, perhaps, not equal to them; but he shares with many
+of these writers the characteristic of masculine common sense, theological
+culture alike exquisite and solid, and the tenderest and simplest piety.
+Happily, these are qualities which do not easily evaporate in a
+translation.”
+
+He then goes on to say that he has “thought it better not to attempt in
+any way to edit Father Palma as to points on which he would perhaps write
+differently were he living in the present century.” We quite agree with
+his decision; and shall here close our notice of the book, since, after
+what we have borrowed from the preface, any comments of our own would be
+superfluous.
+
+
+    ALL‐HALLOW EVE; OR, THE TEST OF FUTURITY, AND OTHER STORIES. New
+    York: The Catholic Publication Society. 1872.
+
+
+This book, containing three tales, _All‐Hallow Eve_, _Unconvicted_, and
+_Jenifer’s Prayer_, while it will doubtless afford much amusement to many
+readers during the long winter evenings, will, we trust, have other and
+more decided effects. By contrast, it shows that fiction of the very
+highest order may be successfully written without the extraneous aid of
+bad taste and more than doubtful morality, and by example it will
+encourage our aspiring writers who, now overawed by the shadow of departed
+genius, are unwilling or afraid to risk their reputations in endeavoring
+to rival the efforts of those who formerly delighted and instructed us by
+their compositions. When the Star of the North, Scott, set, it was feared
+that this species of literature had suffered an irreparable loss; but soon
+a host of writers sprang up in England, Ireland, and, we may say, America,
+who not only compensated for the loss, but more than repaid us for the
+decadence of the historico‐romantic school. When those in turn
+disappeared, it was confidently predicted that the present generation,
+barren of imagination and powers of observation and description, could not
+produce anything equal to what adorned the pages of men like Griffin,
+Dickens, and Hawthorne. Daily experience teaches us that this was a
+fallacy. New buds of promise are constantly springing up around us which
+need but the encouraging voice of the press and the smiles of a
+discriminating public patronage to warm into full‐blown vigor and
+loveliness.
+
+The three tales before us are an earnest of this. The story entitled _All‐
+Hallow Eve_, the first in this collection, as it is, we think, the first
+in merit, is a tale of singular beauty, power and truthfulness. In
+construction artistic without the appearance of art, in verisimilitude it
+is all that would be required by the most orthodox French dramatist. The
+characters are few and clearly defined, the plot simple, the scene
+scarcely changes, the time from beginning to end is short, and the
+_dénoûment_, though tragic, offends neither our sensibilities nor our
+sense of justice. Ned Cavana and Michael Murdock are two aged well‐to‐do
+Ulster farmers whose lands lie contiguous. The former has a daughter
+Winifred or Winny, and the latter a son Thomas; and the natural desire of
+the fond parents is to form a matrimonial alliance between their children,
+and thus unite the families and the farms. Tom Murdock is handsome,
+attractive, cunning, mercenary, and unscrupulous, while Winny, who is
+limned with more than a painter’s art, adds to her natural graces a noble
+heart and keen perception. Edmond Lennon, a young peasant rich in
+everything but money, falls in love with her, and, besides encountering
+the secret or open hostility of the Murdocks, he finds an almost
+insurmountable barrier in the caste pride of the father of his lady‐love.
+Aided, however, by the gentle and astute Winny, he partially succeeds in
+overcoming this difficulty, when the machinations of his rival are
+employed against him, and the result is—but we will not destroy the
+pleasure of our fair and necessarily curious readers by unfolding the
+catastrophe. The contrasts of character of the two old men, each in his
+way aiming at the best, and also between the suitors, are excellently
+drawn; the interludes, such as the All‐Hallow Eve festival and the
+“hurling” match, are accurate and lifelike, and the bits of pathos which
+here and there dot the course of the story are so touching in their very
+simplicity that we venture to say many an eye unused to the melting mood
+will be none the less moistened on their perusal. The style adopted by the
+author is easy and familiar, a little too much so, we imagine, to suit the
+tastes of the more exacting reader; and herein lies the only defect, if it
+can be called one, that we can perceive in this story.
+
+_Unconvicted; or, Old Thorneley’s Heirs_, is a tale of an altogether
+different character, illustrating what may be called a more advanced state
+of civilization. The scene is laid in London, and the principal personages
+occupy a high social position. It is a story of suffering and affection,
+of deep, dark, and unruly passion, and undying love and friendship. It
+would be vain to attempt to epitomize the plot, which is woven so closely
+and so dexterously that our interest in the actors is kept constantly on
+the _qui vive_, and it is only at the very last chapter that we are
+relieved from all anxiety on their account. The tale opens with the death
+of old Gilbert Thorneley, it is supposed by poison, and the discovery of
+his murderer forms the principal theme of the entire narrative. This
+involves a great deal of legal discussion and analysis, and, for the first
+time in the history of fiction, as far as our knowledge goes, we have a
+clear and accurate description of the niceties, quibbles, and profundity
+of English law. Though more curious and instructive than amusing, this
+does not, however detract from the interest of the novel as such, but
+rather acts as an offset to the numerous scenes of connubial and filial
+affection with which it is replete. The moral is of course unexceptionable
+and easily drawn.
+
+_Jennifer’s Prayer_, a shorter but no less meritorious story of English
+life, completes the volume, which, appearing at this season when good
+books become more a necessity than a luxury in the household, will no
+doubt be warmly welcomed by those who, from taste or inclination, prefer
+the attractions of the novel to the more serious study of science and
+history.
+
+
+    THE ILLUSTRATED CATHOLIC FAMILY ALMANAC FOR THE UNITED STATES, FOR
+    THE YEAR OF OUR LORD 1873, calculated for different parallels of
+    latitude, and adapted for use throughout the country. New York:
+    The Catholic Publication Society.
+
+
+There are something over five million Catholics in the United States,
+representing over five hundred thousand families. This little Catholic
+Family Almanac, then, should have a circulation of five hundred thousand.
+If it has not, the fault is not with the Publication Society, but in the
+Catholics themselves neglecting to diffuse it each in his own circle. A
+few years ago such a little annual would have been regarded as an
+impossibility. Beautiful in typography, with woodcut illustrations which
+in design and execution rival those of any work issued in the country, it
+is something that a Catholic can view with pride, and can never blush to
+open before any one. This is merely taking it at its mechanical value. Its
+scope is to give the yearly calendar of the church with what is locally
+interesting to us as Catholics in America, or associated with the trials
+and triumphs of the church in that Old World to which by some degrees more
+or less we must all trace our origin.
+
+In this year’s little volume, we find portraits of various ages, with
+original sketches, telling us of great prelates among ourselves,
+Archbishop Spalding and Bishop McGill, representative men who knew the
+necessity of diffusing information among our people; bishops of the last
+generation like Milner, whose works are familiar to all, yet whose
+counterfeit presentment few have ever met; or Bishop Doyle, J.K.L., whom
+Ireland can never forget; or like De Haro, who extended his kindness to
+American Catholics in their early struggles; or like the illustrious
+Hughes, whose large mind gave us a national life and position. The
+Venerable Gregory Lopez will be new to many, great as was his fame in
+Mexico. Crespel represents the French pioneer clergy at the frontiers in
+colonial times—a man who saw rough life by sea and land in his missionary
+career. Father Mathew needs no comment. The likeness is speaking and fine.
+What part Catholics bore in the days of the Revolution we see in the
+sketch of Charles Carroll of Carrollton, illustrated with a portrait and a
+view of the old mansion. With his cousin, a priest, he was laboring to
+make our cause continental before the Declaration of Independence was
+debated in Congress.
+
+Mrs. Seton, as the lady of wealth and influence in New York society, while
+Washington as President resided there, shows the wonderful hand of
+Providence. Who that saw that young wife then could have said that she
+would be the foundress of a Catholic sisterhood, and not be deemed insane?
+Mother Julia, foundress of the Sisters of Notre Dame, whom some people may
+have heard of, and whose schools in this country alone contain sixty
+thousand pupils.
+
+Next comes the Venerable de la Salle, founder of the Christian Brothers,
+whose pupils in our land, one might say, “no man can number for
+multitude.” The portrait and sketch of this servant of God will be read in
+thousands of American families which owe the Christian training of their
+boys to his devoted community of Brothers; and, happily in the same work,
+we have a portrait and sketch of the brilliant Gerald Griffin, who closed
+his days as a Christian Brother.
+
+The view of old S. Mary’s, the cradle of Maryland, the Catholic settlement
+founded by the Ark and Dove, is alone worth all the _Almanac_ costs. And
+this is but a portion of its contents. We have a stirring incident of the
+early missions, the Rock of Cashel, the Church of Icolmkill, the
+Cathedrals of Sienna and Chartres.
+
+Every Catholic of means should feel it a bounden duty to order a number of
+copies of this _Almanac_, and distribute them among the families less
+likely to hear of its merits. In this way much is yet to be done in the
+diffusion of popular Catholic literature. Our laity have to feel that
+there is an apostolate incumbent upon them. _Fas est et ab hoste doceri._
+
+
+    TRADITION. Principally with reference to Mythology and the Law of
+    Nations. By Lord Arundell of Wardour. London: Burns, Oates & Co.
+    (New York: Sold by The Catholic Publication Society.)
+
+
+This is a work in which the chronologies, mythologies, and fragmentary
+traditions of many nations are gathered together and made to do service in
+the cause of Revelation.
+
+The opponents of revealed truth not unfrequently assume this department of
+knowledge to be their exclusive possession—they have been foremost in
+working this mine, all it contains is theirs, and must be made to sustain
+their theories. Lord Arundell’s book shows how utterly groundless is this
+assumption. Here we have facts and figures, arguments and inferences,
+taken from their own writings, which go to establish the truthfulness of
+the sacred Scriptures from the very standpoint whence it has been sought
+to convict them of falsehood. The first chapter in Genesis is a key to
+every cosmogony. The rudest code of barbaric laws bears some impress of
+the Almighty Finger of Sinai. Traditions, however distant and vague, point
+in one general direction. These facts have long since been established.
+Lord Arundell proves them anew, and brings forth much new matter in his
+proofs. Indeed, while in many books we often have occasion to note the
+absence of data and ideas, this, we may say, is crowded with both.
+
+We doubt not that this book will forward greatly the interests of truth,
+and thus the zeal and devotion of its noble author will be fully requited.
+
+
+    GOD AND MAN. Conferences delivered at Notre Dame in Paris. By the
+    Rev. Père Lacordaire, of the Order of Friar‐Preachers. Translated
+    from the French by a Tertiary of the same Order. London:
+    Rivingtons. (New York: Sold by The Catholic Publication Society.)
+
+
+The translator has already given us two volumes of the great Dominican’s
+Conferences, and promises more in the same readable form. Persons as yet
+unacquainted with Lacordaire will find his papers kindle their enthusiasm
+beyond, perhaps, those of any other author—that is, if they can at all
+appreciate the originality of his argument, together with his giant grasp
+of thought and diction. And especially do we commend these conferences to
+earnest thinkers outside the church, with whom the supernatural is the
+question of questions.
+
+Indebted as we are to the translator, he must not think us hypercritical
+if we complain of bad punctuation, a comma being sometimes found where a
+colon or even a full stop ought to be; or if we take leave to remind him
+that, to render French idiomatically, it will not do to preserve the
+sudden changes of tense which are forcible in that language, as in Latin,
+but sound very strangely in English.
+
+
+    THE HYMNARY, WITH TUNES: A Collection of Music for Sunday‐Schools.
+    By S. Lasar. New York and Chicago: Biglow & Main.
+
+
+We could recommend this hymn‐book to Catholic schools, and, on account of
+its intrinsic worth, would have been glad to do so, if the compiler had
+excluded the few hymns, of no special merit in themselves or in the tunes
+adapted to them, which are anti‐Catholic in doctrine. Poison is dangerous,
+and we cannot offer it even in the smallest quantities to our children.
+
+
+    THE ISSUES OF AMERICAN POLITICS. By Orrin Skinner, Philadelphia:
+    J. B. Lippincott & Co. 1873.
+
+
+Attracted by the title of this book, the fact of its dedication to a
+distinguished citizen of New York, and by its comprehensive table of
+contents, we took it up and read it from cover to cover. In all candor, we
+must say a more confused, ungrammatical, and shallower book it has seldom
+fallen to our lot to peruse; and why any respectable publishing house
+should have been induced to bring it out in such good style, or in any
+form at all, passes our comprehension. To grapple with the great issues of
+our American politics, to state each leading question clearly and fairly,
+and to draw deductions therefrom that will stand the test of justice and
+reason is a task requiring infinitely more experience, judicial ability,
+and knowledge of our language than the author displays or evidently ever
+will possess. Judging from this production, Mr. Skinner has not the
+faintest conception of the principles upon which rests the framework of
+our government. Though a lawyer, he is sadly ignorant of law as a science;
+and, though ambitious of authorship, he seems unable to write a paragraph
+intelligibly. For instance, take the following, snatched at random:
+
+“The deduction from this criticism constitutes, of course, an advocacy of
+intelligent suffrage. The plea is here urged that an unrestricted suffrage
+is its own incentive to the education of those who exercise it. The
+assertion betrays an unpardonable ignorance of one of the most prominent
+characteristics of human nature. Frail humanity is so constituted that,
+when it has presented to it two ways of effecting its purposes, one with
+effort and the other without, it invariably chooses the latter. Equality
+as a fundamental element of republican institutions is also urged, Let
+such a sciolist read his conviction in the quotations from Burke already
+cited.”
+
+It were, however, useless to further attempt to criticise this most
+pretentious and least readable of books, and the best wish we can afford
+the author, and one that we have no doubt will be gratified, is that it
+will be read by few and soon forgotten.
+
+
+    A MANUAL OF AMERICAN LITERATURE: A Text‐Book for Schools and
+    Colleges. By John S. Hart, LL.D. Philadelphia: Eldridge & Bro.
+    1873.
+
+
+Mr. Hart has gathered considerable fresh material on American literature
+in this volume. There is still much which he has omitted. With the same
+industry and care which he has already bestowed on this manual, he may
+render it complete. There is a personality in some of his remarks which is
+uncalled for. In spite of these defects, this is the best work of the kind
+with which we are acquainted.
+
+
+    THE MARBLE PROPHECY, AND OTHER POEMS. By J. G. Holland. New York:
+    Scribner, Armstrong & Co.
+
+
+When our holy church, with its venerated head, its divine sacraments and
+sacred ceremonies, is chosen by a writer of merit as the object upon which
+he feels himself moved to pour forth his scathing abuse or stinging
+ridicule, we bear his ponderous strokes or parry his keen thrusts as best
+we may, confessing to the pardonable weakness of feeling complimented at
+being called to the lists by an adversary of some strength of arm or
+sharpness of weapon; but, when one from the common crowd of chance‐
+assembled knights, like our quondam _Timothy Titcomb_, presumes
+unchallenged to invite the attention of that respectable audience—the
+American public—to _his_ little tilt against the giant of centuries, and,
+in his overeagerness to take a share in the fray, disports himself upon
+such a sorry steed as the “Marble Prophecy,” laden with “other poems” as a
+makeweight, we at once look about us to see if we have not a serviceable
+cane at hand for the use of the same discriminating public, _et voila!_
+
+
+    ROUNDABOUT RAMBLES IN LANDS OF FACT AND FANCY. By Frank R.
+    Stockton. 1 vol. small 4to. New York: Scribner, Armstrong & Co.
+
+
+This is an instructive work, compiled with much judgment and good taste
+from various authors, and is beautifully illustrated, making it a very
+desirable holiday present for the young folk.
+
+
+    NIAGARA: Its History and Geology, Incidents and Poetry. With
+    illustrations. By George W. Holley. New York: Sheldon & Co. 1872.
+
+
+This is something more than a mere _Murray_, or guide‐book, at the same
+time that it serves as a valuable reference to the intelligent tourist.
+Besides some historical and topographical descriptions, for which he draws
+on the works of Shea, Parkman, Marshall, the Relations of the Early Jesuit
+Missionaries, and State Documents, in addition to his own observations, he
+indulges in some geological speculations which will attract the attention
+of scientific readers. The whole is interspersed with anecdotes,
+incidents, and poetical scraps which will serve to relieve the tedium of
+travel, and hotel life.
+
+
+    A HIDDEN LIFE, AND OTHER POEMS. By George Macdonald, LL.D., Author
+    of “Within and Without,” “Wilfred Cumbermede,” etc. New York:
+    Scribner, Armstrong & Co. 1872.
+
+
+There is true poetry in this volume. The author possesses, in our
+judgment, powers of a high order. His mind, too, is of a deeply religious
+cast; and we wonder how he can remain a Protestant after his struggles
+with doubt on the one hand, as shown in the poem of “The Disciple,” and
+his attractions to Catholicity on the other, as evinced especially in his
+poem on “The Gospel Woman,” and most in the opening one, “The Mother
+Mary.” But then he has a laudatory sonnet “To Garibaldi.”
+
+The “Catholic Publication Society” has in press, and will publish
+simultaneously with its appearance in England, from advance sheets
+furnished by the author, a new work, entitled, _My Clerical Friends_, by
+the author of _The Comedy of Convocation_. This will be the only
+authorized edition published in this country.
+
+
+
+Books and Pamphlets Received.
+
+
+From KREUZER BROTHERS, Baltimore: The Catholic Priest. By Michael Müller,
+C.SS.R. 18mo, pp. 163.—The “Our Father.” By the same. 18mo, pp. 221.
+
+From J. A. MCGEE, New York: Sister Mary Francis’ (the Nun of Kenmare)
+Advice to Irish Girls in America. 12mo, pp. 201.
+
+From BURNS, OATES & CO., London: Reflections and Prayers for Holy
+Communion. From the French. With a preface by Archbishop Manning. (New
+York: Sold by The Catholic Publication Society.) 18mo, pp. xii., 498.
+
+From R. WASHBURNE, London: A Dogmatic Catechism. From the Italian of
+Frassinetti. (New York: Sold by The Catholic Publication Society.) 18mo,
+pp. xix., 244.
+
+From JAMES DUFFY, Dublin: Sermons on Ecclesiastical Subjects. By Henry
+Edward Manning, D.D. (New York: Sold by The Catholic Publication Society.)
+pp. viii., 456.
+
+From GEORGE ROUTLEDGE & SONS, New York: The Moral of Accidents, and other
+Discourses. By the late Thomas T. Lynch. 12mo, pp. xviii., 415.
+
+From T. & T. CLARK, Edinburgh, and SCRIBNER, WELFORD & ARMSTRONG, New
+York: Biblical Commentary on the Books of the Kings. By C. F. Keil. 8vo,
+pp. viii., 523—Sermons from 1828 to 1860. By the late Wm. Cunningham, D.D.
+8vo, pp. xxxvi, 416.—The Old Catholic Church. By W. D. Killen, D.D. 8vo,
+pp. xx., 411.—Biblical Commentary on the Book of Psalms. By F. Deleutzsch,
+D.D. Vol. III. 8vo, pp. 420.
+
+From HOLT & WILLIAMS, New York: Fly Leaves by C. S. C. 12mo, pp. vi., 233.
+
+From the AUTHOR: Key to the Massoretic Notes, Titles, and Index generally
+found in the margin of the Hebrew Bible. Translated from the Latin of A.
+Hahn. With many additions and corrections. By Alex. Merowitz, A.M.,
+Professor of the Hebrew language and literature in the University of New
+York. New York: J. Wiley & Son. 8vo, paper, pp. 22.
+
+From ELDREDGE & BROTHER, Philadelphia: A French Verb Book. By E. Lagarde,
+A.M. 12mo, pp. 130.
+
+From P. O’SHEA, New York: Month of the Holy Rosary. By Rev. P. M. Chery,
+O.P. 18mo, pp. iv., 200—The Scapular of Mount Carmel. By Rev. P. Tissot,
+S.J. 24mo, pp. 105.
+
+From the AUTHOR: The Irish Republic. A Historical Memoir of Ireland and
+her Oppressors. By P. Cudmore, Counsellor‐at‐Law. St. Paul: Pioneer
+Printing Company, 1871.
+
+
+
+
+
+THE CATHOLIC WORLD. VOL. XVI., NO. 94.—JANUARY, 1873.
+
+
+
+
+A Son Of The Crusaders.
+
+
+    ... “On his breast a bloodie crosse he bore,
+    The deare remembrance of his dying Lord,
+    For whose sweete sake that glorious badge he wore,
+    And dead, as living, ever him ador’d:
+    Upon his shield the like was also scor’d.
+    For soveraine hope which in his helpe he had,
+    Right faithful true he was in deede and word.”—SPENSER.
+
+
+One day in the month of November, 1833, a stranger descended from the
+lumbering _Schnellpost_ at the little town of Marburg (Electoral Hesse),
+on the pleasant banks of the Lahn. Looking around him, he discovered but a
+single object of interest—the old cathedral of the place, a noble Gothic
+edifice, which, although stripped and cold in its modern dedication to the
+Lutheran service, still preserved the salient features of its inalienable
+beauty and majesty of form.
+
+The traveller, a young man of twenty‐three, a Catholic, and an enthusiast
+in his intelligent and cultivated admiration of the grand architecture of
+his church, recognized in the building a monument celebrated at once for
+its pure and perfect beauty, and the first in Germany in which the pointed
+arch prevailed over the round in the great renovation of art in the XIIIth
+century.
+
+Contrary to Lutheran observance, the church happened on that day to be
+open, in compliance with a traditional custom, for the cathedral bore the
+name of S. Elizabeth, and this was S. Elizabeth’s Day. The stranger
+entered. There was no religious service. There were no worshippers, and
+children were at play among the old tombs. He wandered through the vast
+and desolate aisles, which not even the devastation and neglect of
+centuries had robbed of their marvellous elegance. Naked altars from which
+no ministering hand now wiped the dust, pillars, defaced statues, nearly
+obliterated paintings, broken and defaced wood carvings, successively
+struck his eye and attracted his attention. All these remains of Christian
+art, even in their ruin telling the story of their origin in days of fresh
+and fervent faith, appeared also to picture in a certain sequence the
+events of some devout life. Here was the statue of a young woman in the
+dress of a widow; further on, in painting, a frightened girl showing to a
+crowned warrior her robe filled with roses; yet further, these two, the
+young woman and the warrior, tearing themselves in anguish from a parting
+embrace. Again, the lady is seen stretched on her bed of death amidst
+weeping attendants, and, later, an emperor lays his crown on her freshly
+exhumed coffin.
+
+It was explained to the traveller that these pictured incidents were
+events in the life of S. Elizabeth, queen of that country, who, that very
+day six hundred years ago, had died in Marburg and lay buried in the
+church. A silver shrine, richly sculptured, was shown to him. It had once
+enclosed the relics of the saint, but one of her descendants, turned
+Protestant, had torn them from it, and scattered them to the winds. The
+stone steps approaching the shrine were deeply hollowed by the countless
+pilgrims who, more than three centuries agone, had come here to kneel in
+prayer. “Alas!” thought the stranger, “the faith which left its impress on
+the cold stone has left none upon human hearts!”
+
+He desired to know more of the saintly patroness of Marburg’s cathedral,
+and leaving the church sought out a bookseller, and asked for a life of S.
+Elizabeth. The man stared at him, bethought himself a moment, and then
+went up into a garret, from which he presently emerged with a dust‐covered
+pamphlet. “Here it is,” he said, “the only copy I have: no one ever asked
+for it before.”
+
+The traveller resumed his journey, reading his pamphlet to beguile the
+tedium of his way. Although written by a Protestant in a cold,
+unsympathizing, matter‐of‐fact way, the essential charm of its mere record
+of youthful self‐devotion laid a powerful spell upon him. His artistic
+enthusiasm, his heart, his piety, were all touched and aroused. Just
+emerging in sorrow from one of the most trying ordeals of the battle of
+life, with repelled longings and disappointed hopes, his pent‐up youthful
+energies were now seeking some outlet for escape, some fresh field of
+action. Uncertain what this field, this outlet, might be, he had vowed
+that, with the choice before him of several different objects to pursue,
+he would decide for that which was the most Catholic. He had found it. “To
+S. Elizabeth he would,” in his own words, “sacrifice his fatigue and his
+hopes.” He would write her life, and strive to place on record its
+touching story—at once a tender love‐legend, a page of mediæval romance,
+and the hallowed tradition of a saintly career. At the first stopping‐
+place he left the diligence, and, taking a return carriage, went
+immediately back to Marburg.
+
+This traveller, this young stranger, was Charles, Count de Montalembert,
+peer of France. His sudden impulse, his enthusiastic vow, were not as
+words written in water. To what would at this day seem to many an
+inconsiderate, quixotic rashness, succeeded the deliberate realization of
+an undertaking full of labor and difficulty. He ransacked libraries,
+sought out chronicles, legends, and popular traditions, read old books and
+long‐forgotten manuscripts, and travelled far and wide throughout Germany,
+wherever a locality offered the attraction of the slightest association
+with the name of S. Elizabeth. The charm and fascination of his theme grew
+upon him with every additional fact he learned regarding her. Beginning at
+the famous old castle of Wartburg, where Elizabeth came a child, the
+daughter of a race of kings, from distant Hungary, he made a veritable
+pilgrimage, taking for his route the itinerary of his heroine’s life—to
+Kreuzburg; to Reinhartsbrünn, where, a young wife and mother of twenty,
+she parted in anguish from her husband, a crusader setting out for
+Palestine; to Bamberg, where she was driven by persecution; to Andechs, to
+Erfurth, and finally to Marburg, “whither,” as he says, “he returned to
+pray by her desecrated tomb, and to gather with pain and difficulty some
+remembrance of her from the mouths of a people who have renounced with the
+faith of their fathers the regard due to their benefactress.”
+
+Bow down your heads, O generation of stockbrokers and speculators in
+provisions and railway shares, to the memory of this Montalembert, who, in
+the flower of his youthful manhood, for years went up and down the world
+with an idea in his head and heart!
+
+But this book, this life of S. Elizabeth. you object, was, after all, a
+mere pious legend of dubious trustworthiness? On the contrary, it was a
+work of the highest value, even judged by the severest canons of
+historical criticism. Its introduction alone is sufficient to make the
+work classic. Sainte‐Beuve, high academic and critical authority, calls it
+majestic,(186) and reviewers of all nations have contributed their
+verdicts of approval.
+
+This was Montalembert’s first literary production—a success, as it
+deserved to be, worthy forerunner of his yet greater work, _The Monks of
+the West_, and the first‐fruit of a splendid literary and oratorical
+career, whose main inspiration was always drawn from the sources of
+Catholic truth and Catholic faith.
+
+Montalembert died in March, 1870, leaving a name and a reputation which
+for all time to come will remain one of the proudest illustrations of
+France.
+
+We are fortunate in already having an admirable memoir of his life,(187)
+written by one of the most distinguished women of England. It cannot but
+be gratifying to all who cherish the memory of Montalembert that the task
+should have fallen into the hands of one so eminently capable as Mrs.
+Oliphant. Personally intimate with his family and on terms of friendship
+with his wife (_née_ Comtesse de Merode), thoroughly familiar with the
+language, modern history, and politics of France, and the successful
+translator of _The Monks of the West_, it would have been difficult to
+find a writer better fitted, in knowledge and in sympathy, to record the
+life of Charles de Montalembert. Let us add here that, for reasons which
+the intelligent reader may easily divine, we are glad that the biography
+has been written by a Protestant. Although to a Catholic reader it would
+be more pleasant to read a life in which nothing could be found which is
+not in perfect harmony with the spirit of faith and loyalty toward the
+church, yet, for the public generally, the testimony of a fair and candid
+Protestant in respect to certain very important events in the career of
+Montalembert will be more free from the suspicion of bias, and therefore
+of more value in establishing the fact of his essential devotion to the
+Holy See to the end of his life.
+
+We trust that the ladies of Sorosis and of the various wings and vanguards
+of the grand army of “The Rights of Women” will not take offence if we
+endeavor to compliment Mrs. Oliphant by saying that we especially admire
+the style in which her memoir is written, for a tone and quality
+which—turn whither we may—we cannot otherwise describe than as “manly.”
+Making due allowance for the almost inevitable partiality of the
+biographer for his hero, there is a directness, a solidity, a sound
+common‐sense view of practical questions, and an absence of mere
+sentimentality, all eminently to her credit and in admirable keeping with
+the dignity of her subject. Mrs. Oliphant’s modesty, too, equals her
+ability. Referring to her translation of _The Monks of the West_, she
+tells us: “We are sorry to add, to our personal humiliation, that
+Montalembert was by no means so much satisfied with at least the first
+part of the translation. He acknowledged that the meaning was faithfully
+rendered; ‘but,’ he wrote, ‘I cannot admire the constant use of French or
+Latin words instead of your own vernacular. My Anglo‐Saxon feelings are
+wounded to the quick by the useless admission of the article _the_ or _a_;
+and by such words as _chagrin_ instead of _grief_, _malediction_ instead
+of _curse_, etc.’ The proofs of the translation came back from him laden
+with corrections in red ink—a circumstance which communicated to them a
+certain additional sharpness, at least to the troubled imagination of the
+translator; and the present writer may be perhaps allowed here to avow in
+her own person that up to this present moment, when she happens to have
+the smallest French phrase to translate, she pauses with instinctive
+alarm, hastily substituting _freedom_ for _liberty_ when the word occurs;
+and will cast about in her mind, with a certain sensation of fright, how
+to find words for _authority_, _corruption_, _intelligence_, etc., in
+other than the French form.”
+
+Charles Forbes René de Montalembert was born in London on the 15th of May,
+1810. His father was a noble French _emigré_; his mother, the daughter of
+James Forbes, an Englishman of distinction. The first nine years of his
+life were spent principally in England under the immediate care and in the
+personal companionship of his maternal grandfather, and, dating from this
+period, the English language was always to him a second mother tongue. At
+the age of fourteen we find him at the college of S. Barbe in Paris. The
+fact may be discouraging to many young gentlemen of the present day now at
+school and in sad possession of a class of ideas too generally accepted,
+to the effect that men become useful and distinguished by reason of the
+possession of some unaided special gift rather than by study and the
+laborious acquisition of knowledge—we say the fact may be discouraging to
+them, but nevertheless it remains a fact that the young Montalembert laid
+the foundation of his future distinction as a man of letters, an
+archæologist, a great orator, a great writer, an eminent political leader,
+and the ornament of the Chamber of Peers, in close, unremitting, laborious
+application to his studies while at school. After he had completed his
+college course and entered society, we find him writing to a friend: “It
+is usual to say that youth is the time for the pleasures of society. I
+look upon this opinion as a complete paradox. It seems to me, on the
+contrary, that youth should be given up with ardor to study, or to
+preparation for a profession. When a young man has paid his tribute to his
+country; when he can appear in society crowned with the laurels of debate
+or of the battle‐field, or at least of universal esteem; when he feels
+entitled to command respect, if not admiration—then is the time to enter
+society with satisfaction.”
+
+Soon there came for him the period of _illusions perdues_, which,
+commencing with the entrance into life of every intelligent and ambitious
+young man, accompanies him with more or less persistence to the edge of
+the grave. Young Montalembert spent some time in Sweden, at whose court
+his father was the ambassador of Charles X. On his return to France, he
+wrote an article upon that country which M. Guizot, the editor of the
+_Revue Française_, advised him to cut down to half its length. He
+complied, sent in his abbreviated article, and the editor suppressed the
+best portion of what remained!
+
+About this time he met Lamartine, became intimate with Victor Hugo, “then
+the poet of all sweet and virtuous things,” and numbered among his friends
+Sainte‐Beuve, who then shared Montalembert’s religious enthusiasm and his
+belief that Europe was to be regenerated by the church. Ireland, too, came
+in for a full share of his sympathy. He wrote an article on that country
+which Guizot allowed to go in entire. A friend tells him that his article
+on Sweden is dull, and that on Ireland commonplace. “Disappointing,”
+writes the young author in his diary, “but better than if my friend had
+praised me insincerely.” O’Connell, then in the fulness of his powers and
+his popularity, greatly attracted him. He would go all the way to Ireland
+to see him. And he did. Crossing the two channels, and traversing England,
+he made the journey over the mountains of Kerry on horseback, with a
+little Irish boy for his guide. He visited O’Connell at Derrynane,
+prepared and anxious to discuss with him the great subjects which filled
+his mind. The Liberator received him kindly, and after dinner—looking at
+the ingenuous face of twenty before him—did what he thought precisely the
+proper thing to do—ushered him at once into the drawing‐room, where the
+young count was thrown on the tender mercies of a crowd of pretty and gay
+young Irish women. _Encore une illusion perdue!_ He had crossed seas and
+mountains to discuss freedom, the church, English rule and Irish
+emancipation, with Ireland’s greatest man, who, without listening to a
+word from him, thrust him into another room amid a bevy of laughing girls!
+
+After Montalembert’s return from Ireland came his intimacy with Lacordaire
+and Lamennais, and the joint literary enterprise of the three in the
+establishment of the _Avenir_, whose motto was “God and Liberty.” Its
+first number was issued Oct. 15, 1830. We will not dwell on its history,
+so familiar to all Catholics, except to refer to the holy war waged by it
+and its friends against the monopoly of education by the government. Under
+the law, every private school, every educational institution not licensed
+and regulated by the University of Paris, was absolutely forbidden. Utter
+irreligiousness then pervaded the colleges and schools of France. The
+generation which passed through those schools bears witness to their evil
+influences, and confirms Lacordaire’s own record, who says that he left
+college “with religion destroyed in his soul,” and that he, like almost
+all the youths of his period, “lost his faith at school.”
+
+Montalembert’s picture of these evil influences was everywhere recognized
+as truthful. “Is there a single establishment of the university where a
+Christian child can live in the exercise of faith? Does not a contagious
+doubt, a cold and tenacious impiety, reign over all these young souls whom
+she pretends to instruct? Are they not too often either polluted, or
+petrified, or frozen? Is not the most flagrant, the most monstrous, the
+most unnatural immorality inscribed in the records of every college, and
+in the recollections of every child who has passed as much as eight days
+there?”
+
+To test the law forbidding freedom in education, Lacordaire and
+Montalembert opened a free school for poor children at Paris in the Rue
+des Arts. They were indicted for the offence, and tried at the bar of the
+Chamber of Peers. The audience, as may well be imagined, was made up from
+the nobility and intelligence of the land. The prisoners defended their
+cause in person. Lacordaire, who spoke first, referred to the fact that
+the government had lately impeached the previous ministers by virtue of
+power in the charter not reduced to a special law. “If they could do it,
+so could I,” said the brave priest, “with this difference, that they asked
+blood, while I desired to give a free education to the children of the
+poor.” He ended by recalling to his judges the example of Socrates “in the
+first struggle for freedom to preach.” “In that _cause célèbre_ by which
+Socrates fell,” said Lacordaire, “he was evidently culpable against the
+gods, and in consequence against the laws of his country. Nevertheless,
+posterity, both pagan and Christian, has stigmatized his judges and
+accusers; and of all concerned have absolved only the culprit and the
+executioner—the culprit, because he had failed to keep the laws of Athens
+only in obedience to a higher law; and the executioner, because he
+presented the cup to the victim with tears.”
+
+With this proud and plain warning ringing in their ears, the judges next
+heard Montalembert. He was just twenty‐one, and by the recent death of his
+father but a few weeks in his place as a peer of France. Sainte‐Beuve saw
+that his youth, his ease and grace, the elegant precision of his style and
+diction, veiled the fact that it was a prisoner—not a peer—who spoke, and
+his judges were the first to forget it.
+
+“The entire chamber listened with a surprise which was not without
+pleasure to the young man’s bold self‐justification. From that day M. de
+Montalembert, though formally condemned, was borne in the very heart of
+the peerage—he was its Benjamin.” The sentence was a gentle reprimand and
+a mild fine of a hundred francs.
+
+The _Avenir_, it will be remembered, had incurred no censure from Rome.
+Nevertheless, it had not prospered, and it was resolved by its founders
+that they would appeal to the head of the church for his explicit
+approval. Accordingly, the publication of the paper was suspended, and its
+last number announced “with pomp,” as Lacordaire says, that “the purpose
+of its editors was to suspend it until they had gone to Rome to seek
+sanction and authority for its continuation.” The biographer well remarks
+that “neither from primitive Ireland nor romantic Poland had such an
+expedition set forth.” They asked the head of the church “to commit
+himself, to sanction a new and revolutionary movement, to bless the very
+banners of revolt, and acknowledge as pioneers of his army the
+ecclesiastical Ishmaels who had carried fire and flame everywhere during
+their brief career.” There could, of course, be but one result—failure.
+The _Avenir_ was condemned. Lacordaire and Montalembert at once submitted
+to the decision. Poor de Lamennais did not, and unhappily persisted in his
+sad mistake. In connection with this subject, we cannot here refrain from
+repeating at length some reflections which, coming as they do from an
+intelligent Protestant, have a peculiar force and value.
+
+They are from the pen of Montalembert’s biographer, and present so
+admirable, so eloquent a _résumé_ of the question of apostasy, that we
+have not the heart to curtail the passage containing them by so much as
+the omission of a single word:
+
+
+    “Except at the Reformation, when the great overflow of spiritual
+    rebellion was favored by such a combination of circumstances as
+    has never occurred since, no man or group of men have succeeded in
+    rebelling against Rome, and yet continued to keep up a religious
+    character and influence. No man has been able to do it, whatever
+    the excellence of his beginning might be, or the purity of the
+    motives with which he started. Even in the Church of England the
+    career of a man who separates himself from her communion is
+    generally a painful one. He makes a commotion and excitement in
+    the world for a time before he has fully made up his mind; and at
+    the moment of his withdrawal he is sure of remark and notice, at
+    all events, from certain classes. But after that brief moment he
+    sinks flat as the spirits do in the _Inferno_, and the dark wave
+    pours over him, and he is heard of no more. All that sustained and
+    strengthened and gave him a fictitious importance as the member of
+    a great corporation has fallen away from him. He has dropped like
+    a stone into the water—like a foundered ship into the sea. In
+    England, however, after all has been done, there is a sea of
+    dissent to drop into, and though his new surroundings may please
+    him little, yet he will come out of the giddiness of his downfall
+    to take some comfort in them—will accustom himself by degrees to
+    the lower social level, the different spiritual atmosphere. But he
+    who dissents from the Church of Rome has no such refuge. The
+    moment he steps outside her fold he finds himself in outer
+    darkness, through which awful salutations are shrieked to him by
+    the enemies of religion, by those whom he has avoided and
+    condemned all his life, and with whom he can agree only on the one
+    sole article of rebellion. If he ventures to hold up his head at
+    all after what all his friends will call his apostasy, the best
+    that he can hope for is to be courted by heretics, professed
+    enemies of the church which he has been born in, and which
+    probably he loves most dearly still, notwithstanding his
+    disobedience. To quarrel with your home is one thing—to find its
+    domestic laws hard, and its prejudices insupportable; but to
+    plunge into the midst of the enemies of that home, and to hear it
+    assailed with the virulence of ignorance—to join in gibes against
+    your mother, and mockery of her life and motives—is a totally
+    different matter. Yet this is almost all that a contumacious
+    priest has to look forward to. A recent and striking example, to
+    which we need not refer more plainly, will occur to every one who
+    has watched the contemporary history of the Roman Catholic Church.
+    In this case a brilliant and remarkable preacher—a man supposed
+    the other day to be one of the most eminent and promising sons of
+    Rome—after wavering and falling away in some points from
+    ecclesiastical obedience, suddenly appeared in an admiring circle
+    of gentle Anglicanism, surrounded by a fair crowd of worshipping
+    Protestants, ready to extend to him all that broad and universal
+    sympathy which he had no doubt been trained to regard as vilest
+    latitudinarianism, or the readiness of Pilate to make friends with
+    Herod. This prospect must chill the very soul of a man who has
+    received the true priestly training, and who has been educated in
+    that love of his church which is of itself a noble and generous
+    sentiment. The best thing that can happen to him is to fall among
+    heretics; the other alternative, and the only one, so far as
+    events have yet made it apparent, to fall among infidels: and as
+    his education has taught him to make but small distinction between
+    them, and the infidels are nearer at hand, and his own countrymen,
+    what wonder if it is into their hands that the miserable man, torn
+    from all his ancient foundations, ejected from his natural place,
+    heart‐weary with the madness which is wrought by anger against
+    those we love, should fall—what wonder if he should rush to the
+    furthest extremity, hiding what he feels to be his shame, and
+    endeavoring to take some dismal comfort in utter negation of that
+    past from which he has been torn! Whether there are new
+    developments in the future for the new Protesters whom a recent
+    decision has raised up, we cannot tell. But such has been the case
+    in the past. Life is over for the rebellious priest who breaks
+    with his church; his possibility of service in his vocation has
+    come to an end; even the most careless peasant in his parish will
+    turn from him. He is a deserter from his regiment in the face of
+    the enemy, false to his colors, a man no longer of any human use.”
+
+
+It was during Montalembert’s sojourn in Italy, on his remarkable _Avenir_
+pilgrimage, that he became the intimate friend of Albert de la Ferronays,
+the hero of Mrs. Craven’s beautiful _Récit d’une Sœur_. He appears in the
+book designated under the name of Montal. From the same period, also,
+dates his intimacy with Rio, the future historian of Christian art. The
+young peer’s taste for art, always strong, and his enthusiastic admiration
+of the glorious remains of mediæval architecture, were both developed and
+strengthened under the teaching and influence of Rio. In March, 1833, he
+published an article in the _Revue des Deux Mondes_, in which he
+energetically denounced the desecration and ruin of the grand old
+architectural monuments of France. It was addressed in the form of a
+letter to Victor Hugo, then leader of the Romantic school, who strongly
+sympathized with him on this subject, and whose _Notre Dame de Paris_ had
+been reviewed in the _Avenir_ by Montalembert with enthusiastic praise for
+the grand historical framework of the story. During the autumn of that
+year, Montalembert went to Germany, and, as we have seen, accidentally
+stopped at Marburg. Travel, research, and the collection of materials for
+the life of Elizabeth now engrossed all his time, until, attaining the
+legal age, twenty‐five, he took his seat in the Chamber of Peers. His
+first appearance at the bar of this chamber had been in defence of the
+liberty of teaching, and his first speech was in defence of the liberty of
+the press. These two discourses prefigured his parliamentary career. He
+was always the ardent advocate of liberty; rarely heard on the side of the
+government; and generally the leader of a conscientious and loyal
+opposition: which, well considered, would have been found the most prudent
+adviser of the administration in power.
+
+Strongly imbued with English ideas, he fully appreciated the conservative
+power of an energetic opposition, ever ready to criticise, to question, to
+challenge, or to expose whatever might seem arbitrary or unconstitutional
+in the acts of the government. But this idea of an opposition at once
+loyal and law‐loving, was unfamiliar to his countrymen. To them, as a
+general thing, opposition meant revolution, and to many the spectacle of a
+peer of France, a Catholic, and a _proprietaire_, who was at once the
+friend of the proletaire, the dissenter, the oppressor, and the slave, was
+a paradox. And yet paradox there was none, for his declaration of
+principles was always clear and bold. Thus, in striving to cull from the
+Chamber of Peers a public expression of sympathy for the Poles, he
+insisted that it was their right and their duty to make an avowal of
+national sentiments, an expression of national opinion, that it was an
+obligation imposed by humanity and required by wise policy. “What is it,”
+he asked, “that has raised the British parliament to so high a degree of
+popularity and moral influence in Europe? Is it not because for more than
+a century no grave event has happened in any country without finding an
+echo there? Is it not because no right has been oppressed, no treaty
+broken anywhere, without a discussion on both sides of the question before
+the peers and commons of England, whose assemblies have thus become, in
+the silence of the world, a sort of tribunal where all the great causes of
+humanity are pleaded, and where opinion pronounces those formidable
+judgments which, sooner or later, are always executed?”
+
+And his independence was that of the man as well as of the orator. He was
+committed to no policy, sought no party ends, but always, and at all cost,
+maintained the good, the just, the honorable. A lost or desperate cause,
+if equitable, was always sure of his support. The three oppressed nations
+of the earth, Poland under Russia, Ireland under England, and Greece under
+Turkey, were his most cherished clients. The weaker side ever strongly
+attracted him. “Penetrated by the conviction that just causes are
+everlasting,” says M. Cochin, “and that every protest against injustice
+ends by moving heaven and convincing men, he sought out, so to speak,
+every oppressed cause when at its last breath, to take its burden upon
+himself, and to become its champion. There is a suffering race, a race
+lost in distant isles, the race of black slaves, which has been oppressed
+for centuries. He took its cause in hand, and from the year 1837 labored
+for its emancipation. There are in all manufacturing places a crowd of
+hollow‐cheeked children, with pale faces and worn eyes, and the sight of
+them made a profound impression upon him; he took their cause also in
+hand. If you run over the mere index of his speeches, you will find all
+generous efforts contained in it.”
+
+The year 1836 brought two notable events in the life of Montalembert—the
+publication of his first work, his _Life of S. Elizabeth_, and his
+marriage to a daughter of the noble house of de Merode in Belgium.
+Meantime, he continued his attacks on vandalism in art and his
+parliamentary labors, and was mainly instrumental in the creation of the
+committee of historical art and the commission on historical monuments,
+from both of which he was excluded under the Empire, which no more
+sympathized with his pure conceptions of Christian art than it did with
+his conception of Christian morals.
+
+Rio has recorded the result of the impression made by Montalembert upon
+the English poet Rogers, which admirably illustrates the fact that
+Montalembert’s religion was not a sort of moral “Sunday suit” to be put
+off and on as occasion might require, and at the same time reveals to us
+the old poet in an entirely new aspect. The Montalemberts had spent the
+evening with Rogers, “and after their departure,” Rio relates, “when I
+found myself alone with Rogers, the expression of his countenance, which
+up to that moment had been smiling and animated, changed so suddenly that
+I feared I had offended him by some word of doubtful meaning which I might
+not altogether have understood. He paced about the room without saying
+anything, and I did not know whether I might venture to break this
+incomprehensible silence. At last he broke it himself, and said to me
+that, if he had the power of putting himself in the place of another, he
+would choose that of Montalembert, not on account of his youth and his
+beautiful wife, but because he possessed that immovable and cloudless
+faith that seemed to himself the most enviable of all gifts.”
+
+Mr. Neale advised Montalembert that he had been elected an honorary member
+of the Cambridge Camden Society. On receipt of the news of this
+“unsolicited and unmerited honor,” Montalembert replied in a letter
+protesting against the usurpation of the title “Catholic” by the Camden
+Society. Here are some of its trenchant passages:
+
+
+    “The attempt to steal away from us, and appropriate to the use of
+    a fraction of the Church of England, the glorious title of
+    Catholic, is proved to be an usurpation by every monument of the
+    past and present, by the coronation oath of your sovereigns, by
+    all the laws that have _established_ your church. The name itself
+    is spurned with indignation by the greater half at least of those
+    who belong to the Church of England, just as the Church of England
+    itself is rejected with scorn and detestation by the greater half
+    of the inhabitants of the United Kingdom. The judgment of the
+    whole indifferent world, the common sense of humanity, agrees with
+    the judgment of the Church of Rome, and with the sense of her 150
+    millions of children, to dispossess you of this name. The Church
+    of England, who has denied her mother, is rightly without a
+    sister. She has chosen to break the bonds of unity and obedience.
+    Let her therefore stand alone before the judgment‐seat of God and
+    man. Even the debased Russian Church—that church where lay‐
+    despotism has closed the church’s mouth and turned her into a
+    slave—disdains to recognize the Anglicans as Catholics. Even the
+    Eastern heretics, although so sweetly courted by Puseyite
+    missionaries, sneer at this new and fictitious Catholicism. That
+    the so‐called Anglo‐Catholics, whose very name betrays their
+    usurpation and their contradiction, whose doctrinal articles,
+    whose liturgy, whose whole history, are such as to disconnect them
+    from all mankind except those who are born English and speak
+    English—that they should pretend on the strength of their private
+    judgment alone to be what the rest of mankind deny them to be,
+    will assuredly be ranked among the first follies of the XIXth
+    century.... You may turn aside for three hundred years to come, as
+    you have done for three hundred years past, from the fountain of
+    living waters; but to dig out a small channel of your own, for
+    your own private insular use, wherein the living truth will run
+    apart from its own docile and ever obedient children—_that_ will
+    no more be granted to you than it has been to the Arians, the
+    Nestorians, the Donatists, or any other triumphant heresy. I
+    protest, therefore, against the usurpation of a sacred name by the
+    Camden Society as iniquitous; and I next protest against the
+    object of this society, and all such efforts in the Anglican
+    Church, as absurd.”
+
+
+We now have before us a period of seven years in the life of Montalembert,
+the record of which may be said to be the history of the great public
+questions which then agitated France; so intimately was his entire
+parliamentary career bound up with their development. The first and most
+important of these questions was that of education. Then, as now, the
+examination for the degree of A.B. (_baccalaureat_) was the key to all
+public occupations.
+
+But at that time, from 1830 to 1848, no one had a right to present himself
+for this examination unless he had been educated in one of the public
+_lycées_, or some school licensed by the university, into whose hands the
+government had placed the monopoly of education. A wealthy parent might
+educate a boy under his own supervision in the best universities of
+England or Germany, or by private tutors, yet the youth would not be
+permitted to present himself for examination, although able to pass it
+with ease. And the degree resulting from this examination was the
+essential condition upon which the possibility of a public career was
+opened to every young Frenchman. Without it he could by no possibility be
+admitted to any public employment, the bench or the bar. Ability,
+accomplishments, acquirements, had nothing to do with the question. The
+young man must pass through a state school, or he was for ever debarred
+from a public career in his own country. But to pass through a state
+school, as all Christian parents, both Catholic and Protestant, then well
+knew in France, was to leave it with the loss of his religious principles.
+The biographer may well find it “equally incredible that such restrictions
+should have been borne by any people, and that a government founded upon
+liberal principles and erected by revolution should have dared to maintain
+them; but so it was.”
+
+The parliamentary campaign on the educational question opened in 1844.
+Discussion soon reached a point of warmth. “There is one result given
+under the auspices of the university,” said Montalembert, “which governs
+every other, and which is as clear as daylight. It is that children who
+leave their family with the seed of faith in them, to enter the
+university, come out of it infidels.” The contradictions and _mouvement_
+incited by this statement pushed the orator to more emphatic statement. “I
+appeal,” he said, “to the testimony of all fathers and mothers. Let us
+take any ten children out of the schools regulated by the university, at
+the end of their studies, and find one Christian among them if you can.
+One in ten! and that would be a prodigy. I address myself not to such or
+such a religious belief, but to all. Catholics, Protestants, Jews, all who
+believe humbly and sincerely in the religion which they possess, it is to
+them I appeal, whom I recognize as my brethren. And all those who have a
+sincere belief, and practise it, will confirm what I have said of the
+religious results of the education of the university. Let us hear the
+testimony of the young and eloquent defender of French Protestantism, the
+son of our colleague M. Agenor de Gasparin.... ‘Religious education,’ he
+says, ‘has no existence in the colleges.... I bethink myself with terror
+what I was when I issued forth from this national education. I recollect
+what all my companions were. Were we very good citizens? I know not, but
+certainly we were not Christians; we did not possess even the weakest
+beginnings of evangelical faith.’ ”
+
+The results of the French compulsory anti‐Christian education may be read
+in current history. “The men it has brought up are the men who allowed
+France to be bound for eighteen years in the humiliating bondage of the
+Second Empire; who have furnished excuses to all the world for calling her
+the most socially depraved of nations; who have filled her light
+literature with abominations, and her graver works with blasphemy; and who
+have finally procured for her national downfall and humiliation.”
+
+Montalembert planted his little band in battle array against the compact
+and overwhelming forces of the government, under the inspiration and
+trumpet‐tongued tones of his admirable _fils des croisés_ speech in the
+Chamber of Peers. Here, with its memorable termination, are a few passages
+from it. We regret we cannot give it entire. “Allow me to tell you,
+gentlemen, a generation has arisen among you of men whom you know not. Let
+them call us Neo‐Catholics, sacristans, ultramontanes, as you will; the
+name is nothing; the thing exists. We take for our motto that with which
+the generous Poles in the last century headed their manifesto of
+resistance to the Empress Catherine: ‘We, who love freedom more than all
+the world, and the Catholic religion more than freedom,’ ... are we to
+acknowledge ourselves so degenerated from the condition of our fathers,
+that we must give up our reason to rationalism, deliver our conscience to
+the university, our dignity and our freedom into the hands of law‐makers
+whose hatred for the freedom of the church is equalled only by their
+profound ignorance of her rights and her doctrines?... You are told to be
+_implacable_. Be so; do all that you will and can against us. The church
+will answer you by the mouth of Tertullian and the gentle Fénelon. ‘You
+have nothing to fear from us; but we do not fear you.’ And I add in the
+name of Catholic laymen like myself, Catholics of the XIXth century: We
+will not be helots in the midst of a free people. WE ARE THE SUCCESSORS OF
+THE MARTYRS, AND WE DO NOT TREMBLE BEFORE THE SUCCESSORS OF JULIAN THE
+APOSTATE. WE ARE THE SONS OF THE CRUSADERS, AND WE WILL NEVER YIELD TO THE
+PROGENY OF VOLTAIRE!”
+
+“_Mouvements divers_” might well—according to the reported proceedings of
+the day—follow this burst of indignant eloquence. The words made the very
+air of France tingle; they defined at once the two sides with one of those
+happy strokes which make the fortune of a party, and which are doubly dear
+to all who speak the language of epigram—the most brilliantly clear,
+incisive, and distinct of tongues. Henceforward the _fils des croisés_
+were a recognized power, but they were only known and heard by and through
+Montalembert, and, so far as the public struggle was concerned, might be
+said to exist in him alone. Montalembert fought almost single‐handed. “The
+attitude of this one man between that phalanx of resolute opponents and
+the shifty mass of irresolute followers, is as curious and interesting as
+any political position ever was. He stands before us turning from one to
+the other, never wearied, never flagging, maintaining an endless brilliant
+debate, now with one set of objectors, now with another, prompt with his
+answers to every man’s argument, rapid as lightning in his sweep upon
+every man’s fallacy: now proclaiming himself the representative of the
+Catholics in France, and pouring forth his claim for them as warm, as
+urgent, as vehement as though a million of men were at his back: and now
+turning upon these very Catholics with keen reproaches, with fiery
+ridicule, with stinging darts of contempt for their weakness. Thus he
+fought single‐handed, confronting the entire world. Nothing daunted him,
+neither failure nor abuse, neither the resentment of his enemies, nor the
+languor of his friends, ... not always parliamentary in his language, bold
+enough to say everything, as his adversaries reproached him, yet never
+making a false accusation or imputing a mean motive. No one hotter in
+assault, none more tremendous in the onslaught; but he did not know what
+it was to strike a stealthy or back‐handed blow.”
+
+Time has strange revenges. In April, 1849, came up the important question
+of the _inamovibilité de la magistrature_—the appointment for life of
+magistrates. His old enemies were delighted to find that Montalembert
+declared himself unreservedly in the affirmative, and none more than M.
+Dupin, the very man who uttered the memorable “_Soyez implacables_.” Again
+he had the government to contend with, for under the law magistrates were
+no longer irremovable. Montalembert proposed, as an amendment, that all
+magistrates in office should be reappointed, and that all new appointments
+should be made for life. He pointed out the evils of a system which made
+judgeships tenable only from one revolution to another, and made a noble
+office the object of a “hunt” for promotion dishonoring to all parties. He
+spoke of the magistracy as the priesthood (_sacerdoce_) of justice, and
+added: “Allow me to pause a moment upon the word priesthood, which I have
+just employed. Of all the weaknesses and follies of the times in which we
+live, there is none more hateful to me than the conjunction of expressions
+and images borrowed from religion with the most profane facts and ideas.
+But I acknowledge that our old and beautiful French language, the immortal
+and intelligent interpreter of the national good sense, has, by a
+marvellous instinct, assimilated religion and justice. It has always said:
+_The temples of the law, the sanctuary of justice, the priesthood of the
+magistracy_.” The cause was won by his eloquence, and thus the first
+political success he ever gained was not for himself or his friends, but
+for his enemies. Truly a fitting triumph for a son of the crusaders.
+
+The peerage now being abolished, Montalembert was returned as deputy to
+the National Assembly by the Department of Doubs. Here his career was, if
+possible, yet more brilliant than in the Chamber of Peers. It would
+require a volume fitly to record them. Soon came the presidency of Louis
+Bonaparte. Himself the soul of honor, with an eye single to the welfare of
+France, deceived by solemn assurances which he unfortunately credited,
+unsuspicious of a depth of treachery which he could not conceive, and
+alarmed by the horrible spectre of socialism, just arising from its native
+blood and mire, Montalembert became the dupe and the victim of Louis
+Napoleon. When power had been fully secured, the new president offered him
+the position of senator, along with the _dotation_ of 30,000 francs, which
+was refused without hesitation. A second and a third time the offer was
+renewed, the last offer being urged by De Morny in person. The only
+position he held under the government of Louis Napoleon was the nominal
+one of a member of the Consultative Commission, which he resigned on the
+publication of the decree for the confiscation of the property of the
+House of Orleans. He had already begun to suffer from the attacks of the
+disease to which he finally succumbed; and it was from his sick‐bed that
+he went to receive at the hands of the French Academy the highest and most
+dearly prized reward of French talent and genius. Montalembert was elected
+to the seat in the Academy vacated by the death of M. Droz, and his
+reception was an event. Being now freed from the absorbing engagements of
+life, he made several journeys to England, and travelled into Hungary,
+Poland, and Spain. His work entitled _L’Avenir Politique de l’Angleterre_
+was the fruit of his English visits; and was well received both in France
+and England. In October, 1858, the Paris _Correspondant_ published a
+remarkable letter from Montalembert, describing a debate in the English
+Parliament. Its every paragraph was so full of a subtle and powerful
+contrast between political liberty in England and the absence of it in
+France that the Imperial government and its adherents were stung to the
+quick. He speaks of leaving “an atmosphere foul with servile and
+corrupting miasma (_chargée de miasmes serviles et corrupteurs_) to
+breathe a purer air and to take a bath of free life in England.” Referring
+to a former French colony, he says: “In Canada, a noble race of Frenchmen
+and Catholics, unhappily torn from our country, but remaining French in
+heart and habits, owes to England the privilege of having retained or
+acquired, along with perfect religious freedom, all the political and
+municipal liberties which France herself has repudiated.” A criminal
+prosecution was immediately begun against the count for this letter. Four
+separate accusations were brought. Among them were “exciting the people to
+hate and despise the government of the emperor, and of attempting to
+disturb the public peace.” The legal penalties were imprisonment from
+three months to five years, fine from 500 to 6,000 francs, and expulsion
+from France. According to French custom, the prisoner on trial was
+interrogated concerning the obnoxious passages, and, when Montalembert
+answered, it was discovered that the emperor and his government, not the
+prisoner at the bar, was on trial. With calm gravity he acknowledged each
+damning implication as an historical fact not to be denied, “enjoying,
+there can be no doubt,” says his biographer, “to the bottom of his heart,
+this unlooked‐for chance of adding a double point to every arrow he had
+launched, and planting his darts deliberately and effectually in the
+joints of his adversaries’ armor.”
+
+The foundation of Montalembert’s great work, _The Monks of the West_, was
+laid in his studies for the life of S. Elizabeth, and the remainder of his
+active life was now devoted to its completion. It is sufficient to refer
+to it. We need not dwell upon this greatest production of his literary
+genius. Besides this, two other remarkable productions came from his pen
+toward the close of his career. These were the long and eloquent
+addresses, _L’Eglise libre dans l’Etat libre_, delivered before the
+Congress of Malines, and his _Victoire du Nord aux Etats‐Unis_, which,
+says his biographer, “is little else than a hymn of triumph in honor of
+that success which to him was a pure success of right over wrong, of
+freedom over slavery.”
+
+It is well known that Montalembert was one of those who opposed the
+proclamation of the dogma of infallibility. On this point, his biographer
+gives us this interesting information.
+
+One of his visitors said to him, while lying on what proved to be his
+death‐bed: “If the Infallibility is proclaimed, what will you do?” “I will
+struggle against it as long as I can,” he said; but when the question was
+repeated, the sufferer raised himself quickly, with something of his old
+animation, and turned to his questioner. “What should I do?” he said. “We
+are always told that the pope is a father. _Eh bien!_—there are many
+fathers who demand our adherence to things very far from our inclination,
+and contrary to our ideas. In such a case, the son struggles while he can;
+he tries hard to persuade his father; discusses and talks the matter over
+with him; but when all is done, when he sees no possibility of succeeding,
+but receives a distinct refusal, he submits. I shall do the same.”
+
+“You will submit so far as form goes,” said the visitor. “You will submit
+externally. But how will you reconcile that submission with your ideas and
+convictions?”
+
+Still more distinctly and clearly he replied: “I will make no attempt to
+reconcile them. I will submit my will, as has to be done in respect to all
+the other questions of faith. I am not a theologian; it is not my part to
+decide on such matters. And God does not ask me to understand. He asks me
+to submit my will and intelligence, and I will do so.” “After having made
+this solemn though abrupt confession of faith,” says the witness whom we
+have quoted, “he added, with a smile, ‘It is simple enough; there is
+nothing extraordinary in it.’ ”
+
+The last years of the life of this distinguished man were one long
+protracted agony of physical suffering. The symptoms of disease that first
+manifested themselves in 1852 had gone on increasing in severity until in
+1869, more than a year before his death, he speaks of himself as _vivens
+sepulcrum_. “I am fully warranted in saying that the death of M. de
+Montalembert was part of his glory,” writes M. Cochin, in describing his
+constancy and resignation. He died on the 13th of March, 1870.
+
+
+
+
+At The Shrine.
+
+
+
+I.
+
+
+    The sunset’s dying radiance falls
+      On chancel‐gloom and sculptured shrine,
+    A splendor wraps the pictured walls,
+      Where painted saints in glory shine!
+    And blent with sweet‐tongued vesper‐bells,
+      Through echoing aisles and arches dim
+    The organ’s solemn music swells,
+      The sweetly chanted evening hymn.
+
+
+
+II.
+
+
+    Low at Our Lady’s spotless feet
+      A white‐robed woman kneels in prayer:
+    The _Deus Meus_ murmurs sweet,
+      While _Glorias_ throb on perfumed air;
+    Before the circling altar‐rail
+      She breathes her _Aves_ soft and low—
+    The golden hair beneath her veil
+      Wreathed like a glory on her brow.
+
+
+
+III.
+
+
+    The sunset’s purple splendors fade,
+      The dark’ning shades of twilight fall,
+    The moonbeam’s silver touch is laid
+      On sculptur’d saint and pictur’d wall;
+    And while the weeping watcher kneels,
+      And silence weaves her magic spells,
+    The gray dawn thro’ the oriel steals,
+      And morning wakes the matin‐bells.
+
+
+ADVENT, 1872.
+
+
+
+
+A Christmas Recognition.
+
+
+We were old‐fashioned people at Aldred, and Christmas was our special
+holiday. The house was always filled with guests, not such as many of our
+grander neighbors asked to their houses, but such as cared for good old‐
+fashioned cheer and antiquated habits. Not all were relations, for we
+never asked relations merely on account of their kinship, according to the
+regulation mixing of a conventional Christmas party, but among our own
+people were many whose presence at our Christmas gatherings was as certain
+as the recurrence of the festival itself. Among them was a great‐aunt, a
+soft, mild old lady, always dressed in widow’s weeds, but with a face as
+fresh as a girl’s, and hair white as the snowy cap she wore to conceal it.
+She had not come alone, for her adopted son was with her, the promised
+husband of her only child, dead years ago. He had left his own home and
+people, like Ruth, for the lonely, childless woman whom he was to have
+called mother, and remained her inseparable companion through her
+beautiful and resigned old age. There were, besides these, a young girl
+whose aspect was peculiar and attractive, and whose manner had in its
+mixture of modesty and self‐reliance a piquancy that added to the
+fascination of her person. She had come with a distant cousin of hers, a
+widow of a different type from our dear old relative, and whose object in
+chaperoning Miss Houghton must have been mixed. She was small, blonde,
+coquettish, and thirty‐two, though no one would have taken her for more
+than twenty‐five. She looked soft, pliable, irresolute, and tender, and
+men often found in her a repose which was a soothing contrast to her
+cousin’s energetic, peculiar, somewhat eccentric ways; only it was the
+repose yielded by a downy cushion, and people wearied of it after a while.
+The secret of the apparent partnership between these two opposite natures
+was perhaps this: the widow had a rich jointure, and was an excellent
+_parti_, while her cousin was portionless. Miss Houghton was thus doubly a
+foil to Mrs. Burtleigh.
+
+I shall not speak of the other guests in detail, with the exception of one
+whom it would be impossible to overlook. He was a man nearer forty than
+thirty‐five, good‐humored and careless to all appearance, a hard worker in
+the battle of life, a cosmopolitan philosopher, and one of those handy,
+useful men who can sew on a button, cook an omelet, and kiss a bride as
+easily and unconcernedly as they gallop across country or horsewhip a
+villain. He had been in Mexico, surveying and engineering for an English
+railroad company, and he had spent some years in the East as the land‐
+agent of a progress‐loving pacha. Europe he knew as well as we knew
+Aldred, while the year he had been absent from us had been filled by new
+and stirring experiences in Upper Egypt. But I forget; we have yet to
+speak of many little details of Christmas‐tide which preceded the
+gathering in of the whole party.
+
+The kitchen department was, of course, conspicuous on this occasion. This
+included the village poor, who were regularly assembled every day for soup
+until Christmas eve, when each household received a joint of beef and a
+fine plum‐pudding. Some of us went round the village in a sleigh, and
+distributed tea and sugar as supplementary items. It was a traditional
+Yule‐tide, for the snow lay soft, even, and thick over the roads, as it
+but seldom does in England; then, the school was visited and solidly
+provisioned, the children were invited to a monster tea with accompaniment
+of a magic‐lantern show, after which the prizes were to be distributed, as
+well as warm clothing for the winter season. Nothing was said of the
+Christmas‐tree, as that was kept as a surprise.
+
+The decoration of house and chapel was a wonderful and prolonged business,
+and afforded great amusement. Holly grew in profusion at Aldred, and a
+cart‐load of the bright‐berried evergreen was brought to the house the day
+preceding Christmas eve. The people we have made acquaintance with were
+already with us, and vigorously helped us on with the preparations. Such
+fun as there was when Miss Houghton insisted upon crowning the marble bust
+of the Indian grandee, Rammohun Roy, with a holly wreath, and when Mrs.
+Burtleigh gave a pretty, ladylike little cry as she pricked her fingers
+with the glossy leaves! The children of the house and those of another
+house in the neighborhood (orphan children whose gloomy home made them a
+perpetual source of pity to us) were helping as unhelpfully as ever, but
+what of that? It was a joyous, animated scene, and, still more, a romantic
+one; for the traveller, who had claimed a former acquaintance with Miss
+Houghton, now seemed to become her very shadow—or knight, let us say; it
+is more appropriate to the spirit of a festival so highly honored in
+mediæval times. The chapel, a beautiful Gothic building, small but
+perfect, was decorated with mottoes wrought in leaves, such as “Unto us a
+Son is born, unto us a Child is given,” and _Gloria in excelsis Deo_,
+etc., while festoons of evergreens hung from pillar to pillar, and draped
+the stone‐carved tribune at the western end with a living tapestry. Round
+the altar were heaped in rows, placed one higher than another, evergreens
+of every size and kind, mingled with islands of bright camellias, the
+pride of the renowned hothouses of Aldred. White, red, and streaked, the
+flowers seemed like stars among dark masses of clouds; and, when we lit a
+few of the tall candles to see the effect, it was so solemn that we longed
+for the time to pass quickly, till the midnight Mass should call forth all
+the beauty of which we had seen but a part.
+
+These decorations had been mainly the work of the traveller (whom, in our
+traditional familiarity, we called “Cousin Jim”) and of our other friend,
+the adopted son of our old aunt; but, though their brains had conceived,
+it was Miss Houghton’s deft fingers that executed the work best. The last
+touch had just been put to an immense cross of holly which was to be swung
+from the ceiling, to supply the place of the rood that in old times
+guarded the choir‐screen. A star of snow‐white camellias was to be poised
+just above it, and a tall ladder had been put in readiness to facilitate
+the delicate task. Miss Houghton stood at the foot, one arm leaning on the
+ladder, the other holding aloft the white star. Her friend was halfway up,
+bearing the great cross, when he suddenly heard a low voice, swelling
+gradually, intoning the words of the Christmas hymn:
+
+
+    Adeste fideles,
+    Læti triumphantes;
+    Venite, venite in Bethlehem:
+    Natum videte
+    Regem angelorum:
+    Venite adoremus,
+    Venite adoremus,
+    Venite adoremus Dominum.
+
+
+Startled and touched, he began the repeating words of the chorus, pausing
+with his green cross held high in his arms. The others who, scattered
+about the chapel, heard his deep tones, answering, took up the chorus, and
+chanted it slowly to the end, Miss Houghton looking round with tears in
+her eyes, at this unexpected response to the suppressed and undefinable
+feelings of her heart. It was an impressive scene, the guests, servants,
+gardeners, and a few of the choir‐boys, all mingling in the impromptu
+worship so well befitting the beautiful work they had in hand. At the end
+of the verse, the traveller hastily gained the top of the ladder, and,
+having fastened the holly cross in its place, intoned a second verse, in
+which Miss Houghton immediately joined, and the harmonious blending of
+their voices had, if possible, a still more beautiful effect than the
+unaccompanied chant of the first verse. Again the chorus chimed in,
+
+
+    Venite adoremus,
+    Venite adoremus,
+    Venite adoremus Dominum.
+
+
+in full, solemn tones, and all sang from their places, their festoons in
+their hands, so that at the end of the hymn the traveller said
+thoughtfully to his companion: “_Laborare est orare_ should be our motto
+henceforth. I wish all our work were as holy as this.”
+
+“And why not?” she answered quickly; “only _will_ it so, and so it shall
+be. We are our own creators.”
+
+“What a rash saying!” he exclaimed, with a smile; “but I know what you
+mean. God gives us the tools and the marble; it is ours to carve it _into_
+an angel or a fiend.”
+
+At last the chapel decoration was over, and a few of the more venturesome
+among us went out in the snow for a walk.
+
+Meanwhile, in the corridor (so we called our favorite sitting‐room), the
+Yule‐logs were crackling cheerfully on the wide hearth, and the fitful
+tongues of flame shot a red glimmer over the old‐fashioned furniture. One
+of the chairs was said to have belonged to Cardinal Wolsey, and there was
+another, a circular arm‐chair, that looked as if it also should have had a
+history connected with the great and learned. Full‐length portraits of the
+old possessors of Aldred covered the walls, and on the stained‐glass upper
+compartments of the deep bay‐window at one end were depicted the arms and
+quarterings of the family. The Yule‐logs were oak, cut from our own trees,
+and perforated all over with large holes through which the flames shot up
+like fire‐sprites.
+
+The Christmas‐tree and magic‐lantern also had to be put in order to save
+time and trouble, and a stage for tableaux occupied the rapt attention of
+the amateur mechanician (our great‐aunt’s son) and of “Jim,” the traveller
+and practised factotum. Miss Houghton was never very far from the scene of
+these proceedings, and, when she was not quite so near, “Cousin Jim” was
+not quite so eager. Almost all our guests had brought contributions for
+the Christmas‐tree, of which our children had the nominal charge, and with
+these gifts and our own it turned out quite a royal success. Presents of
+useful garments, flannels, boots, mittens, woollen shirts, petticoats, and
+comforters, were stowed away beneath the lower branches, while all visible
+parts were hung with the toys and fruits, lights and ribbons, that so
+delight children. Gilt walnut‐shells were a prominent decoration, and
+right at the apex of the tree was fixed a “Christ‐child,” that thoroughly
+German development, an image of the Infant Saviour, holding a starred
+globe in one hand and a standard in the other. A _crèche_ had also been
+prepared in the Lady‐chapel, a lifelike representation of those beautiful
+Christmas pictures seen to such perfection in the large churches of Italy.
+Munich figures supplied the place of wax models, however, and were a
+decided improvement.
+
+Many people from the village had asked leave to come in and look at these
+peculiar decorations; but, as few of them were Catholics, it had been
+thought better to wait till the third Mass on Christmas day to open the
+chapel to the public. Christmas eve was a very busy day, and towards five
+o’clock began the great task of welcoming the rest of the expected guests.
+This was done in no modern and languid fashion; the servants, clad in fur
+caps and frieze greatcoats, stood near the door with resinous torches
+flaring in the still night air—it was quite dark at that early hour—and
+the host and hostess welcomed them at the very threshold. The children
+helped them to take off their wraps, and held mistletoe sprigs over their
+bended heads as they reached up to kiss them. Indeed, mistletoe was so
+plentifully strewn about the house that it was impossible to avoid it, but
+we had so far eschewed the freedom of the past as to consider this custom
+more honored in the breach than in the observance. The children and the
+servants, however, made up for our carelessness.
+
+Very little toilet was expected for a seven o’clock dinner (we were not
+fashionable people), but we found that our well‐meant injunctions had
+hardly been obeyed. For the sake of the picturesque, so much the better, I
+thought. One of our friends had actually donned a claret‐colored velvet
+suit, with slippers to match, embroidered with gold; and, when we looked
+at each other in silent amusement, the wearer himself smiled round the
+circle, saying pleasantly:
+
+“Oh! I do not mind being noticed. In fact, I rather like it—this was a
+lady’s fancy, you see.”
+
+“How, how?” we asked eagerly.
+
+“Well,” answered the Londoner, a regular drawing‐room pet, and a very
+clever society jester, “I was challenged to a game of billiards by a fair
+lady, the Duchess of ——. She said to me, ‘And pray _do_ wear something
+picturesque.’ I bowed and said, ‘Your grace shall be obeyed.’ I happened
+to have some loose cash about me. I could not wear uniform, because I did
+not belong even to the most insignificant of volunteer regiments, and I
+went to my tailor. His genius was equal to the occasion, and this was the
+result. I played with the duchess, and she won,”—the hero of the velvet
+coat was an invincible billiard champion.—“As I have the dress by me, I
+take the liberty of wearing it occasionally in the country. It is too good
+to be hidden, isn’t it?”
+
+So he rattled on till dinner was announced. It was a merry but frugal
+meal. The mince‐pies and plum‐pudding crowned with blue flame, the holly‐
+wreathed boar’s head of romance, were not there; they were reserved for
+to‐morrow. So with the “wassail‐bowl,” the fragrant, spirituous beverage
+of which each one was to partake, his two neighbors standing up on each
+side of him, according to the old custom intended as a defence against
+treachery; for once it had happened that a guest whose hands were engaged
+holding the two‐handled bowl to his lips was stabbed from behind by a
+lurking enemy, and ever after it became _de rigueur_ that protection
+should be afforded to the drinker by his neighbor on either side.
+
+The fare to‐night was still Advent fare, but, after dinner, Christmas
+insisted upon beginning. We were told that the “mummers” from the village
+were come, and waited for leave to begin their play. They were brought
+into the hall, and the whole company stood on the steps leading up to the
+drawing‐rooms. The scenery was not characteristic—a broad oaken staircase,
+a Chinese gong, the polished oak flooring, the massive hall‐door. The
+actors themselves, seven or eight in number, dressed in the most fantastic
+and extemporized costume, now began the performance; and but for the
+venerable antiquity of the farce, it was absurd and obscure enough to
+excite laughter rather than interest. The children were wild with delight,
+and were with difficulty restrained from leaping the “pit” and mingling
+with the actors on the “stage.” Indeed, for many days after nothing was
+heard among them but imitations of the “mummers.” There was a grave
+dialogue about “King George,” then a scuffle ensued, and one man fell down
+either wounded or in a fit. The doctor is called; the people believe the
+man dead, the doctor denies this, and says, “I will give him a cordial,
+mark the effect.” The resuscitated man afterwards has a tooth drawn by the
+same quack, who then holds up the tooth (a huge, unshapely equine one
+provided for the occasion), and exclaims: “Why, this is more like a
+horse’s tooth than a man’s!” I never could make out the full meaning of
+the “mummers’” play; but, whether it was a corruption of some older and
+more complete dramatic form, or the crude beginning of an undeveloped one,
+it certainly was the characteristic feature of our Christmas at Aldred. It
+took place regularly every year, without the slightest deviation in
+detail, and always ended in a mournful chorus, “The Old Folks at Home.”
+After the actors had been heartily cheered, and the host had addressed to
+them a few kind words of thanks and recognition, they were dismissed to
+the kitchen, to their much coveted entertainment of unlimited beer. There
+they enacted their performance once more for the servants, who then
+fraternized with them on the most amiable terms.
+
+Meanwhile, our party were gradually collecting round the wood‐fire in the
+corridor. It was a bitter cold night, the snow was falling noiselessly and
+fast, and the wind howled weirdly through the bare branches of the distant
+trees. Our old aunt remarked, in her gentle way:
+
+“One almost feels as if those poor owls were human beings crying with
+cold.”
+
+“We look like a picture, mother,” somewhat irrelevantly answered her son
+after a slight pause; “the antique dresses of many of us are quite worth
+an artist’s study.”
+
+Mrs. Burtleigh, whose blonde beauty was coquettishly set off by a slight
+touch of powder on the hair, and a becoming Marie Antoinette style of
+_négligé_, here pointedly addressed the traveller.
+
+“Sir Pilgrim,” she said, “did you ever think of home when you had to spend
+a Christmas in outlandish countries?”
+
+“Sometimes,” answered “Jim” absently, his eyes wandering towards Miss
+Houghton, who stood resting her head against a carved griffin on the tall
+mantel‐piece.
+
+She caught his glance, and said half saucily:
+
+“Now, if it was not too commonplace, I should claim a story—Christmas eve
+is not complete without a story, at least so the books say.”
+
+“If it were required, I know one that is not quite so hackneyed as the
+grandmothers’ ghosts and wicked ancestors we are often surfeited with at
+Christmas,” replied her friend quickly. The whole circle drew closer
+around the fire, and imperiously demanded an explanation.
+
+“But that will be descending to commonplace,” pleaded the traveller.
+
+“Who knows? It may turn out the reverse, when you have done,” heedlessly
+said Mrs. Burtleigh.
+
+“Well, if you will have it, here it is. Mind, now, I am not going to give
+you a three‐volume novel, full of padding, but just tell you one incident,
+plain and unadorned. So do not look forward to anything thrilling or
+sensational.
+
+“Some years ago, I was in Belgium, hastening home for Christmas, and spent
+three or four days in Bruges. I will spare you a description of the grand
+old city, and come to facts. I was just on the point of leaving, and had
+got to the railway station in order to catch the tidal train for Ostend,
+when a man suddenly and hurriedly came up to me, an old servant in faded
+livery, who, without breathing a word, placed a note in my hand, and was
+immediately lost to sight in the crowd. The waiting‐room was dimly
+lighted, but I could make out my own name, initials and all, on the
+envelope. In my confusion, I hurried out of the station, and, stepping
+into a small _hôtellerie_, I opened the mysterious note. It was very
+short: ‘Come at once to No. 20 Rue Neuve.’ The signature was in initials
+only. The handwriting was small and undecided. I could hardly tell if it
+were a man’s or a woman’s. I knew my way to the Rue Neuve, not a really
+new street, but one of Bruges’ most interesting old thoroughfares. No gas,
+a narrow street, great gaunt _portes‐cochères_, and projecting windows on
+both sides, the pavement uneven, and a young moon just showing her
+crescent over the crazy‐looking houses—such was the scene. I soon got to
+No. 20. It was a large, dilapidated house, with every sign about it of
+decayed grandeur and diminished wealth. Two large doors, heavily barred,
+occupied the lower part of the wall; above were oriels and dormers whose
+stone frames were tortured into weird half‐human faces and impossible
+foliage. No light anywhere, and for bell a long, hanging, ponderous weight
+of iron. I pulled it, and a sepulchral sound answered the motion. I
+waited, no one came; I thought I must have mistaken the number. Taking out
+the letter, however, I made sure I was right. I pulled the bell again a
+little louder, and heard footsteps slowly echoing on the stone flags of
+the court within. _Sabots_ evidently; they made a rattle like dead men’s
+bones, I thought. A little _grille_, or tiny wicket, was opened, and an
+old dame, shading her candle with one brown hand, peered suspiciously out.
+Apparently dissatisfied, she closed the opening with a bang, muttering to
+herself in Flemish. It was cold standing in the street, and, as the
+portress of this mysterious No. 20 made no sign of opening the door for
+me, I was very nearly getting angry, and going away in no amiable mood at
+the unknown who had played me this too practical joke. Suddenly I heard
+the _grille_ open again, very briskly this time, and a voice said in
+tolerably good French:
+
+“ ‘Monsieur’s name is—?’
+
+“ ‘Yes,’ I replied rather impatiently.
+
+“ ‘Then will monsieur wait an instant, till I undo the bars?’ A great
+drawing of chains and bolts on the inside followed her speech, and a
+little gate, three‐quarters of a man’s height, was opened in the massive
+and immovable _porte‐cochère_. I stepped quickly in, nearly overturning
+the old dame’s candlestick. She wore a full short petticoat of bright yet
+not gaudy blue, and over it a large black circular cloak which covered all
+but her clumsy sabots. Her cap was a miracle of neatness, and her brown
+face, wrinkled but cheery, reminded me of S. Elizabeth in Raphael’s
+pictures. She said glibly and politely:
+
+“ ‘Will monsieur give himself the trouble to wait a moment?’
+
+“She disappeared with her candle, leaving me to peer round the courtyard,
+where the moon’s feeble rays were playing at hide‐and‐seek behind the many
+projections. Almost as soon as she had left, she was with me again,
+bidding me follow her up‐stairs. ‘My master is bed‐ridden,’ she explained.
+‘Since he got a wound in the war of independence against Holland, he has
+not been able to move. Monsieur will take care, I hope, not to excite him;
+he is nervous and irritable since his illness,’ she added apologetically.
+
+“I confess I was rather disappointed. I had expected that everything would
+happen as it does in a play—it had looked so like one hitherto. I thought
+I was going to meet a woman—young, beautiful, in distress, perhaps in want
+of a champion—but it was only a bed‐ridden old man after all! Well, it
+might lead to an act of charity, that true chivalry of the soul, higher
+far than mere personal homage to accidental beauty. I entered a darkened
+room, scantily and shabbily furnished, and the old woman laid the
+candlestick on the table. The bed was in a corner near the fire; the
+uneven _parquet_ floor was covered here and there with faded rugs, and
+books and papers lay on a desk on the old man’s bed. At first I could
+hardly distinguish his features, but, as my eyes grew accustomed to the
+gloom, I saw that he was a martial‐looking man, with eyes so keen that
+sickness could hardly dull them, and a bearing that indicated the stern
+will, the clear intellect, and the lofty _bonhomie_ of an old Flemish
+_gentilhomme_. He looked at me with curious and prolonged interest, then
+said, in a voice full of bygone courtesy:
+
+“ ‘Will monsieur be seated? I have made no mistake in the name?’
+
+“ ‘No,’ I answered, wondering what the question meant.
+
+“ ‘Then, monsieur, I have important news for you. The daughter of your
+brother—’
+
+“I was already bewildered, and looked up. He continued, taking my surprise
+for interest: ‘The daughter of your poor brother is now a great heiress,
+and I hold her fortune in trust for her—do not interrupt me,’ he said,
+eagerly preventing me from speaking, ‘it tires me, and I must say all this
+at once. I do not know if you knew of her being taken from her parents
+when a child; of course you recollect that, after her mother’s marriage
+with your brother, there was a great fracas, and poor Marie’s father
+disinherited her at once. When the child was born—I was her god‐father, by
+the bye—her parents being in great poverty, I begged of the grandfather to
+help and forgive them, the more so as your brother was making his poor
+wife very unhappy. He refused, and, though he generally took my advice (he
+was an an old college friend of mine), he was obstinate on this point. The
+child grew, and the parents were on worse terms every year. Marie’s father
+held out against every inducement; your poor brother—forgive me,
+monsieur!—fell into bad company, and made his home a perfect hell; his
+wife was broken‐hearted, but would not hear of a separation, and her only
+anxiety was for her child. I proposed to her to take the responsibility
+myself of putting the little one out of reach of this dreadful example of
+a divided household, and she consented. The father stormed and raved when
+he found the child was gone, but for once his wife opposed him, and
+refused to let him know her whereabouts. Every year I interceded with the
+grandfather, who consented to support the little girl, but would never
+promise to leave her a competency at his death. One day, suddenly, your
+poor brother died.’
+
+“I could not help starting; he saw my surprise.
+
+“ ‘Oh!’ he resumed, ‘did you not know how he died? Pardon me, monsieur, I
+remember now that none of his English kin followed him to the grave, but I
+had heard your name before.’
+
+“ ‘Monsieur,’ I began, fearing that he might be led on to talk of family
+secrets such as he might not wish to share with a stranger, ‘you have told
+me a strange tale; but allow me to undeceive you—’
+
+“ ‘How did you deceive me?’ he asked impatiently, and I, remembering the
+old dame’s warning not to excite him, was puzzled how to act. In the
+meanwhile, he went on.
+
+“ ‘_Eh bien!_ The mother then went to England, to the school where her
+child was, and saw her, but she did not long survive the wear and tear of
+her wretched life, and the grief her husband’s death caused her—for, poor
+woman, she loved him, you see.’
+
+“ ‘Just like a woman, God bless her!’ I murmured involuntarily. The old
+man bent his head in cordial assent, but immediately resumed: ‘Her father
+blessed her before she died, and promised to care for the little girl. He
+then drew up this will’—here he laid his hand on a thick packet on the
+desk—‘and entrusted it me. The child was nine years old then, and that was
+fifteen years ago. She was to be told nothing till her twenty‐first
+birthday, and to be brought up in England, unconscious of anything save
+that she was the child of honest parents. This went on for some years, and
+then my old friend died. I continued to send regular remittances to the
+little girl’s temporary guardians; the bulk of the fortune I kept in the
+house—there in that chest; perhaps it was a foolish fancy, but I did not
+care to have it in a common bank. The war came and passed over the flower
+of our land, and you see, monsieur, what it has left of my former self.
+Well, after a time, five or six years ago, I ceased hearing from my little
+ward; I was unable to get up and search for her; all that advertisements
+and correspondence could do I did, and my chief endeavor was to find you.
+I thought, if anything were likely, this was; she would go to you, her
+father’s step‐brother, a different man, as I always heard her mother say,
+from what her own unhappy parent had been.’
+
+“ ‘But,’ I said, ‘allow me to correct a mistake, monsieur; I never had a
+step‐brother, or a brother either.’
+
+“ ‘What!’ the old man exclaimed nervously—‘what do you mean? Do not joke
+about such things. Your name is ——. Your hair is fair and wavy, your
+figure tall and stalwart—that was the portrait of my poor little ward’s
+uncle, a different man, of different blood, as well as different name,
+from her father.’
+
+“ ‘Do not tell me any names, monsieur,’ I here insisted, ‘until I have
+told you who I am.’
+
+“He looked at me, still agitated, his brows knitted, and his lips
+quivered. I told him my name, birth, country, profession, and assured him
+that I, an only son, had never heard of any story like his. He seemed
+thunderstruck, and could hardly take in the idea; but, recollecting
+himself, said: ‘Pardon me, monsieur, but I have, then, caused you great
+inconvenience.’
+
+“His politeness now seemed overwhelming; he was in despair; he was
+_désolé_. What could he do? How could he apologize? I quieted him as best
+I could by professing the utmost indifference about the delay, and begged
+him, though I would solicit no further confidence, to consider my lips as
+sealed, and, if he wished it, my services as entirely at his disposal.
+
+“He smiled curiously, then said: ‘The best apology I can make is to tell
+you the whole. Your name and initials misled me. Having heard that you
+were in Bruges, I sent my messenger, who, it seems, only reached you as
+you were on the point of starting for Ostend. I thought it was my ward’s
+uncle I had found, and, never having seen him, I could not tell if you
+were the wrong man. I must continue to try and find him; if I fail—never
+mind, I want to tell you her name. She is Philippa Duncombe, and, when I
+saw her last, she was a dark child, quick, peculiar, and resolute. It is
+so long ago that I could give you no idea of her exterior as she is now. I
+think she must have suspected her dependence upon a supposed charity, and
+have left school without the knowledge of any one. Anyhow, I must still
+try to find your namesake; as for you, monsieur, I cannot thank you enough
+for your forbearance.’
+
+“I left Bruges the next day, but, as you may suppose, the story of the
+Baron Van Muyden never ceased to haunt me, and a few months after I was
+glad and flattered to receive a letter from the old veteran saying that he
+had now ascertained that my namesake, the child’s half‐uncle, had been
+dead some years, and that he felt that to none other but myself would he
+now wish to transfer the task of searching for the lost heiress. Of course
+I accepted.”
+
+Our friend paused here, and looked thoughtfully at the fire. The Yule‐logs
+were burning so merrily that a ruin seemed imminent, and while the silence
+was yet unbroken a sound of distant singing came towards the house. It was
+the gay company of Christmas carollers, singing their old, old ditties
+through the frosty night, in commemoration of the Angel‐songs heard by the
+watching shepherds so many long centuries ago on the hills of Judæa. But
+the company was too much absorbed in the traveller’s tale to heed the
+faint echo. Miss Houghton sat with her dark eyes fixed on the speaker, and
+every vestige of color gone in the intensity of her excitement; Mrs.
+Burtleigh, tapping the fender with her tiny gray satin slipper, seemed
+strangely excited, and glanced uneasily at her cousin; the rest of us were
+clasping our hands in our unrestrainable curiosity, and the provoking
+narrator actually had the coolness to hold his peace!
+
+At last some one spoke, unable to control his goaded curiosity.
+
+“Well?”
+
+“Well?” repeated the artful “Jim.”
+
+“Did you find her?” was the question that now broke from all lips, in a
+gamut of increasing impatience.
+
+“I told you a story, as we agreed,” he answered; “but, if I tell you the
+_dénoûment_, we shall fall into what we wish to avoid—the commonplace.”
+
+“Never mind, go on,” was shouted on all sides. Miss Houghton was silent,
+but she seemed to hang on his words. He had calculated on this emotion,
+the wretch, and was making the most of his points!
+
+At last he resumed in a slow, absent way:
+
+“Yes, I accepted the search; I made it; I did all I could think of—but I
+failed.”
+
+The bomb had burst, but we all felt disappointed. This was _not_
+commonplace, not even enough to our minds. “He had cheated us,” we cried.
+
+“I can only tell you the truth; remember this was all real, no got‐up
+Christmas tale, to end in a wedding, bell‐ringing, and carol‐singing.
+Hark! do you hear the carollers outside?”
+
+No one spoke, and he went on, still meditatively: “I do not mean to give
+it up, though.”
+
+Miss Houghton, who, till now, had said nothing, opened a small locket
+attached to one of her bracelets, and, keeping her eyes fixed on “Cousin
+Jim,” passed it to him, saying:
+
+“Did you ever see this face before?”
+
+He took it up, and looked puzzled. “No,” he said; “why do you ask?”
+
+We all looked at her as if she had been a young lunatic, her interest in
+the story being apparently of no very lasting nature. She then unfastened
+a companion bracelet, the hanging locket of which she opened and handed to
+her friend again.
+
+“This face you have seen?” she asked confidently.
+
+He started, and a rush of color came over his bronzed cheeks.
+
+“Yes, yes, that is the Baron Van Muyden—younger, but the same. And here is
+his writing, ‘To Marie Duncombe, her sincere and faithful friend.’ Miss
+Houghton?”
+
+“Yes,” she answered calmly, as if he had asked her a question.
+
+“Then what I have been looking for for three years I have found tonight?”
+he said, looking up at her, while we were all stupefied and silent.
+
+“And what I have never dreamt of,” she answered in a low voice, “I have
+suddenly learned to‐night.”
+
+The carollers were now close under the windows, and the words of a simple
+chorus came clearly to our hearing—
+
+
+    The snow lay on the ground,
+      The stars shone bright,
+    When Christ our Lord was born
+      On Christmas night.
+
+
+After a few moments’ silence, our curiosity, like water that has broken
+through thin ice, flowed into words again. Many questions and a storm of
+exclamations rang through the room, and the concussion was such that the
+Yule‐logs crashed in two, and broke into a race across the wide hearth,
+splinters flying to the side, and sparks flying up the chimney. Then Miss
+Houghton spoke with the marvellous self‐possession of her nature.
+
+“I knew my own name and my mother’s from the beginning,” she said, “and
+Monsieur Van Muyden, and the old house, and the Flemish _bonne_ in the Rue
+Neuve. I remember them all when a child. I used often to sleep there, and
+the night before I left Bruges I still remember playing with the baron’s
+old sword. I remember my mother coming to see me at school in England, a
+convent‐school, where I was very happy, and giving me these bracelets. She
+told me never to part with them; she said she would not be with me long.
+They told me of her death some months afterwards. The other portrait is
+that of my grandfather, given by him to my mother on her _fête_ day, just
+before her marriage, with a lock of his hair hidden behind. She always
+wore it. M. Van Muyden’s was done for her when I was born, and was meant
+to be mine some day, as he was my god‐father. The remittances he spoke of
+used to come regularly; but, when I grew older, my pride rebelled (just as
+he guessed, you say), and I hated to be dependent on those who, kind as
+they were, were not my blood‐relations. I ran away from school, and lived
+by myself for a long time in poverty, yet not in absolute need, for I
+worked for my bread, and worked hard. I had a great deal to go through
+because I dared not refer any one to the school where I had lived. Mrs.
+Burtleigh was very kind to me; I told her my story, as far as I knew it,
+and somehow she found out that we were cousins through my father; so she
+made me take her maiden name, Houghton, instead of the one I had adopted
+before. She, of course, thought as I did, that the child of the
+disinherited Marie Duncombe and the unhappy Englishman, my poor father,
+could be naught but a beggar. She was kindness itself to me, and, though I
+was too proud to accept all she offered me, I _did_ accept her
+companionship and her home. Many little industries of my own, pleasant now
+because no longer imperatively necessary, help me to support myself, as
+far as pecuniary support can be called such; my _home_ has been a generous
+gift—the gift I prize most.”
+
+She stopped, and Mrs. Burtleigh looked up in impatient confusion, perhaps
+conscious that her feelings and motives had been too mixed to warrant such
+frank, unbounded gratitude. “Jim” said nothing, and Miss Houghton seemed
+so calm that it was almost difficult to congratulate her. She was asked if
+she had recognized herself from the first in the story.
+
+“Yes,” she said; “I knew it must be me.”
+
+“You took it coolly,” some one ventured to observe.
+
+“I have seen too much of the _revers de la médaille_ to be much excited
+about this,” she said; but, if she was outwardly calm, her feelings were
+certainly aroused, for her strange eyes had a far‐away look, and the color
+came and went in her cheek.
+
+Our friend seemed almost crestfallen; we thought he would have been
+elated. Presently she said to him, giving him the bracelets:
+
+“You must take these to Bruges, and I think you had better take me, too.”
+
+He stared silently at her. Just then the bell began to ring for the
+midnight Mass. What followed Miss Houghton told us herself.
+
+The guests hurried to the chapel, rather glad to get rid of their
+involuntary embarrassment. Those two remained behind alone. She was the
+first to speak.
+
+“I think you are sorry you have found me.”
+
+“Yes,” he answered slowly, “sorry to find it is you: Miss Houghton was
+poor, and Miss Duncombe is an heiress.”
+
+“What matter! If you like, Miss Duncombe will give up the fortune, or, if
+you want it, she will give it to you.”
+
+He looked offended and puzzled.
+
+“You do not understand me,” she said, half laughing: “Miss Duncombe will
+let you settle everything for her, and say anything you like to Miss
+Houghton.”
+
+“You do not mean—” he began excitedly.
+
+“I do,” she answered composedly.
+
+And they were engaged then and there. He wanted to be married before they
+left England, but she refused, saying their wedding must be in a Flemish
+cathedral, and their wedding breakfast in a Flemish house. And so it was;
+and No. 20 Rue Neuve is now their headquarters, while the household of the
+Belgian heiress is under the control of the old Flemish woman who once
+shut that door in the face of the heiress’ husband.
+
+M. Van Muyden is happy and contented, and a merrier Christmas day was
+never spent at Aldred than the day of this unexpected recognition.
+
+Midnight Mass, Christmas‐tree, school‐feast, and all succeeded each other
+to our perfect satisfaction; the health of the heroine of “Cousin Jim’s”
+tale was drunk in the “wassail‐bowl” on Christmas night, and, as the
+happy, excited, and tired Christmas party separated on the day following
+New Year’s day, every one agreed that it was a pity such things so very
+seldom happened in real life.
+
+
+
+
+Fleurange.
+
+
+By Mrs. Craven, Author Of “A Sister’s Story.”
+
+Translated From The French, With Permission.
+
+
+
+Part IV.—The Immolation.
+
+
+L.
+
+
+While our travellers are completing the last stage of their journey, we
+will precede them to St. Petersburg, and transport our readers for a short
+time among scenes very different from those in which the incidents of our
+story have hitherto occurred.
+
+The sentence of condemnation has been pronounced, and for some days the
+names of the five persons who were to suffer death have been known and
+privately circulated; privately, for the trials which excited universal
+interest were seldom discussed in society. At that epoch (different in
+this respect from a subsequent one, when liberty to say anything was
+allowed in Russia before anywhere else), whether through prudence,
+servility, or a fear resulting from the reign of the Emperor Paul, rather
+than the one just ended, every one refrained with common accord from any
+public expression of opinion whatever respecting the acts of the
+government. Flattery itself was cautious not to excite discussions that
+might give rise to criticism. The sovereign authority did not require
+approval, but only to be obeyed, not judged. This was generally
+understood, and the consequence was a general silence respecting forbidden
+topics; whereas, on every other subject, as if by way of indemnification,
+Russian wit was unrestrained, and so keen that the nation which prides
+itself on being the most _spirituelle_ in the world found a rival, and
+only consoled itself by saying Russian wit was borrowed. It is
+incontestably certain that, though there were still some survivors of the
+time of Catherine’s reign, the French language was now so universally used
+in society at St. Petersburg, that people of the highest rank, of both
+sexes, spoke it to the exclusion of their own tongue, and wrote it with
+such uncommon perfection as to enrich French literature; whereas they
+would have been very much embarrassed if required to write the most
+insignificant note, or even a mere business letter, in the Russian
+language.
+
+There is no intention of discussing here the causes that led to this
+engrafting of foreign habits, or of examining whether the Russians at that
+period, in imitating the French, were always mindful that when others are
+copied it should be from their best side. Still less would it be suitable
+to consider whether the people who possess the faculty of assimilation to
+such a degree are the most noble, the most energetic, and the most
+sincere. This would lead us far beyond our modest limits, to which we
+return by observing that, in spite of a splendor and magnificence almost
+beyond conception, in spite of a tone of good taste and a courtesy now
+almost extinct in France, in spite of hospitality on a grand scale,
+characteristic of Slavonic countries, an indefinable restraint, felt by
+all, prevailed in this attractive and brilliant circle, insinuating itself
+everywhere like an invisible spectre, modifying and directing the current
+of conversation—even the most trifling—and affecting not only the
+intercourse of fashionable life, but the freedom of friendly converse and
+the very outpourings of affectionate confidence.
+
+The Marquis Adelardi had had several opportunities of mingling in this
+society, and found it congenial. It was a society in which he was
+specially adapted to shine, for he, too, as we are aware, had passed his
+life in a school of enforced silence; and, if he was formerly numbered
+among those who revolt under such restrictions, he had now renounced all
+efforts to break through them, and learned to turn his attention
+elsewhere. He understood, better than any other foreigner at St.
+Petersburg, how to navigate amid the shoals of conversation; to be
+entertaining, agreeable, interesting, and even apparently bold without
+ever causing embarrassment by an inadvertent remark; and if, in the ardor
+of discourse, he approached a dangerous limit, the promptness with which
+he read an unexpressed thought sufficed to make him change, with easy
+nonchalance, the direction of a conversation in which he seemed to be the
+most interested.
+
+He was not, however, disposed to talk with any one the day, or rather the
+evening, we meet him again—this time at the Countess de G——’s, a woman of
+superior intellect, already advanced in years, whose salon was one of the
+most brilliant and most justly popular in St. Petersburg. Everything,
+indeed, was calculated to facilitate social intercourse of every degree,
+and, if there was a place where the bounds we have just referred to were
+invisible, though never forgotten, it was here. What could not be said
+aloud here, more than elsewhere, had a thousand facilities for private
+utterance. On the other hand, for the benefit of prudent people who
+preferred to say nothing at all, there were tables where they could play
+whist or a game of chess. A piano at one end of the spacious salon was
+always open to attract amateur performers, then more numerous than now,
+when no one ventures, even in the family circle, to play without unusual
+ability.
+
+In this friendly atmosphere, our marquis, generally so social, was silent
+and preoccupied. Seated in a corner on a sofa where no one else was
+sitting, he took no part in the general conversation. And yet, as the room
+filled, and various groups were formed, here and there foreigners, and
+especially the members of the diplomatic corps who frequented the house,
+broached the great topic, and by degrees were heard on various sides the
+names of Mouravieff, Ryleieff, Pestel, and two others likewise condemned
+to death, as well as the names of those who were to be exiled—a punishment
+almost as terrible.
+
+A young German attaché, perceiving Adelardi, approached, and took a seat
+beside him. “And Walden,” said he in a low voice, “have you not had
+permission to see him twice?”
+
+“Yes.”
+
+“Have you seen him since he was informed of his fate?”
+
+“No; but I have reason to hope I shall obtain that favor.”
+
+“He is not sorry, I imagine, to escape the gibbet.”
+
+“Not the gibbet; but as to death, I am sure he thinks it preferable to the
+fate that awaits him.”
+
+“Poor fellow! but then, _qu’allait‐il faire_?”—
+
+“_Dans cette galère?_” interrupted the marquis with displeasure. “The
+question is certainly apropos, and I would ask him if I could obtain a
+reply that would avail him anything.”
+
+“By the way,” said the other, “I suppose you know who has just arrived at
+St. Petersburg?”
+
+The marquis questioned him with a look of uncertainty, for he was
+expecting more than one arrival that day.
+
+“Why, the fair Vera, who has returned to her post.”
+
+“Really!” exclaimed Adelardi eagerly. “In that case perhaps we shall see
+her here, for I am told she comes every evening when in the city.”
+
+“Yes, but not till the empress dispenses with her services. It is nearly
+ten o’clock. She will probably be here soon. Our agreeable hostess is one
+of her relatives.”
+
+“I was not aware of it. I know the Countess Vera but little. She was not
+at court when I was here three years ago. I only saw her two or three
+times at the Princess Lamianoff’s, who was then here, but was not
+presented to her.”
+
+“At the Princess Catherine’s? I believe you. It is said she wished Vera to
+marry her son, who was indeed very assiduous in his attentions. The young
+countess did not appear wholly insensible to them at that time. Do you
+suppose she is still attached to him?”
+
+“I do not know.”
+
+“Poor girl! I pity her, in that case, but it is not very probable she will
+long be infatuated about a convict. Besides, she will find others to
+console her, if she makes the effort.”
+
+At that moment the piano was heard. The young diplomatist was requested to
+take a part in a trio, and the music put an end to the conversation that
+was becoming too ardent on every side, through the interest caused, not by
+the offence, but by the misfortunes of the criminals. Every one knew them,
+and several of them belonged to the same coterie which now scarcely dared
+utter their names aloud.
+
+Adelardi remained in the same place, his head resting on his hand, more
+absorbed than ever. He pretended to be listening to the music, and was
+mechanically beating time. But he was thinking of something very
+different, and only started from his reverie whenever the bell announced a
+new arrival. Then he eagerly raised his head and looked towards the door,
+but only to resume his former position at the entrance of each new
+visitor—as if not the one whom he desired to see.
+
+
+LI.
+
+
+At the beginning of the same evening a different scene was occurring, not
+far distant, in a salon still more elegant and magnificent than the one we
+have just visited. It was not, however, intended, like that, for the
+reception of visitors, but solely for the pleasure and comfort of her who
+occupied it—a lady, as was evident, though there was no profusion of
+useless trifles or superfluous ornaments. But it seemed as if her hands
+could only touch what was rare and costly. Gold, silver, and precious
+stones gleamed from every object destined to her constant use, from the
+open _cassette_ that contained her work to the sumptuous bindings of the
+books scattered over the embroidered covering of the table, or lying on a
+small _étagère_ of malachite near a large arm‐chair. This chair, intended
+for reading, was also adapted to repose by the soft cushion covered with
+the finest lace for the head of the reader to rest upon in an attitude at
+once convenient and graceful. On all sides were flowers of every season in
+as great abundance as if they grew in the open air at the usual time. They
+gave out an exquisite odor, which, with perfumes more artificial but not
+less sweet, embalmed the apartment.
+
+If, as some think, and we have already remarked, places resemble those who
+inhabit them, the reader may be eager to know the owner of this. We will
+endeavor to describe her as she appeared to those who knew her at the time
+of our story: a woman of that age when beauty is in all its freshness; who
+was truly said to have the dignity of a goddess and the form of a nymph; a
+face sweet and pale, but with noble, delicate features; a complexion of
+charming purity; a look and smile that were captivating; and the whole
+picture was framed by hair floating in long curls over graceful white
+shoulders.
+
+Such was the person who, at the sound of a manly and sonorous voice,
+entered the salon just described, and threw herself into the arms of him
+who had called her by name. Their first words were expressive of joy at
+seeing each other again after a long separation of some hours, and for a
+time they seemed only to think of each other. Their glances, their smiles
+met, and it might have been supposed they had nothing in the world to do
+but love each other and tell each other so.
+
+But the tone of conversation gradually changed. She grew earnest and he
+became uneasy. He made an effort to reply to the questions she addressed
+him and sometimes persistently repeated, but he appeared to do so
+unwillingly, as if he yielded out of condescension, and with difficulty
+resisted a desire of imposing silence on her. Once he rose and left her,
+but she followed him, softly placed her arm within his, and, drawing
+herself up to her utmost height (for, though she was quite tall, he was a
+whole head taller) whispered in his ear. He bent down to listen, but while
+she was talking a frightful change suddenly came over his face. She
+perceived it, and looked at him with surprise and an anxiety she had never
+felt before, as he leaned against the mantel‐piece and remained there
+grave and silent with folded arms.
+
+He was then twenty‐nine years old, and in the brilliancy of that manly
+beauty which suffering, care, the violent passions of a later age, and
+time itself, scarcely altered. Besides his lofty, noble stature, and
+features so regular that no sculptor could idealize them, there was a
+charm in the expression of his face and the tone of his voice which
+inspired attachment as well as admiration. Hitherto resentment or anger
+had seldom been known to flash from his eyes or cause his voice to
+tremble, and perhaps this was the first time she had ever seen his blue
+eyes light up with so threatening a gleam. She did not dare persist in her
+request, but waited for him to break the silence. By degrees his ominous
+aspect gave place to profound and bitter melancholy. “Ah!” said he at
+length, “this is a sad beginning!” Then after a short silence, he looked
+around as he continued: “Cherished home! we shall perhaps often regret the
+happy days passed here!”—
+
+“We will not leave it,” replied she with a quickness that betrayed how
+unused she was to contradiction. “We will keep it as it is, and always
+come back to it. Our _grand_ days shall be passed, if need be, in the
+gloomy Winter Palace, but our _happiest_ days shall be spent here, and
+they shall be in the future what they have been in the past.”
+
+He shook his head: “The past was ours: the future does not belong to us.
+We must henceforth devote ourselves to our great country, and sacrifice
+all—all! God requires it of us.”
+
+“All!” repeated she with alarm. “What! even happiness and mutual
+confidence? Oh! no, that portion of the past nothing shall infringe upon!
+And there is still another right I shall never renounce—that of imploring
+favor and pardon for the guilty.” She hesitated, and then went on,
+clasping her hands and fixing her eyes on him with a supplicating
+expression: “Will you no longer listen to me?”
+
+“Always in favor of the unfortunate, but never for the ungrateful!”
+
+He frowned as he said these words, and turned towards the door, but she
+stopped him.
+
+She felt it would not do to persist, and with the _adresse_ which is the
+lawful diplomacy of love, she at once changed the subject, and obliged him
+to listen while she discussed projects she knew he had at heart. She spoke
+of herself, of him, of the happy past, their brilliant future, of a
+thousand things, and indeed of everything except her whispered petition
+which she now wished him to forget.
+
+The reader has already discovered himself to be in the presence of the
+young emperor and empress, whose unexpected accession took place in the
+midst of a storm. They were in the habit of meeting thus in the palace
+where they lived during the happy days of their early married life, when
+no thought of the throne disturbed their youthful love!(188) Both
+hesitated a long time about leaving this charming palace for the sovereign
+residence, and, when constrained to do so by the necessity of their
+position, they kept it as it was, without allowing anything to be changed,
+as a witness of the days that, in spite of the imperial purple, they
+continued to call the happiest of their life.
+
+After the empress was left alone, she remained thoughtful a moment, then,
+approaching the malachite _étagère_, hastily rang a small gold bell. A
+door concealed beneath the hangings instantly opened, and a young girl
+appeared. She stopped without speaking, awaiting an order or some
+observation. But there was nothing in her attitude to indicate the
+timidity that might have been expected in a maid of honor answering the
+bell of her sovereign. On the contrary, there was a majestic beauty and an
+air about her which might have seemed haughty had it not been modified
+when she spoke. Then, there was a caressing glance in her eyes, though
+they sometimes sparkled as if betraying more passion than tenderness; but
+her fine form, her black eyes, her thick fair hair, and the delicacy of
+her complexion, rendered her at once striking and imposing. She waited
+some moments in silence—then, seeing her mistress did not address her, she
+advanced and spoke first: “Did your majesty venture to plead his cause?”
+said she.
+
+The empress started from her reverie and sadly shook her head. “My poor
+Vera,” she replied, “you must renounce all hope.”
+
+The young girl turned pale. “Renounce all hope!” exclaimed she. “O madame!
+can that be your advice? Can it be there is no hope?”
+
+The empress, without replying, seated herself in her arm‐chair, took a
+book from the _étagère_, and began turning over the leaves as if she
+wished to put an end to the conversation. Vera’s eyes flashed for an
+instant, and it was with difficulty she repressed an explosion of grief or
+irritation. She remained silent, however, and stood beside the table
+absently plucking the petals from the flowers in a crystal vase before
+her.
+
+The empress meanwhile kept her eyes fastened on her book, but presently
+she raised them and looked at the clock. “I do not need you any longer,
+Vera. It is ten o’clock. You are going to the Countess G——’s this evening,
+I think.”
+
+“Yes, madame, if your majesty has no further orders to give me.”
+
+“No, I have nothing more.—Ah! I forgot. Open that drawer,” pointing to the
+other end of the apartment. “You will find a letter there.”
+
+Vera obeyed, and brought the letter to her mistress.
+
+“Be sure to forward it to the address,” said the latter. “It is the
+permission for the Princess —— to accompany her husband to Siberia. I am
+happy to be able to render that heroic woman this sad service. But she is
+not the only one.”
+
+“What a fate those women are bringing on themselves!” said Vera,
+shuddering with horror.
+
+“Yes, it is indeed fearful,” said the empress; “but I admire them, and
+will serve them every way in my power.”
+
+Vera was silent, and after a moment, seeing the empress had nothing more
+to say, she gravely approached to take leave of her. As she bent down to
+kiss her hand, the empress pressed her lips to her forehead.
+
+“Come, Vera,” said she, “look a little more cheerful, I beg you. To
+satisfy you, I promise to make one more effort. But I think, my dear, you
+are very generous to express so much anxiety about him, for it is not the
+emperor alone who has reason to call him ungrateful!”
+
+At this, Vera’s face crimsoned, and she drew herself up at once. “Your
+majesty has a right to say anything to me,” said she in a trembling voice,
+“but this right has generally been used with kindness.”
+
+“Whereas you now find me cruel. Well, be it so; we will let the subject
+drop. Good‐night, and without any ill‐feeling, my dear.”
+
+She dismissed her maid of honor with a motion of the head. Vera bowed, and
+without another word left the room.
+
+
+LII.
+
+
+“The Countess Vera de Liningen!”
+
+At this name the Marquis Adelardi looked up, but this time he did not
+resume his former attitude, for the person he had so impatiently awaited
+at last appeared. It was she! The cause of this impatience, if we would
+know it, was a resolution to make an effort that evening in behalf of his
+friend through the Countess Vera, but it was first indispensable to be
+sure of her feelings towards him. He wondered if he should discover any
+traces of the ill‐concealed passion she once manifested for George, or if
+time and indignation, aided by the influence of the court, had done their
+work? Or had his inconstancy inspired an indifference which had not been
+disarmed by his misfortunes? All this Adelardi flattered himself he should
+discover in a single conversation, provided she consented to an interview.
+As to any fear of her eluding his penetration, he had too good an opinion
+of himself in that respect.
+
+As soon as she appeared, he looked at her with lively interest, and an
+attention which he indulged in without scruple. Having seen her only twice
+some years before, without speaking to her, he thought she would not
+recognize him till he was formally presented.
+
+Vera crossed the salon without embarrassment, and with the ease and grace
+of a person accustomed to high life and the sensation she produced. She
+was dressed in black, the court, and even the citizens, still wearing
+mourning for the Emperor Alexander. This made the dazzling whiteness of
+her complexion and her golden hair the more striking, and suited her form
+of perfect symmetry, though noble rather than slender. The only ornament
+she wore was a knot of blue ribbon on her left shoulder, to which was
+attached the _chiffre_ of diamonds (her badge as maid of honor), in which
+were woven together the initials of the three empresses: Alexandrine, then
+reigning; Mary, the empress‐mother; and Elizabeth, Alexander’s
+inconsolable widow, who was so soon to follow him to the tomb.
+
+Recent emotion still flushed the young girl’s cheeks, and the tears of
+wounded pride, hastily wiped away, gave her a mingled expression of
+melancholy and haughtiness which at once inspired a desire to pity and a
+fear of offending her.
+
+She first approached the table where the lady of the house was playing
+whist. The latter raised her eyes, and merely smiled as she gave her a
+friendly nod of the head. Vera, without offering her hand, bowed, and made
+a salutation at once graceful and respectful, which was customary in that
+country when one lady is much younger than the other; she pressed her lips
+to the edge of the black lace shawl which the elderly lady wore; then she
+remained standing a moment near the card‐table, looking around the room.
+There was in this look neither eagerness, nor curiosity, nor coquetry: it
+was a mere survey of the room and its occupants, and it was easy to see
+she was seeking no one and expecting no one. She only replied to the
+salutations addressed her by a slight inclination of the head, sometimes
+by a smile.
+
+Presently, seeing a vacant seat, she went to take possession of it, and
+thus found herself near the _canapé_ occupied by the Marquis Adelardi. She
+was scarcely seated when the young diplomatist who had so recently spoken
+of her approached with lively eagerness, to which she only responded by a
+look of indifference and giving him two fingers of her gloved hand.
+
+The Marquis Adelardi took advantage of this favorable opportunity to
+approach the young German and beg to be presented to the Countess Vera.
+Adelardi’s name was no sooner pronounced than it awoke a remembrance, at
+first vague, then distinct enough to make her blush. This lively
+embarrassment was quite evident for a moment. She bowed without speaking
+as he was presented, and, turning her face immediately away, continued for
+some moments to converse with the other, but only long enough to recover
+from her confusion. She speedily put an end to this trifling conversation,
+and, suddenly turning towards Adelardi, she said, without any trace of her
+recent embarrassment: “I remember very well, Monsieur le Marquis, your
+visit at St. Petersburg three years ago, but I was so young then you had
+probably forgotten me.”
+
+Adelardi replied, as he would have done in any case, but in this instance
+with truth, that such a supposition was inadmissible.
+
+“And as for me,” he continued, “never having had the honor of a personal
+acquaintance, I necessarily thought myself wholly unknown to you.”
+
+“Your friends have so often spoken of you that your name was familiar, but
+your features, I acknowledge, were somewhat effaced from my memory.”
+
+“Yours naturally clung to mine. Besides, I also heard you constantly
+spoken of.”
+
+There was a moment’s silence.
+
+“Have you seen the Princess Catherine lately?” said she.
+
+“No, I left Florence at the beginning of December.”
+
+“For St. Petersburg?”
+
+“Yes.”
+
+“And have you been here ever since?”
+
+“Yes. You were absent at my arrival, otherwise I should not have waited
+till the present time to solicit the favor I have just obtained.”
+
+There was another momentary pause. The young girl looked around, and
+continued, in a lower tone: “You were here, then, the twenty‐fourth of
+December?”
+
+“I was.”
+
+She hesitated an instant, then, lowering her voice still more, said: “And
+have you seen your friend since that fatal day?”
+
+“Yes, and I hope to see him once more—alas! for the last time.”
+
+Vera bit her lips, quivering with agitation, but soon resumed, with a
+coolness that surprised and, for a moment, disconcerted the marquis:
+
+“I formerly knew Count George de Walden, but for some time had lost sight
+of him. Nevertheless, his sentence fills me with horror, and I would do
+anything in the world to deliver him from it—him and the rest.”
+
+“Him and the rest? One as soon as the other?”
+
+“One as soon as the other; they all excite my pity. I wish the emperor
+would pardon them all.” Her voice by no means accorded with her words; but
+Adelardi continued as if he did not perceive it:
+
+“Pardon them all! That would be chimerical. But there are some who are
+deserving of clemency.”
+
+“The emperor is more lenient towards inferior criminals than to those who,
+after being loaded with favors, forget his kindness.”
+
+“And yet there may be extenuating circumstances even in some cases of that
+number.”
+
+“Do you know of any that would be of any avail to Count George?” said she
+eagerly.
+
+“Not quite so loud; we may be overheard.”
+
+“Yes; you are right,” she said, resuming her former tone. “Let us change
+our seats; we look as if we were plotting something here, and should avoid
+attracting attention. Let us examine the albums on yonder table. There we
+can continue our conversation with less restraint.”
+
+“Well,” continued she, as soon as they had effected the change proposed,
+and were seated before the albums, which they pretended to be examining
+carefully.
+
+“Well,” replied Adelardi, “what I mean is that many things of no avail in
+the eye of the law might not be without influence over him who is head of
+the law.”
+
+And while she was listening with interest, unintentionally betrayed by her
+eager, agitated expression, her glowing cheeks, and parted lips, Adelardi
+pleaded his friend’s cause, relating what we have already learned
+respecting his apparent, rather than real, complicity, his ignorance of
+the actual designs of the conspirators, and the circumstances that led to
+his presence among the insurgents on the twenty‐fourth of December. In
+short, he gave her all the details of which she had been totally ignorant,
+having only heard, during her absence, of George’s offence and the
+sentence he had incurred.
+
+“And the emperor,” said she eagerly, “does he know it was he who saved his
+brother’s life that dreadful day?”
+
+“I doubt it; there were only two witnesses who could attest it. One of
+these did not come forward, for fear of compromising himself; the other
+was exceptionable.”
+
+“Who was the other?”
+
+“A man named Fabiano Dini, George’s secretary; but a great culprit, not
+considered worthy of credit. He told the truth, however, ardently hoping
+his testimony might save his master.”
+
+“He is doubtless condemned to the same fate?”
+
+“Yes, but to a more severe one; his sentence is for life, whereas George’s
+is only for twenty‐five years.”
+
+“Only twenty‐five years!” repeated she, with a shudder.
+
+“Yes, it is horrible; it is worse than death! And George will envy the
+wretch who was the prime cause of his misfortune, for Dini, seriously
+wounded on the twenty‐fourth of December, will probably die before the sad
+day fixed for their departure.”
+
+They were now interrupted by something not foreign to the subject of their
+discourse. A lady, unpretendingly clad, who till now had remained aloof,
+approached the young maid of honor, and, with a faltering, respectful
+tone, asked if the petition addressed his imperial majesty had been
+granted.
+
+“Yes,” said Vera eagerly. “Permission has been accorded. The Princess ——
+received it this very hour. I left it myself at her door, on my way here.”
+
+She kindly extended her hand to the person who addressed her. The latter
+bent down as if to kiss it, but Vera prevented it by cordially embracing
+her.
+
+“Behold a true, faithful friend in misfortune,” said she, as the other
+left them. “She herself is capable of going to Siberia with her whose
+_dame de compagnie_ she was in happier days. But then, the Princess —— has
+in her misfortunes the happiness of feeling herself beloved and respected
+by all.”
+
+“Assuredly,” said Adelardi. “She is really an admirable woman.”
+
+“So admirable that she is beyond my comprehension.”
+
+“How so?”
+
+“I do not understand how a person can resolve on the course she wishes to
+pursue—she and the others.”
+
+“What!” said Adelardi, looking at her with surprise. “You do not
+understand how a woman can thus wholly devote herself to the man—the
+husband whom she loves.”
+
+Vera shook her head. “No,” said she. “I do not wish to appear better than
+I am. If I were in such a position, if I had the misfortune of loving one
+of those convicts, he might rely on my exertions to obtain his pardon, and
+to use every means in my power to that end. But, as to sharing his lot and
+following him to Siberia, no, my dear marquis, I frankly acknowledge that
+is a proof of devoted affection I feel wholly incapable of.”
+
+Another form at this moment passed before the marquis’ mental vision,
+beside which the beauty actually before him paled, and slightly modified
+the lively admiration with which he regarded her.
+
+“Well,” said he, after a moment’s reflection, “I know one of these
+convicts for whom a woman—a young lady of about your age—is ready to give
+a still greater proof of devotion than the Princess ——, for she is not his
+wife. She is only—his betrothed, and wishes to marry him on purpose to
+share his fate.”
+
+“That is something entirely original,” said Vera.
+
+“To do that,” pursued Adelardi, “she has a double favor to obtain, and is
+coming to St. Petersburg for that purpose. She will be here to‐morrow, or,
+at the latest, in a few days. I have been commissioned to solicit for her
+an audience of the empress. Can I do so through your instrumentality?”
+
+“Certainly. All these requests pass through my hands, and none have been
+rejected. But this is really the most singular case that has occurred.”
+She drew her tablets and a pencil from her pocket. “The name of your
+_protégée_?” said she.
+
+Adelardi hesitated an instant, then, noting a little anxiously the effect
+produced, said:
+
+“Her name is—Fleurange d’Yves.” He was relieved to hear the maid of honor
+say, after carefully writing down the name:
+
+“Fleurange! that is a very singular name, and one I never heard before.
+To‐morrow,” continued she, rising, and returning the tablets to her
+pocket, “before noon you shall have a reply. _Au revoir_, Monsieur le
+Marquis.”
+
+As she gave him her hand, she added in a low tone: “I thank you for all
+your information, and will endeavor to avail myself of it. If you see
+Count George, tell him—but no, tell him nothing. If by the merest chance I
+succeed, it will be time enough then to tell him what he owes to my
+efforts. If I do not—it will be better for him to remain ignorant of my
+failure.”
+
+The Marquis Adelardi returned home greatly preoccupied, and absently took
+up two letters lying on the table. But after opening them, he successively
+read them with equal interest. First, he looked at one of the signatures:
+“Clement Dornthal? He is the cousin who accompanies the fair traveller.
+They have arrived, then.—Well, the end of the drama is approaching: we
+must all endeavor to play our parts with prudence. Mine is not the
+easiest!”
+
+He opened the other note, and hastily ran over it. “Thursday! I shall see
+him on Thursday at two o’clock. Poor George! it will be a sad meeting, in
+spite of the news I have to surprise and console him.”
+
+He had the satisfaction of learning by this note that, thanks to the
+powerful influence brought to bear on the occasion, he would be permitted
+to pass an hour with the prisoner every day during the week that yet
+remained before the sad train of exiles would set forth.
+
+“Poor George!” he again repeated. “Can it be he has really come to
+this?—But who knows what may yet take place? If the proverb, ‘What woman
+wills, God wills,’ is true, all hope is not lost, for here are two women
+evidently with the will to aid him, and energetic enough to overrule the
+most adverse destiny. Two—doubtless one too many, and I have been rather
+bold to risk a fearful collision. But things have come to such a point
+that they can hardly be worse. If the fair Vera succeeds, it is George’s
+affair to get out of the complication of gratitude to her who has saved
+him, and the one ready to follow him. But if she fails, as seems only too
+probable, then the case will be very simple: our charming heroine will
+have no rival to fear.”
+
+
+LIV.
+
+
+After the succession of disagreeable surprises Mademoiselle Josephine had
+experienced during her painful journey, another of a different nature, but
+the greatest of all, awaited her at the end. Her imagination, we are
+aware, never furnished her with anything beyond the strictest necessity.
+It was only with difficulty she succeeded in comprehending that her dear
+Gabrielle had decided to marry a stranger condemned to the galleys, and
+this inconceivable idea seemed to have penetrated her mind to the
+exclusion of all others. She was going to join a prisoner, and from the
+day of her departure from Heidelberg she looked upon herself as on the way
+to a dungeon. When therefore she heard the words, “We have arrived!” and
+their sledge passed under the arch of an immense _porte cochêre_, she
+shivered with fear. It was, consequently, with a sort of stupefaction she
+found herself in a brilliantly lighted vestibule, whence a broad staircase
+led to a fine long gallery opening into one salon after another, at the
+end of which our travellers were ushered into a dining‐room, where supper
+was awaiting them of a quality to which mademoiselle was quite as
+unaccustomed as to the splendor with which it was served. She looked
+around with mute surprise, hardly daring touch the dishes before her, and
+looking at her two companions with an interrogative expression of the
+greatest perplexity. But they both seemed affected and preoccupied to such
+a degree as not to notice what was passing around them, and mademoiselle,
+faithful to her habits, forbore questioning them for the moment.
+
+The repast was made in silence; after which Clement wrote a note which she
+heard him ask a valet to send to _M. le Marquis_. Then the two ladies were
+conducted to the apartments prepared for them. Fleurange embraced her
+companion and wished her good‐night, and Mademoiselle Josephine was left
+alone in a chamber surpassing any she had ever seen, with large mirrors
+around her, in which for the first time in her life she saw herself from
+head to foot. There was also a bed _à baldaquin_, which she scarcely dared
+think destined for her modest person, but in which at length she extended
+herself with a respect that for a long time troubled her repose. Never had
+the excellent Josephine found herself so completely out of her element.
+She wondered if it was really herself beneath those curtains of silk, and,
+when at last she fell asleep, it was to dream that Gabrielle, splendidly
+apparelled, was mounting a throne, and she, Mademoiselle Josephine,
+arrayed in a similar manner, was at her side. Her disturbed slumbers were
+not of long duration. Before day she was up, and impatiently waiting for
+the hour when she could leave her fine chamber and sally forth to explore
+this strange dwelling which the night before seemed so much like a fairy
+palace.
+
+This impression was not lessened by the light of day. The rooms were
+really splendid, and furnished with the taste the Princess Catherine
+everywhere displayed, and which was as carefully consulted in the house
+where she only spent three months of the year, as in her palace at
+Florence, which she made her home. Mademoiselle went from one room to
+another in a state of continually increasing admiration, and, while thus
+walking about, she found everywhere the same mild temperature, which
+seemed something marvellous, for all the doors were open, and not only
+were there no fires to be seen, but no glass or even sashes in the
+windows. Apparently there was nothing to screen her from the frosty air
+without—freezing indeed, for on their arrival at St. Petersburg the
+thermometer was down to fifteen or sixteen degrees, and yet—what was the
+secret of this wonderful fact? She was not cold in the least, though the
+sight of the large windows made her shiver, and she only ventured to stand
+at a distance and look at the view without.
+
+She beheld a vast plain covered with snow, with carriage‐ways in every
+direction, bordered with branches of fir. Vehicles of all kinds were
+crossing to and fro. Yonder was a succession of vast buildings, and
+farther off were the gloomy walls of a fortress flanked by a church whose
+gilded spire glittered in the winter sun—a sun radiant, but without
+warmth; which imparted a dazzling brilliancy to the snow, but whose
+deceptive light, far from alleviating the severity of the season, was, on
+the contrary, the surest sign of its merciless rigor.
+
+While thus admiring and wondering at everything, Mademoiselle came to the
+last salon of the _enfilade_, where, before one of the large windows, she
+perceived Fleurange motionless and absorbed in such profound reverie that
+she did not notice her approach.
+
+“Ah! Gabrielle, here you are! God be praised! I was lost, but no longer
+feel so, now I have found you. But, for pity’s sake! what are you doing at
+that open window?”
+
+At this, Fleurange turned around with a smile. “Open! my dear
+mademoiselle? We should not be alive long, clad as we are.”
+
+“I really do not understand why I do not feel the cold, and yet—”
+
+Fleurange motioned for her to approach (for the old lady still kept at a
+respectful distance from the dangerous openings), and made her touch the
+thick glass, one pane of which composed the window—a luxury at that time
+peculiar to St. Petersburg, and which often deceived eyes more experienced
+than those of the simple Josephine. Reassured, but more and more amazed,
+she remained beside Fleurange at the window, profiting by the occasion to
+ask all the questions hitherto repressed. Everything was gradually
+explained to her, and she comprehended that this magnificent house
+belonged to Count George’s mother.
+
+“And he?” she ventured to say when Fleurange had answered all the
+questions,—“he, Gabrielle, where is he?”
+
+“He!” repeated Fleurange, as a flush rose to her cheeks and her eyes
+filled with tears—“he is there: there, mademoiselle, within the walls of
+the fortress before us!”
+
+Poor Josephine started with surprise. “Pardon me!” said she. “If I had
+known that, I should not have mentioned him.”
+
+“Why, mademoiselle?—The sight of those walls does not make me afraid! On
+the contrary, I long to enter them. I long to leave all this splendor
+which separates me from him as it did before! O my dear friend! you must
+not pity me the day I am united to him!”
+
+The language of passion always had a strange effect on this elderly
+maiden, but she only allowed herself to reply meekly:
+
+“Well, my dear child, we will not pity you! It is Clement and I who will
+need pity when that day comes, and you must not be vexed if—” And in spite
+of herself, great tears filled her eyes, which she promptly wiped away.
+
+She remained silent for some moments, then spoke of something else,
+feeling if she resumed the subject it would speedily lead to an explosion
+of grief which she resolved to restrain that she might not afflict her
+young friend.
+
+“What wide plain is that between the quay and the fortress?” she soon
+continued.
+
+“That is the Neva,” replied Fleurange, smiling.
+
+“The Neva?”
+
+“Yes, the river that runs through the city.”
+
+“The river?” repeated Mademoiselle Josephine. “Come, Gabrielle, I know I
+am very ignorant of everything relating to foreign countries, but still,
+not to such a degree as to believe that. A river!—when I see with my own
+eyes hundreds of carriages on it, sledges and chariots of all kinds, going
+in every direction, and houses and sheds!—And what are those two great
+mountains I see yonder?”
+
+“They are ice‐hills, such as they have in Russia, mademoiselle, and which
+were imitated in wood three years ago at Paris. Do you remember? I am told
+these are only erected temporarily during the carnival.”
+
+“Very well; but what you have said does not prove that to be the river,
+and that you are right.”
+
+“It seems incredible, I know, but everything we see there now will
+disappear in the spring, leaving only a broad stream between that fine
+granite quay and the fortress. But I confess I can scarcely realize it
+myself, never having seen it.”
+
+Clement now appeared. He looked pale and disposed to be silent, and gave
+every indication of having passed a no less restless night than
+Mademoiselle Josephine, though for a different reason. After exchanging
+some words with his companions, his eyes glanced over the broad river,
+and, like those of Fleurange, fastened on the gloomy walls of the
+fortress. It was a strange chance that led them all there precisely
+opposite. Clement gazed at the place with despair, jealousy, and horror,
+but still was unable to turn his eyes away.
+
+“There, then, is the end,” thought he; “for her, the end desired: for me,
+the grave of my youth! Yes, when she once enters those walls, all will be
+at an end for me, were I to live beyond the usual period. My life will be
+ended at twenty years of age!”—
+
+These reflections and others of the same nature were not calculated to
+make Clement very agreeable that morning. He was not only serious, which
+often happened, but, contrary to his habit, he was gloomy and taciturn.
+Their breakfast was despatched in silence, after which it was only by a
+great effort he gradually succeeded in regaining his usual manner.
+
+“Cousin Gabrielle,” said he then, “I appear morose this morning, I am
+aware, and I beg your pardon. But I am only sad, I assure you—sad in view
+of what is approaching. This is pardonable, I hope,” continued he, taking
+Mademoiselle Josephine’s hand; “you will not require us, will you, to
+leave you without regret?”
+
+“That is what I said to her a moment ago,” said poor Josephine, wiping
+away her tears. “She says she is happy; that she longs to be there,”
+casting a glance across the river. “We only desire her happiness, I am
+sure; but then for us—”
+
+“Yes,” said Clement, with a sad smile of bitterness, “for us the few days
+to come will not be very happy, and we really have reason to be sad. As
+for me, Gabrielle, I also regret those just ended; for in this new sphere
+my _rôle_ is at an end. I am now to be for ever deprived of the pleasure
+of being useful to you in any way.”
+
+He was still speaking when the Marquis Adelardi was announced; and he
+hastily rose.
+
+“Stay, Clement,” said Fleurange eagerly—“stay. I wish this excellent
+friend to become acquainted with you.”
+
+“I also wish to make his acquaintance, but not now. Tell him that to‐
+morrow, yes, to‐morrow morning—or even this evening, if he will receive
+me, I will call at his residence. Do not detain me now.”
+
+And before the marquis appeared he was gone. He felt he should be _de
+trop_ at this interview of such deep import to Fleurange, for such it was.
+To see George’s friend once more, his confidential friend—him who at this
+solemn period had become the intermediary authorized by his mother!—There
+was great reason to be agitated at such a thought. Besides, Adelardi had
+always inspired her with sympathy and confidence, and in this new sphere
+she realized how beneficial his experience would be, for Clement was right
+in saying he could no longer be of any use. He was as ignorant as she of
+the habits and usages of the court. And yet, to obey the Princess
+Catherine’s instructions, her first object must be to obtain an audience
+of the empress—a formidable prospect, which frightened her a thousand
+times more than all that afterwards awaited her. She therefore received
+the marquis with such childlike confidence as to redouble the regard he
+had always felt for her. There was the same beauty, the same simplicity
+about her, and, above all, the charm most attractive to eyes as _blasés_
+as his—of resembling no one else in the world! The extraordinary courage
+she showed herself capable of made him appreciate the more that which she
+manifested in separating from George, and revealed to him the whole extent
+of the sacrifice then made with so much firmness.
+
+The mission confided to Adelardi assumed, therefore, a graver aspect in
+his eyes than before, and he was for an instant tempted to reproach
+himself for having, the night previous, invoked the aid of a rival in
+George’s behalf, who might prove an enemy to the charming girl before him.
+On all accounts, however, he could not regret this last effort for his
+friend’s welfare. In case Vera failed, and by chance was afterwards
+tempted to display any ill‐will at another’s performing an act of
+devotedness she declared herself incapable of, he had taken some
+precautions to defeat her, and flattered himself the favor would be
+obtained before she discovered by whom it was implored.
+
+Meanwhile, the maid of honor was punctual. The marquis had already
+received her reply, and now placed it in his young friend’s hands.
+
+“Your request is granted: Mademoiselle Fleurange d’Yves will be received
+by her majesty on Thursday, at two o’clock.
+
+V. L.”
+
+“The day after to‐morrow!” said Fleurange with emotion. Then, blushing as
+she continued: “But how happens it that the name which I have not borne
+for so long occurs in this note?”
+
+“It is yours, is it not?” replied the marquis evasively.
+
+“Yes, it is mine, but—” she stopped. A particular remembrance was now
+associated with the name of Fleurange. No one had called her so but George
+for more than three years. And the day for ever graven on her memory, he
+told her he should keep that name for himself—himself alone. She regretted
+to find it here written by a strange hand, and felt an involuntary
+contraction of the heart.
+
+“I should have preferred the request made in the name I generally bear.”
+
+“Pardon me. I am to blame in this,” said Adelardi. “I supposed it a matter
+of indifference. I thought the name of Fleurange would particularly
+attract the attention of her whose favor you seek, and remain more surely
+in her memory.”
+
+This was merely an excuse which occurred to him in reply to a question he
+had not anticipated. His real motive was to conceal from the maid of honor
+another name perhaps more familiar, and which might be connected in her
+mind with some prejudice injurious to the success of the petition of which
+she was the intermediary.
+
+To Be Continued.
+
+
+
+
+Sayings.
+
+
+“We serve God by climbing up to heaven from virtue to virtue; we serve
+Satan by descending into hell from vice to vice.”—_S. Bonaventura._
+
+He who reflects upon death has already cut short the evil habit of
+talkativeness; and he who has received the gift of inward and spiritual
+tears, shuns it as he would fire.—_S. John Climacus._
+
+Spiritual blessings attained by much prayer and labor are solid and
+durable.—_Ibid._
+
+The first degree of interior peace is to banish from us all the noise and
+commotion created by the passions, which disturb the profound tranquillity
+of the heart. The last and most excellent degree is to stand in no fear of
+this disturbance, and to be perfectly insensible to its
+excitement.—_Ibid._
+
+The heart of the meek is the throne on which the Lord reposes.—_Ibid._
+
+The day will belong to him who is first in possession.—_Ibid._
+
+
+
+
+Prince Von Bismarck And The Interview Of The Three Emperors.
+
+
+By M. Adolphe Dechamps, Min. D’état
+
+From La Revue Générale De Bruxelles.
+
+
+
+MY DEAR FRIEND: You question me about the events which during the past two
+years have been subverting Europe, and you in particular ask me what I
+think of the meeting of the three emperors at Berlin, and of the policy of
+von Bismarck.
+
+Your first inquiry is too general for me to take up in a letter which I
+wish to avoid making too long, but in a work which I am writing at present
+I will endeavor to do so to the extent of my ability. About the year 1849,
+I went to work on an _Étude sur la France_, out of which, during the
+second Empire, I put forth three separate publications.(189) In these I
+followed the course of Napoleon III., both in the successes and in the
+blunders which brought about his fall; and now in the midst of the
+obscurity of general politics which thickens more and more from day to
+day, and wherein the attentive observer perceives more sinister flashes
+than gleams of sunshine, I am about to complete the main work which I
+began more than twenty years ago.
+
+In 1859, I sent my first publication on the _Second Empire_ to the aged
+Prince von Metternich, who honored me with his friendship, and asked him
+for his views about the condition of Europe, which was then on the eve of
+being profoundly changed by the war in Italy.
+
+The following is an extract from the interesting reply which I received
+from him only a short time before his death: “After having been a witness
+and spectator of the catastrophes which burst forth between the years 1789
+and 1795, in the latter one I made my first entry into the higher walks of
+the political world, and 1801 was the first year of my diplomatic career.
+I consequently cannot be in ignorance of anything that has taken place
+since the two remote epochs above mentioned. Now, am I thereby in advance
+of other living men? Can I consider myself capable of drawing up a
+prognostication of what will happen even so far only as regards the most
+immediate future? Certainly not! But, nevertheless, one thing I know I can
+do, I can venture to affirm that not during the course of the last seven
+decades has there been a single moment when the elements which make up
+_social existence_ have found themselves plunged in so general a struggle
+as they are now.”
+
+Since the prince thus wrote me, we have had the campaign of Italy against
+Austria in 1859; the war in Germany which ended in Sadowa; the civil war
+in the United States of N. A.; the colossal war of 1870; the astounding
+fall of the second French Empire; the rule of the Commune, and the
+conflagration in Paris; a Republican government in France; the setting up
+of the Empire of Germany; the Italian Revolution in Rome, which keeps the
+Pope a captive in the Vatican and all the church in mourning; we have had
+Spain contended for by three dynasties and a prey to anarchy and civil
+war; and we have a socialistic revolution stirring up everywhere the
+laboring masses and unsettling the deepest foundations of the society of
+our day!
+
+What would old Prince von Metternich say if, having before him the immense
+upheaving of which we are witnesses, he could be now called upon to reply
+to the general inquiry which you have put to me? He would decline giving
+an opinion; he would refuse to make any predictions; he would confine
+himself to the expression of deeper fears, because of the general and
+formidable struggle now raging between all the elements which make up the
+very life of society. I will do just as he would, and for a hundredfold
+more reasons than he could have. I feel, as do all those who have any
+political instinct, that decisive and dreadful events are drawing nigh;
+though I cannot yet distinctly perceive them, I feel them, as one does the
+approach of a storm, from the heaviness of the air before seeing the
+lightning flash or hearing the thunder roll.
+
+I lay aside, then, your general inquiry, and take up the second one, which
+is more precise, and which relates to the meeting at Berlin and to the
+policy of von Bismarck.
+
+It is almost needless for me to mention that, retired as I have been for a
+long time from politics, any opinions which I may express are merely
+individual ones, that I alone am responsible for them, and that nobody can
+claim a right to extend that responsibility to my friends, and still less
+to the political party which I have had the honor of serving. I make this
+express reservation.
+
+What is, then, the meaning, the character, and the bearing of the meeting
+of the three emperors? Is it a congress? Is it an alliance?
+
+It is neither one nor the other, and this has been carefully proclaimed.
+It is not an _European_ congress, since England and France were not
+present at it, the one having been left aside, and the other naturally
+excluded. It is not a _congress_, since no treaty will sanction its views
+and results. But, besides, Prince von Bismarck wants neither congress nor
+treaty. He attached great importance to signing the treaty of Prague alone
+with Austria and the treaty of Frankfort alone with France; he refused,
+with a certain _hauteur_, to allow any interference of the other European
+powers in those treaties, although they brought about a fundamental change
+in the status and equilibrium of Europe.
+
+In times past, after a great war, Europe has always intervened through a
+solemn congress in which it dictated the terms of a general peace, thereby
+securing for it solidity and duration. Thus the treaty of Westphalia
+brought with it its consequent peace, the treaty of Vienna the peace of
+1815, and more recently the treaty of the Congress of Paris in 1856
+followed upon the war in the Crimea. Heretofore Europe has been subject to
+a system of equilibrium: Bismarck has done away with the latter, and
+broken up the former.
+
+But he perceived the danger of this attitude and this situation. Germany
+had vanquished Austria, crushed France, and had won European supremacy,
+but she stood alone. Austria, forced out first from Italy, afterwards from
+Germany, could not, without feeling a deep and natural jealousy, see the
+German Empire rise to the first rank while she sank to the second. Russia
+cannot see the German Empire extend from the Danube to the Baltic, and
+overtop the Slavic Empire, without becoming also jealous. England cannot
+look upon this state of things, which leaves her nothing to do but to keep
+quiet and silent, without feeling somewhat as Austria and Russia do. There
+is felt, then, at St. Petersburg, as at Vienna, and perhaps at London, an
+invincible distrust of the predominance of Germany and of the rupture, for
+her benefit, of the equilibrium of Europe. There are deep and opposing
+interests which are incompatible with a true alliance between the three
+emperors, and, albeit they have at Berlin shaken hands, toasted, and
+fraternally embraced one another and exchanged certain general ideas, they
+have not allied themselves on settled political views.
+
+M. von Bismarck has himself pretty accurately defined the meeting at
+Berlin: “It is of importance that no one should suppose that the meeting
+of the three emperors has for its object any special political projects.
+Beyond a doubt, this meeting amounts to a signal recognition of the new
+German Empire, but no political design has directed it.”
+
+It amounts to this or very nearly this: M. von Bismarck wanted neither a
+congress nor a treaty, nor did he seek an alliance which was impossible of
+attainment just now; but he was determined to put an end to his present
+isolation, and he sought in particular to cut short the dream of
+retaliation in which France might indulge from a hoped‐for alliance with
+Russia or with Austria.
+
+The government of Berlin has in the meeting of the three emperors sought
+two and perhaps three ends: I. To bring about the recognition of the
+German Empire by the two great military powers of the North, and in that
+way deprive France of all hope of finding an ally, with a view to war,
+either at St. Petersburg or at Vienna. II. To discourage at the same time
+the _particularism_(190) of Bavaria and of South Germany, which has always
+looked for a support in the direction of Vienna. The third end may be to
+disarm the resistance of Catholics to the absurd and odious persecutions
+organized against them, by intimating to them that their cause has been
+abandoned by the Apostolic Emperor, the head of the House of Hapsburg.
+
+The remarkable letter published in _Der Wanderer_ of Vienna, under the
+heading of “The Order of Battle,” sets forth very cleverly each of these
+two hopes aforesaid of the Berlin diplomats.
+
+“Those diplomats,” says _Der Wanderer_, “are rather barefacedly making
+game of Austria’s good‐nature. They calculate that this good‐nature will
+have the effect of paralyzing two (as M. von Bismarck considers them)
+implacable enemies of the empire, but heretofore friends of the Hapsburg
+dynasty; I mean the particularism of the minor states and the Catholic
+opposition. ‘Thanks to the house of Austria,’ say they, ‘we are going to
+disarm those reptiles, and pull out their venomous fangs.’ At the same
+time, those diplomats do not conceal their joy (premature, I hope) at what
+they call the _Canossa_(191) of Berlin and the retaliation of Olmutz. ‘We
+will get the old seal of the empire’ (I quote their words textually)
+‘affixed to our heritage by the House of Austria.’ ”
+
+It would seem, then, that the Emperor of Austria, by appearing at Berlin,
+meant to say to particularism and perhaps to the Catholic body: You need
+no longer count on me. And the Emperor of Russia went there to offer a
+toast to the German army and to signify to France: Do not count on any
+alliance with me for a war hereafter.
+
+This would indeed be the crowning of M. von Bismarck’s policy. Since the
+two great wars against Austria and against France which by their
+prodigious results assuredly far surpassed his hopes and previsions, he
+has but one solicitude and one thought—to isolate France, to secure her
+military and political impotence, to file down the old lion’s teeth and to
+muzzle him.
+
+To this end, he needed strong and impenetrable frontiers, which he got by
+the acquisition of Alsace and Lorraine. Prince von Bismarck cannot fail to
+perceive that the annexation of these two provinces to Germany constitutes
+for it, in a political point of view, a source of weakness rather than of
+strength; that it is an additional embarrassment to the difficulties
+following the organization of German unity; that Alsace and Lorraine will
+be, for a long time to come, another bleeding Poland on the flanks of the
+new empire; nevertheless, the conquest of these two provinces seemed to
+him, in a military point of view, indispensable as a first material
+guarantee against the possibility of retaliation on the part of France. By
+the possession of those provinces, he turns against France the formidable
+triple line of defence of the Meuse, the Moselle, and the Vosges; at
+Strasbourg and at Metz he holds the strategical keys of France; these two
+strongholds are, so to speak, iron gates of which the bolts are kept at
+Berlin. The other Rhenish frontiers are defended by the armed neutrality
+of Holland, Belgium, Luxemburg, and Switzerland. Seated behind its
+impassable frontiers, and relying upon its powerful military organization
+and the remembrance of its recent triumphs, the German Empire appears
+perfectly secure from attack.
+
+But even all this was not enough for Prince von Bismarck. He has just been
+repeating the policy which turned out so well for him in the war of 1866
+against Austria. Then, through the guilty and senseless connivance of
+Napoleon III., he allied himself to Italy; he compelled Austria to divide
+her forces, to have two armies, one at Verona, the other in Bohemia—which
+was making sure beforehand of the defeat of Austria. M. von Bismarck has
+just begun a second time this skilful manœuvre. He has formed an offensive
+and defensive alliance with Italy which owes its political life to France,
+and repays the boon by treachery. By means of this alliance he would
+compel France, in the event of a war, to have an army of the Alps and an
+army of the Rhine, which would be equivalent to certain defeat.
+
+Any war of retaliation is consequently for a long time to come rendered
+impossible.
+
+There would be left to France only one resource, and that a distant one,
+viz., an alliance with a great military power, such as Austria, or, in
+particular, Russia, whose secret jealousies she would turn to her account.
+
+But such an alliance presupposes France raised up, in a political,
+military, and moral sense, from her present ruin, and in possession of a
+settled government, stable within and influential without. Can a republic,
+even a conservative one, and even if it always had at its head as capable
+a statesman as M. Thiers, so raise France? Can a republic which is a good
+enough raft to take refuge on for a while, a so to speak narrow bed, which
+will do for France, wounded and ailing, to lie on during the period of
+convalescence—can it, in a country which lacks manly habits and historical
+institutions, unite enough solidity, security, wise liberty, strength, and
+grandeur to become the ally of so great an empire as Russia? To my mind,
+the idea of an alliance between a French republic and one of the two
+empires of the North against the German Empire is one of those
+impossibilities which need but to be asserted, not to be argued. If France
+could succeed in reuniting the separated links of her history, in
+reconciling her present with her past, if she were to again become a
+traditional, representative, and free monarchy, one holding itself
+equidistant from the abuses of the old _régime_ and the errors of the
+Revolution—oh! then her situation would indeed be changed, and great
+alliances at present impossible might become possible soon thereafter. But
+such alliances would not have for their object never‐ending retaliations
+and new wars; they would bear their fruits through social peace, through
+the restoration of authority and order, and through that true, prudent,
+and measured liberty which, now that they have it not, they talk so much
+about. The greatness of France depends less on the extent of her frontiers
+than on her political, social, and religious renovation.
+
+It is because M. von Bismarck understands perfectly that an alliance
+between one of the great military empires of the North and republican
+France is a chimerical project, that he encourages the adherents of the
+republic at Versailles to sustain their work.
+
+Anyhow, M. von Bismarck, having in view the nature of contingencies, has
+sought to shut France out from hopes or temptations in this direction;
+after, having in her folly dreamt of getting a frontier on the Rhine, she
+has wretchedly lost, through the folly of her emperor, her eastern
+frontier; after, having sworn to tear in pieces the treaty of 1815, to
+which she had submitted with detestation, she has had to sign at Frankfort
+the treaty in virtue of which she was invaded and dismembered.
+
+The new Empire of Germany, resting on its formidable army, protected by
+impenetrable frontiers, certain of an alliance with Italy which renders
+the undertaking of war against it almost impossible for France, sustained
+by the official friendship of Austria and of Russia, compels France to be
+resigned and peaceful; condemns her to political and military impotence,
+or, what may sound better, to walk in the ways of prudence. M. Thiers, in
+words which the French press has published, has recently made a resolute
+profession of this policy of prudence, by proclaiming that he desires
+peace—peace to build up and fructify; and that France, at all events, will
+not seek to break it.
+
+When, from the balcony of the Imperial Palace at Berlin, it is proclaimed
+that the object and result of the meeting of three emperors is to sanction
+the _statu quo_ of Europe, and to consolidate a general peace, we believe
+that they mean what they proclaim; but what is the signification of the
+proclamation? Why, that they have thereby accepted the actual state of
+things which has grown out of the recent wars; that is to say, the
+European supremacy of the German Empire, founded on the powerlessness or
+the cautious prudence of France; and that they think to have extinguished
+the centre of combustion from which the firebrand of war might be again
+hurled over Europe.
+
+This is assuredly a clever policy, one in which Prince von Bismarck might
+allow himself to take a certain pride.
+
+But in this serene sky there is one dark cloud, and we may well suppose
+that this cloud has disturbed the optimism of the diplomats assembled at
+Berlin. This cloud is that dreaded unknown future when France will be no
+longer governed by M. Thiers.
+
+Salvation is not to come to France from the republic; in France there is
+neither a republic nor a monarchy; the forces which tend to a monarchy are
+disunited, and consequently powerless, and those which tend to a republic
+are still more divided; the nation is living under an administration _ad
+interim_; there is an absence of settled government and settled
+institutions, and an impossibility of establishing either, because of the
+wide divisions of irreconcilable parties, of anarchy in principles and
+ideas. The salvation of France for the time being is one man, a leader
+whose hand is pliable, firm, and commanding enough to hold political
+parties in submission and keep down the rivalries which would give France
+over to another civil war. M. Thiers believes that any present attempt to
+set up a monarchy would light up a civil war; while the conviction of the
+majority of the Assembly at Versailles is just as strong that, if the
+republic lasts, this civil war will break out on the morrow of the day
+when France will have lost M. Thiers. Probably both are right; it is
+rather to the condition itself of France than to the men that lead her
+that this lamentable state of affairs is to be attributed which finds its
+expression in the government of a provisional republic having nothing to
+look forward to in the future but unfathomable darkness and mystery.
+
+M. Thiers is the embodiment of the conservative republic, which will last
+just so long as he lives, and I desire that his needed dictatorship be
+prolonged for a long while yet; but can we reasonably entertain such a
+hope? He has undertaken the admirable work of saving France; he has in
+Paris fought and won the great battle against anarchy; he has carried the
+loans through, reorganized the army and finances of France; he is pushing
+forward the evacuation of her territory; he maintains order. All this is
+very fine and grand; he is indeed acting the part of the saviour of his
+country; but let him not seek to do more; let him not be ambitious to
+become the founder of a government; let him rather be content with merely
+playing the first part at the head of affairs.
+
+I thoroughly appreciate the work M. Thiers is engaged in; he directs his
+policy by the light of present events, the only ones he can control; he is
+going through the reparative period, _but what is he preparing_? What is
+he founding for the future? What heritage will he leave after him, and who
+will be his heir? Such are the questions which must come up to every
+reflecting mind, and in particular to his, so remarkably clear,
+perspicacious, and penetrating.
+
+The weak side of his policy is that it leaves France on a political _terra
+incognita_. The creation of a few additional institutions will not suffice
+to raise France out of the provisional status in which she lies since her
+fall; I mean such as a vice‐presidency, the establishing of a lower house,
+all which would be adding shadows to shadows. It would never amount to
+anything more than an administration _ad interim_, and a period of
+expectation of a definite, stable, regular government having influence
+abroad, such an one as France feels that she does not but should possess.
+The question for M. Thiers, as well as for France and for Europe, remains
+the same: What is being prepared, what will the future bring?
+
+As we know the tree by its fruits, so do we judge a policy by its results,
+and so will M. Thiers be judged.
+
+If he leaves after him the heritage of a traditional and representative
+monarchy, or if, like a second Washington, he leaves as his successor to
+France a second John Adams or Thomas Jefferson who will enter upon the
+work of consolidating a republic really conservative, free, Christian, and
+powerful, he will indeed be a great man; but, if he is to be followed in
+power by a Gambetta who will be the predecessor of the socialist _commune_
+of Paris, he will, notwithstanding the immense services he has rendered,
+be severely judged by history. No one assuredly ought to understand this
+better than he.
+
+Is the second President of the fourth or fifth French Republic to be a now
+unforeseen Jefferson or a Gambetta?
+
+Such is the dreaded question now before us. These threatening
+eventualities have doubtless been attentively considered at the conference
+in Berlin. M. von Bismarck may have developed thereat the political plan
+which I have endeavored to analyze, and which has for its object the
+founding of the peace of Europe on France’s inability to undertake another
+war; but revolutionary and demagogical France, bearing incendiarism from
+Paris to Madrid, to Rome, and perhaps elsewhere, must be opposed in some
+other way than by the establishment of impenetrable frontiers and the
+formation of alliances; and on these other means of opposition the three
+emperors must have seriously conferred at Berlin, and I doubt much whether
+waging war against the Catholic Church has seemed to them the best way to
+avert the danger aforesaid.
+
+
+
+II.
+
+
+I have sought in this letter to set forth the character and import of the
+meeting at Berlin, and to show the policy which Prince von Bismarck has
+endeavored to inaugurate there. I have not been eaves‐dropping at the
+doors of the chambers in which the three emperors and their chancellors
+held their deliberations; but there is no difficulty in conjecturing what
+was talked about, and, I may add, what was thought therein.
+
+We must not overestimate the importance of these conversations; the
+meeting at Berlin will no more bring about positive results for the
+solution of pending questions in Europe than did the numerous interviews
+which Napoleon III. had with the Emperor of Austria, the ministers of
+Great Britain, and the czar. As we have stated before, it is not a
+congress; it forms no alliances, and no treaty determining the new
+European equilibrium will come out of it. What M. von Bismarck wished
+particularly to bring about was the presence of the two emperors with
+their counsellors in the capital of the new empire. Their mere presence
+signified, in the eyes of the prince chancellor:
+
+The recognition of the German Empire; the sanction of the treaties of
+Prague and Frankfort, which were to form the basis of the new equilibrium
+of Europe.
+
+The impossibility for France to find a powerful ally that would enable her
+to attempt a war of retaliation.
+
+On the part of Austria, the abandonment of all idea of returning to her
+old German policy, and the repudiation of all connivance with the
+_particularistic_ resistance of the lesser states of Germany.
+
+I will presently examine whether the presence at Berlin of the head of the
+dynasty of Hapsburg signifies also the repudiation of the Catholic
+movement which the persecutions directed against the church have stirred
+up throughout entire Germany.
+
+Assuredly this policy of M. von Bismarck shows, I will not say grandeur,
+but skill and audacity; and it has been crowned by wonderful success. When
+I saw Prince von Bismarck raise Prussia, that a few years ago could hardly
+rank among the great powers, to the height of the Empire of Germany
+through the victories of 1866 and 1871—when I contemplated these
+astounding results, I was for a moment tempted to consider him as a great
+minister, as one of the rare successors of Richelieu or of Stein.
+
+I was the more inclined to this judgment because, as a Belgian, I was
+grateful for the honest and upright policy which he had followed as
+regards Napoleon III. before the last war. There is no longer any room for
+doubt, now that the diplomatic documents are known, that Napoleon III., in
+order to redeem the unpardonable blunder which he had committed by
+favoring the war of 1861 between Prussia and Austria, endeavored to obtain
+in Luxemburg and in Belgium the compensations which he considered needful
+for him in view of the aggrandizement of Prussia. We know about the rough
+draft of the Benedetti treaty, which no amount of equivocation and timid
+denial can do away with.
+
+I had, in my work published in 1865, clearly denounced the plot; and from
+the Belgian tribune, because I had pointed out these perils to its
+government, I have been called a political visionary and almost a traitor
+to my country. Subsequent events have justified my allegations, and now
+every one knows that the dangers which we ran for a time were more real,
+nearer at hand, and greater than even I imagined them to be.
+
+The war of 1870 was the consequence of the refusal of the government of
+Berlin to yield to the guilty covetousness of Napoleon III. I ascribe the
+honor of the former to M. von Bismarck and to the integrity of William IV.
+I had proclaimed the existence of two eminent perils: a diplomatic peril,
+viz., an alliance of France with Prussia, of which Belgium would have been
+the stakes and the victim; the chance of a war between those two nations,
+in which France might have been victorious. We have, almost by a miracle,
+escaped those two perils; through the war of 1870, Belgium has been
+preserved from diplomatic conspiracies, and as a Belgian I can never
+forget it.(192)
+
+Belgium, since the late war, finds herself in a new position which has not
+attracted the attention it deserves.
+
+Belgium, for a long time back coveted by France, particularly by France
+under the Empire and under the Republic, had, above all, to fear an
+alliance between France and Prussia, which latter might sacrifice her to
+the political combinations growing out of such an alliance. That is what
+Napoleon III. attempted in the Benedetti negotiation, and it was this
+peril which before the recent war alarmed my patriotism.
+
+Now this peril has vanished. An alliance between the German Empire and
+France is now put off for a long time. But there is another motive still
+more powerful, and which constitutes our complete security, which is this:
+that the existence of a _neutral_ and _strong_ Belgium has become
+henceforward for the German Empire a necessity of the highest order. Since
+the government of Berlin has thought it indispensable for strategic
+purposes to hold Metz and the lines of the Meuse and of the Vosges, it
+cannot allow, under any consideration, independent Belgium to disappear
+and France to occupy that territory of Belgium which is watered by the
+Meuse and the Scheldt. Our neutrality protects the Rhine on the side of
+the gap between the Sambre and the Meuse, but can afford this protection
+only provided our neutrality is politically and militarily strong to such
+an extent as our financial resources will warrant.
+
+Our neutrality, in order to be one of the supports of the peace of Europe,
+must be ever an honest one; it must stand as a barrier against aggression
+whether from the east or from the south; it must be hostile to no power.
+On the other hand, it is plain that, in order to fill this position of
+barrier and guarantee, Belgium must remain always armed and able to repel
+an attack at the outset; otherwise, she would become politically useless,
+and, in the event of a war, the occupation of her territory would follow
+as the fatal result of such omission.
+
+This was true before the late war, and on this point my views have not
+changed; but, since the new European situation created by the war, this
+truth is twice as plain, and our duties to Europe have increased twofold.
+It is important that all our political men, without distinction of party,
+and that the entire nation, understand well the position to which we have
+been brought by recent events.
+
+Far from being hostile to the German Empire, I find in it a new guarantee
+for the independence of my country. Our neutrality now rests on all the
+powers and on all the treaties that have been made: it had become a habit,
+after the advent of the Napoleonic Empire, to consider England as the
+special protector of our national independence, but now that Germany has a
+particular and powerful interest in that independence, instead of one
+special support only, we now have two.
+
+It is proper that I should make this statement, as I am about to submit M.
+von Bismarck’s policy to a severe criticism. In this page of history which
+I have been rapidly writing, I have not been wanting in praise; and, if
+these lines are ever read by M. von Bismarck, he cannot complain of the
+appreciation which I have so far expressed of his policy. In the pages
+that follow, I shall not spare criticism. Much as I have admired the
+policy which prepared the war, in equal degree does my mind fail to
+comprehend the policy followed at Berlin since the peace, and which
+appears to me to be a perfect antithesis of the former one.
+
+This latter policy appears to me so incomprehensible that I ask myself
+whether Prince von Bismarck, instead of being a political genius like
+Stein, is not entering upon the path of error in which Napoleon III. came
+to his ruin.
+
+Napoleon III. has also been the ruler of Europe; the second Empire for
+many years enjoyed preponderance in Europe, and might have retained it
+much longer but for the accumulated blunders of imperial policy. Napoleon
+III., who had begun his reign isolated from other monarchs, and to whom
+the appellation of _my cousin_ had been disdainfully denied, found
+himself, immediately after the war in the Crimea and after the Congress of
+Paris, at the head of a great Western alliance formed with England and
+Austria and by isolating Russia and annulling Prussia. He had reached the
+zenith of power in Europe; he had a star in which he and every one besides
+believed; kings and emperors came to Fontainebleau and to the Tuileries to
+pay their court to the _parvenu_ sovereign who had been transformed into a
+Louis XIV., just as has happened at Berlin.
+
+When I saw Napoleon III., at the summit of such a situation, break with
+his own hands, like a hot‐brained child, this magnificent Western alliance
+to which he was indebted for his high fortune; conspire at the Congress of
+Paris with M. de Cavour to bring about that fatal war in Italy against
+Austria which was the first cause of his disasters; turn out of the
+straight path of conservative principles which he had sworn to follow, and
+then lose himself in the tortuous and obscure ways of revolution, my
+judgment of him was definitively made. A man who could commit such a folly
+was neither a statesman nor a political genius; he was merely a lucky
+adventurer who had been helped on and spoiled by events, but who did not
+know enough to turn them to account.
+
+It was just then, in 1859, on the eve of the war in Italy, that I wrote my
+first work on _Le Second Empire_, in which I did not hesitate to predict
+that this war, no matter how much glory it might make for the emperor,
+would nevertheless amount to a political defeat which would lead to the
+fall of the Empire. “The heads of even the wisest men,” I said, “are
+liable to turn when they have reached such an elevation as he has arrived
+at.” And I selected as the epigraph of my work, the words which old Prince
+von Metternich had uttered when speaking of the extreme good‐fortune of
+the Emperor of the French: “He is successful,” said the prince to me; “he
+has excellent cards in his hands, and he plays his game well, but he will
+be lost as a revolutionary emperor on the Italian reef.” This remarkable
+prediction, made long before the war in Italy, has been verified to the
+letter, and my book, written in 1859, was merely a commentary upon it
+which subsequent events have confirmed.
+
+M. von Bismarck is also at the acme of his triumph; he is presiding at his
+Congress of Paris. Behold Prussia, which but a few years ago had hardly
+any voice in the councils of Europe, now become the German Empire, and
+behold the Emperor of Germany getting the czar and the Emperor Francis
+Joseph to sanction at Berlin his victories, his conquests, and his
+political supremacy, by leaving France isolated, and making of no account
+England, which had kept herself aloof in her policy of forbearance.
+
+Well, I do not hesitate to select this hour of triumph, when M. von
+Bismarck’s policy has been crowned at Berlin, in the midst of festivities
+the splendor of which is talked of far and wide, to predict its failure in
+the end if he does not change it. My reason for asserting this in presence
+of a state of things so contrary to my prediction is that M. von Bismarck
+is committing one of those blunders, I dare not say one of those political
+follies, which astonish reason, and which form the premises of a syllogism
+having for its conclusion an inevitable failure. The blunder is precisely
+similar to that perpetrated by Napoleon III., who, in consequence of
+having allied himself with revolutionary Italy, was led from Mexico to
+Sadowa, and from Sedan to Chiselhurst. This blunder on the part of M. von
+Bismarck, and of which he will yet repent, is his alliance with
+revolutionary Italy, which drags him into a war against the Catholic
+Church, which has always proved fatal to those who have attempted it, and
+which destroys the work of German unity which he had associated with his
+name. The epigraph of my work on _Le Second Empire_, borrowed from Prince
+von Metternich, might serve for this letter as well, if applied to the
+Emperor of Germany and his chancellor; if the head of the dynasty of the
+Hohenzollerns continues in the path of revolution in which M. von Bismarck
+has led him, “he will also perish, like the revolutionary emperor on the
+Italian reef.”
+
+Is it rashness on my part to point out to Prince von Bismarck and to the
+German Emperor the Tarpeian rock so nigh to the capitol to which they have
+ascended? Am I unjust towards the prince chancellor?
+
+No one had a higher opinion of his political merit than I, and in
+appreciating, as I have done in this letter, his astounding successes, I
+have not been sparing of praise nor indeed of admiration. If, then, I am
+compelled to draw a comparison between Napoleon III. and him, and to
+measure by the blunder committed by the Emperor of the French in 1859 that
+which he is now committing, I must ask his pardon, for I make a great
+difference between those two contemporary personages. In the same degree
+that Napoleon III. was irresolute, beset by somnolent indolence and
+continual hesitation, so does, on the other hand, Prince von Bismarck know
+how to show a tenacious persistence and audacity in the carrying out of
+his designs; but this very tenacity may be a source of additional danger,
+if he enters upon a road which leads to an abyss; he will go forward in it
+quicker and more irremediably than another would, because he knows neither
+how to stop nor to draw back.
+
+Let us, then, study the policy of M. von Bismarck.
+
+And, in the first place, without wishing in the least to belittle the
+share which evidently belongs to him in the triumphs of Prussia, we must,
+nevertheless, admit that another important share falls to Count von
+Moltke, the greatest warrior of our day; and an equally considerable part
+is due to the blunders of his adversaries, Austria and Imperial France.
+
+If, for example, Napoleon III. had not betrayed Austria in 1866 by
+allowing and favoring the alliance between Prussia and Italy, a war
+against Austria would have been impossible, and the victory of Sadowa
+would not have taken place; the senseless war of 1870, which grew out of
+the victory of Sadowa, would have been without either cause or pretext;
+France would be now erect, Austria would have maintained its influential
+position in Germany, and the German Empire would not have been established
+for the profit of Prussian _unitarisme_.
+
+With the foundation of German unity, of the German Empire, Napoleon has
+had almost as much to do as M. von Bismarck. The great chancellor has
+found ready for him two instruments which he did not invent: the military
+genius of von Moltke, and the folly of Napoleon. To complete the
+expression of my thought, I will add that the German Emperor has only
+been, as he himself proclaimed after his victories, a mere instrument in
+the hands of Divine Providence for the chastisement of France. France has
+been unfaithful to her past history, from which she has severed herself;
+she has been unfaithful to the monarchical form of government which has
+rendered her glorious, and to the church which has made her great; she has
+lost, by a twofold apostasy, her political faith and her Catholic faith;
+she no longer possesses her institutions, which have been, one after the
+other, destroyed either by the old _régime_ or by the Revolution; she no
+longer knows how to restore the monarchy, the elements of which have been
+scattered in the tempests of revolution; she knows not how to keep up a
+republic of which she has neither the habits, the historical conditions,
+nor the conditions social and political; she is in that state through
+which nations, condemned to perish, fall and decay, and out of which those
+nations which God wishes to save can get, only through punishment by fire
+or by the sword. M. von Bismarck has been, and may become again, that fire
+and that sword; which may perhaps be an honor, but does not justify pride.
+
+The political work, then, which has produced the German Empire undoubtedly
+deserves praise, and assuredly does honor to the political merits of
+Prince von Bismarck, but does not facilitate the forming of a definitive
+judgment in his regard. It is in the work of peace that the statesman
+shows himself, and I must say it, that in this respect I do not find M.
+von Bismarck as great as events seemed to have made him out to be; just as
+he has been seen to be intelligent, fortunate, almost great during the
+period of warfare, so in like degree do I incline to consider him, in the
+period of present organization, improvident and blind.
+
+This work of organization is a difficult one; it requires wisdom and time.
+M. von Bismarck has recourse to precipitation, to force, and to wrath.
+
+German unity, inuring to the benefit of Prussia, could not, before the war
+of 1866, have been foreseen. When, in 1863, the Emperor of Austria made
+his triumphal entry into Frankfort, bearing in his hand federal reform, he
+was surrounded by all the princes of Germany. Prussia stood alone,
+abandoned by all Germany; and, if Napoleon had not foolishly thwarted the
+plans of the Emperor Francis Joseph, the Emperor of Germany would have
+been crowned, not at Berlin, but at Vienna.
+
+After the war of 1866, Prusso‐Germanic unitarism had not yet been
+accomplished. Saxony and the states of the South which had fought by the
+side of Austria were defeated; they submitted to, rather than accepted,
+the terms which Prussia forced on them as the consequence of their defeat.
+Northern Germany was bounded by the Main, and the minor states ever felt
+themselves drawn towards Vienna, their old centre of attraction.
+
+It was the war of 1870, declared by Napoleon against the whole of Germany,
+notwithstanding the patriotic protest of M. Thiers, which all at once
+created this unity; this unity, which brought all the Germans together
+under one flag, received thus the baptism of glory and of blood.
+
+But the Prusso‐German unitarism, extemporized and rough‐cast by the war,
+was not consolidated; many difficulties remained to be overcome.
+
+M. von Bismarck saw before him two formidable adversaries: the
+particularism of the middle states, and socialist democracy, which claims
+to abolish unity for its own gain, by substituting the German Republic for
+the German Empire.
+
+Several symptoms go to show that the particularist movement, which had
+been stopped by the war, is reviving, and certainly the hostile action
+directed against the Catholics assists powerfully towards giving it new
+life. The symptoms of the awakening of this movement are numerous; it is
+needless that I should enumerate them; they are perfectly known at Berlin,
+and have assuredly become aggravated since the religious war undertaken by
+M. von Bismarck.
+
+The particularism of the states, then, is not dead, and red democracy is
+full of life. These are the two great difficulties which M. von Bismarck’s
+policy finds in its way. To these must be added a third one: the
+assimilation of the two conquered provinces, Alsace and Lorraine, so
+thoroughly French by the ties of history, of religion, of habits, and of
+interests.
+
+To overcome these obstacles, to organize unity, the basis of the new
+empire, to accomplish his great work, M. von Bismarck needs prudence,
+time, and the hand of a true statesman.
+
+Now, what does the Prince von Bismarck do? To the three considerable
+existing obstacles he adds another one, greater and more dangerous than
+the former, a difficulty which did not exist, which he of his own accord
+created, which he wantonly got up, and which will crush him; I mean the
+religious difficulty, the brutal war, the veritable persecution which he
+is organizing against the Catholics. He had to fight against particularist
+opposition and radical opposition; he himself, with deliberate purpose,
+needlessly and without reason, raises up a third one—the opposition of
+sixteen millions of Catholics united with their bishops; that is to say,
+almost half of the new empire which he thus unsettles and, so to speak,
+dissolves with his own hand.
+
+Can anything be imagined more incomprehensible or more thoroughly
+preposterous?
+
+What end is M. von Bismarck pursuing? By what thought and what views is he
+guided? The prince chancellor is neither mad nor blind; he has given
+abundant evidence of this; and yet, is it not folly, is it not blindness,
+to thus throw, without any appreciable motive, and with a heart as light
+as that of M. Emile Ollivier, sixteen millions of Catholics, including all
+their clergy and all their bishops, into a resistance which will be all
+the more obstinate and formidable because it will derive its strength from
+the oppression of conscience, from the suppression of liberty, the rending
+of the constitution, from the violation of justice and of rights? I have
+put these questions to eminent Germans of all parties, but have never got
+clear and satisfactory answers.
+
+The Catholic Germans behaved admirably during the war; the Bavarian,
+Westphalian, and Rhenish troops were everywhere foremost under fire and in
+earning honor and glory. The priests and religious, both men and women,
+have shown a heroic devotedness on the battlefields, in the ambulances,
+and in the hospitals, so that M. Windthorst was enabled to say in the
+parliament at Berlin that many of those religious would go into exile
+wearing on their breasts the iron cross which they had earned during the
+last campaign.(193) The old antipathies against Prussia which prevailed
+along the Rhine and beyond the Main among Catholic populations were dying
+out; the establishment of religious liberty in Prussia on a more generous
+basis than in the lesser states had won the Catholics over to unity under
+Prussian hegemony; and the illustrious Bishop of Mayence, Mgr. de
+Ketteler, in an address which made a great noise in Germany and throughout
+Europe, raised the standard of rallying and unity.
+
+The German Empire was consequently very near being established. M. von
+Bismarck stirs up a religious war which divides it in two and breaks it
+asunder. The war had brought together under the same flag Germans of all
+nationalities and all religious beliefs. Should not, then, all manner of
+pains have been taken to keep them united in the mutual work of the
+organization of the empire? Should not the first thought of a politician,
+after having achieved such wonderful success, and having before him the
+obstacles which still remained to be overcome, have been to begin by
+establishing peace in religious matters?
+
+But I must repeat the question, What did M. von Bismarck do? He repulses
+the Westphalians and people of the Rhine who had become reconciled; he
+revives in Bavaria and in the South that particularism which was dying
+out; and on the political grievance he grafts a religious one; he doubles
+the obstacles of all kinds which lie in the way of his plans for
+Germanizing Alsace and Lorraine, so thoroughly French and Catholic; into
+their bleeding wounds he, as it were, introduces gangrene, by entering
+upon an unheard‐of religious persecution, and without any pretext that he
+dare avow; he compromises in the most serious manner the work of unity,
+towards the founding of which he had aided so much; he acts as would the
+greatest adversary of that unity who could not contrive any better means
+for its destruction than to do just what Prince von Bismarck is doing—he
+drives into the ranks of opposition nearly half of the soundest population
+of the empire; he sets against himself the two hundred million Catholics
+spread throughout the world, and who are everywhere protesting against his
+oppression; he will also turn against him the old conservatives, who have
+been deeply hurt by the enactment of the law in regard to schools, as well
+as all sincere friends of religious and political liberty, so audaciously
+ignored by him. These friends of liberty are becoming scarce; they
+maintain, in the face of this odious violation of their principles, a
+shameful silence which they will have to break, if they wish to avoid
+making liberalism synonymous with hypocrisy.
+
+Have I erred in comparing the policy of M. von Bismarck with that of
+Napoleon III., and his present blunder with that committed by the ex‐
+emperor when, after the Congress of Paris, he broke up the splendid
+Western alliance?
+
+When I endeavor to interpret M. von Bismarck’s conduct, I can find but one
+motive which can serve for its explanation, and that is his alliance with
+Italy. That alliance, which he conceived necessary in order to keep the
+forces of France divided, and to render a war of retaliation impossible,
+has drawn him into a fatal hostility against the Catholic Church.
+
+His ally, Victor Emanuel, has conquered the Roman States by stratagem and
+by violence; he has usurped in Rome the throne of the pontiff king, who
+among the monarchs of Europe possesses assuredly the most ancient and most
+venerated titles to sovereignty; he holds the Pope captive in the Vatican,
+until such time as he can compel him to set out on the road to exile; he
+deprives the Sovereign Pontiff of the church of that sovereignty on which
+his independence rests, and thus throws the universal church into alarm
+and mourning.
+
+This outrage against the church, perpetrated at Rome by the Italian
+government, has had its counterpart in Berlin. No doubt the condition
+which Victor Emanuel set upon alliance with him has been to make the
+German Empire enter into the vast plot got up against the independence and
+liberty of Catholicity.
+
+Well! without being a prophet, it is not difficult to predict that the
+Italian alliance will prove as fatal to the German Empire as it has been
+to the second Napoleonic Empire, and that on the Italian rock M. von
+Bismarck’s work will be dashed to pieces, if he allows it to remain in the
+evil path in which it is now so deeply sunk.
+
+
+
+III.
+
+
+Prince Bismarck considers himself to be the successor of Stein, to whom he
+has caused a statue to be erected, and whose great policy he claims that
+he is continuing. In this respect, he is profoundly mistaken; and, very
+far from following that policy, he abandons and betrays it.
+
+Stein and all his school have, like Burke and Pitt, combated the
+principles of the French Revolution. French ideas had, at the close of the
+last century, invaded Germany, and the armies of the first Republic had no
+difficulty in conquering by their arms a country which they had before
+overrun with their ideas.
+
+Baron von Stein, that restorer of the German _Vaterland_ and liberty, was
+a mortal foe of the French Revolution. His mission and his work were to
+withdraw Germany from the fatal path into which, following France, she had
+strayed, and to bring her back into the path laid out for her by her
+history.
+
+He could not save Prussia from the defeat at Jena, but he trained her, by
+his thorough and excellent reforms, for revenge at Waterloo and Sedan. He
+it was who formed Scharnhorst, the organizer of military Prussia, and
+whose system Count von Moltke perfected; he, probably, who became the soul
+of the patriotic movement in 1813; he it was who, together with
+Scharnhorst, Stadion, and Gagern, gave to Germany that powerful impulse
+out of which came the great present situation; he it was who stood the
+distinguished protector of the German historical school, that real
+antithesis of the French revolutionary school, which former had as its
+influential organs Niebuhr, Eichhorn, Schlegel, Görres, the two Grimms, de
+Savigny, etc., and which M. de Sybel represents still in our day.
+
+Stein was a conservative, a patriot, and a Christian. What he fought
+against in the French Revolution was that philosophic and abstract method
+that France had adopted, destructive of all national tradition; that
+spirit of exclusive and narrow equality which influenced her course, and
+in the pursuit of which, according to M. de Tocqueville, she has lost
+liberty; that absolutism, whether in democracy or in Cæsarism, that
+obliteration of the individual, that indifference to rights, that worship
+of brute force, that extinguishment of all local, provincial, and
+autonomous life, that exaggerated idea of the state, that oppression of
+religious liberty, of Christian teaching, and of the Catholic Church, all
+of which characterized the French Revolution.
+
+Stein wanted a Germany united, but federal, Christian, liberal,
+traditional, and historical; he wanted her, as Burke did England, to be
+the reverse of revolutionary France.
+
+Now, is it not Stein’s work, that Germany born of his reforming genius,
+that M. von Bismarck is destroying? The _liberal national_ party, on which
+he leans, is merely a _doctrinaire_ French party, anti‐historic,
+ideological, and anti‐religious, the harbinger of levelling and radical
+democracy; a party which inclines to absolutism and Cæsarism, adores
+centralization, unconditional unification, and the omnipotence of the
+state, and which is the adversary of all proud and free consciences, and
+of any independent church. It is not the Protestant idea, but the Masonic
+and Hegelian one which this party represents.
+
+Stein was a Christian, a conservative, and a German; the Prince von
+Bismarck is sceptical, revolutionary, and belongs to the French school.
+Stein sought to found German unity on federal liberties, in the alliance
+of the church with the school, and on peace between religious
+denominations; M. von Bismarck overturns that basis, substitutes in its
+place absolutist and Prussian unification, secularized teaching, and
+religious discord.
+
+It is surprising that, when in France the ideas which inspired the French
+Revolution have been abandoned even by the most intelligent part of the
+school of liberalism; by such men as Tocqueville, Thierry, and Guizot, who
+are discouraged, and talk more openly of their disappointments than of
+their hopes; when M. Renan asserts that the French Revolution “is an
+experimental failure”; when the _Revue des Deux Mondes_, through the pen
+of M. Montégut, proclaims “that the Revolution is politically bankrupt”;
+on the very morrow of the final miscarriage of that Revolution under its
+two forms of government, the Empire fallen at Sedan, and the social
+Republic fallen under the ruins of the Paris Commune—it is at that very
+time that Prince von Bismarck thinks it skilful and profound to import
+that French revolutionary system into Germany! M. Renan has cause for
+rejoicing; he has given utterance to a wish which M. von Bismarck has set
+about to fulfil. “France,” he said, “need not be considered lost if we can
+believe that Germany will be in her turn drawn into that witches’ dance in
+which all our virtue has been lost.”
+
+To sum up: German unity, the great German Empire, which such an
+extraordinary concurrence of circumstances had created, is being dissolved
+and ruined by Prince von Bismarck through the most inconceivable of
+political blunders. He throws sixteen millions of Catholics, once friendly
+to the Empire, into opposition to it; he gives a new food and new strength
+to the particularism of the Southern States, and to the Polonism of Posen;
+he makes twofold the difficulties of accomplishing the assimilation of
+Alsace and Lorraine; to political grievances he superadds religious
+grievances, far more to be dreaded than the former; he enkindles an
+implacable religious war upon the ruins of that denominational peace which
+King Frederic William III. had happily established, and by aid of which
+the present emperor and the empress Augusta had, in the opening period of
+their reign, won the hearts of the Catholics of the Rhine. To cover this
+blunder, M. von Bismarck enters into the Italian alliance which destroyed
+the second Napoleonic Empire, and will destroy the German Empire; and he
+abandons the historic German policy restored by Stein, to rush into the
+retinue of the _national liberal_ party, into the paths of the French
+Revolution, into that _witches’ dance_ to which M. Renan refers; and he
+inoculates his own country with the poison which has killed France!
+
+
+
+IV.
+
+
+But there is one final consequence of the policy of Prince von Bismarck to
+which I wish to call attention, and which is not least in gravity.
+
+Austria, after having lost Italy, had, by the treaty of Prague, been
+excluded from Germany. Nevertheless, the German Empire, under the hegemony
+of Prussia, had not been set up; there existed only a Northern Germany,
+having the Main as its boundary; the Southern States, and even Saxony,
+preserved a certain autonomy; and Austria might hope by a wise policy to
+draw little by little into the sphere of her influence and attraction
+those countries which had been accustomed to look upon Vienna as their
+political pole.
+
+The war of 1871 against France, which had united all the Germans under one
+flag, established German unity and the German Empire. The boundaries of
+the Empire were moved from the Main to the Danube, and all hope for
+Austria to regain her old German position was gone.
+
+Austria accepted this situation; the Emperor Francis Joseph and his two
+counsellors, Count von Beust and Count Andràssy, worked together to bring
+about a sincere reconciliation between Austria and the German Empire.
+
+They gave up the idea of bringing back the Southern States into the circle
+of Austrian influence; they feared, on the contrary, lest the German
+provinces of Austria, detaching themselves little by little from the
+weakened rule of the Hapsburgs, might be irresistibly drawn towards
+Berlin, the powerful and glorious centre of the German _Vaterland_.
+
+Those fears may at present be entirely set at rest. There has been a
+complete reversal in the position of things. The people, for the most part
+so Catholic, of the Tyrol, of Lower Austria, and of Bohemia, will lose all
+inclination to draw nearer to the German Empire, where a bitter
+persecution is being waged against their religious faith. The bonds which
+unite them to Austria will be drawn the tighter. On the other hand, will
+not the Catholics of the Rhine, of Westphalia, of Poland, of Suabia, of
+Franconia, of Würtemberg, of Bavaria, of Alsace, and of Lorraine, driven
+from the bosom of the German Empire, in which they are no longer citizens,
+but pariahs, be tempted to look again in the direction of Austria, the
+centre of their older sympathies? All Austria has to do is not to
+interfere; M. von Bismarck is working for her.
+
+The prince chancellor, notwithstanding the elated confidence which he has
+in his strength, has understood the danger of the situation.
+
+In order to change it, he had but one easy thing to do, and that was to
+modify his policy, to give up persecuting the Catholics, to admit that he
+had gone astray, and to return to a calmer and wiser policy; but this he
+would not do; he has preferred to keep on, and to try to drag Austria into
+the same road.
+
+Last year, at Gastein, he tried to induce Count von Beust to join in the
+campaign which he wished to begin against the _internationale rouge_ and
+the _internationale noire_, but the Emperor Francis Joseph baffled the
+attempt. The prince chancellor renewed it the same year with the emperor
+himself at Salzburg, but he failed a second time.
+
+Has he met with more success at Berlin, upon the occasion of the meeting
+of the three emperors? Has he tried to get Russia and Austria to recognize
+not only the German Empire, but to sanction by their adhesion to it his
+home policy against “Romanism,” that is to say, against the Catholic
+Church, or has he at least succeeded in inducing the belief that he had
+not tried in vain? Has he sought to drag them into the war which he is
+carrying on against the Jesuits, against the religious orders, against
+denominational liberty, against Catholic teaching, against the clergy and
+the bishops, until such time as he can make it break forth at Rome, by
+laying, in the next conclave, an audacious and sacrilegious hand on the
+pontifical tiara?
+
+We shall find this out before long. If Austria follows the policy of the
+centralist party of the German professors at Vienna and at Prague, to
+which Count von Beust has already yielded too much, and which is identical
+with the policy of the _national liberal_ party of Berlin, she will have
+advanced the interests of Prince von Bismarck, and not her own; she will
+have labored for him and against herself; she will have turned aside the
+danger imminent to the German Empire through M. von Bismarck’s blunders,
+and of which the Austro‐Hungarian Empire should have profited; she will
+have, with her _historical good‐nature_, served the views of Prussia to
+the detriment of her own; and Francis Joseph, the Apostolic Emperor,
+unfaithful to his traditions and to the arms of his house, will have made
+his policy subordinate to that of a Lutheran emperor!
+
+I positively refuse to believe that any such result can come out of the
+interview at Berlin, albeit that our generation is accustomed to the
+realization of political impossibilities. I would fain persuade myself
+that, if the Prince von Bismarck has endeavored to draw Austria into his
+war against the Catholics and against Rome, he will have failed at Berlin
+as he did at Salzburg through the good sense of the Emperor Francis
+Joseph.
+
+
+
+V.
+
+
+The more I study M. von Bismarck’s policy, the less I understand it. If he
+were a sectarian pietist, I could account to myself for the idea of
+perfecting the political and military unity of Germany by a religious
+unity, of creating a _Protestant state_: it would indeed be a sorry
+Utopia, and to attempt it would be to make the mistake of being three
+centuries behind his time.
+
+But M. von Bismarck is neither a sectarian nor a fanatic; he is rather, I
+believe, a sceptic who has little care for religious controversies, and
+who probably understands very little about the question of the Papal
+Infallibility which he is wielding as a warlike weapon against the church.
+M. von Bismarck is a politician; politics he aims at and should be busied
+in; his mission is to help found an empire and not a schism or a sect.
+Now, it is the Empire, the political work, which he gravely compromises by
+disturbing so profoundly through a denominational conflict the religious
+quiet which that work needed for its consolidation. Instead of the _German
+state_ founded on unity and general assent, it is the _Protestant state_
+founded on the deepest and most incurable divisions that he seems to aim
+at creating. There is no difficulty in predicting that he will lose the
+political unity in the pursuit of a religious unity which is but a
+chimerical and impossible anachronism.
+
+This political course which the prince chancellor has inspired the Emperor
+William to follow, whose past one makes such a striking contrast with it,
+is to me an insoluble enigma, and raises doubts in my mind of M. von
+Bismarck’s transcendent ability.
+
+I will nevertheless try to make out this political enigma, by studying the
+pretexts on which the government of Berlin relies to justify itself, the
+circumstances by which it has been enticed, and the temptation to which it
+has yielded.
+
+The _pretext_ which it puts forward is the decision of the Vatican Council
+in regard to the authority of the Sovereign Pontiff in matters of
+doctrine.
+
+The _circumstances_ by which it was carried away are the Italian alliance
+abroad and the alliance with the _national liberal_ party at home.
+
+The _temptation_ that misleads it is the hope, fortunately disappointed,
+which the stand of the _inopportunist_ bishops of Germany and of Austria
+caused it to form, which stand the Berlin government had mistaken for a
+real dissent from doctrine, and destined to become the foundation of a
+national church separated from Rome by that dissent.
+
+I call the question of Papal Infallibility a pretext, and, in fact, it is
+a groundless quarrel without any importance or earnest meaning.
+
+I am not called upon to enter here into a theological dissertation upon
+the dogma of the infallibility of the church and of its sovereign
+magistracy, etc. I refer my readers to the excellent works which have been
+published on the subject, and I trust to be excused for mentioning in
+particular those written by my brother the Archbishop of Mechlin.
+
+I will say but one word _en passant_ on the question. For every Catholic,
+there is no longer any open question. Before the council, discussion was
+allowable; since the definition proclaimed by an œcumenical council united
+to the Pope, all discussion is closed.
+
+Every one knows of the conversation between a very intelligent lady of
+great faith and the Count de Montalembert, shortly before the death of
+that illustrious friend, in which she asked him what he would do if the
+council together with the Pope should define infallibility. “Well, I will
+quietly believe it,” replied the great orator, with the firm accent of the
+Christian who knows his catechism, and who recites his act of faith.
+
+In fact, no father nor doctor of the church, from Origen and S. Cyprian
+down to S. Thomas and Bossuet, no council, no theologian, no Catholic, has
+ever doubted the doctrinal infallibility of the church. The controversy
+lay with the Gallicans, who claimed that the words of the Pope addressed
+to the church _ex cathedrâ_ needed the assent of a council or of the
+church throughout the world to acquire the character of infallibility.
+
+All the old Catholics of all the schools, Gallican even included, were
+agreed to accord to the definitions of a council united with the Pope,
+that is to say, the church, the divine privilege of infallibility set
+forth in Holy Scriptures and in all tradition. On this point Bossuet holds
+the same doctrine as Fénelon and Count de Maistre.
+
+Now, in the present instance we have a council united to the Pope, and no
+council, from that of Trent back to that of Nicæa, has been more
+numerously attended, more solemn, freer, or more œcumenical, than that of
+the Vatican. To deny this is downright nonsense, in which those take
+refuge who seek to hide their apostasy from their own eyes. If the Council
+of the Vatican has not been œcumenical and free, then manifestly no
+council in the past has ever been.
+
+To reject the doctrinal definition of the Council of the Vatican, in which
+the Sovereign Pontiff and the bishops of all the world, whether
+opportunist or inopportunist, have agreed, would undoubtedly be to abandon
+the church of Christ, and to renounce the Catholic faith; it would be
+going beyond Gallicanism, which never thought of calling in question the
+decisions of a council united to a pope; even beyond the Jansenism of Port
+Royal, which would perhaps have accepted the Bull of Innocent X. if
+sanctioned by a council; it would be going beyond 1682, back to Luther;
+that is to say, to open heresy, and to the entire abandonment of the
+church, our mother.
+
+How can M. Döllinger not see this? He who in 1832, at Munich, where the
+encyclical of Gregory XVI. reached M. de Lamennais, insisted with the
+latter, with all his force as a theologian, that he should submit to the
+pontifical encyclical, which, in the doctor’s eyes, was binding on
+conscience, although no council had adhered to it—how can he now, in his
+own case, resist the decisions of Pius IX. and the Council of the Vatican?
+He who has written so many works of grave learning, and in particular that
+one on _The Church and the Churches_, how comes it that he does not see
+that he is no longer in the church, and that he is seeking a shelter for
+his revolt in the smallest, the poorest, and the most dilapidated of those
+churches of a day which, in the name of history, he has so severely
+condemned? How can he find himself at ease and his soul tranquil in those
+ridiculous conventicles of Munich and of Cologne, by the side of Michelis,
+of Reinkens, Friedrich, Schulte, the ex‐abbé Michaud, the ex‐father
+Hyacinthe, and surrounded by Jansenist and Anglican bishops, by Protestant
+and schismatic ministers, by rationalists of all colors? How comes it that
+his faith and his learning are not shocked when brought into the midst of
+that confusion of doctrines and of tongues, and of ignorance of all kinds,
+which rendered the Congress of Cologne so notorious; that congress whereat
+the question was discussed “of the reunion of the old Catholics with the
+other churches having affinity of faith,” which means with all the sects
+separated from Rome, to the exclusion of the great universal church of S.
+Augustine, S. Thomas, Pascal, Descartes, Bossuet, Fénelon, de Maistre,
+Lacordaire, of the eight hundred bishops of the council, and of the
+sainted Pontiff Pius IX.? How can he, a man of learning, a priest,
+advanced in years, on the brink of eternity, prefer to put himself under
+the pastoral crook and the jurisdiction of the Jansenist Archbishop of
+Utrecht, or of a schismatic Armenian bishop, and fraternize with the
+Anglican bishops of Lincoln, Ely, and Maryland, rather than remain an
+humble priest, but proud of that Catholic Apostolic and Roman Church whose
+admirable unity bursts forth in the midst of the vast persecution which is
+being begun and prepared for her, and of which the Provost of Munich
+consents to be the guilty instrument?
+
+This closes my parenthetical remarks on Dr. Döllinger and the Old
+Catholics, who are in reality merely old Jansenists and very old
+Protestants, and I come back to M. von Bismarck and to his policy.
+
+Prince von Bismarck and the governments of Germany have no occasion to
+trouble themselves about the question of settling whether infallibility
+attaches to the Pope speaking _ex cathedrâ_, or to the Pope united to the
+council; these are all dogmatic theses with which they have no concern.
+The pretext got up by politics for trespassing on the domain of religious
+faith is the following: The politicians allege that the declaration of the
+council has conferred upon the Pope a _new authority_, that this authority
+is _absolute_ and _unlimited_, and that this state of things affects the
+relations between the church and the state, which is thereby thrown upon
+its defence against possible usurpation. The Emperor of Germany, in a
+conversation which he recently had at Ems with M. Contzen, the courageous
+Burgomaster of Aix‐la‐Chapelle, brought out this singular idea of the
+politicians when he alleged “that the church, by proclaiming the dogma of
+infallibility, had declared war to the state.”
+
+How can this be? In what respect does the question of the infallibility of
+the church touch the relations between the church and the state?
+
+The declaration of the Vatican Council is not new; it belongs almost
+textually to the Council of Florence when it proclaimed the faith which
+had existed for centuries; it is ancient; all, or nearly all, the bishops
+at the late council were agreed, and are now all agreed, as to the ground
+of the doctrine; they were only divided on the question of opportuneness,
+and Mgr. the Bishop of Orléans, in his pastoral letter of assent, declared
+that he has always professed the doctrine which had been proclaimed.
+
+Nothing, then, has been changed, and church and state remain in precisely
+the same situation of reciprocal independence in their distinct spheres,
+and of harmony in their relations, in which they were before the council.
+
+Some either imagine, through most admirable ignorance, or hypocritically
+make show of believing, that the pontifical infallibility is a _personal_
+privilege, in this sense, that it is conferred _on a person who cannot err
+in anything_, that the Pope is infallible in all that he says and in
+everything; that he could lay upon the faithful the obligation of
+believing any decision that he might proclaim whether in the exclusive
+domain of science or in the exclusive domain of politics, where faith is
+not at all involved.
+
+The object of infallibility is the doctrine of the faith and of the
+revealed law. The church has the deposit of revelation, of the Holy
+Scriptures, and of tradition; the Pope is its supreme guardian; the
+evangelical promise of infallibility is nothing else than the promise of
+_fidelity_ in the custody of this sacred deposit! When the Pope or the
+council united to the Pope declares that a truth is contained in the
+deposit of revelation, they do not invent matter, they repeat and discern;
+they do not create a new truth, they confirm an old one, and cause new
+light to beam from it.
+
+Infallibility is, then, not personal in the absurd sense in which the word
+is used; neither is it absolute and without limits; its domain, which is
+that of faith and morals, is clearly marked out by the constitution of the
+Vatican Council. “According to the perfectly clear text of the decree,”
+say the Prussian bishops who met at Fulda in 1871, “all allusion to the
+domain of politics is completely excluded from the definition of this
+dogma.” His Eminence Cardinal Antonelli, in his despatch of the 19th of
+March, 1870, to the Nuncio at Paris, is even more precise. “Political
+affairs belong,” he says, “according to the order of God and the teachings
+of the church, to the province of the secular authority, _without any
+dependence whatever_ on any other.”
+
+But, as between the secular power and the church, relations are necessary,
+these are settled by the two authorities through arrangements or
+concordats.
+
+I allow myself to call Prince von Bismarck’s attention to this point.
+Positive relations between the church and states have been settled by
+concordats only; always, at all periods of history, the popes alone have
+negotiated concordats with the states; pontifical infallibility has
+absolutely no connection with concordats, and the Pope when he signs them
+does not speak _ex cathedrâ_ and as supreme doctor of the church. How,
+then, can the declaration of the council have changed the relations
+between the church and governments, and how can the church, by proclaiming
+the dogma of infallibility, be said to have declared war to the state?
+
+It is, then, a mere matter of pretext. In point of fact, it is the German
+Empire which is laying claim to absolute and unlimited power in the domain
+of religion as well as in the domain of politics; it examines and judges
+dogmas, intrudes itself into ecclesiastical discipline; it closes the
+priest’s mouth in his pulpit—by the lex Lutziana; it closes Catholic
+colleges and schools; it forbids religious to preach, to hear confessions,
+and even to celebrate Mass; it forbids the bishops to canonically exclude
+from the bosom of the church those who openly separate themselves
+therefrom; it banishes, for no crime, without trial and in bodies, the
+religious orders, in the same way that Louis XIV. (though he could give
+better reasons) drove the Huguenots from the soil of France; it favors
+schism, and aims at establishing a national church. It is, then, the
+German state _which is declaring war to the church_, and which is raising
+claim to political and religious infallibility by founding a veritable
+civil theocracy.
+
+Let us put aside the pretext, which can in no wise serve either for the
+justification or for the explanation of the conduct of the government of
+Berlin. Let us examine the real motives which governed that conduct, the
+circumstances by which the emperor was carried away, and the fatal
+temptations which deluded him.
+
+
+
+VI.
+
+
+Foremost among these reasons and temptations has been, as I have said
+before, the alliance with Italy. It was the first cause, and was the
+signal for the sudden change which took place in the interior policy of
+the German Empire. This is evident from the fact that the political storm
+burst forth during the last session of Parliament precisely upon the
+occasion of a paragraph in the draft of the address got up by the national
+liberal party, and which was a stone hurled at the papacy. This was taking
+place at Berlin at the very hour when the Italo‐German alliance had been
+concluded at Rome; the coincidence is striking, and proves that war
+against the Catholic Church and her head has been made a condition of this
+alliance.
+
+The next temptation, the second blunder of Prince von Bismarck, has been
+his exclusive alliance with the national liberal party, whose character I
+have defined above. This alliance with pseudo‐liberalism is the corollary
+of his alliance with Italy; both rest within and without on the
+revolutionary and anti‐Christian principle. War on Rome and the papacy has
+been the condition of the alliance with Italy; war on the Catholics in
+Germany has been the condition of the alliance with the national liberal
+party.
+
+Prince von Bismarck had, for several years, met a keen resistance to his
+plans from the national liberal party, while during the same period he
+found a support in the conservative section of the Prussian chambers, with
+whom were joined the few Catholics of note who happened to be members of
+them.
+
+To‐day he turns away from this weakened but still powerful conservative
+section, and he wages the bitterest war against the centre section, which
+is made up of Catholics. These two sections watch over the deposit of old
+German traditions; they wish to preserve the federal and constitutional
+character of the Empire, to maintain the Christian and denominational
+character of the schools, and throughout the nation, religious peace.
+Latterly the conservative section has become weak; it has yielded to M.
+von Bismarck’s policy; but sooner or later its traditions will bring it to
+the side of the section of the centre, in order that both may unite in
+sustaining the historic principles of the Germanic race against the
+centralizing anti‐religious policy of the national liberal party, which
+represents above all else the idea of the French Revolution.
+
+The section of the centre, which, in 1870, in point of numbers amounted in
+the parliament to but very little, has seen its power increase
+proportionately with the development of the pseudo‐liberal party of
+centralization, of omnipotence of the state, of political levelling, and
+of anti‐Christian reaction. The outrage committed on the papacy by the
+Italian government gave increased energy to the Catholic movement, and the
+section of the centre, which, at the time it was first organized,
+consisted of fifty members only, saw its numbers increase after the
+elections to more than sixty, all united together by strong convictions;
+it can count to‐day nearly eighty, and it is safe to predict that, unless
+the government sends into the interior, or into exile, or puts in prison
+the leaders of the Catholic movement, the party of the centre will, after
+the next elections, thanks to the war begun against the church, have
+gained a force of more than one hundred votes, which will thus
+counterbalance those of the national liberal party.
+
+It is this growing power of the party of the centre, the fruit of M. von
+Bismarck’s policy, which has impelled him to his policy of violence and
+anger against the Catholic Church; he means to make the clergy, the
+Jesuits, the religious orders, and the bishops pay for the political loss
+of rest occasioned to him by this phalanx which is growing into a legion,
+and at whose head stand such powerful leaders as Reichensperger,
+Mallinckrodt, and Windthorst. The eloquent words of these orators, as in
+former times those of O’Connell in England, and Montalembert in France,
+spread beyond the boundaries of Germany, to arouse and stir up everywhere
+all lovers of right, justice, true liberty, and the church of Jesus
+Christ.
+
+The third temptation of the German government has been the stand taken in
+the Vatican Council by nearly all the bishops of Germany and of Austria.
+These pious and learned prelates were all agreed, along with those of the
+entire world, as to the mere ground of the doctrine; all or nearly all
+were infallibilists; Josephism, Fébronianism, had been for a long time
+dying, if not dead; but these same bishops were nearly all inopportunists.
+This M. von Bismarck misapprehended, he believed that there was, among the
+bishops in council, a real dissent as to doctrine; he imagined that the
+majority of the German and Austrian bishops would separate from Rome to
+follow M. Döllinger in the path of defection or of schism, through which
+he is moving to his ruin. The Italian alliance and the alliance with the
+national liberal party carried M. von Bismarck into hostile action against
+Rome; the difference of opinion among the bishops on the question of the
+opportuneness of the decision by the council led him to hope that he would
+find therein the elements for a _Janist_(194) and national church.
+
+In this he has been entirely mistaken. “He had left the Holy Spirit out of
+his reckoning,” said recently to me a learned ecclesiastic of Berlin, and
+I add that he had also not reckoned on the faith and virtue of the
+episcopate.
+
+Observe what is going on and how the Catholic tide is rising and
+resisting. M. von Bismarck met at Sedan a splendid, courageous French
+army, which, badly led and crushed by the fire of the German artillery,
+was forced to capitulate; he will henceforth find in opposition to him the
+Catholic populations, with their clergy and their bishops at their head,
+who will rise, in the name of God and of the liberty of the church, who
+will resist and never surrender.
+
+M. von Bismarck is about to have experience of what the Catholic bishops
+are and of what they can do. They will not conspire; they will not sow
+rebellion and revolution; they will not join themselves to the red
+international party, but they will resist and will not yield. “In this
+present sad condition of things,” said the bishops met together at Fulda
+in April, 1872, “we will fulfil our duty by not disturbing the peace
+between the church and the state.” “As Christians,” said the learned
+Bishop of Paderborn, in his touching address to the exiled Jesuits—“as
+Christians, we can oppose neither force nor overt resistance to the
+measures of governmental authority. Albeit such measures seem to us
+iniquitous and unjustifiable, we may only meet them by that passive
+resistance which our divine Master Jesus Christ has taught us by his words
+and example; that silence, calm and full of dignity; that patience,
+tranquil and resigned, but abounding in hope; that loving prayer which
+heaps burning coals on the heads of our persecutors.”
+
+Such is the admirable language of the German bishops, as it fell from the
+lips of the Archbishop of Cologne, Mgr. von Droste‐Vischering, on the very
+day preceding that on which he was led captive by a guard of soldiers to
+the fortress of Minden. The calm and intrepid Bishop of Ermeland is
+deprived of his salary and injured in his authority; he is marked out for
+punishment, and he awaits the coming of the soldiers with the fetters to
+bind him.
+
+I cannot recall the venerated name of Mgr. Krementz without adding to it
+the illustrious one of Mgr. Mermillod, whom all Europe will continue to
+address as Bishop of Hebron and Geneva, despite that decision of the
+council of state which forbids him to exercise any function whatever,
+whether as bishop or as curate, and which cuts him off from all salary.
+Here, then, we have this _republican_ and _liberal_ Switzerland
+suppressing the Jesuits and all cognate religious orders, the brothers of
+the schools, the sisters of charity; closing seminaries, as at Soleure,
+because the moral theology of S. Liguori was taught there; unseating
+bishops, as at Geneva; and the people that do these things are yet
+shameless enough to talk of liberty, while all the speech‐makers of
+liberalism, whose hair stands erect at the mention of the revocation of
+the Edict of Nantes, and who dinned the world with their clamors in the
+young Mortara case, cannot find a single word of liberality, not a single
+protest, not a single expression of indignation, to stigmatize these
+unheard‐of outrages against all liberties at once, and against all the
+rights of human conscience.
+
+I have just been adverting to the passive resistance of the bishops in
+Germany; but the lay movement, which is kept strictly within the law, is
+less passive, less resigned, and is somewhat inflamed by politics. The
+reaction against the unwarranted persecution set on foot a year ago is
+breaking out everywhere. A committee of direction has been formed at
+Mainz, whose business is to centralize the legal resistance of German
+Catholics for the defence of religious liberty thus threatened and
+assailed. This committee, in their address dated in July last, call upon
+the Catholics of Germany to a crusade in opposition to the aggressions of
+the government. “We claim,” says this address, “for our creed that liberty
+and independence guaranteed to it by the constitution; and under the
+device, _For God and our Country_, we will fight to the last for the
+maintenance of our rights.” This address is signed by some of the most
+illustrious names of Germany, foremost among which I may mention those of
+Count Felix de Löe, of Baron de Frankenberg, of Count C. de Stolberg, and
+of the Prince of Isenburg.
+
+A numerous meeting of Catholics voted to send the Archbishop of Munich an
+address praising him for his firmness and encouraging him in the contest
+which he is maintaining. At Breslau, a Catholic Congress has just
+assembled with great _éclat_. All the Catholic men of note in Germany were
+present at it. Vent was therein given to the most energetic complaints and
+the most indignant protests, resolutions of great firmness were adopted, a
+new impulse was given to all those associations which, like that of S.
+Boniface, of S. Charles Borromeo, and of Pius IX., have multiplied on
+German soil works of teaching and of charity; powerful preparations were
+in this congress made for resistance, while confiding in their rights and
+in God.
+
+While the Catholic laity were thus meeting and organizing at Breslau and
+at Mainz, the bishops were quietly deliberating at Fulda, presided over by
+the Archbishop of Cologne, who is mindful of his illustrious predecessor,
+Clement Augustus. There, as the apostles of old in the _cenaculum_, they
+tarry in prayer, and they will come forth with a confidence and a courage
+such as have overcome adversaries far more powerful than the Prince von
+Bismarck.
+
+
+
+VII.
+
+
+The old _régime_, before it died out, made trial of rebellion against the
+church. Frederick the Great was certainly as able as M. von Bismarck; he
+had the world at his feet, and the church in Germany, infected with the
+doctrines of Fébronius, was apparently in the pangs of death. The last act
+recorded in history of the then three ecclesiastical electors of Mayence,
+Cologne, and Trèves had been to meet with the Archbishop of Salzburg,
+Primate of Germany, for the purpose of drawing up the _Punctuations of
+Ems_ (1786), which were a code of rebellion against the Holy See. What a
+contrast with the present assembling of the German bishops at Fulda! These
+servile _Punctuations of Ems_ were beginning to be carried out, when the
+armies of the French Republic came down and inflicted upon the authors of
+them the punishment they deserved.
+
+Every one knows about Pombal, Choiseul, and Charles III., who confined the
+Jesuits within certain territorial limits, drove them away, cast them into
+prison, or sent them into exile, pretty much in the same way as M. von
+Bismarck is doing.
+
+The power which did all this was swallowed up by the French Revolution.
+
+This revolution, _satanic_, to use M. de Maistre’s term, _out and out
+anti‐Christian_, as M. de Tocqueville calls it, in its turn drove out,
+exiled, put to death, whether in the massacre of September, the drownings
+of the Loire, by the axe of the guillotine or the dagger of ruffians, the
+priests, Jesuits, and religious whom the old régime had spared.
+
+But this sanguinary revolution went down in the slough of the Directory,
+and Napoleon put an end to it.
+
+That extraordinary man perceived that persecution wounds the hand which
+uses it; he sought to make peace with the church; he reopened the
+churches, recalled the priests and the bishops, and signed the concordat.
+This was the great epoch of his reign: Ulm, Austerlitz, and Jena.
+
+But the potent emperor, intoxicated by glory and by pride, having become
+master of the world, thought he would be master of the church as well; his
+rule was over bodies, he sought to extend it over souls; which is the
+dream of all founders of empire. He stretched out his hand to the States
+of the Church, and annexed them to the French Empire; for which he was
+excommunicated by that gentle Pope Pius VII. He seized the pope, bore him
+away from Rome into exile at Savona and at Fontainebleau, and he found
+that under the lamb‐like exterior of his victim there beat the heart of a
+lion. He summoned together the council of 1811, thinking that it would be
+an easy matter to form a national church of which he would be Supreme
+Pontiff.
+
+This took place in 1811. The next year brought the campaign of 1812, to be
+followed by the events of 1813 and 1814; Leipsic, Elba, Waterloo, and the
+rock of St. Helena last of all.
+
+There is another example nearer to our times, upon which I have looked as
+a witness, and which I submit for the meditations of the Emperor of
+Germany.
+
+King William I. of Orange fell into precisely the same blunder which
+William IV. is now repeating. He ruled over the beautiful kingdom of the
+Netherlands, so easy for him to maintain, and which through his mistakes
+was broken up. He, too, sought to constitute national unity through unity
+of language and of religion. So he suppressed, in 1825, the Catholic
+schools and colleges in Belgium, drove out the Jesuits and the brothers of
+the Christian schools, founded at Louvain the Philosophic College in which
+the clergy of the future national church were to be trained, violated the
+right to teach and of association, prosecuted the Bishop of Ghent, Mgr. de
+Broglie, got him condemned, and he was pilloried, in effigy, on a public
+square of Ghent, between two felons. This reckless and blind policy
+excited in Belgium a movement of resistance similar to that which we
+remark at the present moment in Germany. Five years later, in 1830, the
+Catholic liberal union was brought about, and every one knows the events
+to which it gave birth.
+
+This much is matter of history. The German persecution is a trial for the
+church and for Catholics, but it will also bear with it the salvation
+which a trial properly borne always brings. Two results will come out of
+this trial: the Catholic Church, which they mean to weaken or prostrate,
+will, as always heretofore, come out of the contest more united and more
+powerful; Protestantism, in whose name the persecution is set on foot,
+will be mortally wounded by it, and will see its dissolution hastened;
+pseudo‐liberalism, which will have played the part of intolerance and
+persecution, will be unmasked, and all the friends of a prudent and
+sincere liberty will make their reconciliation with the persecuted, one
+with that great Catholic Church, ever militant, ever attacked, sometimes a
+martyr, but which ever in the end comes out triumphant over these trials
+which temper her anew, purify her, and add to her greatness. The world
+will understand that in trials such as she is now going through in Germany
+she is fighting for the liberty of the conscience of the human race.
+
+Governments, and in particular great empires founded on force, look upon
+the independence of the universal church with feelings of jealousy and
+impatience; the idea of a national church has always been a favorite and a
+pleasing one with despotisms, because it promises them a servile
+instrument to carry out their designs. But when the church is subject to
+the state, there can be no church. The high level of the consciences of
+the people sinks as freedom disappears. The true and divine church can be
+contained within no boundaries and in no nationality; it is the spiritual
+kingdom of consciences and of souls; from the independence of the church,
+the independence of consciences and souls derives its life. If the church
+is under the yoke of the state, all consciences must suffer like
+subjection. The world will at last comprehend that national churches, that
+is, churches in subjection, can have only enslaved souls as followers, and
+that there can be no freedom for the conscience of man, except upon the
+sole condition of the independence of a church, accountable, not to any
+human power, but to God.
+
+Will the persecution which has been begun be kept up with the same
+tenacity and violence which the Prince von Bismarck now displays? I fear
+less from it for the church than for himself and the German emperor, whose
+good sense, uprightness, and religious conscience must feel out of place
+in the midst of a policy so _outrée_, revolutionary, anti‐Christian, and
+anti‐constitutional, so contrary to his instincts, his natural
+disposition, and his antecedents. “It cannot be,” said M. A.
+Reichensperger, “that a monarch, crowned with the laurels of victory,
+after having achieved external peace through the courage and the fidelity
+of the _entire_ German nation, will authorize the persecution of millions
+of Germans on account of their faith, and consent to destroy internal
+peace—that peace which in particular is the work of his royal brother,
+whose memory is still blessed by all Catholics.”
+
+I add my prayer and my hope to the prayer and the hope of the great German
+patriot and orator, but I confess that his fears, which are greater than
+his hopes, are felt by me also, and to like extent. The times are gloomy.
+“The deluge is drawing nigh; but on the waters I see the ark of the
+church,” said Count de Montalembert. “She will ride it out, she will live,
+and will preside at the funeral of the very powers that thought to have
+prepared her own.”
+
+Let Prince Bismarck not forget the words recently uttered by Pius IX. at
+one of those allocutions so sublimely eloquent and touchingly holy in
+spirit, which, from his prison in the Vatican he addresses to the world.
+He was addressing German Catholics, and he told them: “Be confident, be
+united; for a stone will fall from the mountain, and will shatter the feet
+of the Colossus. If God wills that other persecutions arise, the church
+does not fear them; on the contrary, she becomes stronger thereby, and she
+purifies herself, because even in the church there are things that need to
+be purified, and nothing contributes more thereto than the persecutions
+exercised on her by the great ones of the earth.”
+
+Prince von Bismarck may perhaps have smiled on reading these words fallen
+from the lips of the Pontiff Pius IX.; if so, he is sadly mistaken; those
+old popes who are imprisoned and exiled, but who, to use the profound
+expression of the Count de Maistre, _always come back_, are also gifted
+with the command of words which are “as burning coals heaped upon the
+heads of their persecutors.” The Emperor Napoleon I., too, smiled at the
+excommunication hurled at him by Pope Pius VII., then weak and disarmed,
+and his complete ruin followed shortly after. I advise the prince
+chancellor to bear in mind the stone falling from the mountain and
+breaking the feet of the Colossus. I had myself, in my book published in
+1860, ventured to refer to that same passage of Scripture: “That splendid
+figure,” I said, “which Daniel sets before us of kingdoms WITH FEET PART
+OF IRON AND PART OF CLAY, and of the church, _that stone, cut out of a
+mountain, without hands, which broke in pieces the kingdoms_, and _became
+a great mountain_, and filled _the whole earth_—that figure has its
+application in every age, and should stand for all Christians as a hope
+amid trials and a teaching to all the proud.”
+
+
+
+
+A Christmas Memory.
+
+
+    God did anoint thee with his odorous oil
+    To wrestle, not to reign; and he assigns
+    All thy tears over like pure crystallines
+    For younger fellow‐workers of the soil
+    To wear for amulets.
+
+    E. B. BROWNING.
+
+
+No more brilliant party ever assembled for Christmas festivities in
+Northern Vermont than that which met on such an occasion, very early in
+this century, at the home of a young lawyer in the beautiful little
+village of Sheldon, since widely renowned for the efficacy of its healing
+waters.
+
+The host and hostess were from families who came among the first settlers
+to Vermont. The company was gathered from all parts of the new and
+sparsely settled state, with a sprinkling of students who were completing
+their legal course at the famous law‐school of Judge Reeves, in
+Litchfield, Conn.—of which their host was a graduate—and of young ladies
+and gentlemen from different places in Massachusetts and Connecticut.
+Several of these young ladies were passing the winter with acquaintances
+in Sheldon, and the whole country from the “Province Line” (and even
+beyond it) to St. Alban’s was made merry with a succession of gay parties,
+sleigh‐rides, dinners, suppers, and dances given in their honor. Even the
+sequestered hamlets of Richford and Montgomery, nestled among their own
+green hills, did not escape the general hilarity, but were startled from
+their quiet decorum, and resounded with a merriment which awakened
+unwonted echoes in their peaceful valleys.
+
+Among the guests at this Christmas festival was a young lady of Vermont,
+Miss Fanny A——, whose fair form rises before us as we write from the dim
+mists of childhood’s earliest memories—a vision of gentle dignity and
+youthful loveliness which time has no power to efface.
+
+Though some years younger than the lady of the house, she was her very
+dear and intimate friend, and was now passing a few weeks with her. Her
+queenly manners, the silver ripple of her low, sweet voice in the flow of
+a conversation which held her listeners spell‐bound, as it were, by its
+clear and impressive utterances, bore witness to her familiarity with the
+most refined circles of city and country society, and the high culture of
+her splendid intellect.
+
+Other circumstances, as will be seen, combined with her personal charms at
+this time to make her the centre of interest and attraction wherever she
+appeared.
+
+She was the youngest daughter of a Green Mountain hero whom Vermont most
+delights to honor. Her father died when she was too young to realize her
+loss. Some years later, her mother—from whom she inherited her remarkable
+beauty and graceful dignity—married a most amiable man, who was capable of
+appreciating the rich treasure she committed to his charge in the person
+of her young daughter. Every advantage the country offered was secured to
+develop and polish the gem of which he was inexpressibly proud, and over
+which he watched with a solicitude as tender as her own father could have
+exercised.
+
+At that time, the gay society in New England was strongly tinctured with
+the species of infidelity introduced and fostered by the writings of
+Thomas Paine and his disciples, among whom Fanny’s father had been
+conspicuous. Her step‐father was not of that school, but he detested the
+cant and Puritanism of the only religious people he had ever
+known—regarding them as pretensions of which even those who adopted them
+were often the unconscious dupes. He had never been drawn within reach of
+better influences, then exercised only by the Protestant Episcopal Church
+in Vermont, to rescue intelligent thinkers from the grasp of infidelity.
+He conducted the education of his gifted daughter, therefore, with the
+most scrupulous care to avoid entirely all considerations of religion in
+any form. When her active and earnest mind would peer beyond the veil he
+had so carefully drawn between its pursuits and the interests of eternity,
+and send her to startle him with some question touching those interests
+which he could only answer by evasive ridicule, or an emphatic request
+that she would refrain from troubling her head about such matters, she
+would retire to ponder within herself, even while striving to obey her
+earthly father, the higher obligations imposed by One in heaven. Light and
+wisdom from above soon illuminated the soul that surrendered itself a
+willing victim before the altar of eternal truth. She was led by a divine
+hand, through paths she knew not, to a temple of which she had scarcely
+heard, and, while still living among those to whom the Catholic religion
+was entirely unknown, entered its portals to find herself—scarcely less to
+her own astonishment than to the amazement and horror of her devoted
+parents—a Catholic, as firmly established and steadfastly resolved as if
+she had been born and educated in the faith!
+
+The grief and indignation of her parents knew no bounds. They looked upon
+it as a most disgraceful infatuation. Peremptorily imposing silence upon
+her in relation to the subject, they determined to suppress it, if
+possible, until every means had been used to divert her mind from the
+fatal delusion.
+
+All the wiles and artifices of the gayest and most fashionable circles in
+various American cities to which she was taken, were exhausted in vain to
+captivate her youthful fancy and deliver her soul from its mysterious
+thraldom. In vain the ardent addresses of devoted admirers—who were
+destined in the near future to be the brightest ornaments the bench and
+bar of their state could boast—were laid at her feet. In vain were all
+those worldly allurements, generally so irresistible to the young, spread
+before her. Her soul turned steadfastly away from each bewitching
+enticement, to solace itself with thoughts of the humble sanctuary in
+Montreal, where the weary bird had found a place in which she might build
+her nest, even within the tabernacle of thy house, O Lord of hosts!
+
+In the autumn preceding the Christmas festival of which I write, the
+ramblers had returned from their fruitless wanderings. Fanny’s parents,
+discouraged and discomfited, resolved at this crisis to enlist the zeal of
+a few very intimate friends in their cause, by disclosing to them the
+great and unaccountable calamity which had befallen their child.
+
+Among those whom they earnestly entreated to aid them in efforts to
+extricate her from the grasp of the great deceiver, was the lady with whom
+she was now passing the weeks of the early winter. A Connecticut
+Episcopalian of the High‐Church stamp, she occupied what they playfully
+called a “half‐way house,” at which they hoped she would be able to
+persuade Fanny to stop. She invited several gay young ladies to meet and
+enliven Fanny’s visit, but took the greatest pains to conceal from them
+the religious tendencies of her beautiful guest. She entered with great
+zeal upon every scheme for winter pastimes, in the hope of diverting the
+mind of her young friend from its absorbing theme. In their private
+conversations, she exhausted every argument to convince Fanny that the
+Episcopal Church offered all the consolations for which her soul was
+yearning. In vain, in vain! She who had been called to drink from the
+fountain‐head could not slake her thirst with draughts from scattered
+pools, which brought no refreshment to her fainting spirit. Vain also were
+the precautions used for concealment. Suspicions soon arose among her
+young companions that there was something wrong with Fanny. A rosary had
+been partially revealed as she drew her kerchief from her pocket. Worse
+still, a crucifix had been discovered under her pillow! Here were proofs
+of superstition indeed, of rank idolatry in unmistakable form, and no one
+knows to what unimaginable extent! Then it began to be whispered around
+the admiring and compassionate circle that she had not only taken the
+first step on the downward road, but was even now contemplating the still
+more fatal and final one of religious immolation!
+
+It was their apprehension of this direful result which imparted a new and
+melancholy interest in their eyes to all her words and actions. Though she
+maintained a modest reserve upon the subjects dearest to her heart, they
+thought they could discover some mysterious connection with these in every
+expression she uttered.
+
+On several occasions, the most adventurous of her companions endeavored to
+penetrate the silence that sealed her lips in regard to her religious
+convictions, by direct questions, and, when these failed, by ridicule of
+such “absurd superstitions”; but to no purpose. Her nearest approach to
+any satisfactory remark was in reply to one of these questions: “It is
+impossible to convey any clear idea to your mind, in its present state,
+concerning these matters. Your opinions are founded upon prejudice, and
+your prejudices are the result of your entire ignorance in relation to
+them. If you really desire to be better informed, you need, first of all,
+to pray with humility for light and guidance, and then seek for knowledge.
+If you do this with sincerity, you will surely be instructed, and ‘know of
+the doctrine’; but, if you refuse to take this first step, all the
+teaching in the world will be of no avail. ‘They have Moses and the
+prophets; let them hear them. If they believe not Moses and the prophets,
+neither would they believe though one should come to them from the
+dead.’ ”
+
+She rebuked ridicule with such calm dignity that it was soon abandoned,
+one of her assailants, a very lively young lady, remarking one day: “It is
+astonishing to see how terribly in earnest Fanny is! She certainly
+believes in the Catholic religion with all her heart, though how a person
+with her extensive information and splendid talents can receive such
+absurdities is a puzzle to common sense!”
+
+But her severe trials were in her home. Her parents were unutterably
+grieved when she persisted in accepting the Catholic faith. This further
+determination to forsake those who had so fondly loved and tenderly
+cherished her, and who were so justly proud of the use she had made of the
+opportunities for improvement which their solicitude had secured for her,
+was beyond all human endurance.
+
+If she had been the victim of adversity or of disappointed hopes, there
+might have been some excuse; but that the idol of doting parents should
+abandon her elegant home to the desolation in which her departure would
+enshroud it, and turn from all the advantages that wealth, position, and
+the homage of society could offer—dashing to the ground on the very
+threshold of life the brilliant prospects which were opening before
+her—was worse than madness! They complained bitterly to her of her
+ingratitude and heartless disregard of their feelings and wishes; poured
+unmeasured and contemptuous reproaches upon her for stifling the modest
+womanly instincts of her refined and delicate nature, to strike out boldly
+upon a new road hitherto untrodden by any woman of New England.
+Remonstrances, pleading, reproaches, and contempt were alike unavailing.
+Listening only to the persuasions of that “invisible Lover” whose voice
+had called her to relinquish the seductive charms which surrounded her
+worldly course, she turned away from them steadfastly to follow him and
+carry his cross up the steep and thorny paths of penance and self‐
+abnegation, offering herself entirely to him on the Calvary made glorious
+to her by his precious blood.
+
+Not “immediately,” however, like those whom he called of old, did she
+“leave the ship and her father, to follow him.” Weary years of waiting and
+yearning, far from the tabernacles where her soul had chosen its home, did
+she accord in tender regard for the feelings of those, so truly and deeply
+beloved, who could not give her up, and who had no clue by which to trace
+the course her spirit was taking, or power even to conjecture the motives
+that actuated her.
+
+When at length the time arrived to which they had consented to limit her
+stay with them, who shall describe the pangs that rent her heart in a
+parting so full of grief; in severing these nearest and dearest ties, and
+in witnessing the anguish which overwhelmed those around whom her
+tenderest earthly affections were entwined?
+
+Alone, but full of peace, “leaning on the arm of her Beloved,” did she
+tread the painful path. Her parents could not accompany her to witness the
+sacrifice which prostrated their fondest hopes, nor could they ever bring
+themselves to visit her in the sanctuary she had chosen.
+
+Her Sheldon friend did so repeatedly, and was amazed to find her radiant
+with a joy which her countenance had never before revealed—happy in the
+peaceful home that offered only poverty and an unceasing round of labors
+in the service of the sick and suffering, with a happiness which the
+splendors of her worldly one could never impart.
+
+Multitudes of New England people visiting Montreal flocked to the convent,
+begging to see the lovely young nun of the Hôtel Dieu, who was the first
+daughter New England had given to the sacred enclosure, and whom they
+claimed as belonging especially to them through her connection with their
+favorite Revolutionary hero.
+
+So continual were these interruptions that she was driven at length to
+obtain the permission of the mother‐superior absolutely to decline
+appearing in answer to such calls, except when they were made by the
+friends of former days, for whom she still preserved and cherished the
+liveliest affection.
+
+By a singular coincidence—or rather, let us say, through tender memories
+of the gentle nun long since departed from the Hôtel Dieu, and the
+prevailing efficacy of her prayers—a large proportion of those who were
+present at the Christmas party at Sheldon, including the mistress of the
+feast and many of her family, were, from time to time as years flew by,
+received into the bosom of the Holy Catholic Church.
+
+And so does our gracious and mighty Mother, “ever ancient, ever new,” win
+her triumphs, one by one, perpetually through all the ages—wins them often
+in the face, nay, even perforce, of circumstances apparently the most
+directly opposed to her influence; accomplishes them by means so weak and
+simple as would seem, according to all human reasoning, utterly
+inadequate. In countries far remote from her gentle influence, one is
+called—we hardly know how or why—in this place, another in that, as if the
+words of our divine Lord found their fulfilment even in this: “Two shall
+be in the field: one shall be taken, and one shall be left. Two women
+shall be grinding at the mill: one shall be taken, and one shall be left.”
+
+And every soul thus called to launch its eternal interests upon the ocean
+of infinite truth must encounter much the same appalling trials, be
+haunted by the same startling doubts and dark forebodings. Over the sunken
+rocks of heresy and unbelief along this coast the billows break with a
+force that affrights the stoutest heart, and many a would‐be voyager
+shrinks back dismayed before their power; but once pluck up heart of grace
+to pass the foaming barrier, in the mid‐ocean all is “peace, and joy
+unspeakable, and full of glory.”
+
+We cannot more fitly conclude this little sketch of a real event than by a
+quotation from Montalembert’s closing chapter on the “Anglo‐Saxon Nuns”:
+
+“Is this a dream, the page of a romance? Is it only history—the history of
+a past for ever ended? No; once more it is what we behold and what happens
+amongst us every day.... Who, then, is this invisible Lover, dead upon a
+cross eighteen hundred years ago, who thus attracts to him youth, beauty,
+and love?—who appears to them clothed with a glory and a charm which they
+cannot withstand?—who seizes on the living flesh of our flesh, and drains
+the purest blood of our blood? Is it a man? No; it is God. There lies the
+secret, there the key of this sublime and sad mystery. God alone could win
+such victories and deserve such sacrifices. Jesus, whose godhead is
+amongst us daily insulted or denied, proves it daily, with a thousand
+other proofs, by those miracles of self‐denial and self‐devotion which are
+called vocations. Young and innocent hearts give themselves to him, to
+reward him for the gift he has given us of himself; and this sacrifice by
+which we are crucified is but the answer of human love to the love of that
+God who was crucified for us.”
+
+
+
+
+The House That Jack Built.
+
+
+By The Author Of “The House Of Yorke.”
+
+In Two Parts.
+
+PART II.
+
+Concluded.
+
+Late in the afternoon, Bessie went down and leaned on the bars again,
+looking up and down the road, looking at the tracks left by Father
+Conners’ carriage‐wheels—the smooth curve of their turning; looking to see
+the shadows creep across the road as the sun went down. The sadness of a
+lonely evening was upon her, and, though she had not lost her morning
+resolution, she had lost the joyous hopefulness with which those
+resolutions were made.
+
+At her left, and quite near, a fringe of young cedars made a screen
+between the ground that belonged to her house and the farmer next to it,
+where her uncle Dennis had lived when John Maynard had wooed and won her.
+
+Pain came with that recollection, and almost the old bitterness. “I must
+go home again, and put my resolutions in practice right away, or I shall
+lose them,” she said to herself. “It won’t do for me to stay here and
+brood over my troubles. I cannot bear loneliness; and how terribly lonely
+it is here! I wish I had some one to speak to besides poor Aunt Nancy.”
+
+She started, hearing a soft, clear whistling not far away. The strain was
+familiar, not to this region, but to her city life. While she listened,
+the sound ceased, or rather broke off suddenly.
+
+Bessie’s eyes were wide open, her face flushed. Was there more than one
+person who could whistle so marvellously clearly and sweetly?
+
+Some one began to sing then more sweetly still, and coming nearer while he
+sang words written by the most melodious of poets:
+
+
+    “Hark! a lover, binding sheaves,
+      To his maiden sings;
+    Flutter, flutter go the leaves,
+      Larks drop their wings.
+    Little brooks, for all their mirth,
+      Are not blithe as he!
+    ‘Tell me what the love is worth
+      That I give thee.’
+
+    “Speech that cannot be forborne
+      Tells the story through:
+    ‘I sowed my love in with the corn,
+      And they both grew.
+    Count the world full wide of girth,
+      And hived honey sweet;
+    But count the love of more worth
+      Laid at thy feet.
+
+    “ ‘Money’s worth is house and land,
+      Velvet coat and vest!
+    Work’s worth is bread in hand,
+      Ay, and sweet rest.
+    Wilt thou learn what love is worth?
+      Ah! she sits above,
+    Sighing, ’Weigh me not with earth.
+      Love’s worth is love!’ ”
+
+
+The singer had come yet more near, and would have been visible to her had
+not Bessie Maynard’s looks been downcast and her head drooping low. When
+the song ended, and the step paused, she lifted her eyes, and saw James
+Keene standing before her smiling and waiting for the greeting she was so
+slow to give.
+
+Surprise, and perhaps fear, deprived Bessie for a moment of her self‐
+possession. “What! you here!” she exclaimed, without the least sign of
+courtesy; and with that exclamation broke down the barrier of silence that
+had existed between them.
+
+“Why should I not be here?” he asked quietly. “May not I also have
+memories connected with this place? It was here I recovered health, after
+an illness that nearly cost me my life. It was here I shot my first bear.
+And it was here I first saw you.”
+
+Bessie perceived at once that, if the old reserve was to be maintained,
+she must immediately assume an air of decisive politeness. For an instant
+she wavered. Silence may be best for those who are doubtful of themselves,
+and, not willing to commit any flagrant wrong, are still not resolved to
+be absolutely honest. But when we are strong in the determination to be
+sincere, and to let the light of day shine not only on our actions, but on
+our inmost thoughts, then, perhaps, by speech we may most nobly and
+effectually establish our position.
+
+Bessie Maynard, therefore, waited for the words which would give her an
+opportunity to put an end to the tacit and vague understanding existing
+between them.
+
+He read her silence rightly; it was a command for him to speak; and he
+obeyed it, though the pale face and large, downcast lids gave little hope
+of any such answer as he might wish to receive.
+
+“In those old days, so long ago, when I came here to try what a half‐
+savage life would do for me, and was astonished to find a delicate human
+flower in the wilderness, I was a prophet.”
+
+He leaned on the cedar bar that separated them, and looked dreamily off
+toward the woods. He would not surprise in her face any involuntary
+expression she might wish to conceal from him; he would take advantage of
+no impulse. If she came to him, she must come deliberately. For, setting
+aside Christianity—and he did not pretend to believe in it—James Keene had
+an exceptionally honorable nature. He would gladly have taken this woman
+away from a husband who, he believed, knew not how to value her, and who
+made her miserable by his neglect, but he held that it would be no wrong
+for him to do so.
+
+“Yes, I was a prophet,” he continued; “for I believed then, what I am sure
+of now, that your marriage was a most unwise one. Give me credit, Bessie,
+for having been sincerely pained to see that, as years passed away, you
+had reason to come to the same conclusion. Whatever selfish wishes I may
+have had, I would at any time have renounced them could I have seen you
+happy with the man you chose to marry, knowing no other.”
+
+Bessie lifted her eyes, and looked at him with a steady, tearful gaze.
+“People might say that you are wicked to speak so to me,” she said; “but I
+think that, according to your belief, you are very good; only you have no
+faith in religion. I esteem you so highly that I am going to make a
+confession which, perhaps, you may think I ought not to make. There have
+been times during these last few years when, if I had not had some little
+lingering faith, I would have welcomed from you an affection which I have
+no right to receive. There have been times when you might have spoken as
+lovingly as you could, and I should not have been angry. I tell you this
+partly because you must have at least suspected that it was so. And more
+than this. If I had seen you here a few days ago, my impulse would have
+been to welcome you more ardently than I ever yet welcomed any friend. You
+can understand how it all has been, without my explaining. I was so
+lonely, so neglected! I was so lonely!”
+
+She had spoken with a sad earnestness, and there was something touchingly
+humble yet dignified in her manner; but, at the last words, her voice
+trembled and failed.
+
+He was looking at her now. Excitement and suspense showed in the sparkling
+of his clear blue eyes, in the slight flush that colored his usually pale
+face, in the lips firmly compressed.
+
+“All is changed now,” she went on. “I have been recalled to my religion,
+to my duty. I do not think that you should any more show me that sympathy
+which you have shown, and I do not think that you should see me
+frequently. I thank you for your kindness toward me. It has often been a
+comfort. But I am a wife”—she lifted herself with a stately gesture, and
+for the first time a wave of proud color swept over her face—“and the
+sadness which my husband may cause me no other man may ever again soothe.”
+
+There was silence for a moment. The gentleman’s face had grown pale. There
+was a boundless tenderness in his heart for this fair and sorrowful woman,
+and he was about to lose the power to offer her even the slightest
+comfort, while at the same time he must still retain the knowledge of her
+suffering.
+
+“I shall respect your wish and your decision,” he said, with emotion.
+“Forgive me if I have trespassed too much in the past. It seemed to me
+very little; for, Bessie, if I had not known that you had a religious
+feeling which would have held you back, or would have made you miserable
+in yielding, I should long ago have held out my hand to you, and asked you
+to come to me. If I had felt sure of being able to convince you beyond the
+possibility of subsequent regret, I should not have kept silence so long.
+But I respect your conscience. I should esteem myself a criminal if I
+could ask you to do what you believe to be wrong.”
+
+Bessie Maynard’s face was covered with a blush of shame. Her thought had
+never gone consciously beyond the length of tender, brotherly kindness,
+and it was cruelly humiliating to see in its true light the position in
+which she had really stood. At that moment, too, she first perceived what
+a gulf lay between her soul and that of the man who had seemed always so
+dangerously harmonious with her. In principle, in all that firmly
+underlies the changeful tide of feeling, they were antagonistic; for he
+could speak calmly and with dignity of a possibility from which she shrank
+with a protesting tremor in every fibre of her being.
+
+“I am going back to my husband,” she said, “and I shall never again forget
+that his honor and dignity are mine. I have been weak and childish, and
+more wicked than I knew or meant, and it all came because I loved my
+husband too much and God too little. But I trust”—she clasped her hands,
+and lifted her eyes—“I trust that I shall have strength to begin now a new
+life, and correct the mistakes of the past.”
+
+She forgot for a moment that she was not alone, and stood looking away, as
+if there stretched before her gaze the new and loftier pathway in which
+she was to tread. Her companion gazed at her unchecked, with searching,
+melancholy eyes, not more because she was dearer to him in her impregnable
+fortress of Christian will than she ever had been in her human weakness,
+than because there rose from the depths of his restless soul a cry of
+longing for that firm foundation and trust which can hold a man in the
+place where conscience sets him, no matter how the tempests of passion may
+beat upon his trembling heart.
+
+“There is, then, nothing left me but to say farewell.”
+
+The poignant regret his voice betrayed recalled her attention.
+
+“It has come to that,” she said gently. “But if you could know all I mean
+in saying farewell to you, it would not seem an idle word; for I hope and
+pray that you may fare so well as to come before long into the church. It
+is a refuge from every danger and every trouble, and I have only just
+found it out! Good‐by.”
+
+She gave him her hand, and they separated without another word. But Bessie
+did not stop to look after this visitor. Whatever regret she might
+otherwise have felt was swallowed up in the one thought—it had seemed to
+him possible that she might leave, not only her husband, but her sacred,
+sainted babes, and go to him! To what a depth had she fallen!
+
+When she had disappeared in the house, he strolled slowly down the road.
+Unless you had looked in his face, you would have taken him for a man who
+was calmly enjoying the contemplation of nature in that forest solitude.
+But from his face looked forth a spirit weary and hopeless that hastened
+not, because it beheld nowhere a place worth making haste to reach. Once
+only the gloom of his countenance lifted, and then it was with no cheering
+brightness, but as the cloud is momentarily illuminated by angry
+lightning.
+
+A man was coming up the road, not such a man as one usually sees in these
+wild places, but one who bore the marks of city training and habits. The
+uniform gray clothing, the wide Panama hat, even the unobtrusive necktie,
+belonged to the city. This man was taller and broader‐shouldered than he
+whose eyes flashed out so scornfully at sight of him. His face was dark,
+vivid, and clean‐shaven, the forehead was wide, the dark‐brown hair
+closely cut, the gray eyes clear and penetrating. It was a face fitter to
+carve in stone than to paint, for its color and expression were less
+noticeable than its fine, strong outlines.
+
+Yet now there shone a soft and eager light over that granite strength.
+There was a look of glad surprise, mingled with a certain amused self‐
+chiding, as though of one who comes back from a long and gloomy
+abstraction, and finds a half‐forgotten delight still waiting at his side.
+
+At sight of this man, James Keene’s first emotion had been one of anger,
+his first impulse to meet him boldly and with scorn. But scarcely had he
+taken one quickened step before he stopped, with a revulsion of feeling as
+unsuspected as it was confounding. Reason as he might, emancipate himself
+as he might from what he considered the superstitions of religion, he
+found himself now overwhelmed with confusion. He strove to call up to his
+mind all those arguments on which he had founded himself, but they fell
+dead. Whether it was the instinct of a noble heart that would not betray
+even an enemy, or an irradicable root of that religious faith which had
+been implanted in his childhood, or the strangeness of one who for the
+first time acts on principles long maintained in theory, or only a
+sensitive perception of the esteem in which the faithful world would hold
+his action, he could not have told. He only knew that, instead of
+standing, lofty and serene, in the dawn of this new light before which
+superstition and oppression were to pass away, he felt as if he were
+surrounded by a baleful glare from the nether fires. Sudden and scathing,
+it caught him, and burned his courage out like chaff.
+
+In his eagerness and preoccupation, John Maynard had scarcely observed the
+person who approached; and, when the stranger turned aside into a wood‐
+path, he gave him no further thought.
+
+There was the little crooked house squinting at him out of its two
+windows, with the boards he had nailed, the chimney he had built, the door
+he had hung; there was the whole wild, rude place, with everything askew,
+that had once seemed a paradise—that had been a paradise—to him. With his
+hands and eyes educated, as they were now, to the utmost precision of
+outline and balance, the sight made him laugh out; and yet the laugh
+expressed as much pleasure as mockery.
+
+He was taking his first holiday since he had left this house, and
+everything was delightfully fresh and novel yet familiar to him. He did
+not see the beauty that a poet or a painter would have found in that
+unpruned rusticity, for he was an artist of the exact; but the wabbly
+frame‐house, the reeling fences, the road that wound irregularly, the
+straggling trees that leaned away from the northwest, made a good
+background against which to contemplate the trim and shining creatures of
+his hands, regular to a hair’s breadth, unvarying and direct.
+
+Coming to the bars, he threw himself over instead of letting them down,
+and found that he had grown heavier and less lithe than he was when last
+he performed that feat. He walked up the rocky path, his heart beating
+fast as he thought of the old time, and of the slim, bright‐faced girl he
+had brought there as a bride. If she could stand in the doorway now, as
+she was then, and smile at him coming home, he felt that he could be the
+old lover again. He had a vague idea that Bessie had grown older, and
+sober, and pale. Come to think of it, he hadn’t known much of her lately,
+and she had been dissatisfied about something. Why had she allowed him to
+get his eyes and ears so full of machinery? Surely he had lost and
+overlooked much. He had a mind to complain of her, only that he felt so
+good‐natured.
+
+At sound of a step, Aunt Nancy went to the door; but at that sound Bessie
+took her sewing, and bent over it. Had James Keene repented their hasty
+parting?
+
+“Does Miss Bessie Ware live here?” asked the gentleman, with immense
+dignity.
+
+“Bessie Ware?” repeated Aunt Nancy, in bewilderment; then, as the
+recollection of Bessie’s confessions flashed into her mind, she stiffened
+herself up, and answered severely: “No, sir, she does not!”
+
+“The idea of his refusing to give her her husband’s name!” she thought
+indignantly.
+
+“Why, John!” exclaimed Bessie, over the old lady’s shoulder.
+
+Aunt Nancy gave a cry of delight. She would at any time have welcomed John
+rapturously; but his coming now made her twice glad. Of course he and
+Bessie would make it all up.
+
+The exuberance of her welcome covered, at first, the wife’s deficiency.
+But when the excitement was over, and they had gone into the house,
+Bessie’s coldness and embarrassment became evident.
+
+“I am very much surprised to see you here,” she said, when her husband
+looked at her. She did not pretend to be glad.
+
+“Are you sorry?” he asked, with a laugh.
+
+“I am too much astonished to be anything else,” she replied quietly. “What
+made you come?”
+
+John Maynard was disappointed and mortified. That for years he had met his
+wife’s affectionate advances as coldly he did not seem aware. Other things
+had occupied his thoughts. He did not recollect, as he had not noticed at
+the time, that her manner was now just what it had long been.
+
+Supper was over, eaten in an absent way by the husband, who glanced every
+moment at his wife. He found her very lovely, though different enough from
+the glad, girlish bride who had once brightened this humble room for him.
+He could not understand her. Had she no recollection of those days?
+
+She did not seem to have, indeed, for she made no reference to them by
+look nor speech, but talked rapidly, and with an air of constraint, of
+things nearer in time, and listened with affected interest while he told
+the latest city news, and the latest news of his own work; how high the
+engine spouted; of the tiny model locomotive he had built, all silver, and
+gold, and fine steel; of the money he expected to make by his new patent;
+of an accident that had happened in his shop—a German organist, with two
+or three others, had come to look at his machinery, and got his hand
+crushed in it, which would put a stop to his playing.
+
+Bessie looked up with an expression of pain. “Poor man!” she murmured.
+“How miserable he must be!”
+
+“Yes; I was sorry for him,” the husband replied. “They say he cared for
+nothing but music. His name is Verheyden.”
+
+“Poor man!” Bessie sighed again, looking down. “Those machines are always
+hurting some one.”
+
+“It was his own fault,” the machinist said hastily. “Did he suppose that
+the engine was going to stop when he put his forefinger on it? Why, that
+machine would grind up an elephant, and never mismake its face. But it is
+the first time any one was ever hurt by a machine of mine.”
+
+He did not understand the glance she gave him. It was not pleasant, but
+what it meant he knew not. She was thinking: “It is not the first time one
+has been hurt so.”
+
+Aunt Nancy found business elsewhere, and left the couple to themselves.
+
+“I forgot you were coming away that day, Bessie,” her husband said
+hastily, the moment they were alone. “I never thought of it till I was
+five miles off, and then I concluded that you must have changed your mind,
+or you would have told me not to go.”
+
+“You know I never tell you not to go anywhere,” she replied coldly.
+
+He colored. “But you know that I didn’t mean to have you go to the depot
+alone. When I read what you wrote to Jamie, I felt sorry enough.”
+
+In all the long years that were past, how generously would she have met an
+apology like this! How quickly would she have disclaimed all sense of
+injury, and even have tried to find some fault in herself! But now her
+heart, with all its impulses, seemed frozen. She only gave him a glance of
+surprise, and a quiet word. “There was no need of company, I knew the
+way.”
+
+There was silence. Gradually, through the deep unconsciousness and
+abstraction of the man, came out incident after incident of their late
+life, slight, but significant. Each had seemed a detached trifle at the
+time, but now as he sat there, abashed and ill at ease, they began to show
+a connection and to grow in importance. It was as when, in a thick fog,
+the sailor sees dimly a black speck that may be only a floating stick, and
+another, and another, till, looking sharply, as the mist grows thinner, he
+finds himself caught among rocks at low tide.
+
+John Maynard tried to throw off with a laugh the weight that oppressed
+him. “Come, Bessie, let the late past go, and remember only the life we
+lived here. Let’s be young people again.”
+
+He went to her side, bent down, and would have kissed her, had she not
+evaded his touch, not shyly, but with a crimson blush and a quick flash of
+the eyes.
+
+“Don’t talk nonsense, John!” she said, in a low voice that did not hide a
+haughty aversion. “Let us speak of something sensible. I have been
+thinking that some of our ways should be changed at home. I shall begin
+with myself, and attend strictly to my religion. Besides, I am not doing
+rightly in allowing James to grow up without any discipline, and I think
+he should be placed in a Catholic school, where he will be taught his
+duty. He is quite beyond my control.”
+
+Her morbid humility and diffidence were gone. The feeling that had made
+her give up all rights rather than ask for them did not outlive the moment
+of her reconciliation with the church.
+
+“I am willing he should go to any school you choose,” her husband replied
+gravely, impressed by the change. “I suppose the boy is going on rather
+too much as he likes. Do whatever you think best about it, and I will see
+that he obeys.”
+
+She thanked him gently, and continued: “I shall go to High Mass after
+this, and I should be glad to have you go with me, if you are willing. It
+would be a better example for James than to see you go to the shop on
+Sundays. He is becoming quite lawless. We have no right to give our
+children a bad example. I would be glad to have you go with me, if you
+will.”
+
+John Maynard’s face was glowing red. He felt, gently as she spoke, as if
+he were having the law read to him. “I am willing to go with you, Bessie,”
+he said. “I am not a Catholic, but I am not anything else.”
+
+She thanked him again, earnestly this time, for it was a favor he had
+granted her, and she knew that he would keep his word. “You are good to
+promise that,” she said.
+
+He laughed uneasily. “Have you anything else to ask?”
+
+“I do not think of anything,” she replied, and there was silence.
+
+The husband got up, and went to the door. The sun was sinking down the
+west. He looked at the glow it made, and remembered how he had seen it
+there in the days that were past, how quiet and peaceful his life had
+been, how much happier, had he but known it, than in the turmoil of later
+years. Then the days had been full of healthful employment, the nights of
+rest and refreshment, untroubled by the feverish dreams that now swarmed
+in his sleeping hours. And what was it that had made his life so happy?
+What had been the motive, the delight of everything? Nothing but Bessie,
+always Bessie, his help and his reward.
+
+He turned his face, and saw her still sitting there, her head drooping,
+her hands folded in her lap. Those hands caught his glance. They were pale
+and thin. They looked as though she had suffered.
+
+He went to her impulsively as his heart stirred, and put his arm about her
+shoulder. “Bessie, forget the last years, and let’s be as we were in the
+happy old time.”
+
+She did not look angry; but she withdrew herself gently from him.
+
+“John,” she said, “that is too much to expect at once. Years of pain
+cannot be forgotten in a moment. When you came to‐day, you asked if Bessie
+Ware lived here. She does not. The Bessie Ware you married is dead. I
+scarcely know yet who or what I am. I only know that I shall try to do my
+duty by you, and repair some of the faults and mistakes of the past. But,
+John, I must warn you that it is harder to reconcile an estranged wife
+than to win a bride.”
+
+One piercing glance, angry and disappointed, shot from his eyes; then he
+went to the outer door. He stood a moment on the threshold, then stepped
+on to the greensward. Another pause, and he walked slowly back through the
+garden, seeming not to know whither he went.
+
+Aunt Nancy, anxiously awaiting signs of reconciliation, saw him wander
+about aimlessly, then go and lean on a fence next the woods, his back to
+the house.
+
+She went into the front room at once. She was on John’s side now.
+
+“Bessie,” she said decidedly, “you mustn’t stand too much on your dignity
+with John. Men are stupid creatures, and do a good many hard things
+without meaning or knowing; and, if they come round, it isn’t wise to keep
+them waiting too long for a kind word.”
+
+Bessie Maynard laid down the work she was pretending to do, and her hands
+trembled. “I am not acting a part, Aunt Nancy,” she said, “and I cannot be
+a hypocrite. I feel cold toward John. And I feel displeased when he comes
+and kisses me, as if he were conferring a favor, and expects me to be
+happy for that. I could not give up if I would, I ought not if I could.
+There is something more required than a little sweet talk.”
+
+A half hour passed, and still John Maynard stood motionless, with his
+elbows leaning on the fence, and his head bowed. If Bessie had seen his
+face, it would have reminded her of the time when he first studied
+mechanics, and became so absorbed in the one subject as to be dead to all
+else. But there was the difference that he studied then with a vivid
+interest, and now with gloomy intentness.
+
+An hour passed, and still he stood there; and the sun was down, and the
+moon beginning to show its pearly light through the fading richness of the
+gloaming. The birds had ceased singing, and there was no voice of wild
+creatures in the woods. It was the hour for prayer and peace‐making.
+
+John Maynard started from his abstraction, hearing his name spoken by some
+one. “John!” said Bessie. She had been watching him for some time from the
+door, and had approached slowly, step by step, unheard by him.
+
+He turned toward her a pale, unsmiling face. “How late it is!” he said. “I
+must make haste.”
+
+She spoke hesitatingly, something doubtful and wistful in her face. “I
+have been thinking that I might have received you better, when you came on
+this long journey. Won’t you come in now and rest? I didn’t mean to turn
+you out of the house that you made—for me.”
+
+He turned his eyes away. “And I’ve been thinking, Bessie, that I’d better
+go right back again; I can go down to the post‐office to‐night, and take
+the stage to‐morrow morning.”
+
+“You will not go!” she said.
+
+“I should only spoil your visit,” he went on. “I don’t want you to begin
+to ‘do your duty’ by me just now. I know, Bessie, that you had a good deal
+to complain of; but I swear to you that I did not mean to be hard. You
+know I had twenty‐five years to make up; and I was always looking for
+better times. I was so blind that I was fool enough to think you would be
+glad to see me here, and that we could begin over again where we began
+first.”
+
+She did not answer a word. There is something confounding in the sudden
+humiliation of a man who has always been almost contemptuously dominant.
+
+He looked at his watch. “I must make haste, or they will be in bed,” he
+said. “Make some sort of an excuse to Aunt Nancy for me. And when you want
+to come back, let me know, and I will meet you at the depot or come after
+you.”
+
+He started, and she walked beside him down the path to the road. He seemed
+hardly able to hold his head up.
+
+She walked nearer, and slipped her hand in his arm, speaking softly: “I
+said a little while ago that the pain of years cannot be forgotten in a
+moment. But I was wrong. I think it may.”
+
+He looked at her quickly, but said nothing, and they reached the bars.
+Neither made any motion to let down the pole. They leaned on it a minute
+in silence.
+
+“The fact is, Bessie,” the husband burst forth, “I’ve been like a man
+possessed by an evil spirit. I’m sorry, and that is all I can say.”
+
+“No matter, Jack! Let it all go!” his wife exclaimed, clasping her hands
+on his arm, and holding it close to him. “You weren’t to blame!” (Oh!
+wonderful feminine consistency!) “Let’s forget everything unpleasant, and
+remember only the good. How you have had to work and study, poor, dear
+Jack! You must rest now, and never get into the old drudging way again.”
+
+Aunt Nancy raked up the fire, and put down the window, looking out now and
+then at the couple who leaned on the bar below. Each time she looked,
+their forms were less distinct in the twilight. “That’s just the way they
+used to do fifteen years ago,” she muttered contentedly.
+
+She sat a few minutes waiting, but they did not come in. Aunt Nancy sighed
+and laughed too. “It beats all how women do change their minds,” she said.
+“I did think that Bessie would hold out longer. Well, I may as well go to
+bed.”
+
+By‐and‐by she heard them come into the kitchen.
+
+“Now, I shut the doors and windows, and you rake up the fire,” Bessie
+said. “Do you remember it was always so, Jack?”
+
+“Of course I do, little one,” was the answer. “But Aunt Nancy has got the
+start of us to‐night.”
+
+“Aunt Nancy!” repeated Bessie, in a lower voice. “I declare, Jack, I
+forgot all about her.”
+
+“I’ll warrant you did!” says Aunt Nancy to herself, rather grimly,
+perhaps.
+
+“We will be sure to keep all our good resolutions, won’t we?” Bessie said.
+
+“All right!” says John.
+
+The door shut softly behind them, and there were silence, and peace, and
+hope in the house that Jack built.
+
+
+
+
+A Retrospect.
+
+
+Concluded.
+
+Nothing of interest presented itself during the reign of Philip the Bold,
+except the council held there in 1278. In 1383, the unfortunate Charles
+VI., wearied with state troubles that he was so ill fitted to cope with,
+fled in despair from the Louvre to Compiègne. But he was not to find peace
+here more than in the busy turmoil of the city. Soon after his arrival he
+was attacked with insanity; at first it was considered of no moment, the
+natural consequence of a violent reaction or a weak and nervous
+temperament; great pains were taken to conceal the fact from the public,
+but after a time the symptoms became alarming, and it was impossible to
+keep the secret. After the festivities which followed his ill‐starred
+marriage with Isabeau de Bavière, the disease broke through all bounds;
+everything seemed to conspire to exasperate it: the assassination of
+Clisson by the Baron de Craon, the apparition of the phantom in the forest
+that seized the king’s bridle and uttered the mysterious message as it
+disappeared, the bal masqué when the Duke of Orleans inadvertently set
+fire to the king’s Indian costume—a skin smeared with a tarry substance
+and stuck all over with feathers—all these shocks, coming at short
+intervals, irritated the disordered imagination to fury, and the attacks
+became frequent and ungovernable. The king’s illness was imputed by
+popular superstition to the malefices of Valentina of Milan, Duchess of
+Orleans, who, if she lacked the power, no doubt had strong motives for
+evoking the powers of darkness to destroy the king’s reason, and thereby
+his authority. The demon which had taken possession of Charles’ brain does
+not seem to have invaded his heart or changed the natural goodness of his
+disposition. He was removed from Compiègne in one of his fits of madness,
+and when some years later he re‐entered it, it was by force of arms; the
+Bourguignons held the place. Charles laid siege to it; after a desperate
+resistance it surrendered, and he entered in triumph; nothing however
+could induce him to punish the rebels, he said there was blood enough upon
+the ground, and he would take no vengeance on his subjects except by
+forgiving them. Compiègne was soon to be the theatre of a more momentous
+struggle than these rough skirmishes between Charles and his people.
+Shortly after the mock peace signed there by Bedford, it was attacked by
+the Duc de Bourgogne and the English with Montgomery at their head. Jeanne
+d’Arc on hearing of it evinced great sorrow and alarm, but she flew at
+once to the rescue, and appeared suddenly in the midst of the king’s
+troops, with the oriflamme of S. Denis in one hand, and her “good sword of
+liege” in the other. The sight of her whom they looked upon as the angel
+of victory raised the drooping spirits of the soldiers and filled them
+with new ardor; they raised a cry of victory the moment they beheld
+Jeanne. Enguerrand de Monstrelet, who was an eye‐witness of the siege,
+describes her attitude and the conduct of the troops throughout as
+“passing all heroism ever before seen in battle.” But, alas! the star of
+the maid of Orleans was destined to set in darkness at the hour of its
+greatest splendor; her own prediction, so often repeated to Charles and
+those around him, “Un homme me vendra” (A man will betray me), was about
+to be fulfilled. On the 24th of May, 1429, there was a formidable
+engagement between the two armies. Jeanne, at the head of hers, performed
+prodigies of valor; after a brilliant sortie in which the enemy were
+repulsed, she was re‐entering the town by the Boulevard du Pont, and had
+almost reached the barrier through which hundreds of her own victorious
+soldiers had already passed, when, lo! the gates swing forward on their
+hinges, and are closed against her! The maiden’s cry of despair as she
+raised her sword and stretched both arms towards the gates was echoed by a
+yell of fiendish joy from the enemy; in an instant she was surrounded,
+disarmed, and taken captive by Montgomery. Guillaume de Flavy, governor of
+Compiègne, was accused of having committed this act of treachery, bribed
+by Jean de Luxembourg. If the accusation be true, and it has never been
+seriously challenged, the traitor’s punishment was as fitting as it was
+merited; he was immediately destituted of his office and revenues by the
+Connétable de Richemont, and driven to hide his base head in private life,
+where the Nemesis who was to avenge Jeanne d’Arc awaited him in the shape
+of his wife; she was jealous of her husband, who, it would seem, fully
+justified the fact; after leading him a miserable life and failing to
+convert him by slow torture from his evil ways, she bribed the barber to
+cut his throat one morning while shaving him, and finished the operation
+herself by smothering him under a pillow. For many years de Flavy’s effigy
+was burnt regularly at Compiègne on the 24th of May.
+
+Louis XI. was liberated from the English, and came to Compiègne time
+enough to embitter the last days of his father, Charles VIII., who let
+himself die of hunger there from terror of being poisoned by his son.
+Comines says that his dutiful son and most amiable of men was so irritated
+by his courtiers for mocking “his boorish manners, his uncouth dress, and
+his taste for low folk,” that to spite them he published an edict
+forbidding them to hunt or touch the game in the forest of Compiègne, a
+prohibition against all precedent, nor did he ever invite them to join him
+there in the chase. But the pretty palace open to the four winds of heaven
+soon grew distasteful to him, and he forsook it for the more congenial
+retreat of Plessis‐les‐Tours, where, surrounded by spies and quacks and a
+moat filled with vipers and venomous snakes, he ended in terror and
+suffering a life which presents a strange mixture of shrewdness and
+credulity, bonhomie and ferocity, impiety and the grossest superstition.
+
+Francis I. took kindly to Compiègne, which had been deserted by his two
+predecessors. His first act on coming there, as king, was to do public
+homage to the Holy Shroud. Louis, Cardinal de Bourbon, grand‐uncle to the
+king, and abbot of S. Corneille, exposed it to the veneration of the king
+and the people amidst great ceremony and prayer of thanksgiving. “He took
+the holy relic, and laid it on the grand altar with sentiments of great
+devotion and tenderness, which he expressed by abundant tears.” Francis
+added to the shrine “twenty‐two rose‐buds of pure gold, enriched with
+precious stones and pearls, and attached to twenty _fleurs‐de‐lys_ of
+gold,” says Cambry, in his _Déscription de l’Oise_. There is also a letter
+of Francis’ giving a naïve account of the ceremony, quoted at length in
+the _Histoire du Saint Suaire de Compiègne_. Francis passes from the
+scene, and we see “the noble burgesses of Compiègne,” as he was fond
+himself of calling them, making great stir to receive his successor, Henri
+II., on his return from Rheims. Two years more, and there is the same
+merry hubbub, and the town is in gala dress to welcome Catherine de
+Medicis on her marriage. This abnormal type of a woman fell ill not long
+after her arrival, and vowed that if she recovered she would send a
+pilgrim to Jerusalem to give thanks for her; he was to start from
+Compiègne, and perform the journey all the way on foot, making for every
+three steps forward one step backward. Cambry says the vicarious
+pilgrimage was “faithfully executed according to the queen’s vow.”
+
+Charles IX. was only a flying visitor at Compiègne. An odd story is told
+by D. Carlier and others as occurring there during his time. A man was
+discovered in the forest who had been brought up by the wolves, and taken
+so completely to their way of life that he had nearly turned into a wolf
+himself. “He was hairy like a wolf, howled, outran the hounds at the hunt,
+walked on all fours, strangled dogs, tore and devoured them.” For a time
+he made sport for the people, who hunted him like other game, but having
+shown a propensity to deal with men as he did with dogs, they laid a trap
+for him, chained him, and took him before the king. Charles, more humane
+than the noble burgesses, refused to have him killed, but ordered him to
+be shorn and confined in a monastery. “What reflections,” naïvely exclaims
+D. Carlier, “does not this incident suggest on the danger of bad example,
+and the pernicious effects of evil society!” It would be interesting to
+hear how the novice behaved himself in his new position, whether he
+developed any latent dispositions for the mystic life, and quite left
+behind him the habits of his early education which had corrupted his good
+manners; but of this D. Carlier says nothing.
+
+Henri III., who lived at St. Cloud making omelets, expressed a wish to be
+buried near the Holy Shroud at Compiègne, in the church of S. Corneille;
+and as soon as Henri IV. became master of his “good town of Paris” he
+faithfully carried out this wish. Owing, however, to the dilapidated state
+of the finances, he could not do so with the proper ceremonial. “It was
+pitiful,” says Cheverny, in his _Memoirs_, “to see the greatest king of
+the earth in a _chapelle ardente_ with only one lamp, one chaplain
+belonging to the late king, named La Cesnaye, and a few shabby _écus_ to
+keep up a shabby service.” Instead of being removed to S. Denis after a
+temporary rest near the Holy Shroud, the body remained on in the vaults of
+S. Corneille, on account of a prophecy which said that Henri IV. would be
+buried eight days after Henri III.; a prediction which was actually
+accomplished, “though not,” says Bajin, “in a manner apprehended by the
+king”. When Henri IV. fell by the hand of Ravaillac, the Due d’Epernon
+advised Marie de Medicis to have the obsequies of the late king performed
+before those of her husband. Henri IV. was therefore kept waiting till his
+predecessor’s grave was filled. The first ceremony was performed quietly,
+almost in secret; and then the “good Béarnias” was taken to S. Denis, all
+France weeping and refusing to be comforted.
+
+Louis XIII. was attracted to Compiègne solely by the pleasures of the
+chase. We see him watching the meet from a window giving on the Cour
+d’honneur, and whispering to the Maréchal de Praslin, “You see that man
+down there? He wants to be one of my council, but I cannot make up my mind
+to name him.” “That man” was Richelieu. The words were repeated to Marie
+de Medicis, as all her son’s words seem to have been, and she, counting on
+the prelate’s influence in supporting her against the king and her other
+enemies, vowed that he should be named, and so he was. A few days later we
+see Louis, equipped in his hunting costume, stride into the room of the
+queen‐mother, and proclaim in a boistering manner, meant to vindicate the
+independence of his choice, that he “had named the Bishop of Luçon member
+of his council as secretary of state.” Marie de Medicis looks coolly
+surprised, and bows her approval. By‐and‐by we have the Earl of Carlisle
+and Lord Holland presenting themselves at Compiègne to solicit the hand of
+Henriette of France for the Prince of Wales. They are received with every
+mark of cordial good‐will on the part of Louis and entertained with great
+splendor; but Richelieu looked askance on their mission; it was his way to
+begin always by mistrusting an offer, whether it came from friend or foe;
+in this case his piety was alarmed for Henriette’s faith, and he suspected
+England of some sinister design in seeking alliance with France. Louis,
+however, overruled his fears and scruples, and the minister contented
+himself with taking extraordinary precautions to ensure to the princess by
+contract the free exercise of her religion, stipulating that she should
+have in all her chateaux a chapel “large enough to hold as many people as
+she pleased.” The marriage was celebrated by proxy at Notre Dame,
+Buckingham representing the Prince of Wales, and from thence the court
+escorted the bridal party on their way as far as Compiègne. Louis XIII.,
+though he made but short sojourns at the palace, kept up close and
+friendly intercourse with the inhabitants, writing to them himself when
+any important event took place. He announced to them, for instance, the
+siege of Rochelle, the war with the Spaniards, the peace with England, and
+many other events in which the honor and safety of the state were
+interested.
+
+Louis XIV. was only eight years old when he paid his first visit to
+Compiègne, accompanied by his little brother the Duc d’Anjou and the Queen
+Regent; they were obliged to seek hospitality from the monks of S.
+Corneille, because the Carmelite nuns were at the palace, which had been
+lent to them while their monastery was being repaired, and Anne of Austria
+would neither intrude upon them nor suffer them to be disturbed. What a
+checkered space intervenes between this first appearance of the _grand
+monarque_ at Compiègne and his last, when we see him passing the troops in
+review for the amusement of Madame de Maintenon! He stands uncovered
+beside her _chaise à porteurs_ and stoops down to explain the various
+evolutions, while she raises three fingers of the glass to catch the
+explanation without letting in the cold; the Duchesse de Bourgogne and the
+Princesse de Conti, and all the train of princes and princesses, are
+grouped round the poles of the Widow Scarron’s chair, listening
+respectfully while the king speaks; but he addresses none of them.
+
+Louis XV. made his entry into Compiègne preceded by a troop of falconers
+with birds on their wrists, and accompanied by cannon and music of fife
+and drum, and every demonstration of popular joy. He was just eighteen
+then; his life was like the beginning of a stream, bright and clear to its
+depths; soon it was to grow troubled, darkening and darkening as it
+reached its middle course, till at last the waters ceased to flow and
+there was nothing but a loathsome swamp. Compiègne was associated with the
+brightest and happiest incidents of his life. In 1744, after he had
+commanded the army with the Maréchal de Saxe, taken Ypres, Furnes, and
+Menin, and performed that series of brilliant feats of arms that raised
+him to the rank of a demi‐god in the eyes of the people, Louis was
+marching to Alsace when he was suddenly stricken down with a malignant
+fever and obliged to lay up at Metz. The news of his illness was received
+as a personal calamity all over France. Never before nor since was such a
+spectacle given to the world of a nation wrestling with its agony beside
+the death‐bed of a king. The churches were filled day and night, the
+people weeping as if every man were trembling for a wife, every woman for
+a son; unable to control their grief they wept aloud, “filling the streets
+with lamentations”; public prayers were everywhere offered up; processions
+were formed in every town and village, and a universal concert of
+supplication was going up to the divine mercy for the life of the king.
+When it was known that their prayers were heard, and that he was restored
+to them from the jaws of death, the reaction was like a national frenzy.
+“The nation,” says Bajin, “thrilled with joy from one end to another.”
+They christened their new‐found prince _le bienaimé_ and henceforth he was
+called by no other name; he entered Paris like a conqueror bringing home
+the spoils of half of the world; at every step his progress was impeded by
+the people falling at his horses’ feet and struggling to clasp the hand of
+their beloved; mothers held up their babes to kiss him, and strong men
+clung to his hands and covered them with kisses and tears. Louis, overcome
+by this great tide of love that was sweeping round him from his people’s
+heart, was heard to repeat constantly while the tears streamed down his
+cheeks, “O mon Dieu, qu’il est doux d’être aimé ainsi!” (O my God! how
+sweet it is to be thus loved!) It was a manifestation the like of which
+history has never chronicled. Another not less ardent, though on a smaller
+scale, awaited the king at Compiègne. The town, deeming itself entitled to
+make a special family rejoicing, invited him to a _Te Deum_ to be sung in
+the time‐honored abbey of S. Corneille. The king went and joined with deep
+emotion in the solemn hymn of thanksgiving. A monster bonfire was lighted
+on a hill above the town, a rainbow of colored lamps, stretching over an
+enormous space, symbolized the fair promise of delight which had risen
+upon France, fountains of red and white wine flowed copiously on the great
+Place, and a ball was given at night to which every inhabitant of the town
+was invited, and came; gentle and simple, rich and poor, old and young,
+all welded by a common joy without distinction of class into one kindred.
+The victor of Fontenoy responded nobly to this magnificent testimony of
+his people’s trust. Alas! that he should have outlived this glorious
+morrow, and turned from his brave career into a slough of selfishness and
+vice to become a byword to the tongues that blessed him, and accursed of
+the nation that had lavished such a wealth of love upon him! The title of
+Bienaimé, which had been spontaneously bestowed on him by the people, and
+been regularly prefixed to his name in the almanac and elsewhere, became a
+butt for squibmongers, and was applied to the king only in mockery and
+scorn. The following is a specimen:
+
+
+            “Le Bien‐aimé de l’Almanach,
+    N’est plus le Bien‐aimé de France,
+    Il fait tout _ob Loc et ab Lac_.
+    Le Bien‐aimé de l’Almanach:
+    Il met tout dans le même sac,
+    La justice et la finance,
+    Le bien‐aimé de l’Almanach
+    N’est plus le bien‐aimé de France,” etc.(195)
+
+
+When Marie Antoinette came to France as the bride of the Dauphin, it was
+at Compiègne that their first meeting took place. Louis Quinze greeted her
+with the most paternal affection; but his great, his sole preoccupation
+was, not how the Dauphin would like his fair young bride, or how she would
+take to the timid and rather awkward youth who blushed to the roots of his
+hair when the king, after raising her from her knees and embracing her,
+desired him to do the same, but how this pure young creature, who was
+entrusted to his fatherly care, would receive the Marquise du Barry. He
+presented her after all the other ladies of the court, and with a
+trepidation of manner that he was not able to conceal; but the incident
+had been foreseen and discussed at Vienna as well as at Compiègne. Marie
+Antoinette, sustained by her proud but polite mother, proved equal to the
+occasion; “she showed neither _hauteur_ nor _empressement_,” but met the
+difficulty in a manner which put the king at ease, and impressed the court
+with a high sense of her tact and discretion. Nor was this first
+impression belied by her subsequent conduct; the Dauphine proved, on many
+trying occasions, that her good sense and judgment were a match for the
+nobility of her spirit and the goodness of her heart; the busybodies who
+worked so diligently to embroil her in a quarrel with Madame du Barry were
+foiled by her straightforward simplicity and the dignified reserve which
+she maintained alike towards them and towards the favorite. An instance of
+this occurred a few weeks after her marriage. The son of one of her women
+of the bedchamber, a Madame Thibault, killed an officer of the king’s
+guard in a duel; Madame Thibault threw herself at Marie Antoinette’s feet,
+and besought her to implore the king for her son’s pardon; the Dauphine
+promised, and after a whole hour’s supplication she obtained it. Full of
+gratitude and delight the young princess told everybody how good the king
+had been, and how graciously he had granted her request; but one of the
+ladies of the court, thinking to spoil her pleasure and excite her
+jealousy, informed her that Madame Thibault had also gone on her knees to
+Madame du Barry to intercede for her, and that the marquise had done so.
+Marie Antoinette, without betraying the slightest vexation, replied very
+sweetly: “That confirms the opinion I always had of Madame Thibault, she
+is a noble woman, and a brave mother who would stop at nothing to save her
+child’s life; in her place I would have knelt to Zamore(196) if he could
+have helped me.”
+
+Charles V.’s old chateau, which had been patched, and mended, and added to
+till there was hardly a stone of the original building left, was thrown
+down by Louis Quinze, and rebuilt as we now see it. It was just finished
+in time to receive Louis Seize on his accession to the throne. The new
+king came here often to hunt, but he seldom stayed at Compiègne, though it
+was dear to him as the place where he first beheld Marie Antoinette. When
+the Revolution broke out, Compiègne suffered like other towns; some of its
+churches were destroyed, others pillaged; the Carmelites, whose convent
+had been the prayerful retreat of so many queens of France, were
+imprisoned in the Conciergerie, after appearing before Fouquier Tinville
+on a charge of having had arms concealed in their cellars. To this
+preposterous accusation, Mère Térèse de S. Augustin, their superioress,
+drawing a crucifix from her breast, answered calmly: “Behold our only
+arms! They have never inspired fear but to the wicked.” But what did
+innocence avail against such judges? The Carmelites were condemned to
+death, and executed at the Barrière du Trône. They ascended the scaffold
+singing the _Veni Creator_, and had just reached the last verse as the
+last victim laid her head on the guillotine. While awaiting in prison the
+day of their deliverance, those valiant daughters of S. Teresa amused
+themselves composing a parody on the Marseillaise, of which the following
+is a couplet:
+
+
+    “Livrons nos cœurs à l’allégresse!
+    Le jour de gloire est arrivé;
+    Le glaive sanglant est lévé,
+    Préparons nous à la victoire;
+    Sous les drapeaux d’un Dieu mourant
+    Que chacun marche en conquérant;
+    Courans et volons à la gloire!
+    Ranimons notre ardeur,
+    Nos cœurs sont au Seigneur:
+        Montons, Montons,
+    A l’échafaud, et Dieu sera vainqueur!”(197)
+
+
+Napoleon I. furnished Compiègne for his young Austrian bride, Marie
+Louise; she was on her way thither when he met the carriage in the forest,
+and, jumping in, scared her considerably by the abrupt introduction.
+
+At Compiègne took place Alexander of Russia’s famous interview with Louis
+XVIII.; the king entered the dining‐room first, and unceremoniously seated
+himself; his courtiers, scared at the royal discourtesy, began to murmur
+amongst themselves, which, the czar noticing, he observed with a smile:
+“What will you? The grandson of Catherine has not quarterings enough to
+ride in the king’s coach!”
+
+Charles X. received at Compiègne Francis and Isabella of Naples, and gave
+for their entertainment a hunting _fête_, at which 11 wild boars, 9 young
+boars, 7 stags, 56 hind, 10 fawns, 11 bucks, 114 deer, and 20 hares fell
+victims to the will of the royal sportsmen. Charles, who was on the eve of
+losing a more serious and brilliant royalty (1830), was, by common
+consent, proclaimed king of the hunt.
+
+The last circumstance of note connected with Compiègne is the camps held
+there by Louis Philippe in 1847, and commanded by the Duc de Nemours.
+
+Under the Empire the chateau was inhabited for a short time by the court
+every autumn, and was the centre of brilliant _fêtes_ and hospitalities.
+
+
+
+
+The Cross Through Love, And Love Through The Cross.
+
+
+Concluded.
+
+The next morning he went to the _Juden‐Strasse_ before the hour of the
+synagogue service, and walked up unannounced into old Zimmermann’s room.
+As he had hoped, so it proved—_she_ was there, reading the Psalms to the
+old man. He wondered if she remembered him, if she had noticed him when he
+had stood upon the landing last Sabbath morning. Zimmermann greeted him
+with a nod that had not much recognition in it, but said:
+
+“Maheleth, give the stranger a chair. _Mein Herr_, this is my good little
+nurse.”
+
+Holcombe bowed, and the girl looked at him in silence for a few seconds.
+
+“I remember,” she then said, “you picked up my music for me in a storm,
+nearly a month ago.”
+
+“I thought you would not have known me again,” Holcombe stammered.
+
+“Oh! yes, I am not forgetful. You have been very good to my patient, and I
+am very grateful, for he has eaten more this week than he has for a whole
+month.”
+
+“I think I heard your father was ill, fräulein?”
+
+“Oh! he has been so for many months. Is your English friend gone?”
+
+“Yes; he has gone home to be married. I wish, fräulein, if you could
+suggest anything, I could be of some use, besides bringing fruit and
+flowers to this house. Do you know, since I have been in Frankfort, I have
+never found anything to do?”
+
+“Do you mean,” she asked very gravely, “you wish to be of use to _us_?”
+
+“I mean, if I could come and sit with Herr Löwenberg, and read or write
+for him, while you are away; for they tell me you are out all day, and it
+must be lonely for him.”
+
+“That is very kind of you,” she answered, looking at him in calm wonder;
+“it is true he has no society, for the little girls hardly count.”
+
+“Has he any books?” asked Holcombe. “Because _I_ have plenty, and they
+might amuse him; and I have English newspapers, too, coming in regularly.
+Does he speak English?”
+
+“He understands and reads it; but you are a stranger, and why should we
+place our burdens on your shoulders?”
+
+“Oh! you must not mind my way; this sort of thing is a mania with me, you
+know.”
+
+“It is a mania seldom found,” croaked out the old man.
+
+“I think,” put in Maheleth, “it is time for me to leave you. How can I
+thank you, Mr. Holcombe? Perhaps, when you leave my friend here, you will
+stop at the next landing, and go in and see my father?”
+
+“I will, and you must not think I am in a hurry.”
+
+The ice thus broken, many visits followed, and at night, when Maheleth was
+at home, Henry read to the family in the little plain room that was so
+beautiful in his sight. More than once had he again seen the girl in the
+cathedral, always standing, and separated from the worshippers, always
+with that same sad, anxious look. One night, he noticed a certain
+constraint in the father’s and daughter’s manner, and Löwenberg was less
+cordial to him than usual. After that, Maheleth seemed yet more troubled,
+and grew paler and thinner. He asked old Zimmermann if he knew of any
+fresh trouble in the family, but he could learn nothing from him. Rachel,
+who always answered the bell, detained him one evening, and said:
+
+“I would not go in to‐night, if I were you. Don’t be offended, _mein
+Herr_.”
+
+“Why, Rachel, what is the matter?”
+
+“Fräulein Löwenberg went to the Catholic Church last night, and her father
+found it out, and he said it was your fault.”
+
+“Well, I _will_ go in all the same; I had nothing to do with it, and my
+friend must not be angry with his daughter.”
+
+Löwenberg was alone, and the room had a tossed look about it, very
+different from the cosy aspect it usually wore. The invalid lay on a
+couch, with a discontented expression on his dark, thin face.
+
+“Are you worse to‐night?” gently asked Holcombe.
+
+“Ay, worse indeed, and _you_ must add to my troubles after I had treated
+you as a son!”
+
+“_I!_ My friend, do you think that of me? Don’t you know me better?”
+
+“Ah!” said the invalid irritably, “don’t try to deceive me. You know I
+have nothing left to care for but my daughter, and you have been trying to
+convert her. I know _why_, too, but you shall not see her any more.”
+
+“You wrong me, Herr Löwenberg. I have never spoken to your daughter about
+religion, because I did not know whether it might be agreeable to her or
+not, and she never started the subject.”
+
+“You know she goes to your church?”
+
+“Yes, I have seen her there several times; she never saw me, however, and
+I never hinted to her that I had seen her.”
+
+“You speak very fairly about it; but I know how unscrupulous you
+Christians can be in this matter. You would think it a grand thing to
+convert her.”
+
+“Undoubtedly, if I could do it by sheer conviction. But you should know me
+too well to believe I would do it by any undue or secret influence.”
+
+“You do not know how dear she is to me; you do not know how her defection
+from our ancient faith would break my heart; how I should have to renounce
+her for my other children’s sake!”
+
+“And how you would stain your soul with the blackest ingratitude, Herr
+Löwenberg, if you did!” interrupted Henry excitedly.
+
+“So you think _that_, do you? You don’t know who she is, and how such a
+thing would be so unpardonable in her that no consideration could
+influence me. I never told you before, but she is of another blood than
+you are—she is the descendant of martyred rabbis, and her race is as pure
+as that of the old Machabees. We are not Germans. We are Spaniards, and,
+though ruined, our family pride is as great as it ever was—as great, too,
+as our love for our faith.”
+
+“How long ago was it you were ruined?”
+
+“Only a year and two months, and I fell ill six months ago; my wife died
+almost as soon as we came here, and my Maheleth has earned our daily
+bread, and taught her sisters, and managed the housekeeping, all alone. It
+is enough to make one curse God!”
+
+“Hush, hush!” said Holcombe. “You do not mean that—you know you have too
+many blessings to thank him for.”
+
+“And the best and only one you are seeking to take from me.”
+
+“I swear to you that much as I should wish and pray for it—for that I will
+not conceal from you—yet I have never influenced your child in any way.”
+
+“You have, because you love her.”
+
+Henry was staggered at the suddenness of his words.
+
+“You cannot deny it,” continued the invalid.
+
+“No,” answered the young man; “I have no desire to deny it, but your
+daughter never heard it from my lips, and never would.”
+
+“Never would!” echoed Löwenberg, firing up. “And do you, too, despise her
+for her race—she that is as far above you as you are above your lowest
+peasant!”
+
+“God forbid!” said Henry solemnly; “for I think of her as of one of whom I
+am not worthy. But _my_ faith forbids our union, and, love her though I
+shall to my dying day, my love should never cross my lips to stir and
+wound her heart.”
+
+“You shall see her no more; you have seen her too much already; if you
+love her, as you say, desist at least now.”
+
+“Do you mean that she knows—perhaps returns—my love?”
+
+“I have said enough, and shall not gratify your vanity. But promise me you
+will not see her again, and I will even believe that you did not try to
+proselytize her.”
+
+“No; I cannot promise that. Circumstances might arise under which it would
+be death to keep that promise, and yet I should have no hope of inducing
+you to give it me back.”
+
+“You mean she might become a Christian?”
+
+“Even so, as I pray she may.”
+
+“And you will marry her then, and she feels it, and yet you pretend you
+use no influence!”
+
+“I would marry her if she would not think me unworthy.”
+
+“I need say no more. You have been my friend, and I thank you for your
+kindness; but henceforth our paths are separate. If I lose my child, I
+shall know you robbed me of her. I only ask you now to consider what I
+told you of our family and fortunes as a sacred confidence.”
+
+“My friend,” said Henry sadly, as he rose, “I will obey you, and you may
+consider your secret as sacred as if it were my own. But remember this is
+your own act, and, if ever you wish to call on my friendship again, my
+services will be as willingly yours as though this breach had never been.
+God bless you and your daughter Maheleth!”
+
+He left the room as in a dream; Rachel scanned his face curiously as she
+let him out at the crazy door.
+
+“So,” he thought, “thus ends my connection with that house; and yet God
+knows how true my intentions were. I dare not seek her, still I know she
+may need me. God grant it be true that Maheleth is a Christian at heart!”
+
+Unconsciously he bent his steps towards the cathedral; a few people were
+collected about the confessionals. The stained windows were dark and
+blurred in the uncertain light; only a lamp here and there hung from the
+pillars.
+
+Perhaps his prayers were more fervent in intention than full in form, and
+mechanically he watched the shrouded confessionals. Suddenly from behind
+the green curtain of one of them issued the figure of the Jewish girl, a
+calm look lighting up her features, and her deportment altogether unlike
+that which he had so often and so painfully noticed.
+
+Her eye fell upon him instantly, and, far from shunning him, gave him a
+long glance of recognition and sympathy. She knelt for some time, then
+rose and walked down the nave. He followed her, and at the entrance door
+she paused as if to wait for him.
+
+“I have seen your father, Fräulein,” Holcombe said, “and he told me a
+great many things.”
+
+“I hardly think he quite knows how far things have gone,” she answered
+gently. “I could give up anything for him except my soul, and for some
+months I have known that only by becoming a Christian could I save it.”
+
+“I have often seen you in church.”
+
+“Have you, indeed?”
+
+“Your father accuses _me_ of converting you.”
+
+She blushed, and was silent for a few minutes.
+
+“You have helped me by your prayers, I am sure,” she said at last.
+
+“Tell me,” he asked, “are you a Catholic yet?”
+
+“No; I only went into the confessional to speak to the priest; in a few
+days I shall be baptized.”
+
+“I have a favor to ask you—will you let me be present?”
+
+“Certainly, it will make me very happy, believe me.”
+
+“Do you know that, when your father hears of it, he will turn you out of
+your home?”
+
+“He said so—did he tell you so?”
+
+“He did, but he could not have meant it.”
+
+“Oh! yes,” she said sadly, “he would do it; he would think it a duty, a
+matter of principle.”
+
+“It would be very ungrateful.”
+
+“Ungrateful! Was I not bound to work for him who gave me life? He worked
+hard for us, and in the time of trouble we owed it to him.”
+
+“But if he throws you off, what will become of _him_?”
+
+“That is the saddest part; but I know God will take care of him.”
+
+“Remember, Maheleth, that either for yourself or for him (for your sake)
+you must never hesitate to call upon me. Promise me that.”
+
+It was the first time he had called her Maheleth. She blushed and looked
+down, saying:
+
+“You have been very generous and very kind to my father; but surely now
+you have parted friendship with him?”
+
+“No, I have not, as I told even him; but, were it not so, for _your_ sake
+it should be.”
+
+“I have God to look after me, Herr Holcombe.”
+
+“But I want to be his instrument.”
+
+“His Raphael, as you have been to us through this desert of want and
+poverty.”
+
+“And will you not be my Sarah?” he asked suddenly, but in a soft, low
+voice.
+
+Her whole frame shook; then she looked up in his face, silent.
+
+“I have loved you since I knew you,” he went on to say; “I mean since I
+_saw_ you first; but I never meant to tell my secret, for you know I could
+not wed a Jewess. But now, thank God! the bar is gone, and I can be happy
+without sin.”
+
+She did not answer yet.
+
+“Have I deceived myself, then?” asked the young man sadly. “And do you not
+love me, as I hoped?”
+
+“I do,” she answered, quickly looking up. “God knows I do, but I cannot
+marry you.”
+
+“Why, why, Maheleth? You torture me.”
+
+“Because it would break my father’s heart, and because it would give him
+reason to say I had changed my faith for you.”
+
+“But how could he?”
+
+“I could not leave him in misery, and my little sisters alone, and go and
+live in peace and earthly comfort which they could not share.”
+
+“They are most welcome to share it, Maheleth.”
+
+“You are too good, too noble,” she said; “but it cannot be.”
+
+“And you love me, you say?”
+
+“Must we not love God better, dear, dear friend? Henry, do not be angry
+with me. You will be my dear brother in the faith always.”
+
+Holcombe was too overcome to speak. She stopped and entreated him to leave
+her.
+
+“I am paining you beyond necessity,” she said; “you will be happier and
+calmer if you do not see me till the day of my baptism. All things are
+God’s will, and, bitter as the trial may be, he gives us strength to bear
+it, if we look to him. Farewell, Henry.”
+
+He wrung her hand in silence, and saw the drooping figure pass quickly out
+of sight. He felt how much harder her trial was, and how selfish his own
+words had been, yet he did not try to see her again until the day of her
+baptism.
+
+The ceremony was to take place at the cathedral, at four in the morning.
+The sun had just risen, and the quiet streets were golden with his light.
+Holcombe was watching at the door. She came very soon, wrapped in a long
+black cloak, looking radiant and calm, as if nothing more could be of any
+consequence to her, nor stir her heart confusedly. She held out her hand
+to her friend with a “God bless you!” that left him dumb. Her cloak was
+laid on a carved bench, and her white robe gleamed under the rainbow from
+the great stained‐glass window above her. More beautiful than ever she
+seemed, and more angel‐like. The priest poured the saving waters upon her
+head, and performed all the holy mystic ceremonies of the sacrament, and
+she, as if in a heavenly trance, followed him throughout with her eyes and
+her lips. Mass was said directly after, and she and Henry knelt together
+at the altar‐rails to receive the Bread of Angels. A long time passed
+after Mass, and when at length Maheleth, now Mary, rose from her knees, it
+was only to go to the distant Lady‐chapel, and there offer up a golden
+brooch of Spanish workmanship, one of the few treasures saved from the
+wreck of her father’s fortune.
+
+As she left the church, Henry followed her.
+
+“Are you going _home_?” he asked timidly.
+
+She turned her dark eyes upon him very softly, but with no sadness in
+them.
+
+“I have no home now,” she said slowly. “Last night I bade my father
+farewell; I am going to the convent.”
+
+A look of terror came into Henry’s face.
+
+“To stay there always?” he asked.
+
+“As God wills—I do not know,” she replied.
+
+“But are you not sorry about your father and sisters?”
+
+“It was a hard trial,” she answered, with radiant calmness in her eyes,
+“but God has taken the sorrow out of it now.”
+
+“And shall I not see you again, now your faith is mine? I saw you often
+when there was a gulf between us!”
+
+“It is better you should forget me. But that shall be as God wills; I
+leave it to him, and will make no arrangements.”
+
+“Thank you for that, anyhow; remember all I told you, dear Maheleth; so
+far, at least, you can make me happy.”
+
+“I will _remember_ it always, and bless you for it, but I do not promise
+to act up to it.”
+
+“Never mind, you cannot help God protecting you, no matter through what
+instrument.”
+
+And with these words he left her.
+
+For some weeks they did not meet, but Henry was busy at correspondence
+with his English agents and bankers. In the meanwhile, regular remittances
+arrived at Herr Löwenberg’s house, which he at first refused to accept,
+not knowing whether they came from his daughter whom he had thrown off, or
+his friend whom he had insulted, and not wishing to be beholden to either
+for his daily pittance. But starvation was the alternative, and, had not
+Rachel kindly shared her meals with his children, and sent him little
+inexpensive dishes now and then, hunger would have made him yield long
+ago. As it was, he missed his daily sustenance sorely, and at last, under
+protest, and promising himself prompt repayment of these _loans_ as soon
+as he should be well again, he began to use the money sent to him. Many a
+time Holcombe came to the door to inquire after him from the good‐natured
+Rachel; and every day, in the dusk of the evening, came his daughter,
+almost always bearing a basket that held some little delicacy.
+
+One night it happened that Henry and Maheleth met at the door. She was the
+first to speak.
+
+“You see I am not yet immured in my convent!” she said gayly. “I have to
+thank you so much for coming here to look after my dear father. I shall be
+leaving Frankfort soon, and then there will be no one to be so good to him
+as you.”
+
+“But _I_ shall not leave. Do you really mean you are going?”
+
+“Yes; the good nuns have got me a governess’ situation somewhere in
+Bohemia with Catholics. I shall go next week.”
+
+“May I come and bid you good‐by?”
+
+“Oh, yes! come on a visiting day, Thursday. Have you seen my sisters? How
+are they looking?”
+
+“I saw them a week ago; they looked tired, I thought.”
+
+“Oh! they don’t know how to nurse him, and he tires them, I am afraid. But
+God will see to them and him too.”
+
+“Will you be able to come back here for a vacation?”
+
+“Perhaps in a year—not before.”
+
+“Your father may be well again by that time.”
+
+“God grant it! But I must not stay any longer now.”
+
+And having made some inquiries of Rachel, she left the house.
+
+Henry Holcombe longed for Thursday. He wanted to ask leave to write to
+Maheleth, to give her news of her father, he would say. When the time
+arrived, the parlor at the convent was full, and he hardly relished making
+his adieus in a crowd. He was relieved to find a nun come and beckon him
+away, and show him into a quiet little room, with a polished floor, a
+Munich Madonna, and a few plain chairs round a dark table.
+
+In a few minutes, a pleasant‐looking old religious came in, followed by
+Maheleth.
+
+The girl reached her hand to Henry, saying:
+
+“Sister Mary Ambrose knows you by name very well.”
+
+The talk was general for a short time, then the old nun got up and walked
+to the window.
+
+“I wanted to ask you if I might write to you, Maheleth,” said the young
+man, much relieved by the prospect of a comparative _tête‐à‐tête_.
+
+“If you wish to do so, by all means.”
+
+“And you don’t wish it?” he said, in disappointment.
+
+“I meant it might be painful to you after all. What I wish is of no
+moment.”
+
+“Maheleth, how can you say so, when you know I shall always feel for you
+the same love I do now?”
+
+“Well, my friend, let that pass. Write to me, then; you know your letters
+will be welcome.”
+
+“I will always let you know about your father.”
+
+“You will not always stay in Frankfort?”
+
+“Not quite, but I shall be here again this time next year.”
+
+She smiled and said:
+
+“I might not be here myself.”
+
+“Then I shall see you wherever you are, and I shall ask you the same
+question you have answered once.”
+
+“Ah! Henry, do not trust to accidents! It may never be; forget me, as I
+already told you.”
+
+“We’ll not argue about it; we will wait and see. Look, I have brought you
+something,” he added, taking a tiny velvet case from his breast‐pocket.
+“It is not an engagement‐ring, do not be afraid,” he said, as she seemed
+troubled; “it is only a souvenir, and I want you to promise me to wear it
+for one year, till I see you again. After that, you shall do as you like
+about keeping it. You know what a rosary‐ring is?” he asked, as he showed
+her the broad yellow band notched by tiny bubbles of gold. “And here is
+the cross laid upon it, and the cross is of pearls, the emblem of
+innocence. You read what is inside now.”
+
+She took it and read the device on the interior rim: “Crux per amore; Amor
+per cruce.”
+
+“The cross through love; Love through the cross,” he explained.
+
+She replied by kissing the ring and handing it to him, as she said:
+
+“Put it on my finger, Henry, and only you or God himself shall ever draw
+it off.”
+
+“You do not mean—”
+
+“Hush! how can you question him? But I fear he will not call me in that
+way. Who knows, perhaps we shall meet next year? I leave my father to God
+and you.”
+
+The old nun came back from the window.
+
+“My child, I am afraid I cannot stay any longer,” she said.
+
+The girl rose, and took Henry’s hand in both her own.
+
+“God bless and reward you, my dear, dear friend. You know all I would say
+and yet cannot.”
+
+He kissed her hand, and, with an ineffable look of holy calm, the Jewish
+convert left the room, still glancing back at him.
+
+Two months passed, and Löwenberg grew better. One morning, a large letter
+was brought to him, with the Madrid post‐mark. He opened it hastily, and
+scanned its contents. The letter fell from his hands as he read, and a
+dizziness came over him; he lay back on his couch, deadly pale.
+
+“Is it anything bad about Maheleth?” timidly asked little Thamar.
+
+“No,” he said, momentarily roused to anger. He took up the letter again
+and muttered, “A million dollars!” The children thought he was worse, and
+looked on with scared faces.
+
+The letter was from a banker at Madrid, saying that he was authorized by a
+person deeply in Señor Cristalar’s debt, but who wished to remain
+nameless, to apprise him of a certain sum, a million dollars, lying in
+ready money at his command in Hauptmann’s bank at Frankfort. The person
+had long been wishing to make this restitution, but had not till now been
+able to ascertain his hiding‐place. The invalid was in a fever; he could
+not help thinking of the young Christian he had spurned, yet he tried to
+persuade himself it was not he, but the man to whose knavery he had owed
+his total ruin.
+
+Several days passed, and at last he wrote to Holcombe at the hotel he had
+been staying at. In ambiguous terms, he spoke of a generous service
+undeserved by him, and of his desire to see him, if only once. But the
+Englishman was gone and had left no address. He then wrote to his Madrid
+correspondent, urging him to try and discover the person from whom the
+money had been sent; but the banker wrote word that the whole transaction
+had been kept very secret, and that, before it had become known to him, it
+had passed through so many hands that it was impossible to find out the
+first person concerned. There was a hint of some American bank connected
+with it, and the money had been originally paid down in American gold; but
+beyond this there was no clue. Cristalar thought the Spanish banker had
+been probably bribed to keep silence, and a few more weeks sped by without
+his taking any active measures about his newly‐found wealth. He received
+and acknowledged a letter of advice from Hauptmann’s bank, telling him of
+the sum at his disposal, and Hauptmann himself came to call upon him and
+offer him his congratulations. The Spaniard, who still called himself by
+his German name, received the visit of his former employer as a mere
+conventional act of courtesy, and seemed in no wise elated by the sudden
+good‐fortune he was being congratulated upon. He did not change his
+lodgings, but he hired a servant, and sent his daughters to the best
+Jewish school in the town. As soon as he got well, which was by rapid
+degrees, after he had received the letter that once more made him a
+millionaire, he left his children in charge of Rachel, and proceeded to
+London, where he advertised daily for information of Henry Holcombe. The
+weekly supplies in small sums had never discontinued, but he felt assured
+that, notwithstanding all these blinds, he could not be mistaken as to the
+name of his benefactor.
+
+Meanwhile, Maheleth in her Bohemian home heard from Rachel of her father’s
+fortune, his restoration to health, and his journey to England. She, too,
+wrote to Henry, and asked him to tell her if it were he that had thus
+returned good for evil. He simply said in reply that he was free to do as
+he liked with his money, and that he thought Señor Cristalar knew better
+how to use it than he did.
+
+Summer came again, and with it Henry Holcombe; the old _Juden‐Strasse_ was
+once more before him, and then he learnt that Herr Löwenberg had gone
+three months ago to Madrid. He had been travelling in Italy and Greece,
+and had never gone home to his old English country‐house, which now was
+let to good and steady tenants. He went to the convent; _she_ was not
+there, but they expected her. So there was nothing for it but to go and
+chat with Rachel and old Zimmermann about old times and old friends.
+
+A week later he called again at the convent, and the portress told him to
+wait. In the same little parlor, unchanged and clean, he waited for a
+quarter of an hour, hoping and dreading to see Maheleth. She came in this
+time alone. He took her hand in his, and looked a hungry look into her
+eyes. She said to him, smiling:
+
+“Do you see I have kept my promise? I have the dear ring on my finger, and
+every day I have said the rosary with it for you. And now, you know, I
+_must_ thank you.”
+
+“I cannot bear it; don’t, for my sake, Maheleth! Have you heard from your
+father?”
+
+“No; he never _will_ write, I knew that; but I have heard _of_ him; he is
+in Spain. He will begin again as a banker, I feel sure, and never rest
+till he has repaid you.”
+
+“I don’t want to be repaid, except _with interest_, and you know it is not
+from _him_ I can ask that. Do you remember that I was to ask you the same
+question I asked once already?”
+
+“Yes, Henry, but think what you are doing.”
+
+“I shall ask it first, and then think.”
+
+“Well, Henry, if I should say that, I will answer it as you wish, provided
+you can gain my father’s consent?”
+
+The young man looked blank.
+
+“I believe that is what God would wish me to do, Henry. My father has no
+further need of me, and he or I owe you a debt of gratitude we can never
+pay; yet I should like his distinct permission, if I could have it, and
+you can obtain it more easily than I can.”
+
+“I shall not rest till it be done,” said Holcombe excitedly. “Shall I
+write to him? Maheleth, you have had ‘Crux per amore’; now God will give
+us ‘Amor per cruce.’ ”
+
+He wrote that very day to Madrid, asking the hand of his daughter from the
+wealthy Jewish banker, and pleading as hard as though he were some poor
+outcast, with never a roof to his head, begging for the favor of a royal
+maiden’s love. Cristalar was overjoyed at knowing at last where to find
+the man he owed health and fortune to, and, instead of a letter, he sent a
+telegram to say he would be in Frankfort in a week.
+
+Henry took the telegram to the convent; Maheleth turned very pale as she
+read it.
+
+“It is all right, surely, darling, is it not?” asked Holcombe.
+
+“I have never seen him since the eve of my baptism.”
+
+“And,” interrupted the young man, “please God, you will see him again the
+eve of our marriage.”
+
+She hid her face in her hands. “God grant it!” she murmured, under her
+breath.
+
+Ephraim Cristalar, for he called himself by his own name now, went to the
+hotel where Holcombe used to live, and inquired for the young Englishman.
+He had not long to wait.
+
+“Mr. Holcombe!” he exclaimed, as he caught him in his arms, “I cannot
+speak to you—you are master of all I am and have; can you but forgive me,
+say?”
+
+“My friend and father!” replied Holcombe, “you must not give way like
+this! I only asked you a simple question, a great favor, it is true, but
+that is all we have to speak of.”
+
+“Oh! I know better than that, Henry. What have you to _ask_ of me, when
+all I have is yours?”
+
+“There is one thing I want, you know what; and my only other request is
+that you will see your daughter.”
+
+Cristalar drew back. “She is yours, Henry Holcombe,” he said solemnly, “as
+far as she is mine to give; but she is an alien to my faith, and to my
+home.”
+
+“No, no, it must not, shall not be. Remember how she fed you, worked for
+you, brought up your little ones, and sent you the little she earned, even
+though you had cast her off.”
+
+“It is cruel, Holcombe, to remind me of that,” said Cristalar
+reproachfully. “Perhaps as your _wife_ I may see her—as the wife of my
+benefactor, not as my daughter.”
+
+“I want to take her from _your_ hands. And think how she has wearied for
+you all this time!”
+
+“I know—and do you think I have not missed _her_? I have only _half_ lived
+since she left me; and I love her beyond description even yet, but that is
+an unhallowed love.”
+
+“Say, rather, an unnatural delusion; I mean your refusal to see her. You
+will, for my sake, for your son‐in‐law’s sake?”
+
+“Leave me now, Henry, I must think.”
+
+Need we tell the end? How his better nature triumphed; how prosperity had
+softened his heart, and gratitude had bent his pride; how at last his
+father’s love could stand no longer the knowledge of his child’s great
+sorrow; and how Henry’s prophecy that Maheleth should see her father on
+the eve of her marriage was anticipated by many weeks? Her sisters and
+Señor Cristalar accompanied her to the cathedral, and, after the ceremony,
+the banker put into the hands of the officiating priest a check for
+$10,000 for the Catholic poor of Frankfort.
+
+Holcombe House was made ready soon after for the bride’s reception, and
+Señor Cristalar established a branch bank in London, of which his son‐in‐
+law was partner and responsible head. In a very few years, the Holcombe
+income was the same it had been before the appalling drain the agents had
+spoken of, when the young possessor had drawn the £100,000 of ready money
+left him by his father, and added to it an equal sum raised on the estate.
+
+The old Spaniard could never be induced to abandon the faith that was as
+much a part of his family pride as of the tradition of his race; but
+Thamar and Agar, Maheleth’s two sisters, were baptized two years after the
+marriage, under the names of Elizabeth and Magdalen, and, when they in
+their turn married into noble English houses, their father certainly
+showed no sign of disapproval of their change of religion, in the princely
+fortunes he allotted to each.
+
+
+
+
+Europe’s Angels.
+
+
+It was night, and the old year was passing away. The angels had sung their
+anniversary strains of gladness, and had announced anew the coming of the
+Prince of Peace, only a week ago, yet there was a solemn silence now in
+their serried ranks, as they pressed around a group of their
+representatives.
+
+I can hardly tell you _where_ this was, or whether it was “in the body or
+out of the body” that I fancied I saw the glorious vision; I only know
+that it seemed as if infinite space were around them, and an amphitheatre
+of angelic faces, like living stones, were making a barrier between them
+and space, as the rainbow does between clouds.
+
+There were many of those whom I have called representatives, and each bore
+some strange emblem, which I understood to be the badge of the nation over
+which he was set. Around each stood a host similarly distinguished, the
+guardian angels of each individual soul composing the nation. There was an
+awful stillness on this the last night of the year, as the conclave of
+angels sat brooding over the events of the immediate past. A few, more
+prominent among their brethren, presently stood forward, while a figure of
+marvellous beauty, but calm austerity of aspect, presented a book to them,
+which it supported as a deacon against its head. The book was closely
+written on one side, while the opposite page was blank.
+
+An angel, crowned with an iron crown, and robed in a wonderful garment of
+deep azure,(198) curiously wrought in gold with stars and signs of lore
+and art, such as only one land in Europe can boast of being able to
+interpret, taking a pen in his hand, spoke to the assembled multitude.
+
+“Brethren,” he said, in a deep, musical voice whose tones indicated both
+gravity and conscious strength, “before I write my brief record of the
+year we have now added to our experience, let me speak to you, as fellow‐
+watchers over our God’s earthly treasures. My trust has been a bitter and
+a heavy one, yet withal a glorious vindication of faith and truth. We have
+risen among nations like a comet that for a moment eclipses the steadier
+and more lasting glory of the older planets, but in our course there were
+obstacles which have now become almost the monument of martyrs. Unmindful
+of the lion‐hearted men to whom Wilfrid, and Boniface, and Lioba preached,
+and of whom the strongest bulwark of intellectual faith was built by their
+later and more national saints, our new rulers have sought to renew the
+persecutions of the XVIth century, and the absolutism of a State Church.
+But our God, the ‘dear God’(199) of our people, knew how to raise up
+defenders for himself in the fearless pastors of his flock; knew how to
+inspire them with a bravery that scorned imprisonment and laughed at
+death, that made them raise their voices against presumptuous and
+intrusive authority on the one hand, and barefaced heresy on the other. We
+have triumphed in persecution; we have re‐echoed the _non possumus_ of our
+earthly father and Pontiff; we have shown to our God the will of martyrs
+after having displayed before our sovereign the deeds of patriots. He
+thought to weld a mighty nation into one empire; he has riven it in twain
+in his unblest attempt, and has called up against his puny military power
+the anger of that God who, on the shores of the Red Sea, did punish
+Pharaoh and his host. ‘Who is like to thee, among the strong, O Lord? Who
+is like to thee, glorious in holiness, terrible and worthy of praise,
+doing wonders?’ ”(200)
+
+Those that wore robes like that of the mighty angel who had spoken took up
+his last triumphant words, and chanted them forth in two alternate choirs,
+and the voice that came from this host of choristers seemed like the voice
+of the sea thundering amid caves and rocks. It surged up and died away in
+long reverberating echoes, a hymn of strength and defiance, a prophecy of
+a magnificent and almost endless future.
+
+Then the angel who had spoken wrote a few words in the book, and, turning,
+presented the pen to one who stood close beside him, tall, stately, and
+calm, in white raiment, with the historical _fleur‐de‐lis_ broidered
+thickly over his robe. On his brows shone the same emblem, wrought in gold
+and pearls, while in his left hand he held a flame‐colored standard, the
+oriflamme of the Crusades.
+
+“My brethren,” he began, “this year has been a silent one compared with
+its last two predecessors; but none the less a year of sacrifice, of
+heroic expiation, of patient humility of spirit. We have lived amid perils
+as deep as religious persecutions; amid the perils of a civilization that
+is unchristian, and of refinements worse than heathen. The worship of the
+false gods has come back, and we are surrounded with a corruption as
+terrible as that of imperial Rome or effeminate Byzantium. Our name is no
+longer supreme, our escutcheon no longer unstained, our sword is broken in
+the hands of others, our missions are unprotected, and our influence no
+longer paramount among barbarians and plunderers, and still our corruption
+flourishes as unblushingly and undauntedly as ever, and our rivals, nay,
+our very captors, come to learn it at our feet. This is now our shameful
+supremacy; but, in the midst of these Capuan revels, is there still a hope
+for the nation? Yes, my brethren, the same hope that our glorious iron‐
+crowned compeer has told us was his hope—the church, the faith, the truth.
+If our rulers, like those of our whilom foes, forget the Christian heroes
+whom we call our forefathers, the men who at the field of Tolbiac vowed
+our nation to the God of armies, and in a thousand fields in Palestine,
+Syria, and Egypt redeemed that holy vow, _we_ do not and cannot forget it.
+Sons and daughters of the Crusaders, heirs and heiresses of the Kings of
+Jerusalem and the Knights of Rhodes and Malta, many of our nation are now
+in the holier army, the holier knighthood of religion; their habit is
+their coat of mail, their swift prayers and their swifter sacrifices are
+their battle‐axes, their spears, their maces; in every land they are
+fighting the battle of their own, in every breach defending the honor of
+their fallen country. All eyes are still upon their acts; their land, like
+a magnet, compels the glance of Europe and the world. The saviours who are
+working hiddenly at the regeneration of ‘the eldest daughter of the
+church’ are of no party, own no secret master, work for no wages, and seek
+no reward; they are soldiers of the cross, children of God, who, in the
+hospitals, the prisons, the galleys, the schools, the Chinese stations,
+the Canadian missions, the cloistered monasteries, under the names of
+Sisters of Charity, Order of Preachers, _Missions Etrangères_, Christian
+Brothers, Benedictines of Solesmes, Jesuits, and _Sulpiciens_, work for
+God, in God, with God. ‘Seek ye therefore first the kingdom of God, and
+his justice, and all these things shall be added unto you.’ ”(201)
+
+The choir of white‐robed angels that clustered round the one who had
+ceased speaking took up the grave refrain, and chanted it as their
+brethren had done before, and the song swelled majestically as it seemed
+to reach the uttermost bounds of the living barrier of angel faces round
+the central groups. Ere yet it had subsided, the last of the heavenly
+speakers wrote his record in the book, and gave the pen into the hand of a
+third angel who stood in grave expectancy by his side.
+
+This one was tall and stalwart‐looking, a warrior‐angel, one would
+involuntarily be sure to think, yet his long trailing robe of crimson was
+woven not with dragons or golden leopards, but with miniature cathedrals,
+abbeys, and priories. The heaviness of this golden embroidery seemed to
+drag the garment into yet more statuesque folds, as the mighty wearer drew
+himself slowly up and took the pen, letting go, as he did so, his hold
+upon a silver shield bearing a blood‐red cross. His fair waving locks were
+uncrowned, and he bent his head towards the two who had spoken before.
+
+“My brethren,” he began, and his voice sounded clear and clarionlike, “you
+have each of you sought in the continuation of the traditions of the past
+a pledge of the regeneration and safety of the future. I, too, looked to
+the early past for the golden age I would fain see revived among us, but,
+unlike you, it is neither persecution nor bloodshed that I have to record.
+Our nation is not eclipsed in power or in influence; and although our
+rulers are hardly worthy of their chivalric forerunners, yet there are yet
+among them some who are heirs to their fathers’ greatness of soul, though
+not to the integrity of their faith. Still, our race has kept more
+unblemished than others that reverence for authority without which no
+faith is sure, no empire stable. Our life flows more calmly on in our
+island‐home than does the troubled stream of our brethren’s days beyond
+the sea. Still, amid benefits without number, amid the march of science
+and the progress of art, things that in exchange for the ancient gift of
+faith our second fatherland every day gives us in return, we have one
+fruitful source of dread and danger—the sordid love of gain which makes
+our people restless during life, and leaves them hopeless in death. To
+strive against this demon of the air—for we seem to breathe his spirit in
+the very atmosphere—is the constant endeavor of my being. To knit art to
+God as it was joined to him in the olden days, to put honor before wealth,
+and conscience before success, to raise principle triumphant over
+interest, is my daily, necessary, but most wearisome task. Many voices
+erstwhile charmed our nation—that of the warrior, the bard, the monk; the
+voice of glory, the voice of learning, the voice of holy love. Now one cry
+alone harshly calls our children together—the cry of gain. Our country has
+forgotten its ancient fanes of learning, its island monasteries, its
+townlike abbeys, its glorious cathedrals, colleges, libraries, and halls,
+it has forgotten its tournaments of science, its chants, its liturgies,
+even its earthly pageants, and has run after the abject golden calf of
+these latter days. Not the poor alone, but the noble and great have with
+less excuse come down into the new arena, and lowered themselves to the
+level of money‐seekers, till the chivalry of our race has become a
+forgotten dream, a talisman that has lost its charm, a thing as out of
+date as a crowded abbey with its holy pomps of daily service would be
+among the darkened, busy streets of a modern gold‐coining city. And yet in
+many a nook, in many an obscure street of a little town, in many a shady,
+peaceful country home, are rising the fair progeny of our statelier fanes
+of old, and beneath groined roofs and before carved altars rise prayers as
+beautiful and as divers as the trefoils and roses on capital and pillar.
+In prayer, whether petrified into fair churches standing for ever, or
+moulded into golden altar‐plate rich with chasing and with gems, or flying
+straight to God’s feet in ardent, winged words of love, we place our last
+hope, the hope of the only true conversion our land can ever know; for
+‘there is a success in evil things to a man without discipline, and there
+is a finding that turneth to loss.’ ”(202)
+
+Here a countless host of angels, as gravely radiant, yet with the same
+solemn shade of sadness in their aspect, as the last speaker, took up his
+parting words, and chanted them slowly. I thought they caught
+unconsciously the ring of the holy words chanted so often through the ages
+of faith, in that land of cathedrals and cloisters. Indeed, the angel
+choir and their stately leader seemed none other than monastic champions
+turned into bright heavenly spirits, so akin is everything in that isle to
+the claustral ideal from which sprang its life—civil, collegiate,
+ecclesiastical, feudal, and social.
+
+As the chanted dirge grew less and less distinct, another angel advanced
+to take the pen his predecessor had just laid in the folds of the book,
+after having written his year’s record within. This one had stood so far
+in the background as to have escaped my awed notice until now. He wore a
+long, loosely‐falling robe of black, and bowed his head as if in grief;
+his hands were clasped, and a golden and a silver key were held between
+his fingers; in his step there was no elasticity, and in his eye no
+gladness. All those who followed him seemed equally sorrowful, but soon I
+heard why it was, and no longer marvelled at it.
+
+“Brethren,” he said, in mournful tones, “brethren of all climes, who once
+envied me my proud position of warden over the land which holds the father
+of all Christians, envy me no longer the sad honors I must yet bear. When
+I look at my nation, I can see nothing through my tears. Once I saw
+treasures of art and beauty; I can take pride in them no longer. I saw
+fair landscapes, the envy of the world, the garden of Europe, the
+beautiful God’s‐acre of a past of heroic deeds, buried in honorable
+oblivion as the seedlings of a more glorious crop of Christian heroism—I
+can take pleasure in these no more. I saw a people mild, inoffensive,
+believing, loving; now I see them corrupted, deluded, led away, and turned
+into furies. I saw churches gorgeous with the many gifts of fervent piety
+and grateful wealth; I see ruins now, sacrilegiously used for godless
+purposes, in derision and contempt of their lofty dedication. I saw one
+city, the jewel of the universe, the city of sanctuary and refuge, where
+faith reigned, and grief was comforted, and weakness was made strength; a
+‘city of the soul,’ where God held court mid thousands of earthly angels,
+and where he found again the mingled worship of the mysterious Hebrew
+temple and of the holy, silent house of Nazareth. But now, brethren, rude
+men have scattered our treasures, profaned our churches, seized our
+cloisters, driven away learning and charity to put lewdness and brutality
+in their place, and have renewed, with far more blasphemous intention, the
+horrors of the barbaric invasions. I see the father of the faithful with
+the crown of martyrdom surmounting his tiara, waiting, like the _Ecce
+Homo_ eighteen hundred years ago, the final verdict of an infuriate mob,
+while other nations, Pilate‐like, wash their hands of the sacred, helpless
+charge it were their first duty to defend. My brethren, weep with me, weep
+for me, and yet rejoice; ‘for the Lord will not cast off for ever.’(203)
+‘And in that day the deaf shall hear the words of the book, and out of
+darkness and obscurity the eyes of the blind shall see.’ ”(204)
+
+Many were the eager voices that took up the words of hope and sang them
+with a fervor which only guardian spirits can know. As the strain swelled
+and spread, then fell into a gentle murmur, as if the singers were loth to
+leave off the prayer of faith and hope, the angel had written his short
+record for the passing year, and looked around to welcome his next
+successor. There was a pause, and among the angelic conclave a swaying to
+and fro denoted that some suppressed feeling was at work. Those who had
+spoken stood apart in a conspicuous group, conferring among themselves;
+but I looked with awe and interest at those who had hitherto been silent.
+
+The old year’s span was very short now. On earth the snow was falling,
+preparing a fitting shroud for the departing guest, and a fitting cradle
+for the coming stranger; there were revellers in many houses, heedless
+sleepers in more, and watchers in only a few; there were monastic choirs
+filing into silent churches for the coming office of matins; and there
+were also miserable outcasts, some voluntary slaves of the world, others
+unwilling watchers, poverty‐stricken, hunger‐smitten, desperately tempted
+creatures who might murmur at and even curse their fate, yet would not
+begin the year by breaking God’s commandments; there were many sinners
+doing penance, many happy death‐beds, many freed souls rushing on the
+wings of long‐repressed desire towards the goal that weary years of
+purgatory had hardly hidden from their longing gaze; and well might the
+angelic host thrill with holy delight as all these sights and sounds
+struck upon their consciousness. The good surely outweighed the bad!
+
+Just then an angel stepped from among the hitherto silent throng—an angel
+with a face full of suffering, sweetness, and patience, yet withal a look
+of something deeper and stronger than mere patience; and his black robe
+was sown with silver stars, while a star glittered also on his forehead.
+In quick accents, full of strength, he addressed his companions, holding
+the pen in his hand.
+
+“Brethren!” he said, “the march of events, as the world calls it, has
+passed over and by our nation, but in God’s eyes we are not so soon
+forgotten. The civilizer of Eastern Europe, the bulwark of Christianity
+against the Moslem faith, we have nevertheless suffered by the hands of
+Christian princess and been annihilated in the name of civilization. A
+martyr‐nation, a victim to false diplomacy, we stand in Europe with the
+chains still about our feet, while empires change hands and dynasties come
+and go; exiled and dispersed like the Hebrews of old, we are known, like
+them, by our indomitable faith and ever hopeful patriotism. Within this
+year, a gigantic empire has manacled us more cruelly, gagged us more
+closely, than before, but we are steadfast yet, for ‘blessed are they that
+suffer persecution for justice’ sake, for theirs is the kingdom of
+heaven.’ ”(205)
+
+The words were caught up and re‐echoed by the angel throng around their
+star‐crowned leader, while he wrote the brief record of another year’s
+bitter wrongs still so heroically and silently borne. He passed the pen to
+another clothed in purple, who looked at him with angelic sympathy before
+he spoke. His voice was still and low, but clear as a silver bell.
+
+“My brethren,” he said, “my task is hard and dreary; a mist of prejudice
+hangs over those vast steppes which form my dominions; a false
+civilization educates our nobles to a pitch of unnatural and seeming
+polish in which all truth is killed, and all natural kindness crushed;
+like the apples of the Dead Sea, our country is fair to the eye of the
+world, but ashes to the taste of God. We have all to hope, it is true, but
+much to fear; and, while the desolate semblance of the true faith spreads
+its outward and deceptive gorgeousness before the barren and fettered
+nation, the souls of our brethren perish of thirst, as it were, within
+sight of the Fountain of Life. Brethren, pray for my unhappy charge, and
+thou, O God! enlighten my people! ‘How incomprehensible are thy judgments,
+and how unsearchable thy ways!’ ”(206)
+
+The purple‐robed choir around him took up the angel’s last words, and
+slowly chanted them, as if in awe and expectation, while their leader
+wrote a few brief words in the book.
+
+Another came forward, gathering his golden robe together, the hem of which
+was broidered with figures of ships and charts, somewhat faded now, but
+this was redeemed by the effulgent brightness of the scroll he held on his
+outstretched hand a scroll bearing the divine motto, _Ad majorem Dei
+gloriam_. Looking swiftly around, he began thus:
+
+“My brethren, my provinces are narrowed and my nation lessened since her
+ships explored the ocean, her fleet sent forth armadas, and her leaders
+conquered new continents, but the spirit of the missionary and the martyr
+has not followed that of the less successful and less lasting
+investigator. Chivalry still lives in the land of the Cid, and fires the
+hearts in whose veins flows the blood of the Crusaders of Granada. Saints
+took up the warrior’s shield, and won their spurs in distant, dangerous
+services, till the names of Xavier, Loyola, Gaudia, and Teresa became the
+household words of a whole universe. Unbelief has poisoned our present
+position, and for our sins we have suffered dire misfortune and perennial
+disturbance. Still, our people are unchanged; faithfully the sons of the
+Visigoth martyrs keep the trust of their fathers, and, secure amid their
+mountain fastnesses, within the last year have raised the standard of the
+cross wreathed with the golden lilies of a national and well‐beloved
+dynasty. We have had triumphs of the soul and heroic deeds of patriotic
+daring mingled together in the annals of our peasant soldiers; the spirit
+of another Vendée has spoken to our nation; and God has rejoiced to find
+at last a human bulwark against human unbelief. ‘Judge me, O God, and
+distinguish my cause from the nation that is not holy; deliver me from the
+unjust and deceitful man.’ ”(207)
+
+And while the angel wrote his record in the book, his followers echoed his
+last words in tones of mingled triumph and supplication, chanting them, as
+all the others had done before them, in two alternate choirs. And now
+there was again a pause, while the first groups of angels who had spoken
+drew closer to the book, and gazed at the last records written in it. One
+more representative came forward, an angel robed in softest green, and
+bearing a harp in his hand. Turning to the west, he spoke in a voice full
+of deep emotion: “My brethren, I look towards the sea, and gaze at the
+land of the setting sun. I see my people spreading over the earth, so that
+I have more children in far‐away lands than on my own soil. I see them,
+the pioneer nation of whom Brendan was the first leader, planting the
+cross and the shamrock in unfailing union, wherever they go. Long ages of
+suffering have not reft them of the gift of faith, the treasure of art, or
+the strength of enterprise; their arm hath upreared every throne and
+stayed every altar; their women make a Nazareth of every home and a
+tabernacle of every hovel; their race links two worlds, that of the past
+and that of the future, that of culture and civilization, to that of
+enterprise and freedom. I look with pride on the ocean darkened by the
+barks of my people, and forget, as I look, to sigh over the ruined fanes
+and dismantled castles of old. Children of impulse, they carry their home
+in their hearts, and make another Erin round every cross they plant. Sea
+kings, but Christians, they take from the Norsemen their daring, and from
+their own isle its poetry, and, blending the two, bear the highest gifts
+of the Old World to be the heirlooms of the New. To my nation may it well
+and fittingly be said, ‘They went out from thee on foot, and were led by
+the enemies: but the Lord will bring them to thee exalted with honor as
+children of the kingdom.’ ”(208)
+
+These prophetic words were caught up by the numerous followers of the
+green‐robed angel, and rang now in grand and now in softened cadence
+through the boundless field of space that encircled the heavenly throng.
+As the tones died away, the angel wrote his record in the book, and the
+bells of earth sounded faintly in the still air.
+
+The old year was passing away, and the angels in silence gathered round
+the book. As the last stroke of midnight was heard, the bearer of it
+turned the leaf, presenting a surface fair and smooth as the petal of a
+lily, and the whole company of blessed spirits intoned the _Veni Creator_.
+
+I heard as it were in a dream, and saw forms of light and beauty disperse
+like the fleecy clouds of morning, till the singing died away in faraway
+corners of our old, prosaic, yet blessed earth. The songs of heaven were
+carried into the uttermost recesses where earthly misery was keenest and
+earthly revelry loudest on that fateful night; and, as its echoes passed
+over them, the misery grew strangely bearable, the revelry was
+unaccountably hushed. Everywhere the new‐born year came in with a blessing
+and a promise, reverently gathering its predecessor’s lessons even while
+mourning its inevitable shortcomings; and so once more, according to the
+patience of God, his ministers went forth to clear for every man a new
+field where, past errors being forgotten, he might renew his struggle in
+the battle of life, and retrieve himself in the eyes of infinite purity
+and infinite justice.
+
+Such was the beautiful death of the old year 1872.
+
+
+
+
+The Nativity Of Christe.
+
+
+    Behould the Father is His daughter’s Sonne,
+      The bird that built the nest is hatched therein,
+    The Old of Yeares an hower hath not outrunne,
+      Eternall life to live doth now beginnn,
+    The Word is dumm, the Mirth of heaven doth weepe,
+    Mighte feeble is, and Force doth fayntely creepe.
+
+    O dyinge soules! behould your living Spring!
+      O dazeled eyes! behould your Sunne of grace!
+    Dull eares, attend what word this Word doth bringe!
+      Upp, heavy hartes, with joye your joy embrace!
+    From death, from darke, from deaphnesse, from despayres,
+    This Life, this Light, this Worde, this Joy repaires.
+
+    Gift better than Himself God doth not knowe,
+      Gift better than his God no man can see;
+    This gift doth here the giver given bestowe,
+      Gift to this gift lett ech receiver bee:
+    God is my gift, Himself He freely gave me,
+      God’s gift am I, and none but God shall have me.
+
+    Man altred was by synne from man to best;
+      Beste’s food is haye, haye is all mortal fleshe;
+    Now God is fleshe, and lyes in maunger prest,
+      As haye the brutest synner to refreshe:
+    O happy fielde wherein this foder grewe,
+    Whose taste doth us from beastes to men renewe!
+
+    SOUTHWELL.
+
+
+
+
+The Progressionists.
+
+
+From The German Of Conrad Von Bolanden.
+
+
+
+Chapter VIII. Continued.
+
+
+Once more the bell of the chairman was heard amid the tumult.
+
+“Mr. Seicht, officer of the crown, will now address the meeting,” Schwefel
+announced.
+
+The audience were seized with amazement, and not without a cause. A
+dignitary of a higher order, a member of the administration, ascended the
+pulpit for the purpose of making an assault upon Christian education. He
+was about to make war upon morals and faith, the true supports of every
+solid government, the sources of the moral sentiment and of the prosperity
+of human society. A remnant of honesty and a lingering sense of justice
+may have raised a protest in Seicht’s mind against his undertaking; for
+his bearing was anything but self‐possessed, and he had the appearance of
+a wretch that was being goaded on by an evil spirit. Besides, he had the
+habit peculiar to bureaucrats of speaking in harsh, snarling tones. Seicht
+was conscious of these peculiarities of his bureaucratic nature, and
+labored to overcome them. The effort imparted to his delivery an air of
+constraint and a sickening sweetness which were climaxed by the fearfully
+involved style in which his speech was clothed.
+
+“Gentlemen,” said Seicht, “in view of present circumstances, and in
+consideration of the requirements of culture whose spirit is incompatible
+with antiquated conditions, popular education, which in connection with
+domestic training is the foundation of the future citizen, must also
+undergo such changes as will bring it into harmony with modern enlightened
+sentiment; and this is the more necessary as the provisions of the law,
+which progress in its enlightenment and clearness of perception cannot
+refuse to recognize as a fit model for the imitation of a party dangerous
+to the state—I mean the party of Jesuitism and ultramontanism—allow
+untrammelled scope for the reformation of the school system, provided the
+proper clauses of the law and the ordinances relating to this matter are
+not left out of consideration. Accordingly, it is my duty to refer this
+honorable meeting especially to the ministerial decree referring to common
+schools, in accordance with which said common schools may be established,
+after a vote of the citizens entitled to the elective franchise, as soon
+as the need of this is felt; which in the present instance cannot be
+contested, since public opinion has taken a decided stand against
+denominational schools, in which youth is trained after unbending forms of
+religion, and in doctrines that evidently conflict with the triumph of the
+present, and with those exact sciences which make up the only true
+gospel—the gospel of progress, which scarcely in any respect resembles the
+narrow gospel of dubious dogmas—dubious for the reason that they lack the
+spirit of advancement, and are prejudicial to the investigation of the
+problems of a God, of material nature, and of man.”
+
+Here leader Sand thrust his fingers in his ears.
+
+“Thunder and lightning!” exclaimed he wrathfully, “what a shallow babbler!
+What is he driving at? His periods are a yard long; and when he has done,
+a man is no wiser than when he began. Gospel—gospel of
+progress—fool—numskull—down! down!”
+
+“Quite a remarkable instance, this!” said Gerlach to the banker.
+“Evidently this man is trying might and main to please, yet he only
+succeeds in torturing his hearers.”
+
+“I will explain this man to you,” replied the banker. “Heretofore Mr.
+Seicht has been a most complete exemplar of absolute bureaucracy. The only
+divinity he knew were the statutes, the only heaven the bureau, and the
+only safe way of reaching supreme felicity was, in his opinion, to render
+unquestioning obedience to ministerial rescripts. Suddenly Mr. Seicht
+heard the card‐house of bureaucracy start in all its joints. His divinity
+lost its worshippers, and his heaven lost all charms for those who were
+seeking salvation. He felt the ground moving under him, he realized the
+colossal might of progress, and hastened to commend himself to this party
+by adopting liberal ideas. He is now aiming to secure a seat in the house
+of delegates, which is subsequently to serve him as a stepping‐stone to a
+place in the cabinet. Just listen how the man is agonizing! He is wasting
+his strength, however, and the attitude of the audience is beginning to
+get alarming.”
+
+For some time past, the chieftains in the chancel had been shaking their
+heads at the efforts of this official advocate of progress. To avoid being
+tortured by hearing, they had engaged in conversation. The auditors in the
+nave of the church were also growing restive. The speaker, however,
+continued blind to every hint and insinuation. At last a tall fellow in
+the crowd swung his hat and cried, “Three cheers for Mr. Seicht!” The
+whole nave joined in a deafening cheer. Seicht, imagining the cheering to
+be a tribute to the excellence of his effort, stopped for a moment to
+permit the uproar to subside, intending then to go on with his speech; but
+no sooner had he resumed than the cheering burst forth anew, and was so
+vigorously sustained that the man, at length perceiving the meaning of the
+audience, came down amid peals of derisive laughter.
+
+“Serves the gabbler right!” said Sand. “He’s a precious kind of a fellow!
+The booby thinks he can hoist himself into the chamber of deputies by
+means of the shoulders of progress, and thence to climb up higher. But it
+happens that we know whom we have to deal with, and we are not going to
+serve as stirrups for a turn‐coat official.”
+
+The chairman wound up with a speech in which he announced that the vote on
+the question of common schools would soon come off, and then adjourned the
+meeting.
+
+The millionaires drew back to allow the crowd to disperse. Near them stood
+Mr. Seicht, alone and dejected. The countenances of the chieftains had
+yielded him no evidence on which to base a hope that his speech had told,
+and that he might expect to occupy a seat in the assembly. Moreover, Sand
+had rudely insulted the ambitious official to his face. This he took
+exceedingly hard. All of a sudden, he spied the banker in the chancel, and
+went over to greet him. Greifmann introduced Gerlach.
+
+“I am proud,” Mr. Seicht asseverated, “of the acquaintance of the
+wealthiest proprietor of the country.”
+
+“Pardon the correction, sir; my father is the proprietor.”
+
+“No matter, you are his only son,” rejoined Seicht. “Your presence proves
+that you take an interest in the great questions of the day. This is very
+laudable.”
+
+“My presence, however, by no means proves that I concur in the object of
+this meeting. Curiosity has led me hither.”
+
+The official directed a look of inquiry at the banker.
+
+“Sheer curiosity,” repeated this gentleman coldly.
+
+“Can you not, then, become reconciled to the spirit of progress?” asked
+Seicht, with a smile revealing astonishment.
+
+“The value of my convictions consists in this, that I worship genuine
+progress,” replied the millionaire gravely. “The progress of this
+community, in particular, looks to me like retrogression.”
+
+“I am astonished at what you say,” returned the official; “for surely
+Shund’s masterly speech has demonstrated that we are keeping pace with the
+age.”
+
+“I cannot see, sir, how fiendish hatred of religion can be taken for
+progress. This horrible, bloodthirsty monster existed even in the days of
+Nero and Tiberius, as we all know. Can the resurrection of it, now that it
+has been mouldering for centuries, be seriously looked upon as a step in
+advance? Rather a step backward, I should think, of eighteen hundred
+years. Especially horrible and revolting is this latest instance of
+tyranny, forcing parents who entertain religious sentiments to send their
+children to irreligious schools. Not even Nero and Tiberius went so far.
+On this point, I agree, there has been progress, but it consists in
+putting a most unnatural constraint upon conscience.”
+
+Gerlach’s language aroused the official. He was face to face with an
+ultramontane. The mere sight of such an one caused a nervous twitching in
+his person. He resorted at once to bureaucratic weapons in making his
+onslaught.
+
+“You are mistaken, my dear sir—you are very much mistaken. The spirit of
+the modern state demands that the schools of the multitude, particularly
+public institutions, should be accessible to the children of every class
+of citizens, without distinction of religious profession. Consequently,
+the schools must be taken from under the authority, direction, and
+influence of the church, and put entirely under civil and political
+control. Such, too, is now the mind of our rulers, besides that public
+sentiment calls for the change.”
+
+“But, Mr. Seicht, in making such a change, the state despotically
+infringes on the province of religion.”
+
+“Not despotically, Mr. Gerlach, but legally; for the state is the
+fountain‐head of all right, and consequently possessed of unlimited
+right.”
+
+“You enunciate principles, sir, which differ vastly from what morality and
+religion teach.”
+
+“What signify morals—what signifies religion? Mere antiquated forms, sir,
+with no living significance,” explained Seicht, lavishly displaying the
+treasures of the storehouse of progressionist wisdom. “The past submitted
+quietly to the authority of religion, because there existed then a low
+degree of intellectual culture. At present there is only one authority—it
+is the preponderance of numbers and of material forces. Consequently, the
+only real authority is the majority in power. On the other hand,
+authorities based upon the supposed existence of a supersensible world
+have lost their cause of being, for the reason that exact science plainly
+demonstrates the nonexistence of an immaterial world. _Cessante causa,
+cessat effectus_, the supersensible world, the basis of religious
+authority, being gone, it logically results that religious authority
+itself is gone. Hence the only real authority existing in a state is the
+majority, and to this every citizen is obliged to submit. You marvel, Mr.
+Gerlach. What I have said is not my own personal view, but the expression
+of the principles which alone pass current at the present day.”
+
+“I agree in what you say,” said the banker. “You have spoken from the
+standpoint of the times. The controlling power is the majority.”
+
+“Shund, then, accurately summed up the creed of the present age when he
+said, ‘Progress conquers death, destroys hell, rejects heaven, and finds
+its god in the sweet enjoyment of life.’ It is to be hoped that all‐
+powerful progress will next decree that there are no death and no
+suffering upon earth, that all the hostile forces of nature have ceased,
+that want and misery are no more, and that earth is a paradise of sweet
+enjoyment for all.”
+
+Mr. Seicht was rather taken aback by this satire.
+
+“Besides, gentlemen,” proceeded Gerlach, “you will please observe that the
+doctrine of state supremacy is a step backward of nearly two thousand
+years. In Nero’s day, but one source of right, namely, the state, was
+recognized. In the head of the state, the emperor, were centred all power,
+all authority, and all right. In his person, the state was exalted into a
+divinity. Temples and altars were reared to the emperor; sacrifices were
+offered to him; he was worshipped as a deity. Even human sacrifices were
+not denied him if the imperial divinity thought proper to demand them.
+And, now, to what condition did these monstrous errors bring the world of
+that period? It became one vast theatre of crime, immorality, and
+despotism. Slavery coiled itself about men and things, and strangled their
+liberty. Matrimonial life sank into the most loathsome corruption.
+Infanticide was permitted to pass unpunished. The licentiousness of women
+was even greater than that of men. Life and property became mere
+playthings for the whims of the emperor and of his courtiers. Did the
+divine Caesar wish to amuse his deeply sunken subjects, he had only to
+order the gladiators to butcher one another, or some prisoners or slaves
+or Christians to be thrown to tigers and panthers; this made a Roman
+holiday. Such, gentlemen, was human society when it recognized no
+supersensible world, no God above, no moral law. If our own progress
+proceeds much further in the path on which it is marching, it will soon
+reach a similar fearful stage. We already see in our midst the
+commencement of social corruption. We have the only source of right
+proclaimed to be the divine state. Conscience is being tyrannized over by
+a majority that rejects God and denies future rewards and punishments. All
+the rest, even to the divine despot, has already followed, or inevitably
+will follow. Therefore, Mr. Seicht, the progress you so loudly boast of is
+mere stupid retrogression, blind superstition, which falls prostrate
+before the majority of a mob, and worships the omnipotence of the state.”
+
+“Don’t you think my friend has been uttering some very bitter truths?”
+asked the banker, with a smile.
+
+“Pretty nearly so,” replied the official demurely. “However, one can
+detect the design, and cannot help getting out of humor.”
+
+“What design?” asked Seraphin.
+
+“Of creating alarm against progress.”
+
+“Indeed, sir, you are mistaken. I, too, am enthusiastic about progress,
+but genuine progress. And because I am an advocate of real progress I
+cannot help detesting the monstrosity which the age would wish to palm off
+on men instead.”
+
+The church was now cleared. Greifmann’s carriage was at the door. The
+millionaires drove off.
+
+“Pity for this Gerlach!” thought the official, as he strode through the
+street. “He is lost to progress, for he is too solidly rooted in
+superstition to be reclaimed. War against nature’s claims; deny healthy
+physical nature its rights; re‐establish the reign of terror of the seven
+capital sins; permit the priesthood to tyrannize over conscience; restore
+the worship of an unmathematical triune God—no! no!” cried he fiercely,
+“sooner shall all go to the devil!”
+
+A carriage whirled past him. He cast a glance into the vehicle, and raised
+his hat to Mr. Hans Shund.
+
+The chief magistrate was on his way home from the town‐hall. He could not
+rest under the weight of his laurels; the inebriation of his triumph drove
+him into the room where sat his lonely and careworn wife.
+
+“My election to the assembly is assured, wife.” And he went on with a
+minute account of the proceedings of the day.
+
+The pale, emaciated lady sat bowed in silence over her work, and did not
+look up.
+
+“Well, wife, don’t you take any interest in the honors won by your
+husband? I should think you ought to feel pleased.”
+
+“All my joys are swallowed up in an abyss of unutterable wretchedness,”
+replied she. “And my husband is daily deepening the gulf. Yesterday you
+were again at a disreputable house. Your abominable deeds are heaped
+mountain high—and am I to rejoice?”
+
+“A thousand demons, wife, I’m beginning to believe you have spies on
+foot!”
+
+“I have not. But you are at the head of this city—your steps cannot
+possibly remain unobserved.”
+
+“Very well!” cried he, “it shall be my effort in the assembly to bring
+about such a change that there shall no longer be any houses of disrepute.
+Narrow‐minded moralists shall not be allowed to howl any longer. The time
+is at hand, old lady—so‐called disreputable houses are to become places of
+amusement authorized by law.”
+
+He spoke and disappeared.
+
+
+
+Chapter IX. Progress Grows Jolly.
+
+
+The agitators of progress were again hurrying through the streets and
+alleys of the town. They knocked at every door and entered every house to
+solicit votes in favor of common schools. Thanks to the overwhelming might
+of the party in power, they again carried their measure. Dependent,
+utterly enslaved, many yielded up their votes without opposition. It is
+true conscience tortured many a parent for voting against his convictions,
+for sacrificing his children to a system with which he could not
+sympathize; but not a man in a dependent position had the courage to
+vindicate for his child the religious training which was being so
+ruthlessly swept away. Even men in high office gave way before the
+encroaching despotism, for in the very uppermost ranks of society also
+progress domineered.
+
+One man only, fearless and firm, dared to put himself in the path of the
+dominant power—the Rev. F. Morgenroth. From the pulpit, he unmasked and
+scathed the unchristian design of debarring youth from religious
+instruction, and of rearing a generation ignorant of God and of his
+commandments. He warned parents against the evil, entreated them to stand
+up conscientiously for the spiritual welfare of their children, to reject
+the common schools, and to rescue the little ones for the maternal
+guardianship of the church.
+
+His sermon roused the entire progressionist camp. The local press fiercely
+assailed the intrepid clergyman. Lies, calumnies, and scurrility were
+vomited against him and his profession. Hans Shund seized the pen, and
+indited newspaper articles of such a character as one would naturally look
+for from a thief, usurer, and debauchee. Morgenroth paid no attention to
+their disgraceful clamor, but continued his opposition undismayed. By
+means of placards, he invited the Catholic citizens to assemble at his own
+residence, for the purpose of consulting about the best mode of thwarting
+the designs of the liberals. This unexpected fearlessness put the men of
+culture, humanity, and freedom beside themselves with rage. They at once
+decided upon making a public demonstration. The chieftains issued orders
+to their bands, and these at the hour appointed for the meeting mustered
+before the residence of the priest. A noisy multitude, uttering threats,
+took possession of the churchyard. If a citizen attempted to make his way
+through the mob to the house, he was loaded with vile epithets, at times
+even with kicks and blows. But a small number had gathered around the
+priest, and these showed much alarm; for outside the billows of progress
+were surging and every moment rising higher. Stones were thrown at the
+house, and the windows were broken. Parteiling, the commissary of police,
+came to remonstrate with the clergyman.
+
+“Dismiss the meeting,” said he. “The excitement is assuming alarming
+proportions.”
+
+“Commissary, we are under the protection of the law and of civil rule,”
+replied Morgenroth. “We are not slaves and helots of progress. Are we to
+be denied the liberty of discussing subjects of great importance in our
+own houses?”
+
+A boulder coming through the window crushed the inkstand on the table, and
+rolled on over the floor. The men pressed to one side in terror.
+
+“Your calling upon the law to protect you is utterly unreasonable under
+present circumstances,” said Parteiling. “Listen to the howling. Do you
+want your house demolished? Do you wish to be maltreated? Will you have
+open revolution? This all will surely follow if you persist in refusing to
+dismiss the meeting. I will not answer for results.”
+
+Stones began to rain more densely, and the howling grew louder and more
+menacing.
+
+“Gentlemen,” said Morgenroth to the men assembled, “since we are not
+permitted to proceed with our deliberations, we will separate, with a
+protest against this brutal terrorism.”
+
+“But, commissary,” said a much frightened man, “how are we to get away?
+These people are infuriated; they will tear us in pieces.”
+
+“Fear nothing, gentlemen; follow me,” spoke the commissary, leading the
+way.
+
+The ultramontanes were hailed with a loud burst of scornful laughter. The
+commissary, advancing to the gate, beckoned silence.
+
+“In the name of the law, clear the place!” cried he.
+
+The mob scoffed and yelled.
+
+“Fetch out the slaves of the priest—make them run the gauntlet—down with
+the Jesuits!”
+
+At this moment, a man was noticed elbowing his way through the crowd;
+presently Hans Shund stepped before the embarrassed guardian of public
+order.
+
+“Three cheers for the magistrate!” vociferated the mob.
+
+Shund made a signal. Profound silence followed.
+
+“Gentlemen,” spoke the chief magistrate, in a tone of entreaty, “have the
+goodness to disperse.”
+
+Repeated cheers were raised, then the accumulation of corrupt elements
+began to dissolve and flow off in every direction.
+
+“I deeply regret this commotion of which I but a moment ago received
+intelligence,” said Shund. “The excitement of the people is attributable
+solely to the imprudent conduct of Morgenroth.”
+
+“To be sure—to be sure!” assented Parteiling.
+
+The place was cleared. The Catholics hurried home pursued and hooted by
+straggling groups of rioters.
+
+The signs of the approaching celebration began to be noticeable on the
+town‐common. Booths were being erected, tables were being disposed in rows
+which reached further than the eye could see, wagon‐loads of chairs and
+benches were being brought from all parts of town, men were busy sinking
+holes for climbing‐poles and treacherous turnstiles; but the most
+attractive feature of all the festival was yet invisible—free beer and
+sausages furnished at public cost. The rumor alone, however, of such cheer
+gladdened the heart of every thirsty voter, and contributed greatly to the
+establishment of the system of common schools. Bands of music paraded the
+town, gathered up voters, and escorted them to the polls. As often as they
+passed before the residence of a progressionist chieftain, the bands
+struck up an air, and the crowd cheered lustily. They halted in front of
+the priest’s residence also. The band played, “To‐day we’ll taste the
+parson’s cheer,” the mob roaring the words, and then winding up with
+whistling and guffaws of laughter. This sort of disorderly work was kept
+up during three days. Then was announced in the papers in huge type: “An
+overwhelming majority of the enlightened citizens of this city have
+decided in favor of common schools. Herewith the existence of these
+schools is secured and legalized.”
+
+On the fourth day, the celebration came off. The same morning Gerlach
+senior arrived at the Palais Greifmann on his way home from the
+Exposition.
+
+“I am so glad!” cried Louise. “I was beginning to fear you would not come,
+and getting provoked at your indifference to the interests of our people.
+We have been having stirring times, but we have come off victorious. The
+narrow‐minded enemies of enlightenment are defeated. Modern views now
+prevail, and education is to be remodelled and put in harmony with the
+wants of our century.”
+
+“Times must have been stirring, for you seem almost frenzied, Louise,”
+said Conrad.
+
+“Had you witnessed the struggle and read the newspapers, you, too, would
+have grown enthusiastic,” declared the young lady.
+
+“Even quotations advanced,” said the banker. “It astonished me, and I can
+account for it only by assuming that the triumph of the common‐school
+system is of general significance and an imperative desideratum of the
+times.”
+
+“How can you have any doubt about it?” cried his sister. “Our town has
+pioneered the way: the rest of Germany will soon adopt the same system.”
+
+Seraphin greeted his father.
+
+“Well, my son, you very likely have heard nothing whatever of this hubbub
+about schools?”
+
+“Indeed, I have, father. Carl and I were in the midst of the commotion at
+the desecrated church of S. Peter. We saw and heard what it would have
+been difficult to imagine.” He then proceeded to give his father a minute
+account of the meeting. His powerful memory enabled him to repeat Shund’s
+speech almost verbatim. The father listened attentively, and occasionally
+directed a glance of observation at the young lady. When Shund’s coarse
+ridicule of Christian morals and dogmas was rehearsed, Mr. Conrad lowered
+his eyes, and a frown flitted over his brow. For the rest, his countenance
+was, as usual, cold and stern.
+
+“This Mr. Shund made quite a strong speech,” said he, in a nonchalant way.
+
+“He rather intensified the colors of truth, ’tis true,” remarked Louise.
+“The masses, however, like high coloring and vigorous language.”
+
+A servant brought the banker a note.
+
+“Good! Shund is elected to the assembly! The span of bays belongs to me,”
+exulted Carl Greifmann.
+
+“Your bays Seraphin?” inquired the father. “How is this?”
+
+Mr. Conrad had twice been informed of the wager; he had learned it first
+from Seraphin’s own lips, then also he had read of it in his diary; still
+he asked again, and his son detailed the story a third time.
+
+“I should sooner have expected to see the heavens fall than to lose that
+bet,” added Seraphin.
+
+“When a notorious thief and usurer is elected to the chief magistracy and
+to the legislative assembly, the victory gained is hardly a creditable one
+to the spirit of progress, my dear Carl. Don’t you think so, Louise?” said
+the landholder.
+
+“You mustn’t be too rigorous,” replied the lady, with composure. “Rumor
+whispers many a bit of scandal respecting Shund which does, indeed, offend
+one’s sense of propriety; for all that, however, Shund will play his part
+brilliantly both in the assembly and in the town council. The greatest of
+statesmen have had their foibles, as everybody knows.”
+
+“Very true,” said Gerlach dryly. “Viewed from the standpoint of very
+humane tolerance, Shund’s disgusting habits may be considered
+justifiable.”
+
+Seraphin left the parlor, and retired to his room. Here he wrestled with
+violent feelings. His father’s conduct was a mystery to him. Opinions
+which conflicted with his own most sacred convictions, and principles
+which brought an indignant flush to his cheek, were listened to and
+apparently acquiesced in by his father. Shund’s abominable diatribe had
+not roused the old gentleman’s anger; Louise’s avowed concurrence with the
+irreligious principles of the chieftain had not even provoked his
+disapprobation.
+
+“My God, my God! can it be possible?” cried he in an agony of despair.
+“Has the love of gain so utterly blinded my father? Can he have sunk so
+low as to be willing to immolate me, his only child, to a base
+speculation? Can he be willing for the sake of a million florins to bind
+me for life to this erring creature, this infidel Louise? Can a paltry
+million tempt him to be so reckless and cruel? No! no! a thousand times
+no!” exclaimed he. “I never will be the husband of this woman, never—I
+swear it by the great God of heaven! Get angry with me, father, banish me
+from your sight—it would be more tolerable than the consciousness of being
+the husband of a woman who believes not in the Redeemer of the world. I
+have sworn—the matter is for ever settled.” He threw himself into an arm‐
+chair, and moodily stared at the opposite wall. By degrees, his excitement
+subsided, and he became quiet.
+
+In fancy, he beheld beside Louise’s form another lovely one rise up—that
+of the girl with the golden hair, the bright eyes, and the winning smile.
+She had stood before him on this very floor, in her neat and simple
+country garb, radiant with innocence and purity, adorned with innate grace
+and uncommon beauty. And the lapse of days, far from weakening, had
+deepened the impression of her first apparition. The storm that had been
+raging in his interior was allayed by the recollection of Mechtild, as the
+fury of the great deep subsides upon the reappearance of the sun. Scarcely
+an hour had passed during which he had not thought of the girl, rehearsed
+every word she had uttered, and viewed the basket of grapes she had
+brought him. Again he pulled out the drawer, and looked upon the gift with
+a friendly smile; then, locking up the precious treasure, he returned to
+the parlor.
+
+He found the company on the balcony. The sound of trumpets and drums came
+from a distance, and presently a motley procession was seen coming up the
+nearest street.
+
+“You have just arrived in time to see the procession,” cried Louise to
+him. “It is going to defile past here, so we will be able to have a good
+look at it.”
+
+A dusky swarm of boys and half‐grown youths came winding round the nearest
+street‐corner, followed immediately by the head of a mock procession. In
+the lead marched a fellow dressed in a brown cloak, the hood of which was
+drawn over his head. His waist was encircled with a girdle from which
+dangled a string of pebbles representing a rosary. To complete the
+caricature of a Capuchin, his feet were bare, excepting a pair of soles
+which were strapped to them with thongs of leather. In his hands he bore a
+tall cross rudely contrived with a couple of sticks. The image of the
+cross was represented by a broken mineral‐water bottle. Behind the cross‐
+bearer followed the procession in a double line, consisting of boys, young
+men, factory‐hands, drunken mechanics, and such other begrimed and
+besotted beings as progress alone can count in its ranks. The members of
+the procession were chanting a litany; at the same time they folded their
+hands, made grimaces, turned their eyes upwards, or played unseemly pranks
+with genuine rosary beads.
+
+Next in the procession came a low car drawn by a watery‐eyed mare which a
+lad bedizened like a clown was leading by the bridle. In the car sat a fat
+fellow whose face was painted red, and eyebrows dyed, and who wore a long
+artificial beard. Over a prodigious paunch, also artificial, he had drawn
+a long white gown, over which again he wore a many‐colored rag shaped like
+a cope. On his head he wore a high paper cap, brimless; around the cap
+were three crowns of gilt paper to represent the tiara of the pope. A
+sorry‐looking donkey walked after the car, to which it was attached by a
+rope. It was the _rôle_ of the fellow in the car to address the donkey,
+make a sign of blessing over it, and occasionally reach it straw drawn
+from his artificial paunch. As often as he went through this manœuvre, the
+crowd set up a tremendous roar of laughter. The fat man in the car
+represented the pope, and the donkey was intended to symbolize the
+credulity of the faithful.
+
+This mock pope was not a suggestion of Shund’s or of any other inventive
+progressionist. The whole idea was copied from a caricature which had
+appeared in a widely circulating pictorial whose only aim and pleasure it
+has been for years to destroy the innate religious nobleness of the German
+people by means of shallow wit and vulgar caricatures. And this very
+sheet, leagued with a daily organ equally degraded, can boast of no
+inconsiderable success. The rude and vulgar applaud its witticisms, the
+low and infamous regale themselves with its pictures, and its demoralizing
+influence is infecting the land.
+
+The principal feature of the procession was a wagon, hung with garlands
+and bestuck with small flags, drawn by six splendid horses. In it sat a
+youthful woman, plump and bold. Her shoulders were bare, the dress being
+an exaggerated sample of the style _décolleté_; above her head was a
+wreath of oak leaves. She was attended by a number of young men in masks.
+They carried drinking‐horns, which they filled from time to time from a
+barrel, and presented to the _bacchante_, who sipped from them; then these
+gentlemen in waiting drank themselves, and poured what was left upon the
+crowd. A band of music, walking in front of this triumphal car, played
+airs and marches. Not even the mock pope was as great an object of
+admiration as this shameless woman. Old and young thronged about the
+wagon, feasting their lascivious eyes on this beastly spectacle which
+represented that most disgusting of all abominable achievements of
+progress—the emancipated woman. And perhaps not even progress could have
+dared, in less excited times, so grossly to insult the chaste spirit of
+the German people; but the social atmosphere had been made so foul by the
+abominations of the election, and the spirits of impurity had reigned so
+absolutely during the canvass in behalf of common schools, that this
+immoral show was suffered to parade without opposition.
+
+The very commencement of this sacrilegious mockery of religion had roused
+Seraphin’s indignation, and he had retired from the balcony. His father,
+however, had remained, coolly watching the procession as it passed, and
+carefully noting Louise’s remarks and behavior.
+
+“What does that woman represent?” he asked. “A goddess of liberty, I
+suppose?”
+
+“Only in one sense, I think,” replied the progressionist young lady. “The
+woman wearing the crown symbolizes, to my mind, the enjoyment of life. She
+typifies heaven upon earth, now that exact science has done away with the
+heaven of the next world.”
+
+“I should think yon creature rather reminds one of hell,” said Mr. Conrad.
+
+“Of hell!” exclaimed Louise, in alarm. “You are jesting, sir, are you
+not?”
+
+“Never more serious in my life, Louise. Notice the shameless effrontery,
+the baseness and infamy of the creature, and you will be forced to form
+conclusions which, far from justifying the expectation of peace and
+happiness in the family circle, the true sphere of woman, will suggest
+only wrangling, discord, and hell upon earth.”
+
+The young lady did not venture to reply. A gentleman made his way through
+the crowd, and waved his hat to the company on the balcony. The banker
+returned the salutation.
+
+“Official Seicht,” said he.
+
+“What! an officer of the government in this disreputable crowd!” exclaimed
+Gerlach, with surprise.
+
+“He is on hand to maintain order,” explained Greifmann. “You see some
+policemen, too. Mr. Seicht sympathizes with progress. At the last meeting,
+he made a speech in favor of common schools; he sounded the praises of the
+gospel of progress, gave a toast at the banquet to the gospel of progress,
+and has won for himself the title of evangelist of progress. He once
+declared, too, that the very sight of a priest rouses his blood, and they
+now pleasantly call him the parson‐eater. He is very popular.”
+
+“I am amazed!” said Gerlach. “Mr. Seicht dishonors his office. He
+advocates common schools, insults all the believing citizens of his
+district, and runs with mock processions—a happy state of things, indeed!”
+
+“His conduct is the result of careful calculation,” returned Greifmann.
+
+“By showing hostility to ultramontanism, he commends himself to progress,
+which is in power.”
+
+“But the government should not tolerate such disgraceful behavior on the
+part of one of its officials,” said Gerlach. “The entire official corps is
+disgraced so long as this shallow evangelist of progress is permitted to
+continue wearing the uniform.”
+
+“You should not be so exacting,” cried Louise. “Why will you not allow
+officials also to float along with the current of progress until they will
+have reached the Eldorado of the position to which they are aspiring?”
+
+“The corruption of the state must be fearful indeed, when such deportment
+in an officer is regarded as a recommendation,” rejoined Mr. Conrad
+curtly.
+
+A servant appeared to call them to table.
+
+“Would you not like to see the celebration?” inquired Louise.
+
+“By all means,” answered Gerlach. “The excitement is of so unusual a
+character that it claims attention. You will have to accompany us,
+Louise.”
+
+“I shall do so with pleasure. When sound popular sentiment thus proclaims
+itself, I cannot but feel a strong desire to be present.”
+
+The procession had turned the corner of a street where stood Holt and two
+more countrymen looking on. The religious sentiment of these honest men
+was deeply wounded by the profanation of the cross; and when, besides,
+they heard the singing of the mock litany, their anger kindled, their eyes
+gleamed, and they mingled fierce maledictions with the tumult of the mob.
+Next appeared the mock pope, dispensing blessings with his right hand,
+reaching straw to the donkey with his left, and distorting his painted
+face into all sorts of farcical grimaces.
+
+The peasants at once caught the significance of this burlesque. Their
+countenances glowed with indignation. Avenging spirits took possession of
+Mechtild’s father; his strong, stalwart frame seemed suddenly to have
+become herculean. His fist of iron doubled itself; there was lightning in
+his eyes; like an infuriated lion, he burst into the crowd, broke the line
+of the procession, and, directing a tremendous blow at the head of the
+mock pope, precipitated him from the car. The paper cap flew far away
+under the feet of the bystanders, and the false beard got into the
+donkey’s mouth. When the mock pope was down, Holt’s comrades immediately
+set upon him, and tore the many‐colored rag from his shoulders. Then
+commenced a great tumult. A host of furious progressionists surrounded the
+sturdy countrymen, brandishing their fists and filling the air with mad
+imprecations.
+
+“Kill the dogs! Down with the accursed ultramontanes!”
+
+Some of the policemen hurried up to prevent bloodshed. Mr. Seicht also
+hurried to the scene of action, and his shrill voice could be heard high
+above the noise and confusion.
+
+“Gentlemen, I implore you, let the law have its course, gentlemen!” cried
+he. “Gentlemen, friends, do not, I beg you, violate the law! Trust me,
+fellow‐citizens—I shall see that the impertinence of these ultramontanes
+is duly punished.”
+
+They understood his meaning. Sticks and fists were immediately lowered.
+
+“Brigadier Forchhaem,” cried Mr. Seicht, in a tone of command—“Forchhaem,
+hither! Put handcuffs on these ultramontanes, these disturbers of the
+peace—put irons on these revolutionists.”
+
+Handcuffs were forthwith produced by the policemen. The towering, broad‐
+shouldered Holt stood quiet as a lamb, looked with an air of astonishment
+at the confusion, and suffered himself to be handcuffed. His comrades,
+however, behaved like anything but lambs. They laid about them with hands
+and feet, knocking down the policemen, and giving bloody mouths and noses
+to all who came within their reach.
+
+“Handcuff us!” they screamed, grinding their teeth, bleeding and cursing.
+“Are we cutthroats?” The bystanders drew back in apprehension. The
+confusion seemed to be past remedying. A thousand voices were screaming,
+bawling, and crying at the same time; the circle around the struggling
+countrymen was getting wider and wider; and when finally they attempted to
+break through, the crowd took to flight, as if a couple of tigers were
+after them.
+
+Many of the spectators found a pleasurable excitement in watching the
+battle between the policemen and the peasants; but they would not move a
+finger to aid the officers of the law in arresting the culprits. They
+admired the agility and strength of the countrymen, and the more fierce
+the struggle became, the greater grew their delight, and the louder their
+merriment.
+
+Holt had been carried on with the motion of the crowd. When he dealt the
+blow to the fellow in the car, he was beside himself with rage. The
+genuine _furor teutonicus_ had taken possession of him so irresistibly and
+so bewilderingly as to leave him utterly without any of the calm judgment
+necessary to measure the situation. After his first adventure, he had
+submitted to be handcuffed, and had watched the struggle between Forchhaem
+and his own comrades in a sort of absence of mind. He had stood perfectly
+quiet, his face had become pale, and his eyes looked about strangely. The
+excitement of passion was now beginning to wear off. He felt the cold iron
+of the manacles around his wrists, his eyes glared, his face became
+crimson, the sinews of his powerful arm stiffened, and with one great
+muscular convulsion he wrenched off the handcuffs. Nobody had observed
+this sudden action, all eyes being directed to the combatants. Shoving the
+part of the handcuff which still hung to his wrist under the sleeve of his
+jacket, Holt disappeared through the crowd.
+
+The resistance of the peasants was gradually becoming fainter. At length
+they succumbed to overpowering force, and were handcuffed.
+
+“Where is the third one?” cried Seicht. “There were three of them.”
+
+“Where is the third one? There were three of them,” was echoed on every
+hand, and all eyes sought for the missing one in the crowd.
+
+“The third one has run away, sir,” reported Forchhaem.
+
+“What’s his name?” asked Seicht.
+
+Nobody knew.
+
+A street boy, looking up at the official, ingenuously cried, “’Twas a
+Tartar.”
+
+Seicht looked down upon the obstreperous little informant.
+
+“A Tartar—do you know him?”
+
+“No; but these here know him,” pointing to the captives.
+
+“What is the name of your comrade?”
+
+“We don’t know him,” was the surly reply.
+
+“Never mind, he will become known in the judicial examination. Off to jail
+with these rebellious ultramontanes,” the official commanded.
+
+Bound in chains, and guarded by a posse of police, these honest men, whose
+religious sense had been so wantonly outraged as to have occasioned an
+outburst of noble indignation, were marched through the streets of the
+town and imprisoned. They were treated as criminals for a crime, however,
+the guilt of which was justly chargeable to those very rioters who were
+enjoying official protection.
+
+The procession moved on to the ground selected for the barbecue. A motley
+mass, especially of factory‐men, were hard at work upon the scene. The
+booths, spread far and wide over the common, were thrown open, and around
+them moved a swarm of thirsty beings drawing rations of beer and sausages,
+with which, when they had received them, they staggered away to the
+tables. Degraded‐looking women were also to be seen moving about
+unsteadily with brimming mugs of beer in their hands. There were several
+bands of music stationed at different points around the place.
+
+The chieftains of progress, perambulating the ground with an air of
+triumph, bestowed friendly nods of recognition on all sides, and
+condescendingly engaged in conversation with some of the rank and file.
+
+Hans Shund approached the awning where the woman with the bare shoulders
+and indecent costume had taken a seat. She had captivated the gallant
+chief magistrate, who hovered about her as a raven hovers over a dead
+carcass. Moving off, he halted within hearing distance, and, casting
+frequent glances back, addressed immodest jokes to those who occupied the
+other side of the table, at which they laughed and applauded immoderately.
+
+The men whom Seraphin had met in the subterranean den, on the memorable
+night before the election, were also present: Flachsen, Graeulich, Koenig,
+and a host of others. They were regaling themselves with sausages which
+omitted an unmistakable odor of garlic, and were of a very dubious
+appearance; interrupting the process of eating with frequent and copious
+draughts from their beer‐mugs.
+
+“Drink, old woman!” cried Graeulich to his wife. “Drink, I tell you! It
+doesn’t cost us anything to‐day.”
+
+The woman put the jug to her lips and drained it manfully. Other women who
+were present screamed in chorus, and the men laughed boisterously.
+
+“Your old woman does that handsomely,” applauded Koth. “Hell and thunder!
+But she must be a real spitfire.”
+
+Again they laughed uproariously.
+
+“I wish there were an election every day, what a jolly life this would
+be!” said Koenig. “Nothing to do, eating and drinking gratis—what more
+would you wish?”
+
+“That’s the way the bigbugs live all the year round. They may eat and
+drink what they like best, and needn’t do a hand’s turn. Isn’t it glorious
+to be rich?” cried Graeulich.
+
+“So drink, boys, drink till you can’t stand! We are all of us bigbugs to‐
+day.”
+
+“And if things were regulated as they should be,” said Koth, “there would
+come a day when we poor devils would also see glorious times. We have been
+torturing ourselves about long enough for the sake of others. I maintain
+that things will have to be differently regulated.”
+
+“What game is that you are wishing to come at? Show your hand, old
+fellow!” cried several voices.
+
+“Here’s what I mean: Coffers which are full will have to pour some of
+their superfluity into coffers which are empty. You take me, don’t you?”
+
+“’Pon my soul, I can’t make you out. You are talking conundrums,” declared
+Koenig.
+
+“You blockhead, I mean there will soon have to be a partition. They who
+have plenty will have to give some to those who have nothing.”
+
+“Bravo! Long live Koth!”
+
+“That sort of doctrine is dangerous to the state,” said Flachsen. “Such
+principles bring about revolutions, and corrupt society.”
+
+“What of society! You’re an ass, Flachsen! Koth is right—partition,
+partition!” was the cry all round the table.
+
+“As you will! I have nothing against it if only it were practicable,”
+expostulated Flachsen; “for I, too, am a radical.”
+
+“It is practicable! All things are practicable,” exclaimed Koth. “Our age
+can do anything, and so can we. Haven’t we driven religion out of the
+schools? Haven’t we elected Shund for mayor? It is the majority who rule;
+and, were we to vote in favor of partition to‐morrow, partition would have
+to take place. Any measure can be carried by a majority, and, since we
+poor devils are in the majority, as soon as we will have voted for
+partition it will come without fail.”
+
+“That’s sensible!” agreed they all. “But then, such a thing has never yet
+been done. Do you think it possible?”
+
+“Anything is possible,” maintained Koth. “Didn’t Shund preach that there
+isn’t any God, or hell, or devil? Was that ever taught before? If the God
+of old has to submit to being deposed, the rich will have to submit to it.
+I tell you, the majority will settle the business for the rich. And if
+there’s no God, no devil, and no life beyond, well then, you see, I’m
+capable of laying my hand to anything. If voting won’t do, violence will.
+Do you understand?”
+
+“Bravo! Hurrah for Koth!”
+
+“There must be progress,” cried Graeulich, “among us as well as others. We
+are not going to continue all our lives in wretchedness. We must advance
+from labor to comfort without labor, from poverty to wealth, from want to
+abundance. Three cheers for progress—hurrah! hurrah!” And the whole
+company joined in frantically.
+
+“There comes Evangelist Seicht,” cried Koenig. “Though I didn’t understand
+one word of his speech, I believe he meant well. Although he is an officer
+of the government, he cordially hates priests. A man may say what he
+pleases against religion, and the church, and the Pope, and the Jesuits,
+it rather pleases Seicht. He is a free and enlightened man, is he. Up with
+your glasses, boys; if he comes near, let’s give him three rousing
+cheers.”
+
+They did as directed. Men and women cheered lustily. Seicht very
+condescendingly raised his hat and smiled as he passed the table. The
+ovation put him in fine humor. Though he had failed in securing a place in
+the assembly, perhaps the slight would be repaired in the future. Such was
+the tenor of his thoughts whilst he advanced to the climbing‐pole, around
+which was assembled a crowd of boys. Quite a variety of prizes, especially
+tobacco‐pipes, was hanging from the cross‐pieces at the top of the mast.
+The pole was so smooth that more than ordinary strength and activity were
+required to get to the top. The greater number of those who attempted the
+feat gave out and slid back without having gained a prize. There were also
+grown persons standing around watching the efforts of the boys and young
+men.
+
+“It’s my turn now,” cried the fellow who had carried the cross in the
+procession.
+
+“But, first, let me have one more drink—it’ll improve the sliding.” He
+swallowed the drink hastily, then swaying about as he looked and pointed
+upward, “Do you see that pipe with tassels to it?” he said. “That’s the
+one I’m going after.”
+
+Throwing aside his mantle, he began to climb.
+
+“He’ll not get up, he’s drunk,” cried a lad among the bystanders.
+“Belladonna has given him two pints of double beer for carrying the cross
+in the procession—that’s what ails him.”
+
+“Wait till I come down, I’ll slap your jaws,” cried the climber.
+
+The spectators were watching him with interest. He was obliged to pause
+frequently to rest himself, which he did by winding his legs tightly round
+the pole. At last he reached the top. Extending his arm to take the pipe,
+it was too short. Climbing still higher, he stretched his body to its
+greatest length, lost his hold, and fell to the ground. The bystanders
+raised a great cry. The unfortunate youth’s head had embedded itself in
+the earth, streams of blood gushed from his mouth and nostrils—he was
+lifeless.
+
+“He’s dead! It’s all over with him,” was whispered around.
+
+“Carry him off,” commanded Seicht, and then walked on.
+
+One of the bystanders loosed the cross‐piece of the mock crucifix; the
+corpse was then stretched across the two pieces of wood and carried off
+the scene. As the body was carried past, the noise and revelry everywhere
+ceased.
+
+“Wasn’t that the one who carried the cross?” was asked. “Is he dead? Did
+he fall from the pole? How terrible!”
+
+Even the progressionist revellers were struck thoughtful, so deeply is the
+sense of religion rooted in the heart of man. Many a one among them,
+seeing the pale, rigid face of the dead man, understood his fate to be a
+solemn warning, and fled from the scene in terror.
+
+The progressionist element of the town was much flattered by the presence
+at its orgies of the wealthiest property owner of the country.
+
+The women had already made the discovery that the millionaire’s only son,
+Mr. Seraphin Gerlach, was on the eve of marrying a member of the highly
+respectable house of Greifmann, bankers. But it occasioned them no small
+amount of surprise that the young gentleman was not in attendance on the
+beautiful lady at the celebration. Louise’s radiant countenance gave no
+indication, however, that any untoward occurrence had caused the absence
+of her prospective husband. The wives and daughters of the chieftains were
+sitting under an awning sipping coffee and eating cake. When Louise
+approached leaning on her brother’s arm, they welcomed her to a place in
+the circle of loveliness with many courtesies and marks of respect.
+
+Mr. Conrad strolled about the place, studying the spirit which animated
+the gathering.
+
+To Be Continued.
+
+
+
+
+ὙΠΝΟΣ
+
+
+    Not now for sleep, O slumber‐god! we sue;
+    Hypnus! not sleep, but give our souls repose!
+    Of the day’s music such a mellowing close
+    As might have rested Shakespeare from his art,
+    Or soothed the spirit of the Tuscan strong
+    Who best read life, its passions and its woes,
+    And wrought of sorrow earth’s divinest song.
+    Bring us a mood that might have lulled Mozart,
+    Not stupor, not forgetfulness, not dreams,
+    But vivid sense of what is best and rarest,
+    And sweet remembrance of the blessed few;
+    In the real presence of this fair world’s fairest:
+    A spell of peace—as ’twere by those dear streams(209)
+    Boccaccio wrote of, when romance was new.
+
+
+
+
+A Legend Of Saint Ottilia.
+
+
+Attich, Duke of Alsace, had a lovely wife, with whom he lived in great
+happiness, desiring but one thing more than he possessed—this was the
+blessing of children. His prayers, however, remained unanswered until he
+vowed that, if the Lord would grant his ardent wish, he would dedicate the
+child entirely to his service. At length a daughter was born to him, but
+the parents’ first joy was turned into sadness, for the child was blind.
+
+Ottilia (thus was she named) grew up a lovely maiden, with rare goodness
+and virtues, showing, from her earliest youth, singular piety and
+devoutness of character. One of her daily prayers was that God might
+bestow on her the gift of sight. By‐and‐by, to the great astonishment of
+all, this prayer was answered. Beautiful before, the new expression of her
+eyes so enhanced her charms that, whereas previously she had no lack of
+suitors, now she was wooed by many and most noble youths. These dazzling
+prospects affected the mind of her father, and led him to repent the vow
+he had made to give his sweet child to God. Then Count Adelhart, a brave
+man, and one who had performed great services for Attich, claimed the hand
+of Ottilia, and the duke resolved that his daughter should become his
+wife. Ottilia heard this with terror; she told her father how wrong she
+believed it to be, and how she feared the vengeance of heaven if they thus
+disregarded his vow. Seeing, however, that her entreaties were of no
+avail, and that they meant to marry her by compulsion, she fled she knew
+not whither. Then Attich called out his servants to pursue her, he
+himself, in company with Ottilia’s suitor, taking the lead. They took the
+road to Freiburg, in Breisgau.
+
+The day began to decline, and their efforts to find her had been in vain,
+when, on riding up a hill from whose top they could overlook the country,
+they heard a cry; turning their eyes toward the place from whence the
+sound came, they saw her whom they were seeking standing on the summit.
+They urged their steeds onward, rejoicing in the certainty of capturing
+the fugitive. Then Ottilia threw herself upon her knees, and prayed to
+heaven for assistance. The rock opened beneath her feet, and, in the sight
+of all, she sank into the yawning depth. The rock closed again, and, from
+the spot where it had been reft in twain, a clear well flowed, taking its
+course downward into the forest below.
+
+The mourning father returned to his now desolate home. Never again did he
+behold Ottilia.
+
+The wonderful tale soon spread far and near. The fountain became a place
+of pilgrimage. People drank from its waters, to which a wonderful healing
+influence for weak eyes was attributed. A hermit built his hut in its
+neighborhood, and “The Well of S. Ottilia” was and is much frequented by
+old and young. The mountain itself bears the name of “Ottilia‐Berg.”
+
+Thus runs the simple legend which, even after the lapse of centuries,
+brings people to visit this famous spring, partly drawn thither by
+religious faith in the curative power of its waters, and partly attracted
+by the renowned beauty of the scenery which surrounds the spot where
+heaven‐trusting Ottilia had thrown herself upon the intervention of
+Providence.
+
+
+
+
+The Year Of Our Lord 1872.
+
+
+There lurks a grim sarcasm in our title for those who, as the years grow
+and die out one after the other, ask each in turn: What have you brought
+us? what growth of good and lessening of evil? what new bond to link the
+scattered and divided masses of a humanity which should be common—but is
+not—more closely and firmly together? Have you brought us a step nearer
+heaven, that is, nearer the destiny which God marked out in the beginning
+for his creation, or thrown us backward? Years are the days of the world,
+of national life; and as each closes, even the superior minds which will
+not deign to believe in such old‐fashioned words as a God, a heaven, or a
+hell, cannot fail to ask themselves the question, What has the world
+gained or lost in this its latest day?
+
+We know that we shall be greeted at the outset by the old cry:—Catholics
+behind the age again: it is plain their religion was not made for the
+XIXth century; they will drift backward and sigh for the days that were,
+the gloom and the mist and the superstition of the “ages of faith”: they
+refuse to recognize the century, to understand it and its glorious
+enlightenment: they decline to march hand in hand with the great leaders,
+the apostles of the day, in politics, science, and religion—the Bismarcks,
+the Lanzas, the Mills, the Fawcetts, the Bradlaughs, the Döllingers, the
+Beechers, the Huxleys, the Buckles, the Darwins, the novelists, and the
+newspapers; the “enlightened” ideas of the age on marriage, education,
+civil government, and the rest. We humbly plead guilty to the greater
+portion of this charge. Modern enlightenment, as preached by the apostles
+above enumerated, and others such, possesses still too few charms to win
+us from our benighted ignorance. To us Utopia appears as far off to‐day as
+when it grew upon the mind of Sir Thomas More in the shape of a dream too
+splendid to be realized; as far off as the fairyland which presented
+itself to our youthful imagination, where everybody was goody‐goody, where
+all were kings and queens with crowns and sceptres, or lovely princesses
+and amiable princes, who loved each other with the most ardent nursery
+love, and with only one crabbed old fairy to spoil the scene, whose
+witcheries caused the amiable princes to undergo a certain amount of mild
+misfortunes, creating a corresponding amount of misery in the bosoms of
+the lovely princesses, till at length the old harridan was overridden to
+her shame and confusion, truth and virtue triumphed, everybody married
+everybody else, and there was peace and joy for ever after. To drop fancy:
+the story of the year would not seem to bring happier tidings of the great
+joy which was announced at the coming of Christ: of “peace on earth to men
+of good‐will.” “Civilized” governments still hold fast by the good old
+rule,
+
+
+    That he may take who has the power,
+    And he may keep who can.
+
+
+We purpose passing in review a few of the chief events which have moved
+the world during the past year and made its annals memorable in all time.
+Our review must necessarily be a rapid one, a mere glance in fact, at the
+multitude of events which confront us, some like ghosts which we have
+summoned from their graves in the buried year, others which accompany us
+into the new and the unknown to ripen or wither with us into their measure
+of good or of evil.
+
+As the year opened, the eyes of the world were fixed upon the sick‐bed of
+the Prince of Wales, stricken down by fever apparently beyond hope of
+recovery. The whole thing is long forgotten; but the anxiety which his
+illness caused—in view of the possible political complications which might
+have resulted from the death of the heir to the English throne—and the
+enthusiasm which his recovery evoked from end to end of the land, makes
+the event worthy of mention in the record of the year as significant of
+the innate as well as outspoken loyalty of the English nation for their
+crown and institution—a national trait which it is becoming fashionable to
+question.
+
+Our own year opened tragically with the murder of Fisk by Stokes, his boon
+companion. The man’s end was in keeping with his life, and his name should
+not have sullied our pages, but for the consequent collapse of the long
+triumphant Erie Ring. The era of blood thus commenced has flourished
+bravely. _Quid novi? quid novi?_ was the daily cry at Athens when S. Paul
+entered it. We would not demean the commercial metropolis of the New World
+and of the new age by comparing it with the intellectual metropolis of
+paganism; but as the cry of the Athenians was each day: What new system,
+doctrine, or philosophy is there? the question of our more enlightened and
+Christian capital might well be: What new thing in the way of murder?
+Scarcely a day passes but some fresh horror greets our eyes in the
+morning. Nor is it left to the hand of man alone to take life as he
+pleases; the privilege has passed to women, and they make right good use
+of this latest form of their “rights.” We read till our blood curdles of
+the political poisonings of the XVIth century in Italy; of their secrecy
+and the safety of their carrying out. We are a more honest race than the
+Italians; we enshroud our deeds of blood in no false Machiavellian veil;
+we kill in open day. The lady or gentleman who has just taken away a life
+politely hands the pistol to the officer, who escorts him or her with the
+utmost courtesy to the police station, where a cell is luxuriously fitted
+up according to the exigencies of the case; the murderer stands up in open
+court, with the ablest champions to defend him; he calls upon the law to
+save him, and the “law” does. In the meantime obtuse people are beginning
+to inquire if there be such a thing as law in New York, and in America
+generally, and if the present administration of justice be not very
+closely allied to administering injustice.
+
+We have felt compelled to touch on this point at some length; for murder,
+cool, deliberate, wilful murder, has marked our year with a red stain
+which was never dry; the murderers have either escaped or are living at
+ease and being “lionized” by the press in their prisons; justice is not
+administered among us. So true is this, that outraged public feeling,
+which requires a very heavy force to set its inertia in motion, has at
+length found it necessary to begin to weed the judiciary. Until it does so
+thoroughly, the law of New York is the law of the bullet and the knife.
+
+If we were not above taking a lesson from people for whom we entertain, of
+course, a sovereign contempt, we might find something commendable in the
+action of the populace in Lima, Peru, on the occasion of the murder of
+Colonel Balta, the president, by Guttierez, the minister of war; who, in
+order to attain supreme power, caused Balta to be assassinated, having
+previously gained over the garrison of Lima, and had himself proclaimed
+dictator. The people, finding reason to object to this summary mode of
+settling questions, refused to accept this dictatorship; rose in revolt,
+overpowered the garrison, hanged the dictator and his brother to lamp‐
+posts in the public square, and burned their bodies. We, are far from
+advocating the cause of “Judge Lynch”; but a slight touch of the sensible
+spirit displayed by the inhabitants of Lima has a wonderfully wholesome
+effect on evil doers in power.
+
+Our political life for the past year has been absorbed in the presidential
+election and the settlement of the Alabama claims. This latter very vexed
+question has come at last to a final, peaceful, and satisfactory solution.
+Our claim for “indirect damages” against England was ruled out of court.
+An adequate propitiation was made in the final decision, given in our
+favor: England was compelled to pay us £3,000,000; she is supposed to have
+lost very much in prestige in consequence; particularly as the San Juan
+boundary question was also decided in our favor; the whole thing was
+settled by peaceful arbitration, and, therefore, no matter which party
+lost in prestige, or diplomacy, or pocket, both have good reason to
+congratulate themselves on getting out of sight, let us ardently hope, for
+ever, a very ugly question which was fast becoming a gangrene, corroding
+and eating out all good feeling between the two nations. It is one of the
+things which we sincerely trust may be buried with the dead year; and the
+two rival claimants we hope to see enter on a new lease of friendship and
+good‐will.
+
+General Grant was re‐elected; the opposition arrayed against him under Mr.
+Greeley as candidate for the presidency, and such very able secessionists
+from the republican ranks as Messrs. Sumner, Schurz, and others, and the
+attempted coalescing of Democrats with dissatisfied Republicans, who would
+not coalesce, utterly broke down. General Grant’s is undoubtedly a
+national election: we trust, therefore, that his future term may
+correspond with the confidence placed in his rule by the nation; may be
+productive of all the good which we expect of it for the nation at large;
+may heal up old wounds still sore, and may lead the country wisely into a
+new era of prosperity and peace: the more so that the outer world is fast
+pouring in on us the most skilled artisans and law‐abiding, intelligent
+citizens of every European race.
+
+Having said so much for ourselves, we turn to the workings of events in
+Europe during the past year, which indeed have occupied our attention
+more, almost, than our home questions. Our gaze has been riveted with an
+interest of almost painful intensity on the two contestants during the
+late dread struggle, and the actions and bearing of each have brought out
+the inner character of the two nations in such strong relief that we can
+think of Germany and France as two individualities. On the one side, we
+behold United Germany, the victor in the fight, like a strong athlete
+glorying in his great strength, setting on his own brow the laurels which
+he plucked from that of his fallen foe; not resting on his honors, and
+satiated for the time being with his glory, but anxious, careful, trying
+his strength, not letting his arms rust for want of practice, preparing
+himself for new glories and new contests to come as though they were to
+come to‐morrow, and as a matter of course. On the other, we have France
+wounded and bleeding at every pore. We thought its life had ebbed out,
+stricken first by the terrible blows of a merciless conqueror, after by a
+delirious contest with itself. And what do we behold? No longer a weak
+convalescent, sick, sore, and spiritless, but a great nation, infused with
+a new life; strong and gaining in strength every day; cautious indeed and
+still uncertain, but these are not bad signs in a nation which is
+recovering at however rapid strides, and which fell from its overweening
+confidence. It has almost exhausted its terrible debt to Germany, and rid
+the soil of the foot of the foe. Its loans were eagerly taken up and
+covered four times over: its exports for the first six months of the year
+were in advance of those for the corresponding six months, esteemed a
+period of great prosperity, prior to the war; its army is again on a firm
+and sound footing; its children are peaceful, calm and obedient to the law
+in the face of the tyranny and unnecessarily harsh measures and dictation
+of the conqueror and the rash declamations of Gambetta, biding their time
+with a calm good sense which we scarcely expected in the French people. Of
+course the nation is taxed and heavily; but the wonder is that a nation
+can endure such blows and live; can not only live, but present to the
+admiration and astonished gaze of the world, a year after what we
+considered its death and burial, so glorious a resurrection into a
+powerful and wealthy country. As these two nations have been the centre of
+attraction to the whole world during the year, we feel called upon to
+touch upon each in a more special manner than on other nations.
+
+On April 7th, the Emperor William delivered a speech from the throne, from
+which we cull the following extract:
+
+“Honored Gentlemen: You will share the satisfaction with which the
+Confederate Governments look back on the events of the first year of the
+newly founded German Empire, and the joyful confidence with which they
+look forward to the further national and state development of our internal
+institutions. With equal satisfaction you will hail the assurance that the
+policy of his majesty, the emperor and king, has succeeded in retaining
+and strengthening the confidence of all foreign states; that the power
+acquired by Germany through becoming united in one Empire is not only a
+safe bulwark for the fatherland, but likewise affords a strong guarantee
+for the peace of Europe.”
+
+Now, that sounds so well, at least it did in April last, that it is almost
+a pity to spoil it by the inevitable comments which cannot fail to present
+themselves to the minds of its readers in December, in the face of one or
+two little events which have occurred since April. But before commenting
+on it, we must add a further exquisite little piece of irony from the same
+speech of Bismarck’s—we mean of the Emperor William: Prince Bismarck only
+read it:
+
+“The new administration in, and the consolidation of the affairs of,
+Alsace and Lorraine make satisfactory progress. The damage done by the war
+is gradually disappearing with the aid of the subvention given in
+conformity with the law, dated June 15, 1871.”
+
+As it is not the purport of this article to go extensively into the
+various subjects which come under our notice, we think that the best mode
+of dealing with the German question will be to read the above speech by
+the December light:
+
+Honored Gentlemen: You will share the satisfaction with which the
+Confederate Governments look back on the events of the intervening nine
+months since his majesty, the emperor and king, first found reason to
+congratulate you on the consolidation of the newly founded empire. Those
+events are, in brief, as follows:
+
+1. As we consider national education to be the first means in making good,
+sound, and efficient citizens of the Empire, and as we consider it,
+moreover, to be the great moralizer of the masses in these days, we have
+found it necessary to take this education from the hands in which it has
+rested for so long, “which the Prussia of the past encouraged, and indeed
+enforced; which have had the honor to receive the zealous support of two
+deceased monarchs, the father and brother of the present sovereign; which
+have received for the last two generations the approbation of all sorts of
+thinkers—who believed that the Prussian state could only subsist by a
+strict military and religious organization, that a definite church system
+must be chosen by the state, and the people drilled in it as they were
+drilled for his majesty’s armies.”(210) Notwithstanding the very solid
+proofs which our success in the late war gave us of the efficiency of this
+system, when our soldiers went to battle under the double panoply of
+intelligence and faith in God, we have since found it fit to divorce
+religion from education, and place this moralizer of the masses in the
+hands of those to whom morality is a thing unknown, or, if it mean
+anything, means blind obedience to the state in all things.
+
+2. Holding as we do that marriage is another powerful moralizer of the
+masses, and the strongest bond for the welfare, happiness, and power of a
+nation, we have thought fit to divorce it also from religion, to strip it
+of the sacred character with which Jesus Christ invested it, and which,
+even were it false, has been the chief means of restoring woman to her
+fitting station in life, of civilizing man, and substituting love and
+purity for sensuality and animal passion: being perfectly alive to all
+this, we have still seen fit to hand the power of the binding and the
+loosing of marriage into the hands of the magistracy, to be dealt with for
+the future as a civil contract, thus reducing it to the far more
+convenient form of a mere matter of buying and selling at will.
+
+3. Having already testified in the most direct and special manner our
+gratitude for the great services rendered us by the Society of Jesus and
+kindred orders recently on the fields of France, and in the more lasting
+and beneficial fields of intellectual and religious culture under the
+educational system which obtained so long and with such profit to us, but
+which we have since seen fit to put an end to, we think it fit to prove
+their devotion still further to us by banishing them the Empire, breaking
+up their communities, closing their churches, appropriating their property
+to our own use and imprisoning them if we find them within our territory.
+We mercifully spare them the further trial of immediate martyrdom.
+
+4. Having been compelled to meet the demands of two powerful bodies of our
+subjects whose interests on religious questions sometimes clash, we have
+very wisely, and very satisfactorily to both bodies, met those demands by
+special articles in our legislative code which have hitherto answered
+their purpose so well that both bodies have been enabled to work
+harmoniously though in friendly rivalry together as common children of
+fatherland. We have seen fit to erase those laws, at least in the case of
+the Catholics. We cannot allow their bishops to excommunicate our
+subjects, though we have hitherto allowed it, and though we still allow it
+to the Protestants.(211)
+
+Honored Gentlemen: Having thus succeeded in creating a profound and
+widespread agitation by outraging the feelings and the conscience of
+14,000,000 of our most faithful subjects, an agitation which has spread
+from these 14,000,000 to hundreds of millions of their co‐religionists
+outside the Empire, and indeed of large bodies and powerful secular organs
+opposed to them in faith, the confederate governments, the most powerful
+of which is Catholic, may look forward with joyful confidence to the
+further national and state development of our institutions. With equal
+satisfaction you will hail the assurance that the policy of his majesty,
+the emperor and king, has succeeded in retaining and strengthening the
+confidence of all foreign states,(212) that the power acquired by Germany
+is not only a safe bulwark for the fatherland,(213) but likewise affords a
+strong guarantee for the peace of Europe.
+
+The new administration in, and the consolidation of affairs in, Alsace and
+Lorraine, have made most satisfactory progress. By careful and well‐
+devised management we have succeeded in driving out the population of
+these two provinces, two of the wealthiest in the world, in rendering
+their cities desolate and their smiling country a desert: in gaining for
+ourselves a new legacy of hatred, and arousing the disgust and, what
+politically is worse, the suspicion of all governments outside our own.
+
+As a further comment on this speech we must add the dangerous symptoms of
+revolt exhibited by the Upper House in the Prussian diet, and the
+dubiously constitutional mode adopted of bringing it to submission. The
+influx of French gold would seem to have created a South Sea Bubble
+commotion in financial circles. Rent in the chief cities and towns has
+increased twofold; the cost of living has risen with it. This falls
+heaviest, of course, on the middle and lower classes, so that we are not
+surprised to hear, that the rate of living having increased 60 or 70 per
+cent. for the poorer classes during the last six or seven years, and the
+French gold never having filtered down to their pockets, the poor have
+been unable to meet their new expenses, and “ever since the conclusion of
+peace with France,” to quote the special correspondent of the London
+_Times_, April 11th, “the German workmen have been at war with their
+‘masters.’ ” As a last comment we see the German people fleeing from this
+glorious consolidation of confederate governments in such numbers that the
+central government is compelled to call into practice measures as harsh on
+the one side to restrain their own people from running away as they used
+to force out the inhabitants of Alsace and Lorraine. We believe we have
+said enough of German “Unity” on its first two years of lease to show that
+its workings, whether internal or external, have been anything but
+satisfactory so far, and far from hopeful to the world at large.
+
+The strikes which were successful in Germany were not restricted to that
+locality. They spread through the greater part of Europe, and reached out
+here to us, with varied success. New York was in many departments of
+business at a standstill in what is generally esteemed as the busiest
+portion of the year. Fortunately with us and for the greater part
+elsewhere, the “strikes” passed off peaceably, and the masters and workmen
+succeeded in coming to a compromise at least for the time being. This
+uprising of labor against capital formed one of the most significant, we
+fear most threatening, aspects of the year. There was a union and a
+combination among the working classes of European nations and our own,
+which enabled them to offer a persistent, solid, and bold front to their
+employers. Funds and a more perfect organization, neither of which seem to
+us impossible, would convert trades‐unions into the most formidable power
+in the world. Christian education can alone hope to convert this into a
+legal power. At present it wavers between the dictates of good sense and
+fair demands and the wild and impossible, but, to half‐educated men, very
+fascinating, dreams of the Communists. Labor is beginning at last to feel
+its power, its numbers, its irresistible force; that the world cannot get
+on without it, as little as it can get on without the co‐operation of the
+rest of the world. Let the laboring classes receive an education worthy of
+the name, plant religion in their hearts while at school, and, when they
+come to face the hard problem, the division of wealth, they will be led
+away by no fallacious teachings that what is and always must be a
+necessity is a wrong done to humanity; but divorce the schools, as
+governments seem now resolved to do, from religion, and labor will merge
+into Communism.
+
+France has borne her terrible trials with a calmness, a magnanimity, and a
+self‐dependence which have regained for her in the eyes of the world more
+than she ever lost at Sedan. We speak here of the nation, not of its
+haphazard government. Thiers is at present a necessity; and by the aid of
+the bogy “resignation” which he has conjured up so often, and whereby he
+frightens the still cautious Assembly into submission, he has managed to
+hold the dangerous elements in such a state of order that the nation has
+been able so far to regain public confidence that its loans were caught up
+with avidity; it has almost freed itself from the foot of the foe; it has
+frowned down the folly of Gambetta; restored its army to a sound footing,
+and won the admiration and good‐will of all by its truly patriotic bearing
+in the face of a rapacious, dictatorial, and merciless conqueror. But
+Thiers cannot last, and what is to follow? The country would not bear the
+rule of “the man of Sedan,” though, undoubtedly, his twenty years of firm
+government wrought it up to the pitch of material prosperity which even
+its terrible losses have been unable to destroy. The speech of the Duc
+d’Audiffret Pasquier on the army contracts, showing a system of finance in
+the army somewhat similar to that which has recently greeted our eyes in
+the city government, has killed Napoleonism for the nonce. We can only
+hope for the best in France from some other and nobler sprout of former
+dynasties; we cannot foresee it. We must not forget that the nation has
+been kneeling at its altars and shrines. Of course superior people and
+“witty” writers have laughed at and insulted a nation for being foolish
+enough and so far behind the age as to believe in the assistance of a God
+whom they could not contain in their capacious intellects. France has
+survived the laughter and disregarded the laughers; but her sons have been
+none the less obedient to the laws and constitution established, and thus
+restored confidence in their country, by acknowledging the efficacy of
+divine worship, and the intercession of the blessed Mother with her divine
+Son.
+
+The year has, happily, borne no war stain on its record; for we cannot
+dignify the English expedition against the Looshais in India by that
+title. Revolts among the natives have of late been cropping up again in
+British India, while the silent but steady march of Russia, with all her
+vast forces, nearer and nearer to the outline of the British possessions,
+threatens at no distant date an inevitable collision between the two
+powers, which, in the not very doubtful event of Russia’s victory, would
+avenge Sebastopol, and, at the same time more than counterbalance the
+present supremacy of Germany in Europe.
+
+While England was all aglow with the gorgeous story of pomp and pageantry
+coming from the far East, of reviews of armies, of gallant processions
+from end to end of the land, of displays of splendor, and more than royal
+magnificence flashing on the bewildered gaze of the Easterns; outshining
+in dazzling brilliancy their own “barbaric pearl and gold”—wrought up to
+win over their allegiance by giving them some idea of the vast power of
+that empire far away, whose representative could muster such a show of
+majesty—came a cruel little flash across the world telling us that the
+show was ended by the death of the chief performer at the hands of an
+obscure assassin. A few feet in advance of his party, in the gloom of
+evening, as he is about to step from the pier into his boat, the stroke of
+a knife from a hidden assailant, and—Lord Mayo, the great Viceroy, is
+slain. England viewed his death as a national calamity. Following close on
+the heels of the murder of Mr. Justice Norman by another native, of the
+outbreaks of the Kookas and the Looshais, it had a significance which the
+nation took to heart.
+
+From a further corner of the East still comes a dread story of famine
+devouring 3,000,000 of people in Persia. Small succor was offered them by
+their Christian brethren: and such as was sent seems to have reached them
+with the greatest difficulty. Horrible tales are told of hunger overcoming
+all the ties of nature, and mothers, in their madness, devouring even
+their own offspring. The harvest for this season was a very excellent one;
+but its effects cannot be felt till the coming year.
+
+The East has not exhausted its romance yet, though this time it wears a
+less grim visage. We refer to the discovery of Dr. Livingstone by Mr.
+Stanley, a reporter of the _New York Herald_. Everybody believed Dr.
+Livingstone dead: Mr. Bennett believed him living: he despatched Mr.
+Stanley to interview him somewhere in the middle of Africa, and Mr.
+Stanley obeyed as successfully as though he had only been despatched to
+one of our hotels to “interview” a political man. Of course nobody
+believed either Stanley or the _Herald_; and of course there has been much
+consequent laughing at the “easy‐chair geographers,” when white, after
+all, turned out to be white and not black, as the learned gentlemen thus
+designated demonstrated to a nicety. But we should imagine that the
+persistent doubts of these gentlemen were the highest compliment which
+could be paid, either to Mr. Stanley or Mr. Bennett, as indicating the
+almost utter impossibility of their stupendous and brilliant enterprise.
+To the world at large, the finding of a man, whom, with all due respect,
+we cannot but look upon as self‐lost, is the least part of the
+undertaking. Mr. Stanley’s expedition and disclosures of the horrors of
+the slave trade have awakened a new interest in that horrible traffic, and
+promises to enlist the sympathies of nations in unison against it.
+
+After a sleep of centuries Japan has reopened her gates to Christian
+influences and civilization—gates closed since the work so gloriously
+commenced by S. Francis Xavier was marred by the narrowness and
+selfishness and unchristian spirit of European traders. The Mikado
+despatched an embassy under the leadership of one of his chief statesmen,
+Iwakura, in order to study this boasted civilization and see what it was
+like. In the meantime, Christians are still suffering persecution and even
+death in Japan. But why should Iwakura interfere to stop it when he finds
+“civilized” governments, such as Germany and Italy, setting Japan a
+brilliant example in the same line of policy?
+
+Correspondents give us reason to dread a fresh outbreak in China similar
+to the Tientsin massacre. We trust that the representatives of the
+European powers and our own will be alive to this. Nothing of great import
+has occurred in the empire beyond the marriage of his Celestial Majesty.
+
+Going back to Europe, we find Spain in much the same state as the opening
+year found her; restless, dissatisfied, and disunited. A Carlist rising
+was effected in the spring, which at one time threatened to be formidable;
+but, after showing itself in fitful bursts at different points, it finally
+died out, for the time being at least, with a greater loss of gunpowder
+than of life. It was mismanaged. There were and still are a variety of
+little eruptions here, there, and everywhere. An attempt on the life of
+King Amadeo was got up for the purpose of arousing some loyalty in his
+favor. It created a little sensation at first; but people speedily
+suspected something, and the subject dropped. All parties in Spain are
+still at daggers drawn. Even if Amadeo could, by his influence, which we
+very much doubt after his sufficient trial, conciliate them, they would
+not be conciliated. We do not expect to find Amadeo’s name at the head of
+the Spanish government this day twelvemonth. A good regent, not
+Montpensier, might bring about the restoration of Don Alfonso; but where
+is such a regent? Don Carlos possesses the greatest amount of genuine
+loyalty to his name and cause, and he would be the winning man, could he
+only manage his rising in a more efficient manner. Even the _Saturday
+Review_, the other day, almost lamented the loss of Queen Isabella.
+
+The state of Italy is perhaps on a par with that of Spain, with the
+advantage of the utter lawlessness touched upon in our last number. We are
+now informed that a bill for the suppression of religious orders is
+introduced. Of course it will pass. A government which shakes hands with
+the _Garibaldini_, which is hand and glove with the murderer and assassin
+whom it fears, is strong when it comes to the spoliation of religious
+houses and the persecution of Christian men who it knows will not resist.
+We cannot pass Italy by—alas! what an Italy it has become!—without one
+word of admiration for the Holy Father. Men, journalists, all sorts of
+people, would have driven Pius IX. from Rome long ago. But the pilot is
+still at the helm of the barque of Peter, though pirates tread the decks.
+And never during the successive storms which have made his long reign so
+dark with trial has our great pontiff presented to the angry world a more
+forcible spectacle of a man utterly above all the pettiness, all the
+trials, all the misery, which human malice can inflict upon humanity, than
+at this moment in his own person; looking afar over the troubled waters
+for the calm which shall come from heaven, and bring men back from their
+insane mood at the old whisper, “Peace, be still!” He stands there the
+truest and purest living protest of justice shackled by injustice, and
+around that prisoned throne range the hearts of all true Catholics and all
+true men in the world.
+
+In England, the Gladstone Ministry after many threatenings has managed to
+hold its own, in consequence probably of the successful termination of the
+Alabama claims. The Ballot Bill has at length passed, and in future we
+hope to be spared the degrading scenes which were wont to accompany
+English elections. The Irish Church Establishment has falsified Mr.
+Gladstone’s high hopes of new life, vigor, efficiency, and so forth, on
+being deprived of its “temporalities,” which came into act this year. It
+has come to a miserable collapse, and is now a pauper asking alms to live.
+The agitation for the disestablishment of the English Church is gaining
+ground, as is also the Home‐Rule movement in Ireland, which undoubtedly
+received a fresh impetus from the attack made by a renegade Catholic judge
+on the Irish clergy and on one of their leaders, Archbishop McHale, whose
+name is venerated wherever his fame is known. There has been a cry of a
+coal failure, and a much more serious one, because better founded and more
+immediate, of a potato failure in Ireland as well as England, which,
+coupled with the strike of the agricultural laborers and the coming
+winter, threatens an ugly season. Serious riots incurring a lamentable
+loss of life and property occurred in Belfast on the repeal of the Parties
+Processions Act. The rioters held the city in a state of terrorism for
+days. “Of course the Orangemen began it,” commented the London
+_Spectator_; “the worst murder committed, that of Constable Morton, was
+the murder of a Protestant by Protestants, because he upheld the law.”
+
+In Mexico, the death of President Juarez, the murderer of the unhappy
+Maximilian, as well as of countless others, whom “people who ought to
+know” were never tired of calling the saviour of his country, the true
+patriot, and the like, oddly enough put an end to the internecine strife
+which was ravaging the country, and everybody suddenly collapsed into
+peace: “Yet Juarez was an honorable man.”
+
+In the natural order, there have been terrible convulsions, followed, in
+the closing year, by a succession of tempests on sea and land, productive
+of dismal disasters. In the spring, an earthquake shook Antioch, and half
+the city was gone, with a loss of 1,500 inhabitants. In the same month,
+Vesuvius belched forth torrents of burning lava for days, causing a vast
+destruction of property and loss of life to a few overcurious sight‐seers.
+Later on came the inundations of the Po, accompanied by losses more
+grievous still. Then storms swept the country, and, indeed, all Europe,
+strewing the shores with wrecked vessels and their crews. Fire touched and
+marred, but, fortunately, did not succeed in destroying, two of the
+grandest monuments of European art—the Escurial of Philip II. in Spain,
+and the Cathedral of Canterbury in England, doubly consecrated—the second
+time by the blood of the martyred S. Thomas. It was more successful among
+ourselves; and a few hours’ blaze in the month of November destroyed the
+finest portion of our most ancient city, Boston.
+
+Among what might be termed the curiosities of the year figured the Boston
+Jubilee; an assembling together of European bands and singers, with a
+native chorus of 20,000. It was called music. A second curiosity was the
+epidemic which recently broke out among the horses, and brought life in
+New York to a standstill, or at least to a walking pace, for several days.
+It is to be hoped that means of transit may be devised to prevent the
+effects of such a casualty in future. A third curiosity was an assembly of
+recreant priests and others to the number of 400 at Cologne in order to do
+something. What the something was never appeared. They dined, quarrelled,
+and separated; while the world was agape to see something arise which
+should crush God’s Church. Other curiosities were the great trials, civil
+and military, which took place during the year. Among the former class
+that of the man known as the “Tichborne Claimant” stands pre‐eminent. The
+story is too well known to be commented on here; the “claimant’s” case
+broke down; he was committed to Newgate prison, bailed out, and is now
+“starring” the country to procure funds for a new trial. The case was
+remarkable for the strangest and oddest disclosures of character and
+hidden life from the highest almost to the lowest classes, not only in
+England, but in many other countries. The trial of Marshal Bazaine for the
+surrender of Metz, which is still pending, stands foremost in the rank of
+military trials. _Væ victis!_ Many of Bazaine’s comrades were condemned
+for premature surrender by the Committee of Inquiry; we shall see whether
+the once great marshal will be able to come off with a clear escutcheon.
+Other trials were those of the Communists and the murderers of the
+Archbishop of Paris and the clergy. As a rule, a more villanous set never
+stood face to face with justice. They have had full, fair, and exhaustive
+trials; such as could offer any excuse for their crimes escaped; the
+others were shot.
+
+Death has been mowing right and left among us with indiscriminating
+scythe. In Persia he grew weary of his own grim harvest. Eastern Europe
+was threatened with cholera, but escaped. Some tall heads have fallen
+among the mean; many whose names are memorable for evil as well as good;
+many others whose places it would seem hard to fill. The Catholic Church
+has lost Archbishop Spalding, Bishops McGill and O’Connor in America,
+Morris and Goss in England, Cardinal Amat in Italy. Their names will live
+in the church and in her prayers. Anderson and Meade have gone, Seward and
+Morse, and Bennett, the founder of the _New York Herald_, and Greeley, the
+founder of the _Tribune_. Persigny, and Conti, and Mazzini, each memorable
+in his way, dropped out during the year. Lever, one of the most genial of
+Irish novelists, is dead, and his much‐lamented countryman, Maguire, of
+Cork. The only surviving son of the Duc d’Aumale, a promising young man,
+was snatched away—an important event, as the claims of this branch of the
+family to the French throne fall now to the Count de Chambord. Bernadotte,
+Charles XV. of Sweden, has gone, and was succeeded on the throne by his
+brother Oscar.
+
+And now, passing from the old, we look to the new, not without anxiety.
+The war against the church, in reality against the rights of man, the
+freedom of conscience, commenced in Germany, has spread thence to Italy,
+Switzerland, and Spain, and, under the form of the educational question,
+wider and further still. If Catholics would save the souls of their
+children, and of their children’s children, from the infidelity and the
+moral decay which we see around us, even in this free breathing
+atmosphere, they must be firm and united in their resistance to the
+encroachment of the state, where states possess no rights—over the
+dictates of conscience. The uprise of labor against capital, which was the
+real cause of the first French Revolution and its mad excesses, we have
+already touched upon. It should be a deep source of anxiety and care to
+true statesmen. War looms on the European horizon, gathers in silent
+thunder‐clouds all around. A flash is enough to kindle the combustion and
+make the thunder speak. Who shall say when or whence it comes? Europe is
+arming, and we have good authority for saying that “the next war will rage
+over half a century”—Bismarck himself. For the church we foresee an
+increase of bitter and severe trials. We can only appeal to that
+enlightenment which the age vaunts; to its common sense and common
+fairness to allow us the freedom in our own worship which they, if they
+possess any, claim for themselves. Public opinion is, to a great extent,
+the lever of the age. We must work at that until we shame it into powerful
+and persistent action to remove and overthrow the mountain of intolerance,
+bigotry, and opposition, which rulers, who are neither Protestant nor
+Catholic, are raising up in order to overwhelm all religion, all right,
+all freedom.
+
+
+
+
+New Publications.
+
+
+    MY CLERICAL FRIENDS. New York: The Catholic Publication Society.
+    1873.
+
+
+We need not say more than that the above is by the author of that
+production of exquisite humor and satire, _The Comedy of Convocation_, to
+awaken a profound interest in its appearance. This new book from his pen
+is somewhat similar. It is a choice compound of argument, history, and
+wit. Its object is to represent the English clerical body as it is, with a
+special intention of showing the ridiculousness of the claim made by some
+of its members to the character of Catholic priesthood. The author is the
+son of a clergyman, and was himself a clergyman, and is at home in his
+subject. We promise our readers a rare treat in this new and spicy volume.
+
+
+    CONVERSION OF THE TEUTONIC RACE. CONVERSION OF THE FRANKS AND
+    ENGLISH.
+
+    SEQUEL TO THE SAME. S. BONIFACE AND THE CONVERSION OF GERMANY. By
+    Mrs. Hope. Edited by the Rev. J. B. Dalgairns, of the Oratory.
+    London: Washbourne. 1872. 2 vols. crown 8vo. (New York: Sold by
+    The Catholic Publication Society.)
+
+
+Few readers of English books know much of those most splendid and
+important chapters of history, of which these two volumes contain a
+summary within a moderate compass. The lady who has written them is a very
+competent and graceful narrator of historical scenes and events. She has
+given us the cream of authentic and truly scientific historical works with
+care and skill, and at the same time she has clothed her narrative with a
+flowing and agreeable diction. There are scarcely two volumes to be found
+in the whole mass of recent English literature better worth reading than
+these. We are delighted, also, to meet again, in the preface of the second
+volume, with F. Dalgairns, from whose pen nothing ever comes which is not
+choice both in matter and style. His editorship adds a most satisfactory
+sanction to the historical and critical accuracy of these volumes, over
+which he has exercised a supervision, and some pages of which have been
+written by himself. These volumes which have gained great repute and favor
+in England will, we trust, have also a wide circulation in this country,
+and help to diffuse sound historical knowledge, which, as F. Dalgairns
+remarks, is such a powerful auxiliary to religious truth.
+
+
+    LIFE AND TIMES OF SIXTUS THE FIFTH. From the French of Baron
+    Hübner. By James F. Meline. New York: The Catholic Publication
+    Society. 1873.
+
+
+The dying Gregory XIII., worn out with the difficulties and
+responsibilities of his position, raised his weary hands to heaven, and
+exclaimed: “Thou wilt arise, O Lord, and have mercy on Zion”; prophetic
+words that were realized in the election of Pope Sixtus V., who, as Ranke
+justly observes, possessed in the highest perfection the moral and
+intellectual qualities demanded for the suppression of the prevalent
+disorders of the times. Perhaps there is no other pope whose life is of
+more universal interest. His striking individuality of character appeals
+to the popular mind, and has given rise to a variety of fables respecting
+him which fasten themselves on the memory and, though not literally true,
+yet embody a certain truth of their own.
+
+His rise from obscurity to become a link of that august dynasty beside
+which “the proudest royal houses are but of yesterday,” his ability to
+cope with all the difficulties of his position at a critical period in the
+political and religious world, his astuteness in dealing with the most
+wily diplomatists, his clear notions as to the necessity of balance of
+power among different nations, his financial ability and genius for
+statesmanship, have all commanded the very admiration of the enemies of
+the papacy. “A grand old man,” the _British Quarterly_ styles him, and
+with reason. “A great pope, to whom posterity owes a debt of gratitude in
+consideration of the whole results of his pontificate,” says the
+_Edinburgh Review_.
+
+The extraordinary events of the life of Sixtus V. were the result of his
+wonderful energy and persistency. People like decision of character—a man
+with a purpose, and the ability of putting it into execution. This is why
+all admirers of “self‐made” men like to retrace the upward steps of the
+life of this eminent pope, from the rustic boyhood of Felice Peretti on
+the shores of the Adriatic; his thirst for knowledge that impelled him to
+study by the lamp of the sanctuary; his girding himself with the cord of
+the humble Francis while yet a mere boy; his career as a young friar‐
+preacher, drawing crowded Roman audiences to listen to his fervid
+eloquence, among them such men as S. Ignatius de Loyola and S. Philip
+Neri; his promotion to a cardinalship by a sainted pope who was his
+benefactor, and whose last moments he had the happiness of witnessing; his
+temporary retirement to his villa, where he gave himself up to quiet
+observation of the needs of the times, especially of his own country, the
+study of architecture and the improvements needed in Rome, and all those
+pursuits which tended to fit him for his subsequent elevation to the
+papacy. Sixtus V. did not look upon his success in life as solely due to
+his own merit. He recognized the finger of Divine Providence, and chose as
+his motto: “Thou, O God, hast been my defender, even from my mother’s
+womb.”
+
+_The Life of Sixtus V._ by Baron Hübner, though written from a Catholic
+point of view, is acknowledged by the _Edinburgh Review_ to be one of the
+most valuable contributions to the literature of the age, so rich in
+historical biography. Its superiority to the previous lives of that pope
+is partly due to his access to the archives of Simancas, not open to
+research at the time of Ranke. Though the pontificate of Sixtus V. was
+only about five years long, it embraced a rapid succession of
+extraordinary and tragical events, as is evident when we remember he was
+contemporary with Queen Elizabeth of England, Mary Queen of Scots, Philip
+II. of Spain, and Henry of Navarre, whose names recall the persecution of
+the Church in England, the execution of Mary Stuart, the Armada, the
+overthrow of the League, and the accession of Henri Quatre to the throne
+of France, and show us what a weight of responsibility rested upon the
+Head of the Church. No wonder he was soon worn out by the pressure. The
+tiara is but a thorny crown at the best, as befits him who stands in
+Christ’s stead. The very condition of the Pontifical States was an affair
+of no slight difficulty. Only a man of extraordinary energy and decision
+of character could have surmounted it. Sixtus V. has been called pitiless
+from the terrible punishments he inflicted for apparently trivial
+offences, but he was personally humane, for at the murder of his nephew he
+was the first to entreat the pope (Sixtus being at that time Cardinal
+Montalto) to drop his investigations, and when he had cleared the Roman
+States of brigandage, he endeavored to conciliate the nobles. His
+inflexible severity seemed imperiously demanded. Twenty‐seven thousand
+brigands ravaged his dominions; the castles of noblemen were their
+strongholds; they were protected by neighboring princes; and the very
+streets of Rome often witnessed the attacks of peaceful citizens by armed
+bands. Sixtus himself when a cardinal had nearly lost his life in
+encountering a band of lawless young nobles as he was going home one
+night. He saw the absolute necessity of putting an end to such disorders
+and the terror of the inhabitants. Accordingly, one of his first acts
+after his election was to forbid the carrying of fire‐arms in the streets,
+and, when he found his order disobeyed by four young men, he had them hung
+the very next morning.
+
+But he was strictly impartial in administering justice. No clerical
+offender was screened by the sacredness of his garments. The friar who
+imposed on the piety of the faithful was scourged from one end of the
+Corso to the other; the cardinal who was desirous of protecting a guilty
+servant was threatened with the Castle of St. Angelo; the traitor‐priest
+who gave Queen Elizabeth information of what was occurring at Rome was
+executed in such a manner as to strike terror into every treacherous
+breast. No wonder Sixtus became a terror to evil doers, and his very name
+sufficed to put an end to the brawls in the streets. The time arrived when
+he could say with grim humor: “_Fugit impius nemine persequente_”—“The
+wicked flee when no man pursueth.”
+
+Sixtus V. left proofs of his genius and energy all over Rome. He kept
+thousands of men constantly employed. The dome of S. Peter’s was completed
+in twenty‐two months, though the architect said it would require ten
+years. He restored a colossal aqueduct that had fallen to ruin, and
+brought the Acqua Felice into Rome from a distance of about twenty miles.
+He opened great thoroughfares all through the city, built the Lateran
+Palace, erected monuments, undertook to drain the Pontine Marshes,
+encouraged agriculture and the manufacture of silk, established the
+Congregation of Rites and several others, limited the number of cardinals
+to seventy, and partly revised the Vulgate with his own hand. His
+practical nature by no means made him insensible to softer influences. His
+soul was so alive to music that at the exciting time of his election he
+lent an ear to Palestrina’s music hastily composed for the occasion, and
+remarked that Pierluigi had forgotten Pope Marcello’s Mass—a criticism
+that mortified the great composer, but which has since been acknowledged
+to be true.
+
+He won the gratitude of the Israelites by his favor. Amazed Rome saw a
+Gentile actually scourged on the Corso for insulting a member of that
+ancient race. To another Israelite was granted special privileges for his
+success in increasing the production of silk.
+
+Col. Meline’s book is not a literal translation of Baron Hübner’s _Life of
+Sixtus V._: it is rather a _résumé_, as the preface explains. It consists
+of three parts: the first reviews the life of that pope, giving such
+details as are of interest to the general reader; the second portrays the
+experience of a Transalpine traveller to Rome three centuries ago; and the
+third is a vivid picture of Rome at that time: the whole being an improved
+edition of three essays already given to the public.
+
+The readers of THE CATHOLIC WORLD are already too familiar with Mr.
+Meline’s felicitous style and his power of analysis to require any
+commendation on our part. And to the public at large he has recommended
+himself by his chivalrous defence of Mary, Queen of Scots. The strong
+lance he has wielded in the defence of her fair name against that doughty
+writer of fiction, Mr. James Anthony Froude, has been too universally
+applauded not to secure a general welcome to whatever comes from his able
+pen.
+
+
+    THE HEART OF MYRRHA LAKE; or, Into the Light of Catholicity. By
+    Minnie Mary Lee. New York: The Catholic Publication Society. 1872.
+
+
+The enthusiastic author of this charming little story has succeeded in
+presenting much logic which is usually dull, in very attractive attire.
+The arguments and conclusions are so wonderfully clear, that it is to be
+hoped the book will fall frequently into the hands of the class most in
+need of it, but, alas! least likely to read it. There is in it much of
+quiet humor which is irresistible and very “telling”; as, for instance,
+when to the question, “What Catholic books have you read, sir?” the sturdy
+Methodist, Abner White, replies: “_Fox’s Book of Martyrs_, _Maria Monk_,
+_Six Months in a Convent_, _Romanism at Home_, _Priest and Nun_, etc.” And
+again, in the interview between Aunt Ruth and the committee of Methodist
+ladies who had come to wait upon her after her husband’s conversion, human
+nature, and especially Methodist nature, is painted with a very clever
+pen. Who has not known just such spinsters as Miss Nancy and Miss Sarah?
+And what a keen dash is this:
+
+“ ‘Then we shall report that you choose to follow your husband, rather
+than the goodly rules of our Methodist discipline?’
+
+“ ‘I shall go with my husband certainly,’ was the firm, respectful answer.
+
+“ ‘And may God have mercy on your soul,’ solemnly added the spinster, as
+if addressing a person about to be hanged.
+
+“ ‘Thank you!’ absently and innocently responded the quiet Quakeress.
+
+“ ‘I suppose, then, _we need not even pray for you_?’ said one.
+
+“ ‘You always _was_ a little queer, Sister White, you and Brother White,
+too, now that we come to think it over,’ said another.
+
+“ ‘Extremely odd it is for one to lose all sense of propriety, and assume
+the responsibility of such a fearful step,’ rapidly spoke little Sarah.
+
+“ ‘We pity you, and _would_ help you, but you won’t let us,’ was Mrs.
+Sand’s trembling good‐by.
+
+“ ‘We wash our hands of all sin in this matter. It lies at your own door,’
+were the last consolatory words of Miss Nancy.”
+
+Many another reader might say with Myrrha, “When I took up that small book
+called _A General Catechism of the __ Christian Doctrine_, I little
+dreamed upon what a study I had entered. Again, after reading it through,
+I as little dreamed upon what a sea of speculation I had launched.” May
+the result of such reading prove as fruitful of good to all readers as to
+Myrrha! But such results seem to happen oftener in books than in real,
+selfish life. The best of this story is its ending, which, this time, is
+neither marriage nor death for the lovers.
+
+
+    FLEURANGE. By Mme. Augustus Craven. Translated by M. P. T. New
+    York: The Catholic Publication Society. 1872.
+
+
+Rarely, indeed, have we met a work whose author exhibits so many of the
+qualities indespensable in a good novelist, as the one under
+consideration. Artistic in conception, pure and elevated in style, it is
+withal faultless in tone and sentiment.
+
+It is not our purpose to give an outline of the plot of this tale, or to
+enlarge on the actors through whom it is evolved, but we shall confine
+ourselves to some observations on certain characteristics of the writer as
+developed in her work.
+
+The author manifests a high degree of insight and the æsthetic sense, an
+intimate knowledge of feminine nature, and more of that of the opposite
+sex than its members may dream of—in acquiring which the delicate
+intuitions of her own sex doubtless serve a better purpose than the mere
+logic and learning of ours. Although the story introduces the reader into
+the highest social circles, and its incidents are of the most absorbing
+interest, there is no sacrifice of the dramatic unities, or any departure
+from the essential simplicity of the narrative. This severity of style, we
+may say, is at once the most winning quality of a work of genius, and the
+best test of its success; making the latter dependent on inherent
+excellence, rather than adventitious aids. In works of this character, art
+in letters reaches its highest development—that in which it becomes the
+most natural.
+
+A noticeable feature is the epigrammatic conciseness with which a
+sentiment or description is finished. The reader is never wearied with
+platitudes or over‐minuteness of limning. Whatever idea occurs to the
+writer which she is willing to share with the reader is expressed in the
+fewest possible words. Is a scene to be presented to the mind’s eye?—a few
+touches of the artist’s pencil bring it vividly before us. The reader
+finds himself moved alternately to mirthfulness, or tears, or
+astonishment, as he encounters an unexpected bit of humor, and exquisite
+burst of pathos, or some reflection almost startling in depth or
+suggestiveness. Some passages are open to obvious inference, while others
+constitute studies if we would probe their philosophy. It was a question
+with those who watched the serial progress of the story, how the author
+could bring order and harmony out of the complications in which she had
+involved her principal characters; and the way this has been accomplished
+will be acknowledged as not the least of her achievements. No characters
+are interchanged or lose their identity. Each acts his part as naturally,
+and retains his individuality, as in real life; so that, when the
+_dramatis personæ_ are at length summoned to the footlights for a final
+adieu, we feel inclined to protest, in the name of all the delighted
+auditors, against the call, as a premature termination of a very pleasant
+intercourse.
+
+The reception _Fleurange_ has met with thus far is very flattering. It has
+commended itself to the favorable judgment of the London _Saturday
+Review_, and other authorities of like critical acumen; has been _crowned_
+by the French Academy; and received the general approval of the press and
+public, so far as we have learned, while passing through the pages of _Le
+Correspondant_ and THE CATHOLIC WORLD. We know of no recent imaginative
+work of which we could speak in terms of more unqualified approbation, or
+better deserving a permanent place in our literature, both as a work of
+art and for the sound principles by which it is pervaded and informed.
+
+On the translation, we do not know that we could bestow higher praise than
+to say that it reads like an original work of the first order; while we
+are convinced that it is a faithful and conscientious rendering from the
+French text.
+
+
+    LEGENDS OF ST. PATRICK By Aubrey De Vere. Dublin: McGlashan &
+    Gill. London: Henry S. King & Co. 1872. (New York: Sold by The
+    Catholic Publication Society.)
+
+
+“If the Ireland of early times is ever understood, it will not be till
+after thoughtful men have deemed her legends worthy of their serious
+attention.” This remark Mr. De Vere makes in his preface, and not until we
+had read through his _Legends_ did we fully realize its truth. It is a
+most certain fact that the twilight of Irish history can be changed into
+day only by the profound study of its legendary lore. We have read several
+lives of S. Patrick, and more than one history of Ireland have we studied,
+but from none of them did we get so clear an insight into the character of
+the saint and the genius of his people as from Mr. De Vere’s _Legends_,
+few and short though they be.
+
+The subjects are beautiful and poetic, and the author’s conception of them
+lofty and spiritual. There is indeed a sacred melody about early Irish
+song which only a spiritual bard can evoke. Chords there are in Erin’s
+ancient harp which a hand of mere flesh and blood may not touch. Mr. De
+Vere has sung those songs; he has touched these chords, and they have
+given forth their true melody. It is not to his beautiful diction and
+varying metres, it is not to his wonderful descriptive powers and high
+poetic gifts, that we attribute this success, but it is to those two
+passions of his soul which impress themselves on all that he writes—love
+of God and love of Ireland. And here an opportunity is afforded us of
+speaking of Mr. De Vere as the poet of Ireland. That he is far superior to
+any Irish poet of the present day is beyond all question, and that his
+equal, in everything save popularity, to any English poet of the day is a
+verdict competent judges have not hesitated to give.
+
+We often ask ourselves, How is it, then, he is so little known and read by
+his countrymen in America? For twenty years he has scorned “the siren’s
+tinsel lure,” and devoted all his talents to sounding the praises of
+Ireland and of Ireland’s Catholicity. His sole aim through life has been
+to enshrine Ireland’s faith and Ireland’s song in the temple of fame.
+Patriotism is his only incentive to labor; he seems indifferent to
+popularity, and perhaps this is one reason why he enjoys so little. But
+there are other reasons, we think, and they also are in his favor. Mr. De
+Vere is too polished, too thoughtful, and too spiritual to be a popular
+poet.
+
+If he would descend from his high poetic ideal to sing love songs, he
+would soon be popular; but he will never prove a recreant bard. Those for
+whom he has so long and so faithfully labored must disenthrall themselves
+from the spirit of the age, and ascend to his level; then will they find
+in him all they can desire, and proclaim him their laureate. They will not
+find in him, it is true, the inimitable sweetness of Moore or the poetic
+fire of Davis, but they will find in him the patriotism of both, a polish
+superior to either, and, over all and above all, they will find a muse
+ennobled by the highest sentiments of religion and morality.
+
+
+    THE TRUTH. By Field Marshal the Duke of Saldanha. Translated from
+    the Portuguese, by William John Charles Henry. London: Burns,
+    Oates & Co. 1872. (New York: Sold by The Catholic Publication
+    Society.)
+
+
+This little volume will be found to contain not only some of the most
+forcible arguments for Christianity that have ever been advanced, but
+particularly a collection (in the first chapter) of testimonials from
+ancient heathendom to what is only realized in Christ and his religion.
+Nothing can be more interesting, surely, than the study of the great
+tradition of expectation which fulfilled the prophecy of the dying Israel:
+“And He shall be the expectation of the nations” (Gen. xlix. 10). Our
+noble author opens his first chapter with this sentence: “From the east to
+the west, from the north to the south, in every language, in the
+literature of all nations, with a voice spontaneous, universal, and
+unanimous, the entire human race cried aloud for the coming of a Divine
+Teacher.” And when we have delightedly perused this first chapter, we as
+heartily endorse its concluding sentence: “This we believe to have most
+clearly demonstrated that, ... with one voice, unanimous, spontaneous, and
+universal, the human race cried out for the coming of a God of
+revelation.”
+
+The work is designed for a defence of Christianity against the infidelity
+of the day. And we think it a most able and a singularly attractive one.
+Let our young men especially read it. It will make them a match for any
+sceptical show of learning.
+
+
+    CATHOLIC WORSHIP. A Manual of Popular Instruction on the
+    Ceremonies and Devotions of the Church. By Frederick Canon
+    Oakeley. New York: The Catholic Publication Society. 1872.
+
+
+Recent converts and inquirers after religious truth frequently experience
+some difficulty in understanding the ceremonies of the church and the
+various devotional practices of Catholics. We know of no more suitable
+book to place in the hands of such persons than this little treatise of
+Canon Oakeley. It is concise, clear, and methodical. Nothing is left
+unexplained, from the practice of taking holy water upon entering the
+church to the consecration of a bishop. This book will be found to be of
+great use not only to converts, but to Catholics in general, containing as
+it does a thoroughly reliable explanation of everything connected with our
+worship. This second edition is an evidence of the favor with which it has
+been received by the Catholic public.
+
+
+    THE SHADOW OF THE OBELISK, and Other Poems. By Thomas William
+    Parsons. London: Hatchards, Piccadilly. 1872.
+
+
+This modest volume is from the author whose translations from Dante, that
+have appeared in our magazine, are attracting deserved attention.
+
+Mr. Parsons’ powers as a lyric poet are considerable. His verse has, for
+the most part, the easy and often careless diction of a school which many
+think gone out, but which we believe destined to revive. Yet here and
+there we see the influence of Tennyson. The lines, “To Henry Wadsworth
+Longfellow,” are in the latter style. For strength his sonnets are his
+best efforts. We wish he had favored us with more of them.
+
+There is ample variety in the pieces collected. The poet has travelled
+much. “The Shadow of the Obelisk” sets us musing in Rome. “The Birthplace
+of Robert Burns” takes us to “bonnie Scotland.” “St. James’ Park” tells us
+the writer has philosophized in London. While the “Willey House,” “On the
+Death of Daniel Webster,” and “Hudson River” are themes from his native
+America. The lines, “On a Magnolia Flower,” are fragrant with the
+South—the pale, sad South—and one of the gems of the book.
+
+Mr. Parsons is a Unitarian, as he takes care to indicate; but, like
+Longfellow, he has Catholic sympathies. However, there is one short
+translation from Dante, entitled “A Lesson for Easter,” the last two lines
+of which _seem_ to talk Protestantism:
+
+
+    “Ye have the Testament, the Old and New,
+    And this for your salvation is enough.”
+
+
+But the preceding lines should throw light on the Catholic poet’s meaning:
+
+
+    “Christians, be staid: walk wisely and serene:
+    Be grave, and shun the flippant speech of those
+    Who think that _every_ wave will wash them clean—
+    That _any_ field will serve them for repose.
+    Be not a feather to each wind that blows:
+    There is a _Shepherd_ and a _Fold_ for you:
+    Ye have a _Leader_ when your way is rough.”
+
+
+All this is unmistakable orthodoxy; and, therefore, the two lines quoted,
+which come next, speak of the evidence of the Old and the New Testament
+for the “one Fold and one Shepherd” and the infallible “Leader.”
+
+We conclude by hoping that Mr. Parsons will vouchsafe us another volume of
+minor poems, and especially of sonnets.
+
+
+    THE LIFE OF FATHER MATHEW, THE PEOPLE’S SOGGARTH AROON. By Sister
+    Mary Francis Clare, Author of _The Illustrated History of
+    Ireland_, _Advice to Irish Girls in America_, _Hornehurst
+    Rectory_, etc.
+
+
+The indefatigable Nun of Kenmare could not have employed her pen on a
+worthier subject than the life and labors of the Apostle of Temperance.
+She will have accomplished a great end if this work serves to keep green
+in the hearts of her countrymen and of all Catholics the memory of one who
+accomplished more good than many who possessed more brilliant abilities,
+yet who neglected to employ their talents in that usurious activity which
+wins a blessing.
+
+
+    DAILY STEPS TO HEAVEN. New York: D. & J. Sadlier & Co. 1872.
+
+
+This, as well as the preceding work, belongs to a series of publications
+by the same author, embracing religious, historical, and miscellaneous
+books, which have attained an extraordinary popularity in the old country
+and in the United States.
+
+
+    A BIOGRAPHICAL DICTIONARY. By Rev. Reuben Parsons, D.D. New York:
+    D. & J. Sadlier & Co.
+
+
+This work has been compiled “for the use of colleges, schools, and
+families.” It contains short biographical sketches of the principal
+characters of history, together with chronological tables. The subjects
+are for the most part well selected, and, as far as we have read, are well
+and correctly treated. The style of the author is terse and vigorous, and
+well adapted to this kind of composition.
+
+The printing is excellent, the binding neat, but the figure in the
+frontispiece has suffered not a little at the hands of the artist—an
+accident which mars somewhat the general appearance of the book.
+
+
+    THE NEW GOD. Translated from the German of Conrad von Bolanden, by
+    Very Rev. Theodore Noethen, V.G. Albany: M. O’Sullivan. 1872.
+
+
+Our readers have already had a sufficient taste of this author’s quality
+in “The Progressionists,” now going through our pages, to desire the
+further treat to be found in the new products of his pen. We do not recall
+any series of fictitious writings, designed to combat vicious principles
+and actions, more admirable as specimens of vigorous and effective
+composition. The most obtuse progressionist could scarcely fail to
+comprehend the drift of the underlying argument, while the more fastidious
+reader will be carried along by the interest of the tale through which it
+is conveyed. Father Noethen is performing an acceptable service in making
+these works known to the English reader.
+
+Bolanden’s works fairly palpitate with the gravity of themes of living
+interest. The new German Government, the burthen of the present tale, has
+given evidence of their telling effect by ordering their suppression.
+
+
+    GERALDINE: A TALE OF CONSCIENCE. By E. C. A. New York: P. O’Shea.
+
+
+_Geraldine_ was one of the first successful religious novels which
+followed the revival of Catholic doctrine in England, and bids fair to
+hold its own for many a year to come. It enjoys a wider reputation than
+either of Miss Agnew’s other works, one of which, _Rome and the Abbey_,
+forms a sequel to this.
+
+Mr. O’Shea also issues a reprint of Cardinal Wiseman’s _Lectures on the
+Connection between Science and Revealed Religion_; intended, apparently,
+as the commencement of an uniform series of the great author’s works.
+
+It is to be regretted that this work had not undergone a thorough revision
+by some competent hand before its reappearance, in order to adapt it to
+the present state of scientific investigation. Although true science can
+never be out of harmony with revelation, its successive developments may
+enable us to see the conditions of that harmony and relation in a clearer
+light than when the _Lectures_ were originally published.
+
+
+    THE HISTORY OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN MARY. Translated from the French
+    of the Abbé Orsini, by the Very Rev. F. C. Husenbeth, D.D., V.G.
+    Boston: Patrick Donahoe. 1872.
+
+
+This work is already known to many readers in the presentation edition
+issued by the Messrs. Sadlier some years since, and the recent English
+edition of which the above is a _fac‐simile_. We are glad to see an
+edition like this made accessible to the great body of readers, though the
+fire in which the publisher was involved, will interfere for a time with
+that consummation. It has a number of pictorial illustrations, and there
+are appended the letters apostolic concerning the dogmatic definition of
+the Immaculate Conception.
+
+
+    LIZA. By Ivan S. Turgenieff. New York: Holt & Williams. 1872.
+
+
+_Liza_ is another work from the pen of M. Turgenieff, the distinguished
+Russian novelist, several of whose works are already familiar to us. His
+quiet sarcasm in depicting the Russian of the old school, who needs no
+scratching to reveal the genuine Tartar—crafty and brutal, but with a
+kindly streak withal—and the Russian of the present generation who has
+imbibed foreign habits and theories by no means elevating, is admirably
+calculated to correct the evils of a transition state of society. The
+former affords us two affecting pictures in this book of women of
+repressed lives, who humbly kiss with their dying lips the hand that has
+crushed them. One of them leaves a young son, Fedor Lavretsky, who never
+forgets his pale and gentle mother, who in turn hardly dared caress him
+for fear of the sharp eyes and cutting tongue of her sister‐in‐law,
+Glafira, who had taken charge of the child. He is brought up under a
+system of repression, and, when his father dies, he goes to Moscow
+determined to repair the defects of his education. There he falls in love
+with the face of a beautiful girl who regards him as a _schöne Partie_ and
+marries him. He gives himself up to the happiness of his new life, and is
+induced by his wife to leave his estate, and, after various changes, to go
+to Paris, where admiration seems to have intoxicated her. Fedor, becoming
+aware of her real character, settles an annuity on her, leaves her, and
+returns to his native land. He cannot bear, however, to go to his own seat
+where he passed the first happy days of his married life, but betakes
+himself to his aunt’s place—the stern Glafira, who had died during his
+absence. The desolate house is once more opened, and he stands alone in
+the room where she breathed her last, and looks with softened heart on the
+sacred icons in their gilded frames in the corner, and the worn carpet,
+covered with drippings from the wax candles she had burned before them,
+and on which she had knelt to pray. His old servant waits on him, he
+drinks tea out of the great cup he had used in his boyhood, looks over the
+large book full of mysterious pictures which he had found so wondrous in
+childish days. Everything recalls the earlier remembrances of his life.
+“On a woman’s love my best years have been wasted,” thought he.
+
+Going to pay his respects to his great‐aunt, who is admirably drawn with a
+few vivid touches, he meets with Liza, whom he left a child, but is now
+nineteen years of age. There is a natural grace about her person; her face
+is pale, but fresh; her eyes lustrous and thoughtful, her smile
+fascinating, but grave, and she has a frank, innocent way of looking you
+directly in the face. Lavretsky is instantly struck with her appearance,
+and the impression is deepened the oftener he sees her. Liza’s mother is
+one of those women, _qui n’a pas inventé la poudre, la bonne daìne_, as
+one of her visitors ungratefully remarks. Her daughter owes the elevation
+and purify of her character to the nurse of her childhood, who gave
+herself up to penitential observances. Instead of nursery tales, she told
+Liza of the Blessed Virgin, the holy hermits who had been fed in their
+caves by the birds, and the female martyrs from whose blood sprang up
+sweet flowers. She used to speak of these things seriously and humbly, as
+if unworthy to utter such high and holy names, and Liza sat at her feet
+with reverent awe drinking in the holy influences of her words. Aglafia
+also taught her to pray, and took her at early dawn to the matin service.
+Liza grew up thoroughly penetrated with a sense of duty, loving everybody,
+but loving God supremely and with tender enthusiasm. Till Lavretsky came,
+no one had troubled the calmness of her inner life.
+
+After some time, learning through a newspaper that his wife is dead, he
+confesses his love to Liza. She feels drawn towards him, her heart seems
+to respond to his love, but it is hardly with genuine passion; it is
+rather the agitation of a lily too rudely stirred by the breeze. Not that
+she has no depth of feeling; but, as she afterwards acknowledges, when she
+did indulge in hopes of happiness, her heart shuddered within her. Love
+seemed almost a profanation, as if a stranger had entered her pure maiden
+chamber.
+
+Suddenly, the wife, supposed to be dead, reappears. It is all a mistake.
+Her husband is stunned. He feels he can never give back his love to one
+who has no longer his respect. And Liza is lost to him. After several
+attempts, he sees her again. Her eyes have grown dimmer and sunken, her
+face is pale, and her lips have lost their color. She implores him to be
+reconciled to his wife, and they part without her allowing her hand to
+meet his.
+
+Six months later, Liza takes the veil in a remote convent in Russia. The
+Greek as well as the Latin convent seems to be the ideal refuge of
+startled innocence and purity. Once Lavretsky goes there, hoping to catch
+a glimpse of her. He sees her as she is leaving the choir. She passes
+close by him with the quick, noiseless step of a nun, but keeps steadily
+on without looking at him. But he sees the almost imperceptible tremor of
+her eye; she bends her emaciated face still lower, and the hands that hold
+the rosary are clasped more tightly together.
+
+But the chief value of M. Turgenieff’s novels to a Catholic lies not in
+the stories themselves certainly, but in the delightful pictures of
+Russian life and manners they present, and the influence they have had in
+softening the rugged manners of the north and changing the condition of
+the serfs.
+
+
+    WONDERS OF THE MOON. Translated from the French of Amédée
+    Guillemin, by Miss M. G. Mead. Edited, with additions, by Maria
+    Mitchell, of Vassar College. Illustrated with forty‐three
+    engravings. New York: Scribner, Armstrong & Co. 1873.
+
+
+This little book contains a tolerably full account of all that is known
+about the moon, and that is of interest to the general reader. Our
+knowledge of our satellite is in some respects hardly equal to that which
+we have recently acquired of the much more distant sun; though so near,
+comparatively, to us, it is still too far away for the telescope ever to
+give us as clear a view of it as we need; and the spectroscope is of
+little use in its examination. We shall never know much about it, and
+especially about its other side, unless we go to see it; and a trip to the
+moon, chimerical as it may seem, may not always remain an impossibility
+for some adventurous person who is willing to run his chance of finding in
+the apparently uncomfortable little place the necessary conditions for
+human life. However, not a few of us will be content with the information
+given in this book, which is vastly greater than what most persons would
+probably acquire by examining the moon with the finest telescope; for a
+telescope is of little service to one unaccustomed to use it, and few
+things are more provoking to an experienced moon‐gazer than evident
+failure of others to see what seems to him so plain. To those, then, who
+really wish to get a good idea of the moon, and especially of its physical
+constitution and probable scenery, in really the most satisfactory way,
+this little volume, notwithstanding a few slight inaccuracies (such as the
+placing of Petit’s bolide at 9,000,000 miles from the earth), will be
+quite interesting and valuable. These inaccuracies, if in the original,
+should have been corrected in the translation.
+
+
+    THE GREAT PROBLEM: The Higher Ministry of Nature viewed in the
+    Light of Modern Science, and as an aid to advanced Christian
+    Philosophy. By John R. Leifchild, A.M., author of _Our Coal Fields
+    and our Coal Pits_; _Cornwall: Its Mines and Miners_, etc., etc.
+    With an introduction by Howard Crosby, D.D., LL.D., Chancellor of
+    the University of New York. New York: G. P. Putnam & Son. 1872.
+
+
+Dr. Crosby introduces this really able and valuable essay with a just and
+manly rebuke of the unparalleled absurdity and impudence of our modern
+materialistic scientists; and it is high time for him, considering what
+balderdash he is obliged to listen to from his chancellor’s chair. The
+essay of Mr. Leifchild is a series of arguments on the topics of natural
+theology, in which some of the principal manifestations of the power and
+wisdom of God in the physical world are pointed out and referred to their
+true cause and end. The author most absurdly saws off the limb of the tree
+on which grows all the fruit he admires so much and gathers so carefully,
+by denying the value of metaphysics. But, in spite of that, his sound mind
+holds implicitly the very metaphysics he ignorantly despises, and he is
+therefore able to reason very well and conclusively. Most persons who read
+books of this kind are more ready to listen to a geologist teaching
+theology than to a professed theologian, and they prefer the roundabout
+method of coming to a point by induction to the straight road of logical
+deduction. This book is likely to be useful, therefore, and is, besides,
+printed in very clear, legible type, which makes it a pleasant book to
+read, though laboring under the sad inconvenience of having neither index
+nor table of contents. There are a good many interesting facts and
+statements about eminent writers interspersed, e.g., Spinoza and Leibnitz;
+but the author is seriously mistaken in ascribing any pantheistic
+doctrines or tendencies to Henry Suso and Tauler. We are happy to welcome
+such books from English writers who are adepts in the physical sciences.
+For these sciences, and the men who are really masters of them, we have a
+great respect in their own sphere. And we consider it a very praiseworthy
+and useful task for men of this kind, to undertake to show the conformity
+of these sciences with the queen over all the scientific realm—Christian
+philosophy.
+
+
+    THE MINNESINGER OF GERMANY. By A. E. Kroeger. New York: Hurd &
+    Houghton. 1872.
+
+
+In this little book we have a very charming, as also very learned,
+exposition of mediæval art. The Minnesinger or minstrel‐knights of the
+latter half of the XIIth and earlier half of the XIIIth centuries are but
+little known outside of Germany. In this book we are introduced to the
+principal masters of this beautiful and ephemeral school of song,
+Gottfried von Strassburg, Walter von der Vogelweide, Ulrich von
+Lichtenstein, Hartmann von der Aue, Regenbogen, Conrad von Würzburg, and
+Henrich von Meissen, known as “_Frauenlob_,” or “ladies’ praise.” These
+poets sang chiefly of religion and love. But foremost among all women, the
+great Mother of God chiefly claimed their enthusiastic homage, as we see
+by the long extracts given by Mr. Kroeger of some of their glorious “Hymns
+to the Virgin.” Here is an example, from “The Divine Minnesong,”
+attributed sometimes to Gottfried of Strassburg:
+
+
+    “Thou art the blooming heaven‐branch,
+    Which blooming, blooms in many a grange;
+      Great care and strange
+      God lavished, Maid, on thee.”
+
+
+We have, unfortunately, no space for a selection of the beauties collected
+for us in this book, and can only recommend our readers to procure it for
+themselves. It is full of gems, and is especially welcome to us as
+evidence of the high degree to which the burning faith of those days had
+led and guided lyrical art. Hartmann von der Aue’s “Poor Henry” is, so we
+are told, “the original of that sweet story of self‐sacrifice which
+Longfellow has made universally known as the ‘Golden Legend,’ (p. 190).”
+The same hymn we have already quoted has this allusion to the “living wine
+of true remorse” and the following words:
+
+
+    “He whom God’s love has never found
+    Is like a shadow on the ground,
+      And does confound
+      Life, wisdom, sense, and reason.”
+
+
+Conrad von Würzburg, in his “Golden Smithy,” represents himself as a gold‐
+smith working an ornament for the Queen of Heaven, and says, “If in the
+depth of the smithy of my heart I could melt a poem out of gold, and could
+enamel the gold with the glowing ruby of pure devotion, I would forge a
+transparent shining and sparkling praise of thy work, thou glorious
+Empress of Heaven.” Walter von der Vogelweide sings these grand words:
+
+
+    “Who slays the lion? Who slays the giant?
+    Who masters them all, however defiant?
+    He does it who himself controlleth;
+    And every nerve of his body enrolleth,
+    _Freed from passion, under strict subjection_.”
+
+
+Mr. Kroeger has done a service to art, to history, and to religion in
+opening thus before our eyes a few of the treasures of the _so‐called_
+dark ages.
+
+
+    COLLEGE JOURNAL. Georgetown College: Dec., 1872, Vol. I., No. 1.
+
+
+This is as elegant a little paper in outward appearance as we remember to
+have seen. The articles are written with taste and correctness, and we
+offer a hearty welcome to the young gentlemen of classic Georgetown on
+their editorial _début_. We have only one piece of advice to give them,
+which is, to be careful that their wit and humor be as classic and
+scholarly as their serious pieces. Most papers, especially juvenile ones,
+break down on this point. We wish our young friends honor and success in
+their enterprise.
+
+The Catholic Publication Society will publish in a few days Wild Times, a
+story by Miss Caddell.
+
+
+
+Books And Pamphlets Received.
+
+
+From C. DAREAU, Quebec: Francis Parkman. Par L’Abbé H. R. Casgrain. 18mo,
+paper, pp. 89.
+
+From A. WILLIAMS & CO., Boston: The Blazing Star; with an appendix
+treating of the Jewish Kabbala. 12mo, pp. 180.
+
+From JAMES R. OSGOOD & CO., Boston: The Masque of the Gods. By Bayard
+Taylor. 12mo, pp. 48.
+
+From LEE & SHEPARD, Boston: Humanity Immortal. By L. P. Hickok, D.D.,
+LL.D. 8vo, pp. 362.—God‐Man. By L. T. Townsend, D.D. 12mo, pp.
+446.—Autobiography of Amos Kendall. Edited by his Son‐in‐law, Wm.
+Stickney. 1872.
+
+From ROBERTS BROTHERS, Boston: Paul of Tarsus: An Inquiry into the Times
+and the Gospel of the Apostle of the Gentiles. By A Graduate, 12mo, pp.
+401.
+
+From D. VAN NOSTRAND, New York: A Treatise on Acoustics in Connection with
+Ventilation. By Alexander Saeltzer. 12mo, pp. 102.
+
+From J. B. LIPPINCOTT & CO., Philadelphia: Thoughts on Paper Currency,
+etc. By Wm. Brown. 18mo, pp. 240.—Black Robes; or, Sketches of Missions
+and Ministers in the Wilderness and on the Border. By Robert P. Nevin.
+12mo, pp. 366.
+
+From A. D. F. RANDOLPH & CO., New York: The Scripture Doctrine in
+Reference to the Seat of Sin in the Regenerate Man. 18mo, pp. 125.
+
+From DESFORGES & LAWRENCE, Milwaukee: A Religion of Evolution: Letters of
+“Internationalist” Reviewing the Sermons of J. L. Dudley, Pastor of
+Plymouth Congregationalist Church, Milwaukee, 8vo, pp. 42.
+
+From C. C. CHATFIELD & CO., New Haven: Hints to Young Editors. 12mo, pp.
+31.
+
+From CARROLL, Wheeling: Pastoral Letter of the Rt. Rev. Richard Vincent
+Whelan, Bishop of Wheeling, to the Clergy and Laity of the Diocese. 8vo,
+pp. 12.
+
+Ninth Annual Report of the New York Catholic Protectory. Paper, 8vo, pp.
+66.
+
+Constitution and By‐Laws of the Catholic Total Abstinence Union of
+America, with the Journal of Proceedings and Address of the First General
+Convention held at Baltimore, Md., Feb. 22, 23, 1872. 8vo, pp. 57.
+
+Library Work in the Army. United States Military Post Library Association.
+Annual Report, 1871‐2. Paper, 12mo, pp. 57.
+
+The English Inquisition worse than the Spanish. By an English Priest.
+Montreal. 18mo, pp. 34.
+
+From Hon. EUGENE CASSERLY: Papers relating to the Foreign Relations of the
+U. S. transmitted to Congress with the Annual Message of the President,
+Dec. 4, 1871.
+
+
+
+
+
+THE CATHOLIC WORLD. VOL. XVI., NO. 95.—FEBRUARY, 1873.
+
+
+
+
+Who Made Our Laws?
+
+
+It is a characteristic of every succeeding century to consider itself much
+wiser than any or all that have preceded it. In this respect our beloved
+NINETEENTH is no exception; in fact, with a vanity that may be palliated,
+if not excused, it considers that, comparatively speaking, the world has
+hitherto been in its schoolboy days, and only attained its majority on the
+first day of January, 1800. It is true that the great advances made in the
+physical sciences, in chemistry, astronomy, and geology, and in the
+application of steam and electricity, have marked our age as one of true
+progress in a certain direction, and are substantial subjects of self‐
+congratulation; but it must also be remembered that very little of the
+genuine happiness of mankind in general depends upon any or all of these
+discoveries and appliances. Man, being an intellectual as well as an
+animal being, must look to spiritual discoveries and mental agencies for
+his chief sources of enjoyment; and, as the soul controls the body, as his
+main duty in this life is to qualify that soul for an eternity of bliss,
+as the unlimited future is superior to the limited present, it follows
+that the things merely of this world play a small and insignificant part
+in the real drama of the life of a human being. The sad misconception of
+this solution of the problem of man’s destiny has been the principal
+mistake of materialists, and their consequent punishment here below has
+been so marked that the criticism of the charitable is considerately
+withheld.
+
+Fortunately for us Catholics, the great desideratum—the law that includes
+all laws—is immovably fixed, and no new discoveries, no alleged progress,
+no experiment, can disturb it. Immutable as the eternal hills, it stands
+to‐day as when promulgated in Judæa over eighteen hundred years ago by its
+Divine Founder, and though the heavens and earth may pass away, we have
+the assurance that it shall not. But there have sprung out of the
+operation of this great law other laws which may be called secondary or
+subsidiary, which have long affected the welfare of Christendom, and upon
+the observance or rejection of which much of the welfare or misery of
+nations has depended and must for ever depend. Political justice, social
+order, art, science, and literature, everything which relates to the
+relations of man with his fellows, and brightens and beautifies life, have
+a great deal more to do with forming the character and insuring the purity
+of a people, as well as the regulation of their actions justly, than
+railroads, telegraphs, and anæsthetic agents. Respect for the memory of
+the dead and charity for the living prevent us from pointing out
+individual instances where men, remarkable for their skill and
+perseverance in forwarding the latter projects, have neither been
+distinguished for their truthfulness, liberality, nor for any moral
+quality typical of intelligent Christians. The best of these men are
+simply clever mechanists, increasing, it is true, our sum of knowledge of
+the effect of certain forces in nature, yet without being able to reveal
+the nature of the forces themselves, which seems impossible; but whoever
+teaches us true ideas regarding the active agencies that govern ordinary
+life is the true benefactor of his species, and is the governor of his
+audience or race. Have our discoveries in this science of making mankind
+more moral, humane, and refined kept pace with our more intimate
+acquaintance with the secrets of nature and the laws of mechanism, or have
+we to look back to the despised past for all our ideas of rectitude in
+legislation, honesty in the administration of government, and truthfulness
+in the plastic arts? We fear that a candid answer to this question would
+involve some loss of our self‐esteem. While, like the degenerate Hebrews,
+we have been worshipping graven images, the work of men’s hands, we have
+been neglecting the Tables of the Law.
+
+All national governments reflect more or less correctly the ideas of the
+people governed. The absolutism of Russia is as much the reflex of the
+mental status of the inhabitants of that vast and semi‐civilized empire as
+that of the United States is of our busy, hasty, and heterogeneous
+population. The first is a necessity growing out of a peculiar order of
+things, wherein many tribes and barbarous races are to be found struggling
+towards light and civilization; the other is the creation of the matured
+minds of experienced and profound statesmen, acting as the delegates of a
+self‐reliant and self‐sustaining people. Still, though the framework of
+the government is _unique_, the ideas of justice and equality which
+underlie it are old. In one sense they are not American, but European, for
+it cannot be denied that the principles of our constitutions, state and
+national, the laws accepted or enacted in harmony therewith, and the modes
+of their interpretation and administration, are taken from the civil
+polity of the nations of the Old World, as those again have been the
+direct and palpable result of the teachings of the Catholic Church. Russia
+to‐day is mainly barbarous, and subject to the unfettered will of one man,
+because centuries ago the East broke away from the centre of Catholic
+unity, and, in losing the Apostolic authority, lost all its vivifying
+power, and the ministers of the so‐called Greek Church their capacity and
+efficiency as civilizers and law‐givers.
+
+The West was more loyal, and consequently more fortunate. If we consider
+for a moment the chaotic condition of the greater part of Europe when the
+church commenced to spread far and wide the teachings of the Gospel,
+slowly but steadily pursuing her holy mission, we may be able to
+appreciate the herculean task before her. Then, in every part of Europe,
+from the pole to the Mediterranean, from the Carpathians to the Atlantic,
+disorder, ignorance, and rapine prevailed. Wave after wave of Northern and
+Eastern hordes had swept over the continent and most of the islands,
+submerging the effete nations of the South, and carrying destruction and
+death wherever they surged. The old Roman civilization, such as it was,
+was entirely obliterated, all municipal law was abolished, the conquered
+masses were reduced to the condition of serfs, and, as each successive
+leader of a tribe rested from his bloody labors and built a stronghold for
+his occupancy, he reserved to himself the exclusive monopoly of plunder
+and spoliation in his own particular neighborhood. This of course led to
+rivalry and unceasing warfare between rival marauders, and the incessant
+slaughter and oppression of their retainers and tenants.
+
+It was with these fierce and lawless _nobles_, as they loved to style
+themselves, that the church for centuries waged most persistent and
+uncompromising warfare, and against them she hurled her most terrible
+anathemas. It was she who taught the sanguinary barons and chieftains that
+there was a moral power greater than armed force and stronger than moated
+and castellated tower, who took by the hand the downtrodden, impoverished
+serf, freed him from his earthly bonds, taught him the knowledge of God’s
+law, the principles of eternal justice and the rights of humanity, and
+instilled into his heart those ideas of human liberty which have since
+fructified and now permeate every free or partially free government in
+both hemispheres. Those great results were achieved in many ways, as local
+circumstances required; by teaching and exhorting, by persuasion or
+threats, by taking the serf into the ministry of the church and thereby
+making him the superior of his former master, by introducing gradually
+just and equitable laws, and when necessary forcing their adoption on
+unwilling sovereigns and reluctant nobles, and, perhaps, most potently by
+the example of her own organization, which permitted the humblest of her
+children to be crowned by a free election with the tiara of the successors
+of S. Peter.
+
+The influence of the church in secular affairs was particularly remarkable
+in England, from which we have drawn so many of our political opinions and
+principles. The early missionaries to the Britons and Saxons were
+doubtless men of high intelligence as well as sanctity; but the Norman and
+Anglo‐Norman ecclesiastics who came into the country with William the
+Conqueror and clustered around his sons and successors were still more
+remarkable for astuteness and breadth of view. For many generations after
+the Conquest they may be said to have governed England in so far as they
+framed her laws, conducted her ordinary jurisprudence, and mainly directed
+her foreign and domestic policy. The most interesting, though by no means
+the most impartial, chapters in Hallam and Blackstone are those devoted to
+the struggles between the lay lawyers supported or subsidized by the
+nobility, and the clerical jurists who defended the privileges of their
+order and the natural rights of the oppressed masses. The Great Charter,
+of which we hear so much from persons who very probably never read it, was
+undoubtedly the work of the latter, though signed by all the barons with
+their seal or mark; trial by jury, the germs of which may be traced into
+remote antiquity, was systematized and as far as possible perfected under
+their auspices; courts of equity, for the rectification of “injustice
+which the law from its generality worketh to individuals,” were their
+creation, and even until comparatively late years were presided over by
+them; and representative or parliamentary government may justly be said to
+have been the fruit of their fertile and ever‐active brains. Its founder,
+in England at least, was de Montfort, who, though not in orders, was the
+follower, if not the pupil, of the great S. Bernard.
+
+It is thus that we, the ungrateful or forgetful eulogists of the XIXth
+century, while laying the flattering unction to our souls that we have
+done more than put a girdle round the earth in forty minutes, ignore the
+long, painful, and continuous efforts of our spiritual forefathers to
+christianize, civilize, and make free our ancestors in the order of nature
+whom pagan despotism and barbaric cupidity sought to degrade and
+brutalize. In our self‐glorification we forget that all we have in
+legislation, of which we are naturally so proud and for which we never can
+be too thankful, is the product of long years of toil and reflection of
+humble priests and learned prelates, whose names are now scarcely
+remembered. The ideas of justice and clemency generated in the minds of
+those men of the past by the spirit of Catholicity are the same which
+govern our daily actions, and regulate the most important affairs of our
+lives and of those most dear to us, though we are so occupied or so
+ungrateful that we fail to acknowledge the sources from whence they arose.
+
+For instance, the possession of real estate forms one of the principal
+attractions for the ambition of industrious Americans, yet how few of them
+ever think that the laws regulating its disposition, acquisition, and
+inheritance are the very enactments framed by monks, hundreds of years
+ago, and recognized by armed laymen after long and at times doubtful
+contests with the advocates of the arbitrary feudal system. Personal
+liberty, speedy trial by our peers, were first secured in an incontestable
+form by an archbishop of the church which some of our so‐called and
+“loudly called” preachers are never tired of denouncing as tyrannical.
+That the right of the people governed, to elect representatives to make
+laws affecting their “lives, liberty, and pursuit of happiness,” was
+obtained and carried into practical effect by a Catholic statesman many
+centuries before Thomas Jefferson or Benjamin Franklin were born, seems to
+have been forgotten by our pseudo‐liberals; while the grand principle of
+political equality which lies at the foundation of our republic, instead
+of being less than a hundred years old, is coeval with Christianity
+itself, and in its operation within the church is more expansive and less
+discriminating as regards social rank and condition.
+
+But though, in this inconsiderate age, we fail to acknowledge the deep
+debt of gratitude we owe to the workers and thinkers of the past for our
+laws, civilization, and correct ideas of government, we cannot if we would
+deny that we are still ruled by those very ideas, and that none of our
+boasted, and in their way valuable, discoveries have had the effect to
+give us a new or a better scheme of jurisprudence, whereby mankind can be
+made better, wiser, or happier.
+
+The people of the United States are not generally considered a profoundly
+reflective people; we are too much engaged with the present to care much
+about either the past or future; but we respectfully suggest that, while
+we may be justly proud of our laws and system of government, it is hardly
+fair or generous to assume to ourselves all the credit for their formation
+and existence. We have done enough to secure the liberty of our fellow‐
+men, and maintain our authority in the family of nations, not to be able
+to be just, if not generous, to the memory of the men who have bequeathed
+to us so invaluable a legacy; and let us therefore accord to our Catholic
+ancestors due credit for the conception and transmission of the laws under
+which we all so happily live. After all, their ideas rule more than our
+own, whether we will or not.
+
+
+
+
+Dante’s Purgatorio. Canto Sixth.
+
+
+    When from the game of hazard men depart,
+      The loser stays, and, casting o’er his throws,
+    Learns a hard lesson with a heavy heart;
+      While with the winner all the assembly goes:
+    One runs before, one plucks his robe behind,
+      But he delays not, though beside his way
+    Another comrade calls himself to mind;
+      And every one perceives that he would say:
+    “_Press me no more!_” to whom he lifts his hand,
+      And by so doing keeps the crowd at bay;
+    Such I was, freeing me from that dense band,
+      To this and that one bending my survey,
+    And promising to answer each demand.
+
+    Here was that Aretine whose lethal wound
+      The savage hands of Ghin’ di Tacco made;
+    Also that knight who in pursuit was drowned.
+      Here with stretched palms Frederic Novello prayed,
+    The Pisan, too, at whose defeat his sire,
+      Good old Marzucco, showed a strength sublime.
+    I saw Count Orso, and that soul whom dire
+      Envy and spite, but no committed crime
+    Tore from his mortal frame, as he declared;
+      Pierre de la Brosse I mean: so, while she may,
+    Be that bad woman of Brabant prepared
+      Lest she go join a far worse flock than they.
+
+    When I had freed me from the gathering press
+      Of shadows praying still that others’ prayers
+    Might hasten forward their own blessedness,
+      I thus began: “Thy page, my Light! declares
+    Expressly, in one text, that Heaven’s decree
+      To no beseeching bendeth.(214) Yet this race
+    Prays with such purpose: will their praying be
+      Without avail? or have I in that place
+    Misread thy word?” He answered: “It is gross
+      And plain to reason: no fallacious hope
+    Is theirs, if thy sound mind consider close;
+      The topmost height of judgment doth not slope,
+    Because love’s fire may instantly complete
+      The penance due from one of these: but where
+    I closed that point with words which you repeat,
+      A gulf betwixt the Most High was and prayer:
+    No praying there could cover past defect.
+      Yet verily, in so profound a doubt
+    Rest not, till she who, ’twixt thine intellect
+      And truth, shall be thy light, herself speak out.
+    Dost understand me? Beatrice I mean:
+      Thou shalt behold her in a loftier place,
+    This mountain summit, smiling and serene.”
+      “Good Guide,” said I, “then let us mend our pace,
+    I feel no more my weariness: o’er us
+      The mountain shadow grows and hides mine own.”
+    “We will go forward”—he gave answer thus—
+      “Far as we can, ere this day’s light be gone;
+    But thy thought wanders from the fact. That height
+      Ere thou canst gain, thou shalt behold the day’s
+    Returning orb, who now so hides his light
+      Behind the hill that thou break’st not his rays.
+    But yonder look! one spirit, all alone,
+      By itself stationed, bends toward us his gaze:
+    The readiest passage will by him be shown”
+
+    Sordello.
+
+    We came up tow’rds it: O proud Lombard soul!
+      How thou didst wait, in thy disdain unstirred,
+    And thy majestic eyes didst slowly roll!
+      Meanwhile to us it never uttered word,
+    But let us move, just giving us a glance,
+      Like as a lion looks in his repose.
+    Then Virgil, making a more near advance,
+      Prayed him to show us where the mountain rose
+    With easier slope, and still that soul replied
+      Nothing to his demand; but question made
+    About life, and our country. My sweet Guide
+      Began to answer: “Mantua”—and the shade
+    From where it had been, separate from his band,
+      All rapt in self, sprang up towards him in haste,
+    Saying: “O Mantuan, I am of thy land,
+      I am Sordello.” And the twain embraced.
+
+    Ah slavish Italy! thou common inn
+      For woe to lodge at! without pilot, thou
+    Ship in great tempest! not what thou hast been,
+      Lady of provinces, but brothel now!
+    That gentle soul so quickly, at the dear
+      Sound that recalled his country, forward came
+    To grace his townsman with a greeting here;
+      And now thy living children, to their shame,
+    Are all at war, and they who dwell most near
+      Prey, each on each, with moat and wall the same!
+    Search, wretched! search all round thine either coast,
+      And then look inland, in thy bosom, see
+    If peace in any part of thee thou know’st!
+      What though Justinian made new reins for thee,
+    What boots it if the saddle remain void?
+      Without his mending thy disgrace were less.
+    And O ye tribe that ought to be employed
+      In your devotions, and let Cæsar press
+    The seat of Cæsar if God’s word you heed,
+      See, since your hand hath on the bridle been,
+    How wanton grown and wicked is the steed,
+      Through want from you of the spur’s discipline.
+    O German Albert! who abandonest
+      Her now run wild, unchecked by curb of thine,
+    When thou shouldst ride her with thy heels hard‐pressed;
+      May heaven’s just judgment light upon thy line,
+      And be it something strange, and manifest,
+    To make him tremble that comes after thee,
+      Because, for lust of barren fiefs out there,(215)
+    Thou and thy Father have not shamed to see
+      The empire’s garden desolate and bare.
+    Come see the Capulets and Montagues,
+      Monaldi and Filippeschi, O thou being
+    Without concern! these wan with fears, and those
+      Already crushed: come sate thyself with seeing,
+    Thou cruel man, the outrage that is done
+      To thy best blood, and make their bruises well!
+    And thou shalt see too, thou cold looker‐on,
+      Santafiore’s lords how safe they dwell.
+    Come see thy Rome that mourning all alone
+      Weepeth, a widow, calling day and night,
+    Why, O my Cæsar, dost thou leave thine own?
+      Come see what love there—how all hearts unite!
+    And if no pity move thee at our moan
+    Blush for thy fame beholding such a sight.
+      And, lawful if I speak, O most high Jove
+    Who wast for _our_ sakes crucified on earth,
+      Are thy just eyes who watchest men above
+    Turned elsewhere?—Or is this before the birth
+      Of some great good a preparation hid
+    From us in the abyss of thy intent,
+      That all the Italian towns are tyrant‐rid,
+    And every clown that comes on faction bent
+      Makes as much clamor as Marcellus did?
+
+    My Florence! well may’st thou remain content
+      At this digression; it concerns not thee,
+    Thanks to thy people, great in argument!
+      Many with justice in their hearts there be
+    Who stay the shaft lest, coming to the bow
+      Without discretion, it might err; but they
+    On their lips wear it. Many men are slow
+      To serve the state, and turn from place away;
+    Thy people do not—every one bends low,
+      Crying before he’s called for: “I obey.”
+    Now make thee joyful, who may’st triumph well;
+      Thou who art rich—so wise! and so at peace!
+    If I speak true in this—let the truth tell.
+      Athens and Sparta, that raised civil Greece
+    To such a height, and framed the ancient laws,
+      Towards the well‐ordered life made small beginning
+    Compared with thee, whose legislation draws
+      Threads out so fine that thy October spinning
+    Comes before mid‐November to a pause.
+      How many times hast thou renewed thy men,
+    Yea, within days that in thy memory dwell,
+      And changed thy laws and offices, and then
+    Customs and coins! if thou remember well
+      Thou wilt behold thyself, unless quite blind,
+    Like a sick woman, restless, that in vain
+      Seeks on her pillow some repose to find,
+    And turns and turns as ’twere to parry pain.
+
+
+
+
+The Church The Champion Of Marriage.
+
+
+“There is nothing new under the sun,” least of all the continued crusade
+the church has headed and now heads against the enemies of Christian
+marriage. What marriage is, what duties it involves, what holiness it
+requires, what grace it confers, we leave to other pens more learned or
+more eloquent to define. What are the Scripture authorities and allowable
+inferences concerning the married state, its indissolubility and its
+future transformation in heaven, we leave to theologians to state. Those
+who may feel curious as to that part of the question, or as to the local
+and civil enactments concerning marriage and divorce, we refer to two able
+articles published in THE CATHOLIC WORLD of October, 1866, and July,
+1867.(216)
+
+But as witnesses are multiplied when a strong case has to be made out in
+favor of some important issue, let us turn to the tribunal of history, and
+look over the record of the church’s battles. Witnesses without number
+rise in silent power to show on which side the weight of church influence
+has ever been thrown—the side of the oppressed and weakly. Every liberty,
+from ecclesiastical immunities to constitutional rights, she has upheld
+and enforced, and it would be impossible that she, the knight‐errant of
+the moral world, should have failed to break a lance, through every
+succeeding century, for the integrity of the marriage bond.
+
+Take, for instance, the history of the new Frankish kingdom in the VIth
+century, at the time when the church was laboriously moulding pagan hordes
+into Christian and civilized nations. The times were wild and unsettled,
+the very laws hardly established, heathen license barely reined in by the
+threatening barrier of solemn excommunication. They were times of great
+heroism, it is true, but none the less of great abuses and of startling
+crimes. The bishops of the Christian church stood alone in the midst of
+the universal depravity, like mighty colossi, defying the civil power and
+rebuking royal license. S. Nicetus, the Bishop of Trèves, was one of
+these. The young King of the Franks, Theodebert, who was betrothed to
+Wisigardis, the daughter of the Lombard king Wakon, had, during a war
+against the Goths, taken a beautiful captive named Denteria. He made her
+his mistress, and, forgetful of his solemn betrothal, lived with her for
+seven years. The bishop never ceased boldly to admonish him and warn him,
+but to no purpose. After a while, his powers of persuasion failing to
+effect his charitable design, he resorted to the penalties of the church,
+and excommunicated him. But, instead of suspending his evil career, the
+king persuaded many of his courtiers to follow his example. The holy
+bishop excommunicated them all with calm impartiality. Despite the
+censures under which they lay, they insolently attempted to assist at High
+Mass one Sunday in the bishop’s presence. S. Nicetus turned to meet the
+sacrilegious throng, and undauntedly announced that, unless those who were
+excommunicated left the church, the Mass would not be celebrated. The king
+publicly demurred to this, but a young man in the crowd, possessed by the
+devil, suddenly started up, and in impassioned language gave testimony to
+the holiness of the bishop and the vicious and debased character of the
+king himself. Four or five stalwart men got up to hold him, but were
+unable to do so; his strength defied their utmost efforts, and burning
+words of condemnation continued to fall from his lips. The king, abashed,
+was forced to leave the church, while S. Nicetus caused the young man to
+be brought to him. The touch of the holy bishop’s hand, and his
+efficacious prayer breathed over him, cured him at once of the grievous
+affliction which had beset him for ten years. Finally, the displeasure of
+the Franks at the insult offered to the King of the Lombards and his
+daughter grew so serious that, with S. Nicetus at their head, they called
+a general meeting to denounce his conduct. He listened to their
+reproaches, and at last agreed to dismiss his mistress and fulfil his
+contract with the Lombard princess.(217)
+
+An eminent French writer, De Maistre, says of the part played by the popes
+in the middle ages: “Never have the popes and the church rendered a more
+signal service to the world than they did in repressing by the authority
+of ecclesiastical censures the transports of a passion, dangerous enough
+in mild and orderly characters, but which, when indulged in by violent and
+fierce natures, will make havoc of the holiest laws of marriage.... The
+sanctity of marriage, the sacred foundation of the peace and welfare of
+nations, is, above all, of the highest importance in royal families, where
+excesses and disorders are apt to breed consequences whose gravity in the
+future none can calculate.”
+
+In the early part of the VIIth century, S. Columbanus, the great Irish
+monk who founded the powerful monastery of Luxeuil in Burgundy, began that
+opposition to royal license which finally cost him his exalted position,
+and made him an exile and wanderer from his chosen abode. Queen Brunehault
+was practically reigning in Burgundy under the name of her grandson
+Theodoric. She connived at the young sovereign’s precocious depravity, and
+herself furnished him with attractive mistresses, thereby preventing his
+marriage with a suitable princess, for fear of losing her own influence
+over him in public affairs. One day, as S. Columbanus, whose monastery the
+king had munificently enriched, came to see Theodoric on matters of
+importance, the queen rashly presented the king’s illegitimate children to
+the saint, and begged him to bless them. Columbanus refused, turning away
+his eyes and saying sternly, “These children are the offspring of guilt,
+and they will never sit upon their father’s throne.” Another time, after
+many vain threats and remonstrances, the saint again visited Theodoric,
+but, instead of accepting the hospitality of his palace, took up his
+quarters in a neighboring house. Brunehault and her grandson, keenly alive
+to the implied rebuke, and resenting the public slight thus put upon them
+before their court and subjects, sent some officers of their household
+with costly vases and golden dishes, full of delicacies from the royal
+table, to Columbanus, at the same time entreating him to come to them. The
+saint made the sign of the cross, and spoke thus to the messengers: “Tell
+the king that the Most High spurns the gifts of the unjust; heaven is not
+to be propitiated by precious offerings, but by conversion and
+repentance.” And as he spoke the vases fell to the earth and broke,
+scattering the food and wine that had been brought to bribe the servant of
+God. The king, afraid of the divine judgments, promised to amend, but did
+not fail to relapse into sin, upon which Columbanus wrote to him again,
+and finally excommunicated him. Theodoric then visited the monastery of
+Luxeuil, and in retaliation publicly accused the saint of violating his
+rule. Columbanus answered, “If you are come here to disturb the servants
+of God, and stir up confusion among them, we will relinquish all your aid,
+countenance, and presents, O Theodoric; but know that you and all your
+race shall perish.” The king retired, awed for this time into silence;
+but, being further incensed against Columbanus by his grandmother
+Brunehault, he had him exiled to Besançon. The saint’s reputation was such
+that no one would venture to guard him, and he of his own accord soon
+returned to Luxeuil. Theodoric, growing more obstinate the firmer he saw
+his judge become, again ordered him to leave, even threatening force.
+Columbanus defied him, and announced that physical violence alone could
+drive him from his post; but, upon the persecution of the monastery
+continuing unabated, he judged it more perfect and charitable to exile
+himself for the peace of his community. Three years after, Theodoric and
+his children were all killed, and Clotaire, his relative and ruler of a
+neighboring kingdom, reigned in Burgundy in his stead.
+
+The Byzantine Empire also was constantly torn by schisms and dissensions
+originating in the unbridled passions of its ignoble sovereigns. In the
+VIIIth century, Constantine VI., surnamed Porphyrogenitus, the son of the
+Empress Irene, married at his mother’s instigation an Armenian woman of
+low birth but irreproachable morals, named Mary. It was not long, however,
+before he became enamored of one of his wife’s attendants, Theodota,
+whereupon he proceeded to divorce the Empress Mary and force her to take
+the veil. The Patriarch of Constantinople, Tarasius, refused to dissolve
+the first marriage and perform the second, as required by the dissolute
+emperor, who then attempted to blind him by alleging that his wife had
+conspired to poison him. This the patriarch firmly refused to believe,
+and, moreover, represented to the emperor the scandal of his conduct, the
+infamy that would attach to his name in consequence, and especially the
+incalculable evil his bad example would cause among his not too chaste
+courtiers and people. Constantine lost his temper, and violently replied
+that he would close the Christian churches, and reopen the temples of the
+heathen gods. The patriarch threatened to refuse him the right of entering
+the sanctuary, and of assisting at the sacred mysteries; but when an
+unworthy priest, Joseph, the treasurer of the church of Constantinople,
+was found willing to celebrate between the emperor and Theodota an invalid
+“marriage” in one of the halls of the palace of S. Maurice, Tarasius
+hesitated to pronounce the excommunication. At this distance of time, it
+is not easy to point out the reasons and excuses which the unsettled state
+of things in the Byzantine Empire may have furnished for this act of
+seeming compromise; much less should we rashly condemn a holy and zealous
+bishop; but it is noticeable that such instances have never been repeated
+when it was the popes themselves who were directly appealed to.
+
+As the patriarch had foretold, evil results followed the sovereign’s
+licentious example, a frightful laxity of morals prevailed, and
+insubordination to the church went hand in hand with the violation of the
+marriage bond. Tarasius excommunicated the priest Joseph two years after,
+but, although he had refrained from directly and publicly censuring the
+principal culprit, he was none the less persecuted by him.
+
+In the following century, a still worse case of the kind took place, the
+chief actors in it being Bardas, the ambitious uncle of the wretched
+Emperor Michael the Drunkard, and the Patriarch of Constantinople, S.
+Ignatius. The former, who had the practical control of the state, and had
+induced his sottish nephew to give him the title of “Cæsar” of the
+Byzantine Empire, deliberately left his lawful wife, and lived in publicly
+incestuous union with the wife of his own son. S. Ignatius indignantly
+reproved him, and when the prince, braving his censures, presented himself
+in church on the Feast of the Epiphany, the patriarch publicly refused to
+admit him to the Holy Communion. Bardas furiously threatened him before
+the faithful, but the holy prelate boldly presented his breast to the
+blows he seemed about to receive, and in a few solemn words invoked the
+wrath of God on the sacrilegious “Cæsar.” He was promptly exiled to the
+Island of Teberinthia, where Bardas, partly by threats and partly by
+hypocritical promises, induced all his suffragans to repair in a body, and
+entreat him to resign the patriarchate. With holy firmness he resisted the
+treacherous appeal, whereupon Bardas had him put in irons, deposed, and
+replaced on the patriarchal chair by Photius, a creature of his own and a
+layman. The famous schism of Photius thus sprang from the same cause as
+later heresies, and everywhere we see contumacy to ecclesiastical
+authority making common cause with abandoned passion and shameless
+license.
+
+The Photian schism was abetted in the West by another rebellious son of
+the church, Lothair, King of Lorraine, who was anxious to get rid of his
+wife Thietberga. This was one of the most famous cases of the sort during
+the middle ages, and was prolonged over many years, breeding not only the
+utmost moral disorder, but threatening also to bring about even political
+convulsions. Lothair had conceived a criminal passion for one of his
+wife’s maids, Waldrade, and to marry her his first endeavor was to prove
+the queen guilty of incest before her marriage with him. For this purpose
+he summoned his bishops three times at Aix‐la‐Chapelle, in 860, and had
+Thietberga condemned to the public penance usually inflicted in those days
+on a fallen woman. The time‐serving prelates, after a superficial
+examination of the evidence, allowed the divorce on the plea that “it is
+better to marry than to burn”; thus giving an early historical proof of
+the old saying about a certain person “quoting Scripture.” Widalon, Bishop
+of Vienne, who had not concurred in this iniquitous decree, wrote to the
+pope for guidance. The pope, Nicholas I., firmly standing by the tradition
+of the church, and vindicating the fundamental dogma of the sanctity of
+marriage, replied uncompromisingly that the divorce was null and void, the
+bishops blamable for their servility, and that even were it proved beyond
+doubt that Thietberga had been guilty of incest or any other sinful
+intercourse before marriage, yet the marriage itself could never on that
+account be legally dissolved. The queen herself then appealed to the pope,
+who appointed two legates to inquire into the matter. Baffled in his first
+attempt, Lothair now trumped up a second pretext, and pretended that he
+had been previously married to Waldrade, and that the queen had therefore
+never been his lawful wife. The pope replied that, until this matter was
+disposed of, the queen should be sent with all honor to her father, and
+suitably provided for from the royal treasury. Thietberga was now
+arraigned before a packed and bribed tribunal, and forced to acknowledge
+herself an interloper, but found secret means of sending word to the pope
+that she had acted under compulsion. Nicholas then wrote an indignant
+letter to the king and bishops, annulled all previous decisions, and
+commanded a new and _fair_ trial of the case to be held. He then wrote to
+the Emperor of Germany, Louis II., and the King of France, Charles the
+Bald, as well as to all the bishops of the four kingdoms, Lorraine,
+France, Germany, and Provence, whom he ordered to repair to a council at
+Metz, where his legates would meet them. He charged them to have more
+regard to the laws of God than the will of men, and to protect the weak
+and innocent with all the dignity of their influence. Lothair, however,
+succeeded in corrupting the legates themselves, and the council merely met
+to confirm the previous infamous decrees and condemnations. Two of the
+prelates were chosen to report to the pope and bear hypocritical and
+falsified messages to him, but in vain. Nicholas, secretly advised of this
+treachery, and no doubt also divinely inspired, detected the imposition,
+abrogated the decrees of the false council, and canonically deposed the
+two guilty prelates from all their functions and dignities. They
+immediately took refuge at Benevento with the Emperor Louis II., who,
+hotly espousing their cause, marched with his army against Rome, and
+surprised the clergy and people in the act of singing the litanies and
+taking part in a penitential procession at S. Peter’s. His soldiers
+dispersed the people by force of arms, and blockaded the pope in his
+palace. Nicholas escaped in disguise, and for two days lay concealed in a
+boat on the Tiber, with neither covering for the night nor scarcely food
+enough to sustain nature. Thus the conflict between a sovereign’s
+unbridled passions and the calm and immutable principles of the Gospel was
+carried so far as to entail actual persecution on the sacred and
+representative person of the pontiff. The emperor, repenting of his hasty
+attack, sent his wife to the pope to negotiate a reconciliation. The two
+insubordinate bishops at the same time sent an embassy to Photius, the
+sacrilegious successor of S. Ignatius in the See of Constantinople, to
+demand his support and countenance. “And thus,” says Rohrbacher, to whom
+we are indebted for these graphic pictures of the early struggles of the
+church, “did the schism born of the adultery of Lothair in the West join
+hands with that born of the incest of Bardas in the East.” Lothair and the
+rebellious bishops now quarrelled among themselves, and one of the deposed
+prelates, the Archbishop of Cologne, repaired in haste to Rome to reveal
+the duplicity, the plotting, and insincerity that had characterized the
+whole of the proceedings.
+
+The king himself, however, showed a disposition to submit, most of the
+bishops begged the pope’s forgiveness, and the former legate, Rodoaldus,
+having been excommunicated for his collusion with the king, a new one,
+Arsenius, Bishop of Orta, was appointed. The conditions he was charged to
+demand were explicit—either Waldrade must be dismissed, or the
+excommunication until now delayed in mercy would be pronounced. Unwilling
+to submit entirely, yet dreading the consequences if he did not, Lothair
+actually recalled Thietberga to her lawful position, and allowed Waldrade
+to accompany the legate to Rome, as a public token of her repentance and
+obedience. But although his royal word was plighted, he soon found his
+blind appetites too much for his reason and his faith, and, sending
+messengers to bring back his mistress, relapsed into his former sins.
+Waldrade herself was now publicly excommunicated.
+
+In the meantime, Pope Nicholas died, and was succeeded by Adrian II., who
+proved himself no less strenuous an opponent of royal license than his
+holy predecessor had been. Lothair, naturally inclined to temporize,
+offered to go to Rome and plead his own cause with the new pontiff. In a
+preliminary interview held at Monte‐Casino, the pope reiterated his firm
+intention of coming to no understanding before the king had made his peace
+with Thietberga and finally dissolved his criminal union with Waldrade.
+The next day was Sunday, and the king hoped to hear Mass before he left
+for Rome, but he could find no priest willing to celebrate it for him, and
+was forced to take his departure in diminished state for Rome, where no
+public reception awaited him, so that he had to enter the Holy City almost
+as a pilgrim and a penitent. In those days of princely hospitality and
+profuse pageantry, such an occurrence was rare, and, therefore, all the
+more significant of the majestic and practical power of the church.
+
+Lothair, now thoroughly sensible of his sin, and warned by the terrible
+dissensions of the past of what further misery to his country and people
+his prolonged obstinacy might involve, signified his intention to submit
+unconditionally to the pope’s decree. High Mass was then celebrated in his
+presence and that of all his noble followers by the pope in person, and
+when at the moment of communion the king approached the altar, Adrian
+impressively addressed to him the following unexpected adjuration:
+
+“I charge thee, O King of Lorraine, if thou hast any concealed intention
+of renewing thy shameless intercourse with thy concubine Waldrade, not to
+dare approach this altar and sacrilegiously receive thy Lord in this
+tremendous sacrament; but if with true repentance and sincere purpose of
+amendment thou dost approach, then receive him without fear.”
+
+The king, evidently moved by this solemn address, knelt down and
+communicated, and his retainers and courtiers took their places at the
+sacred board. That no pretext might remain for further equivocation, the
+holy pontiff warned them also, before administering the Blessed Sacrament
+to them, saying:
+
+“If any among you have wilfully aided and abetted the king, and are ready
+wilfully to aid and abet him again in his wicked intercourse with
+Waldrade, let him not presume to receive sacrilegiously the body of the
+Lord; but you that have not abetted him, or that have sincerely repented
+of having done so, and are resolved to do so no more, approach and receive
+without fear.” A few of them shrank back at these awful words, but the
+greater part, whether in sincerity or in contempt, followed the king’s
+example and received.
+
+After this, which did not take place till 869, we hear no more of
+Lothair’s passion for Waldrade.
+
+Germany, too, had her Lothair, and, in the XIth century, King Henry IV.,
+one of the most abandoned sovereigns that ever reigned, brought upon
+himself not only the papal anathema, but the displeasure of his electors
+and confederated vassals themselves by his shameless trifling with his
+marriage vows. His wife Bertha, a beautiful and virtuous woman, the
+daughter of Otho, Marquis of Italy, never found favor in his sight; and,
+in concert with some of his simoniacal bishops, Siegfried, the Archbishop
+of Mayence at their head, Henry held a diet at Worms in 1069 to procure a
+divorce from her. Siegfried, however, feeling uneasy at the part allotted
+him, sent to the Pope Alexander II. for advice, and received from him a
+severe reprimand for having countenanced the dissolute king. The papal
+legate, an austere and holy man, Peter Damian, arrived during the session
+of a diet at Frankfort, where the king’s cause was to be finally judged.
+Despite Henry’s protestations that his divorce would enable him, as he
+hypocritically said, to marry lawfully a wife that would please him, and
+to abandon his numerous harem of favorites, whom he would have no excuse
+any longer to retain, the stern sentence of Rome was passed against
+him—either excommunication or reconciliation with his wife. He reluctantly
+submitted, but only in appearance, for he refused even to see Bertha, and
+soon gave himself up to his former illicit pleasures. His brutal treatment
+of his second wife, Praxedes of Lorraine, whom he married according to his
+own choice after the death of Bertha, drew upon him further ecclesiastical
+censures, and he left a memory justly branded by all historians as more
+infamous still than that of the notorious Henry VIII. of England.
+
+At the same time that his passions were revolutionizing the German Empire,
+Philip I. of France was showing an equally deplorable example to his
+vassals and subjects. He was married to Bertha, daughter of Hugh, Count of
+Frisia, by whom he already had two children, one of whom, Louis le Gros,
+succeeded him; but, blinded by a sinful affection, he carried off, in
+1092, Bertrade, the wife of Fulk, Count of Anjou, and lived with her in a
+doubly adulterous union.
+
+Hugh of Flavigny, a contemporary historian, says of this occurrence: “Even
+if our book were silent, all France would cry out, nay, the whole of the
+Western church would re‐echo like thunder in horror of this crime. It is
+truly monstrous that an anointed king, who should have defended even with
+the sword the indissolubility of marriage, should on the contrary _wallow
+shamelessly_ for years in _intolerable disorder_.” The Blessed Yves,
+Bishop of Chartres, immediately lifted his voice against the enormity of
+the crime; but though his fervent reproaches fell upon a deadened
+conscience, and his letter to the king was in vain, still among the
+bishops of France none could be found, at least for a long time, to
+perform a scandalous “marriage” between the king and his mistress. At last
+the Archbishop of Rouen allowed himself to be blinded, and consented to
+unite them, but a prompt and sharp interference on the part of Rome
+punished him by a deposition from all his ecclesiastical dignities, which
+lasted for several years. The whole of the controversy had now come
+clearly to the knowledge of the Pope Urban II.
+
+The Count of Anjou had declared war against the ravisher, and the king had
+put the B. Yves in irons under the guard of the Viscount of Chartres. In
+the meanwhile, the pope wrote a scathing letter to the metropolitan of
+Rheims and the episcopate of France. “You,” he says, “who should have
+stood as a wall against the inroads of public immorality, you have been
+silent and allowed this great crime; for not to oppose is to consent. Go
+now, speak to the king, reproach him, warn him, threaten him, and, if
+necessary, resort boldly to the last measures.” From 1092 to 1094 the pope
+never ceased publicly and privately to oppose Philip’s unlawful passion,
+and, sending as his legate Hugh, Archbishop of Lyons, convoked an assembly
+at Autun for the 15th of October, 1094, to decide the matter. The king
+insolently attempted to forestall the papal decision by calling a council
+for the 10th of September previous, which accordingly took place, and in
+which a few contumacious bishops confirmed the king in his obstinate
+resistance to the head of the church. As the queen had died a short time
+before, Philip presumptuously began to hope that his marriage with
+Bertrade would now be legalized; but, since she herself was the wedded
+wife of the Count of Anjou, it will be easy to see how vain were his
+expectations. The Council of Autun met, and, finding the king determined
+to continue in sin, solemnly excommunicated him. Philip then wrote a
+threatening letter to the pope, declaring that, if he did not absolve him
+from the church’s censures, he would go over to the anti‐pope Guibert,
+styled Clement III. Philip now attempted to secure immunity for himself in
+another way: he promised all sorts of reforms, both ecclesiastical and
+moral, if he could only obtain permission to indulge his guilty passion
+undisturbed. To this proposal the B. Yves replied, like S. Columbanus to
+Theodoric, that it was impossible to compound for sin by costly gifts,
+that God desires ourselves, not our treasures, and that heaven is won by
+penance and not by gold.
+
+At length, in 1095, the Council of Placentia was held. Philip pleaded for
+a delay, which was granted him, but at the following council, that of
+Clermont, he and his concubine were at last rigorously excommunicated. And
+here Rohrbacher takes occasion to remark, _à propos_ to the crusade which
+was then occupying Christendom: “Indeed, of what use would a crusade
+against the Turks have proved if the popes had not, at the same time,
+resolutely opposed the introduction of Turkish disorders into Christian
+society?”
+
+In 1096, Philip consented to submit, and went in state to the Council of
+Nismes to meet the pope, and be absolved from the excommunication, which,
+as he found, weighed very heavily on his conscience. Throughout the middle
+ages this one trait, a lively faith, proved, indeed, the only barrier
+against excesses which, had they been unrestrained by the fear of
+ecclesiastical censures, would have simply produced a state of license
+worse than that of the latter days of the Roman Empire. But Philip’s
+repentance was short‐lived; he recalled Bertrade, and even gave away
+benefices and church dignities to her favorites, seculars, and persons of
+questionable morality. Urban II. died, and was succeeded by Paschal II.,
+who again sent his legates to the king, and, at the Council of Poictiers,
+excommunicated the guilty pair a second time. At this council a strange
+scene took place. A layman threw a stone at one of the legates, and,
+though it missed him, it split open the head of another bishop who was
+standing near. This was the signal for a violent attack on the prelates;
+the unruly crowd outside the church battered down the doors, and rushed
+in, throwing stones and missiles of all kinds among the deliberating
+bishops. Of these a very few, seized with panic, hastily made their
+escape, but the greater part stood like heroes at their post, and even
+took off their mitres that their heads might present a better mark to the
+infuriated and partisan mob. Nor was this the only act of violence
+perpetrated in the name of Philip and Bertrade. Shortly after this scene,
+while staying at Sens, they remained a fortnight without hearing Mass,
+which so incensed Bertrade that she sent her servants to break open the
+doors of the church, and caused one of her priests, a tool of her own, to
+celebrate the Holy Sacrifice in her presence. Philip now noisily
+proclaimed that he was going to Rome to receive absolution, but Yves of
+Chartres warned the Pope of the king’s insincerity, and the pontiff
+remained conscientiously cold to all his advances until he had wrested
+from him a solemn oath not only to cease his criminal intercourse with
+Bertrade, but also to abstain from seeing her or speaking to her unless in
+the presence of a third person. Nevertheless, the solemn absolution was
+not pronounced in his favor before the Council of Beaugency, assembled in
+1104, _twelve_ years after his first sin in carrying off the lawful wife
+of his own vassal and kinsman.
+
+The XIIth century, so stormily begun, was disturbed later on by yet
+another controversy of the same kind. It has been noticed by Protestant
+writers, says De Maistre, that it was almost invariably marriage, its
+indissolubility and the irregularities against its integrity, that have
+provoked the “scandal” of excommunication. In this admission, made rather
+to criminate than to honor the church, made indeed to throw the obloquy of
+schism upon the popes themselves, is there not an unwilling testimony to
+the Papacy’s unflinching championship of virtue?
+
+In 1140, Louis VII. of France, surnamed _Le Jeune_, refused to sanction
+the canonical nomination of Peter, Archbishop of Bourges, whom Thibault,
+Count of Champagne, valiantly defended and upheld. At the same time,
+Raoul, Count of Vermandois, a man advanced in years, who had long been
+married to Thibault’s niece, wished to dissolve his marriage in order to
+contract another with Petronilla, the sister of the Queen of France,
+Louis’ wife, Eleanor of Antioch. He succeeded in persuading a few bishops
+to grant him this permission on the plea of relationship between him and
+his first wife, which, if true, would have made that union illegal from
+the first. S. Bernard, in a fervid letter to Pope Innocent II., denounces
+his vile conduct, giving a most lamentable picture of the state of the
+kingdom of France. “_That which is most sacred in the church_,” he says,
+“is trodden underfoot.” The pope, through his legate, Cardinal Yves,
+excommunicated the Count of Vermandois, and laid his whole territory under
+an interdict. Mass could no longer be said, the sacraments were not
+administered, the churches were closed, the bells silent. The king
+revenged himself by declaring war on the Count of Champagne, who had given
+shelter to the archbishop, and appealed to Rome against the Count of
+Vermandois. He devastated Thibault’s territory with fire and sword, and
+behaved, says Rohrbacher, rather like a Vandal chief than a Christian
+king. In 1142, he arrived before the town of Vitry, sacked it, and set
+fire to its church and castle. In the former were no less than 1300
+persons, men, women, and children, who had sought safety in the sanctuary.
+He ruthlessly closed all avenues to the church, and burnt the miserable
+inhabitants as they vainly strove to escape. The town was hereafter called
+_Vitry le Brûle_. The Count of Champagne, weakened by this terrible onset,
+sued for peace, and promised to exert his influence to have both
+excommunication and interdict taken off the person and fiefs of Raoul de
+Vermandois. It was, in fact, provisionally suspended, but, as the culprit
+still refused to dissolve his criminal union, he was excommunicated for
+the second time. S. Bernard was a prominent actor in this controversy, and
+powerfully worked for the preservation of peace.
+
+But greater troubles were yet in store for France and the church. In 1193,
+Philip Augustus lost his first wife, Isabella of Hainault, and soon
+afterwards sent the Bishop of Noyon, Stephen, with great pomp to the King
+of Denmark, Canute III., to ask the hand of his sister Ingeburga in
+marriage. The request was joyfully granted, and the queen‐elect brought
+back to France with all possible honor. The marriage took place at once,
+and the king confessed himself much pleased with his new consort. The next
+day he caused her to be solemnly crowned, a ceremony to which great
+importance was attached in those days; but, strange to say, during the
+service itself he was seen to turn pale as if with horror, and to cast
+sudden looks of aversion towards the queen. He, however, retired with her
+to Meaux, and lived with her a short time, still unable to conquer his
+dislike, which many did not fail to attribute to witchcraft, for Ingeburga
+was both comely, virtuous, and accomplished. The king now called together
+his parliament at Compiègne, his uncle, the Archbishop of Rheims and
+legate of the Holy See, presiding. The queen, who did not understand
+French, and whose Danish attendants had all been sent away, was present at
+the deliberation. Unheard, therefore, and even unchallenged, she was
+speedily declared too closely related to the king through his former wife
+Isabella to be united to him in lawful marriage. This seems to have been
+the favorite pretext for dissolving inconvenient marriages in those times,
+as it was also later in the too famous case of Henry VIII. of England and
+Catharine of Aragon, but even in this we see the spirit of subordination
+to the general authority of the church still underlying the partial
+revolts of her unruly sons. When Queen Ingeburga was made acquainted by an
+interpreter with the sentence rendered against her, she was painfully
+astonished, and, bursting into tears, cried out in her broken French,
+_Male France! Male France!_ Some pitying hearts there must have been in
+that assembly of lords spiritual and temporal, some remorseful consciences
+among that gathering of Frenchmen, who, as Rohrbacher quaintly says,
+“forgot even to be courteous to a stranger and a woman.” Ingeburga,
+rising, then added, “Rome! Rome!”—sublime appeal of oppressed innocence to
+the fountain‐head of justice and honor! Philip had her immured in the
+Abbey of Cisoing. Pope Celestine III. sent legates to inquire into the
+rights of the case, but the king succeeded in intimidating them, and no
+conclusion was arrived at in the council held at Paris. The pope then
+wrote an energetic letter to the bishops, concluding by a decision to this
+effect, that, having carefully examined the genealogy upon which turned
+the question of the alleged close relationship between the king’s first
+and second wives, he solemnly annuls the unlawful act of divorce passed at
+the Parliament of Compiègne, and decrees that, if the king should attempt
+to marry any other woman during Ingeburga’s lifetime, he should be
+proceeded against as an adulterer.
+
+This speedily came to pass. Not content with repudiating his wife, he
+attempted, in 1196, to marry another, Agnes of Merania (Tyrol). Ingeburga
+instantly appealed to the pope, saying that for this outrage her husband
+“allegeth no cause, but of his will maketh an order, of his obstinacy a
+law, and of his passion _une fureur_,” as Rohrbacher rather untranslatably
+puts it.
+
+The Protestant historian Hurter says: “In this instance, the pope stands
+face to face, not with the king, but with the Christian. Innocent III. (he
+had succeeded Celestine) would not sacrifice the moral importance of his
+office even to procure help for the Crusade or to prepare for himself an
+ally in his dissensions with the German emperors.”
+
+Pope Innocent remonstrated with the king first through the Bishop of
+Paris, Eudes de Sully, then personally by letter, and threatened him with
+the last and most awful punishment, excommunication. The king temporized,
+and would give no satisfactory answer, until in 1198 the papal legate,
+Peter of Capua, was directed to give him his choice between submission
+within one month or the imposition of an interdict upon the whole kingdom.
+This appalling measure had never before been so sweepingly resorted to,
+and the preparations for it were as solemnly magnificent as if they had
+portended the funeral of a nation. The council met at Dijon in 1199, and,
+during its seven days’ session, once more invited the king to attend and
+avert the doom his sin had well‐nigh brought upon the realm. But Philip
+remained inflexible, despite the last and urgent letters of the pope, and
+the interdict was accordingly pronounced.
+
+Four archbishops, eighteen bishops, and a great number of abbots composed
+the august assembly, and on the seventh day of the council a strange and
+impressive scene closed the unavailing deliberations. At midnight the
+great bell of the cathedral tolled out the knell of a parting soul, the
+prelates repaired in silent and lugubrious procession to the high altar,
+now divested of all its ornaments, the lights were extinguished and
+removed, the figure of Christ on the great rood was veiled in penitential
+guise, the relics of the patron saints were removed into the crypt below,
+and the consecrated hosts yet unconsumed were destroyed by fire. The
+legate, clothed in purple, advanced to the foot of the denuded altar, and
+promulgated the awful sentence that was to deprive a whole Christian
+kingdom of the consolations of religion. The assembled people answered
+with a great groan, and, says a historian of the times, it seemed as if
+the Last Judgment had suddenly come upon men. A respite of twenty days was
+allowed before the interdict was publicly announced, but after Candlemas
+Day, 1200, it was not only announced, but rigorously enforced. The effect
+was terrible; thousands flocked to Normandy and other provinces belonging
+to the King of England, to receive the sacraments and perform their usual
+devotions; the king’s own sister, on the occasion of her marriage with the
+Count of Ponthien, had to remove to Rouen to have the ceremony canonically
+performed. The king, meanwhile, vented his fury on the bishops, imprisoned
+some, confiscated the temporalities of others, and caused many to be even
+personally maltreated. Queen Ingeburga was dragged from her convent, and
+barbarously imprisoned in the Castle of Etampes, near Paris. Philip’s
+wrath extended to all classes; the nobles he oppressed, the burghers he
+taxed beyond their means, until his very servants left him as a God‐
+forsaken man. The pressure at last became so terrible that he was heard to
+exclaim in a transport of rage, “I shall end by becoming a Mussulman!
+Fortunate Saladin! he at least had no pope over him!” At a meeting of the
+lords and prelates of the kingdom, at which Agnes of Merania assisted,
+Philip moodily asked, in the midst of an ominous silence, what he was to
+do. “Obey the pope,” was the instant and uncompromising reply of the
+assembly; and, when the king further obtained a confession from his uncle
+the Archbishop of Rheims that the decree of divorce passed by him had been
+invalid from the first, he exclaimed in ill‐concealed anger, “You were a
+fool to give it, then!”
+
+At this juncture, both Agnes and the king sent ambassadors to Rome to ask
+for a suspension at least of the interdict, but the pope was inflexible,
+and would hear of no negotiation before an unconditional submission. This
+Philip reluctantly promised; the interdict had now lasted seven months,
+and he could no longer withstand the dangerous and threatening attitude of
+his dissatisfied subjects. In the summer of the year 1200, Cardinal John
+Colonna, Cardinal Octavian, of Ostia, and several others repaired first to
+Vezelay, then to Compiègne, where they met the king and received his
+overtures. On the eve of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin, the assembly
+of lords spiritual and temporal met at the Castle of S. Léger, where the
+legate insisted on the deliberations being held in public. The anxious
+people crowded round the doors of the great hall, eager to watch every
+fluctuation in the proceedings. At last, on the legate’s urgent advice,
+and in his presence, Philip consented to visit Queen Ingeburga in state.
+She had been sent for to be present, but had not yet seen her husband. It
+was their first meeting since their separation six years before. At sight
+of her, the king recoiled, crying out, “The pope is forcing me to this.”
+
+“Nay, my lord,” replied the injured wife, calmly and meekly, “he seeks but
+justice.”
+
+Philip soon afterwards swore by proxy to receive the queen as his only and
+lawful wife, and to render her all the honors due to her rank. As soon as
+this was done, the bells rang out a joyous peal, and the people knew that
+peace had been made. The sacred images were again uncovered, the church
+doors were opened, and Mass was everywhere celebrated with great pomp. The
+people were frantic with joy, but the king, though he had bent under the
+weight of influence that had been brought to bear upon him, still
+persisted in asking for a divorce from his wife on the before‐mentioned
+plea of relationship. The pope delayed an answer, and, the better to
+satisfy the reason of the refractory king, appointed another meeting to be
+held at Soissons, six months after the date of the recent one at S. Léger.
+
+To this meeting Canute III. of Denmark sent bishops and learned doctors to
+plead his sister’s cause, but, as on the king’s side was arrayed the
+best—though servile—talent of France, the case seemed not very hopeful,
+until an unknown and obscure ecclesiastic arose, and, towards the end of
+the council, which had already lasted a fortnight, modestly asked leave of
+the august judges to speak in favor of Queen Ingeburga. His address
+startled and moved all who listened, and they agreed with one voice that
+this sudden and almost inspired burst of eloquence was surely a sign of
+the will of God directly urging the queen’s rights. Philip, anticipating
+the papal decision, determined to surprise the assembly by forestalling
+it. He accordingly appeared on horseback very early one morning at the
+gate of the palace of Notre Dame, the queen’s residence, and in public—and
+shall we not say primitive?—token of reconciliation took Ingeburga away
+with him, making her sit on a pillion behind him. They rode away quietly
+and almost unattended, but soon after it became known that he had again
+imprisoned her in an old castle, and that, having thus broken up the
+council before a public decision had been rendered, he still considered
+himself free to seek the divorce. Soon after the difficulty was lessened
+by the death of the unfortunate Agnes of Merania, whose health had been
+shattered by the terrible and infamous publicity necessarily brought upon
+her during her recent pregnancy. It was not, however, for many years after
+her death, not until 1213, that Philip was sincerely and permanently
+reconciled to Ingeburga, whom he calls in his will his _dear wife_, and to
+whom he left a suitable provision as queen‐dowager.
+
+Hurter and Schlegel both give witness to the admirable conduct of the
+mediæval popes in these and kindred struggles. The former says: “If
+Christianity was not reduced to a vain formula like the religion of the
+Hindoos, or relegated to one corner of the globe like a common sect, or
+sunk altogether in the mire of oriental voluptuousness, it was entirely
+owing to the vigilance and constant efforts of the popes.” And Schlegel,
+in his _Concordia_, speaks thus: “We hardly dare to liken the Guelphs,
+with the popes at their head, to anything approaching _liberalism_, so
+degraded has the term become in connection with _modern liberals_; yet
+they alone, because they had religion and the church on their side, were
+the _true liberals_ of the middle ages. Indeed, if we look at the position
+of the popes in its highest type, we shall find that they were always
+either gentle peace‐makers and arbiters in times of unnecessary and
+foolish wars, or stern champions of the oppressed, and austere censors of
+morals.”
+
+We pass over a few other less important cases, and come at once to the
+last and most fatal, those connected with the Protestant Reformation. In
+the XVIth century, the old story of Bardas and Photius was lamentably
+repeated in England. Germany was in open revolt; Philip, Landgrave of
+Hesse, was extorting shameful permissions for polygamy from the married
+monk Luther; religious were trampling their vows underfoot; Wittenberg,
+according to the Lutheran chronicler Illyricus, was no better than a den
+of prostitution; troops of “apostate nuns,” as Luther himself called them,
+were constantly arriving, begging, says Rohrbacher, for _food, clothing,
+and husbands_; Luther, their prophet, was hawking his mistress, Catharine
+Boris, about among his disciples, offering her as a wife first to one,
+then to the other, till he was at last forced to take her himself, to the
+no small disgust of his best friends, who remonstrated in the following
+graphic words: “If any, at least not _this_ one.” The Germanic world was
+crazy with a new revolution, and henceforth the struggle was no longer to
+be a partial one, a revolt of the flesh, but a radical onset upon
+everything divine, upon revelation and faith, as well as upon moral
+restraints and social decencies. Philip of Hesse, petitioning in 1539 for
+permission to marry a second wife while the first was living, says that
+“necessities of body and of conscience obliged him thereto”; that “he sees
+no remedy save that allowed of old to the chosen people” (polygamy); that
+“he begs this dispensation in order that he may live more entirely for the
+glory of God, and lie more ready to do him earthly services; that he is
+ready to do anything that may be required of him in reason (as an
+equivalent), whether concerning the property of convents or anything
+else.” He also hints that he will seek this permission from the emperor,
+“no matter at what _pecuniary cost_,” if it be denied him by the
+Wittenberg divines, and alleges as a sufficient reason that it is too
+costly for him to take his wife to diets of the empire, with all the
+honors due to her rank, and equally too hard for him to live without
+female society during such times of gaiety. The permission was granted at
+last, reluctantly, it must be admitted, for even the first Reformers, lax
+as they were, were not Mormons. Melancthon drew it up, and eight divines,
+including Bucer and Luther, signed it, but made secrecy a condition. The
+shameful “marriage” was performed on the 4th of March, 1540, between the
+landgrave and Marguerite de Saal, and perhaps the most revolting feature
+of the proceeding was the consent of Philip’s lawful wife, the Duchess
+Christina.
+
+In Chambers’ _Book of Days_, a collection of curious information, we read
+that a still more liberal dispensation from the ordinary rules of morality
+was in the last century accorded by the Calvinistic clergy of Prussia to
+the reigning King, Frederick William, successor of Frederick the Great, to
+have three wives at the same time, the Princess of Hesse, the Countess
+Euhoff, and Elizabeth of Brunswick. The progenitor of the Prussian dynasty
+had already given a similar example of licentiousness. In Luther’s time,
+Albert of Brandenburg, Grand Master of the religious order of chivalry,
+the Knights of S. Mary, otherwise called the Teutonic Order, broke his
+vows and took a wife, having already abjured his faith. Prussia, then only
+a province dependent on the Order, he seized as his own, Protestantizing
+it, and making moral disorder the rule there rather than the exception.
+
+But we must glance at England, though the story of its defection is so
+well known that we will not do more than pencil the outlines of the
+conflict on this occasion. After twenty years of married life, without a
+scruple to mar his domestic peace, without a breath of scandal to sully
+the fair fame of the queen, Henry VIII. suddenly strives to obtain a
+divorce from his wife, Catharine of Aragon, that he may marry one who is
+already his mistress and the acknowledged head of his court. A faithful
+son of the church until a personal test of fidelity is demanded from him,
+he had already refuted Luther’s errors, and gained the title of “Defender
+of the Faith.” But passion blinds him, and everywhere he seeks a sanction
+for his unrestrained license. He applies to Rome and to Wittenberg: the
+latter answers in a deprecatory tone, “Rather than divorce your wife marry
+_two_ queens”; the former, in the person of Clement VII., urges him to
+desist from his unlawful courses. Repulsed the first time, the pope sends
+Cardinal Campeggio, his legate, to treat of the matter with Cardinal
+Wolsey; they summon the queen to their presence; she refuses point‐blank,
+and appeals directly to Rome.
+
+In 1531, Cromwell, the astute and traitorous _protégé_ of Wolsey, suggests
+schism to the king as a means to the desired end. Henry, knowing the
+corrupt and venal state of the clergy in England, eagerly accepts the
+proposals, and instantly attempts to enforce a declaration of his supreme
+headship of the English Church by putting in force, against the clergy,
+several obsolete statutes of Norman origin, named “præmunire”; the whole
+ecclesiastical body is threatened with the punishment of attainder due to
+high treason, and to save the rest they offer the king a ransom of
+£100,000 (equal at that period to at least four times that sum according
+to modern computation). The king only accepts this amount with the
+supplementary condition of the “oath of supremacy.” At one stroke the
+episcopate is gagged, and schism practically effected. Meanwhile, Cranmer
+is sent to Rome to apply anew for the divorce.
+
+His mission proved unsuccessful, and on his return a final council was
+held at Dunstable, Bedfordshire, where, however, the queen refused again
+to appear, and was therefore condemned as _contumacious_. Shortly after,
+at Lambeth, her marriage was annulled, and her daughter, the Princess
+Mary, declared illegitimate. Pope Clement VII. threatened to excommunicate
+the king; Henry never heeded him. A public consistory, held at Rome in
+1534, reversed the Lambeth decision, but the die was already cast, and the
+complaisant parliament was ready to confirm Henry in all his desires.
+More’s and Fisher’s were the only dissentient voices heard throughout the
+kingdom; we know at what cost their courageous protest was raised. A reign
+of blood was inaugurated; confiscations enriched the royal treasury, and
+the servile episcopate bent to the shameful yoke like one man. Of the
+Franciscan friars, Peyto and Elston, who dared to preach to the king’s
+face against his adulterous union, the Protestant historian Cobbett says:
+“They were not fanatics, as some have said; they were the defenders of
+morality and order, and I know of no instance in ancient or modern history
+of a greater and nobler heroism than this.”(218)
+
+In 1536, Queen Catharine died, and the same year was performed the
+marriage of Henry with Anne Boleyn by a Catholic chaplain, who was ordered
+to say Mass early one morning by the king, Henry falsely alleging that he
+had in his possession the newly arrived permission from Rome. But passion
+is no foundation whereon to build a permanent and happy domestic life.
+Anne’s immorality matched Henry’s, and ere long she was accused, vaguely,
+it is true, of treason, adultery, and incest. Her supposed accomplices and
+lovers were all executed, and she herself, in cruel derision, condemned on
+the 15th of May, 1536, to be executed on the 19th, while, on the
+intermediate 17th, the Archbishop of Canterbury, according to his royal
+master’s orders, declared her marriage annulled, and her daughter
+Elizabeth illegitimate. Thus she was first proved to have never been the
+king’s lawful wife, and then beheaded for _infidelity_ to the man who had
+never been her husband. Of Henry’s subsequent wives and his methods of
+disposing of them we need say nothing; the separation from Rome had won
+him a sad independence of the only tribunal once recognized by kings, and
+divorce, adultery, and consequent murder had already begun the dark record
+which has ever since steadily increased in England.
+
+The church was the only bulwark adequate to resist that flood of violent
+and powerful passions which kingly supremacy naturally incites and
+fosters, and, in breaking with the church, the licentious sovereigns of
+the XVIth century acted indeed with the _wisdom_ of the children of this
+world. Still the church stood fast, sad but not conquered; the Mosaic law
+stood fast, passing into the dicta of society even where it was exiled
+from the legal courts—for who does not attach even now some idea of
+obloquy to a divorced or impure person?—still history pointed to the
+inevitable punishments that fall on the adulterer, and of which the
+“churches” so‐called, born of royal adultery, have invariably been
+palpable monuments.
+
+In our days, who can doubt that that church alone which guarantees the
+sanctity and indissolubility of marriage can hope to become the saviour
+and regenerator of modern society; that that church alone which protects
+and ennobles woman can remain triumphant in lands where woman’s influence
+is slowly leavening the whole social mass; who can doubt that that church
+alone which can trace its uncompromising laws back to Mount Sinai can hope
+to retain the moral mastery over the unruly ages to come, even to that age
+which shall witness the Last Judgment and the final condemnation?
+
+
+
+
+Fleurange.
+
+
+By Mrs. Craven, Author Of “A Sister’s Story.”
+
+Translated From The French, With Permission.
+
+
+
+Part IV.—The Immolation.
+
+
+LV.
+
+
+The clock had just struck two. Vera, according to her custom, was waiting
+in the ante‐room of the empress’ audience‐chamber. The door was soon
+opened by an usher, and the person she was waiting to introduce appeared.
+There was an involuntary movement of surprise on the part of both.
+Fleurange stopped as if in doubt. Vera’s appearance did not correspond
+with the idea she had formed of the lady‐in‐waiting she expected to find
+at her majesty’s door, and for an instant she thought she was in the
+presence of the empress herself.
+
+Vera, on her side, expected still less to see a petitioner like the one
+who now appeared.
+
+The Princess Catherine, with her usual forethought, had, in view of this
+important occasion, carefully prepared a dress for her who was to be
+regarded as her son’s _fiancée_, and, when the day came, the young girl
+opened a coffer which had a special place among her luggage, and followed
+with docility the instructions she there found in the princess’ own
+handwriting, with the dress she was to wear. It was black, as etiquette
+then required, but a court dress, and the princess took pleasure in having
+it made as magnificent as possible. Fleurange thus arrayed was dazzling.
+Nevertheless, her only ornaments were a gold chain from which was
+suspended a cross concealed in her corsage (a precious gift from her
+father which she never laid aside), and on her right arm a bracelet the
+Princess Catherine had taken from her own wrist the eve of the young
+girl’s departure, assuring her it would bring her good luck. She wore no
+ornament on her head, but her beautiful hair was turned back and plaited
+in a way not common at that time, though so becoming and striking as to
+add another peculiar charm to that of her whole person, which was as noble
+as if she was entitled to a place at court, but simple enough to show that
+she now appeared there for the first time.
+
+The two young girls looked at each other, and, as we have said, their
+surprise was mutual. But it was only for an instant. Vera advanced.
+
+“Mademoiselle Fleurange d’Yves, I suppose?”
+
+Fleurange bowed.
+
+“The empress awaits you: follow me.” She turned towards the door, but
+before opening it she said: “Take off the glove on your right hand—that is
+etiquette—and hold your petition in that.”
+
+Fleurange mechanically ungloved her beautiful hand in which trembled the
+paper she held. She stopped a moment, pale and agitated.
+
+“Do not be afraid, mademoiselle,” said the maid of honor to her in an
+encouraging tone. “Her majesty is kindness itself. You have nothing to
+fear; she could not be better disposed to give you a favorable reception.”
+
+There was not time to utter another word. The door then opened. Vera
+entered first. She bowed, and made Fleurange advance; then retired herself
+with another profound reverence, leaving the young girl alone with the
+empress.
+
+The audience lasted over half an hour, and Vera, though accustomed to
+wait, was beginning to find the time long, when the door again opened, and
+Fleurange came out. Her face was agitated, her eyes brilliant and tearful.
+Perceiving Vera, she stopped, and took her by the hand.
+
+“Oh! you were right,” she said. “Her majesty treated me with wonderful
+kindness. But I know how much I am also indebted to you. It was owing to
+you she was disposed to be gracious even before I was heard. May God
+reward you, mademoiselle, and repay you for all you have done for me!”
+
+Vera replied to this effusion with unusual cordiality, and accompanied
+Fleurange to the door. As they took leave of each other, their eyes met; a
+common impulse caused them both to make a slight movement: but a little
+timidity on one side, and some haughtiness on the other, stopped them, and
+the young girls parted without embracing each other.
+
+Vera slowly retraced her steps, and entered the empress’ salon. As soon as
+the latter perceived her, she said: “Well, Vera, what have you to say? Did
+you ever see a more charming apparition?”
+
+“The young lady was beautiful indeed,” said Vera, with a thoughtful air.
+“I never saw such eyes.”
+
+“That is true—eyes that look you directly in the face, with an expression
+so innocent, so frank, and almost of assurance, were it not so sweet. I
+was not reluctant, I assure you, to take charge of her petition, and
+promise to favor it. Here, take it: I would not even read it. I am ready
+to grant all this charming girl requests. It is sufficient to know she
+loves one of those criminals, and wishes to marry him in order to share
+his fate. Such a terrible favor will not be refused, I am sure.”
+
+The empress seated herself in her large arm‐chair. “But what fools men
+are,” she continued, after a moment’s silence, “to thus foolishly risk the
+happiness of others as well as their own! Really, I admire these women
+whom nothing daunts, nothing discourages, and who thus sacrifice
+themselves for such selfish beings.”
+
+“Yes,” replied Vera, “their devotedness is certainly admirable; but the
+women who implore, who supplicate, and at length avert the punishment of
+the guilty, have also a noble _rôle_, madame, and one which the
+unfortunate have reason to bless.”
+
+“I understand you, Vera. Your large beseeching eyes have nothing to remind
+me of, or reproach me for. I have already told the emperor all I learned
+from you yesterday. We must now leave it to his magnanimity, and importune
+him no more.”
+
+These words were uttered with a slight accent of authority, and some
+moments of silence followed. Vera, with mingled sadness and displeasure,
+stood motionless with her eyes cast down, awaiting her sovereign’s order.
+In this attitude, she perceived a bracelet on the carpet, which she picked
+up to give her mistress, who recognized it. “Ah!” said she, “it is the
+talisman that charming creature, just gone, wore on her arm. Keep it,
+Vera, you can return it to‐morrow with the reply I promised her.”
+
+Vera examined the bracelet with curiosity. It was a massive gold chain
+with a deep‐red cornelian clasp on which was graven some talismanic
+figure. It looked natural. She had seen some one wear a similar bracelet,
+she was sure; who could it be? For the moment, she could not remember.
+
+While thus examining it, the empress continued: “Take a seat at that
+table, and write Prince W—— in my name, without any further delay—in my
+name, you understand. Send this petition with your letter, and say it is
+my wish it should be granted, and that I beg him to send me an answer—a
+favorable answer—to‐morrow morning at the latest. As soon as it arrives,
+you will forward it in my name without any delay to that lovely girl. She
+is staying at the Princess Catherine Lamianoft’s house on the Grand Quay.”
+
+Vera could not resist a slight start: “The Princess Catherine’s?”
+
+“Yes; but make haste, and do what should be done at once.”
+
+Vera again looked at the bracelet; the princess’ name clearly recalled the
+remembrance so vague a moment before. It was hers. She had seen the
+Princess Catherine wear the bracelet.
+
+“Come, Vera, what are you thinking of?”
+
+“Nothing, madame; excuse me.”
+
+“Then make haste and write what I tell you, and send the letter and the
+petition without any delay.”
+
+Vera obeyed without reply; she took the petition, and went to a table in
+one of the deep embrasures of the windows, before which a gilt trellis
+covered with a vine formed a genuine screen. As soon as she was seated in
+this place where she could not be seen, she eagerly opened the petition,
+and glanced over it before beginning the letter. This glance was
+sufficient to justify the suspicion just excited. A deadly paleness came
+over her face; her features, generally so calm, were suddenly transformed
+by a violent explosion of anger and hatred. She crushed the paper, and
+remained motionless on the chair into which she had fallen, incapable of
+acting, thinking, or realizing where she was and what she had to do.
+
+At length she returned to herself, and made an effort to collect her
+thoughts. The moments were passing away; the empress would be astonished
+at the time it took to accomplish her wishes. She therefore took up her
+pen, but had scarcely written a few words with a trembling hand, when a
+noise, unusual at that hour, was heard in the court—the sound of a drum,
+and the guards shouldering arms. Vera rose with surprise, and looked out
+of the window. The emperor had arrived in his sledge, alone and without
+any escort, according to his custom, though this was not his usual time of
+coming. Shortly after, the doors of the salon were thrown open—a signal
+for Vera to leave the room. She tore up the note, put the petition in her
+pocket, and, while the empress was advancing to meet her husband, the lady
+of honor disappeared through a side door, and hurried to her room next the
+empress’ apartment.
+
+A whole hour passed away, she could not tell how. She had been able to
+control and generally to effectually disguise the strong feelings which
+pique had not suppressed—feelings which gave her assurance of some day
+overcoming all obstacles. And then, what were these obstacles? It was not
+long since George, her chosen husband from childhood, plainly testified
+the attraction he felt for her, and seemed as much as she to regard the
+union arranged in their infancy as the realization of his wishes. It is
+true a cloud had since passed across that brilliant horizon, and, when she
+met George again, he was not the same.—Why was it so?—She had often sought
+the reason, but all she was able to ascertain was that a young girl, an
+obscure _demoiselle de compagnie_ in his mother’s service, fascinated him
+for a while, and some one had whispered the name of _Gabrielle_, but the
+haughty Vera was not disturbed by so trifling an affair. The future was
+hers, and she was awaiting it without any fear, when the news of George’s
+crime and misfortune came like a thunderbolt, enabling her to estimate the
+depth of her affection for him by the very liveliness of her grief. From
+that time she had but one thought—to prevail over the emperor, obtain
+George’s pardon, and win him back to herself. Her first repulse did not
+destroy all hope of success. But while her influence, her passion, and her
+efforts were still without any result, another—and what a rival! (for
+Vera, in spite of her pride, was not so vain or so stupid as not to
+recognize the redoubtable charm against which she had to
+struggle)—another, young, as beautiful as herself, and even more so, had
+eclipsed in an instant, by an heroic act, all her own devotedness had even
+dreamed of, and gone beyond the limits which she dare not cross! How could
+she doubt George’s feelings when the young lady she had just seen appeared
+in his prison. How could she thwart her? What was to be done? Besides, who
+was this girl who suddenly appeared in their midst—who had the air of an
+angel, but whom she hated as if she were a demon? All at once an idea
+flashed into her mind. “Can this be Gabrielle?” she exclaimed aloud. But
+before Vera had time to dwell on this idea, and calm the fresh agitation
+which it caused, the sound of the little bell interrupted her painful
+reverie. She rose, but with some surprise, for she had not heard the usual
+signal of the emperor’s departure, and she was very seldom admitted when
+he was present. But her hesitation was only momentary, for the bell again
+hastily repeated the summons. Vera hastened to answer it, but, confused at
+the sight of the emperor, she stopped at the door, and bowed profoundly.
+The empress, with mingled kindness and impatience, exclaimed:
+
+“Why do you not come in, Vera? The emperor wishes to speak to you, and you
+are making _him_ wait!”
+
+
+LVI.
+
+
+While all we have just related was occurring at the palace, the Marquis
+Adelardi was on his way to the fortress, considering as he went what it
+was advisable to say to George. After much reflection, he resolved not to
+announce Fleurange’s arrival till he knew the result of her interview with
+the empress. He must not torture George in his misfortunes with vague
+hopes; above all, he must avoid arousing expectations that might prove
+vain. This would delay the communication but little, for the young girl’s
+audience was the same day, and on the morrow he could act with a complete
+knowledge of the case.
+
+Strong apprehensions were mingled with these thoughts as he reflected, on
+the new position in which his friend now stood. His fate was decided, the
+prolonged excitement of the trial was over, and the time come for him to
+resign himself to his lot. In what disposition should he find him? With a
+nature ardent and impetuous, but at the same time delicate, sensitive to
+the least restraint, and excessively fond of the comforts of life, how
+would he endure the horrors of this new prospect—he whose very object in
+his studies, and in the gratification of his tastes and passions, was only
+enjoyment? Pleasure by means of his intelligence, his affections, his
+intellect, and his senses—such had been the sole motive of his actions,
+even the best; and, in the dangerous risks that led to his destruction, he
+had rather sought to satisfy a thirst for a new sensation than the
+realization of a chimerical though generous scheme. How would he, for whom
+the words duty, sacrifice, and restraint had no meaning, now bear up in
+the presence not of danger, but of misfortune under so merciless a form?
+
+The marquis asked himself these questions with an anxiety founded perhaps
+on some resemblance between his own nature and that of him whom he
+comprehended so thoroughly. Both were men of the world: one more refined
+and cultivated, more captivating; the other with more acuteness, more
+sagacity, and more judgment. Both were generous and noble, and, apart from
+the political entanglements that had misled them one after the other,
+incapable of a base action unworthy of their noble birth. But there exists
+in the human soul a chord whose tone is the echo of the divine voice; this
+chord gave out no sound in these men, otherwise accomplished; or, if not
+voiceless with the elder of the two, at least, according to the expression
+of the great poet of his country, inert and feeble from “silence too
+prolonged.” This mysterious and hidden chord never resounds very loudly,
+it is true, and the tumult of the world with its passions, pleasures, wit,
+talent, and glory, often deadens its tone and prevents its being heard;
+but when the silent hour of adversity comes, then it awakes to a sweet,
+powerful harmony which sometimes transforms the soul it fills. At such a
+time its want is felt, and excites a horror, the cause of which is not
+comprehended by those who experience it.
+
+George was not confined in a dungeon, but in a narrow cell lighted only by
+a high grated window. There was nothing in it but a bed, a table, and two
+straw‐bottomed chairs. In his former visits, the marquis had found his
+friend sad, but always calm, courageous, and, as it were, contemptuous of
+the danger of his position. Though grown pale and thin, his features
+hitherto retained their lofty, noble character, and the disorder of his
+hair and even of his garments did not at all detract from the aristocratic
+appearance which, in the very best sense of the word, characterized his
+whole person. But this was no longer the case. He could not have been more
+changed by a long illness, or the inroads of time, than he was since they
+last met. Seated beside his table in an attitude of deep dejection, he
+hardly raised his head at his friend’s entrance. After pressing his hand,
+the latter remained some moments too much affected himself to break the
+mournful silence. George waited till the warden who ushered the visitor in
+had left the cell.
+
+“You have come at last, Adelardi,” said he at length, with an altered
+voice. “I have been surprised not to see you since—since everything was
+decided.”
+
+“I could not obtain permission to enter any sooner; but, to make up for
+it, I am allowed to come every day, till—” He stopped.
+
+“Till I give up the enjoyments of this place for those that await me when
+I leave it,” said George, with a bitter smile.—“Adelardi,” continued he,
+changing his tone, and rising abruptly, “can a friend like you come to me
+to‐day with empty hands? Is it possible you have not divined my wants, and
+are here without bringing me the means of escaping my doom, and meeting
+death, which they have had the cruelty to refuse me?” He strode up and
+down his cell two or three times as if beside himself. “Answer me, then,
+Adelardi!” exclaimed he, in a violent manner. “Why have you not rendered
+me this, the greatest of services? In a similar position, you would have
+expected it of me, and I assure you it would not have been in vain.”
+
+The marquis was not ignorant of the religious principles that should have
+inspired his reply, but he had long lost the habit of appealing to them.
+He therefore simply replied: “You know well, George, what you ask would
+have been impossible.”
+
+“Ah! yes, I forgot.—It is just. They take precautions to prevent their
+victims from finding another way out of these walls than that opened by
+their murderers; but they do not consider all the resources of despair,”
+continued he, with agitation. “When a man is determined to die, they must
+be sharper than they are now to prevent him, and oblige him to accept the
+odious life they would inflict upon him.”
+
+Adelardi allowed him without any interruption to give vent for some time
+to the despair that burdened his heart, but at last he turned to him with
+sudden firmness: “George, I have always found you calm and courageous till
+to‐day, but now your language is unworthy of you.”
+
+A slight flush rose to the prisoner’s brow, and he resumed his seat. “You
+are right, my friend, I acknowledge. I am no longer what I was. I must
+indeed astonish you, for I no longer recognize myself.” He remained
+thoughtful for some moments, and then continued: “It is strange! for,
+after all, Adelardi, in saying that till now I never knew what fear was,
+or shrunk in the presence of danger or death, saying I had courage, was
+not laying claim to any extraordinary merit, for there are but few men who
+lack it. Yes, if any virtue fell to my lot, it was certainly that, it
+seems to me. Why, then, am I so weak to‐day?—Courage,” repeated he, after
+a pause. “Is it true? Was it really courage, or was I merely brave, which
+seems to be another thing? What is the difference between them?”
+
+“I know not,” replied the marquis, as if in a dream; “but there is a
+difference, certainly.”
+
+Neither of them possessed the true key to the enigma; neither of them now
+thought of searching for it. But Adelardi, glad to see his friend’s
+excitement somewhat allayed, continued the subject to which the
+conversation had led. Besides, he saw it would afford an opportunity of
+touching on a point he did not wish to introduce directly.
+
+“No,” he resumed, “bravery and courage are not the same thing. What proves
+it is that the most timid woman can be as courageous as we when occasion
+requires it, and often more so.”
+
+“Yes, I acknowledge it.”
+
+“For example,” continued Adelardi, looking at him attentively, “more than
+one of your companions in misfortune have had a signal proof of such
+courage to‐day.”
+
+“How so?”
+
+“Do you not know that their wives have fearlessly and unhesitatingly
+requested and obtained the favor of sharing their lot? Some are to
+accompany them in their sad journey; others will follow them.”
+
+“And have their husbands accepted such a sacrifice?”
+
+“They who inspire such great devotedness can generally comprehend and
+accept it. It was only yesterday, one of them conversing with a friend
+admitted to see him, as I to see you, said: ‘I can submit to anything now;
+I can endure my fate without murmuring; I shall not be separated from her.
+The only intolerable sorrow in life will be spared me. I am grateful to
+the emperor, and will no longer complain!’ I must add that he was recently
+married, and adores his wife.”
+
+“The only sorrow,” repeated George slowly—“the only one!—that is really
+something I cannot understand. To love a woman to such a degree as to feel
+her presence could alleviate such a lot as ours, and that never to behold
+her again, would be a misfortune surpassing that which awaits us! No, I do
+not understand that, I frankly confess.”
+
+“And yet,” said Adelardi, with some eagerness.—But he stopped and did not
+continue his thought—that one can accept and admire heroic affection, but
+not suggest it.
+
+“And yet,” continued George, smiling, “how often you have seen me in love,
+you were going to say. Yes, I acknowledge it, though perhaps I was
+sincerely so but once, only once, and yet—shall I confess it, Adelardi?
+Love even then was a holiday in my life; it added to its brightness; it
+was an additional enjoyment, another charm. Her beauty; her rare, naïve
+intelligence; even her virtue, which gave a mysterious attraction to the
+passionate tenderness sometimes betrayed, in spite of herself, by her
+eyes, so innocent and frank in their expression; Oh! yes, that time I was
+in love and ready to commit a folly I am now glad to have avoided. Poor
+Fleurange! If I had married her, what a fate I should have reserved for
+her, as well as for myself.”
+
+“For her! Yes, indeed; it was a very different lot your affection promised
+her when you displayed it without any scruple; but if she—she, charming,
+devoted, and courageous, were there with you, do you not imagine she could
+sweeten yours?”
+
+“Mine?—my lot?—the frightful lot that awaits me?” asked George, with a
+bitter laugh. Then he resumed the previous tone of their conversation.
+
+“No, no; I am not one of those men whom love alone can suffice—stripped of
+all that outwardly adorns and adds to its value. In short, think of me as
+you please, Adelardi, but I do not resemble in the least my companion in
+misfortune you have just referred to. No human affection could make me
+endure the life I lead here; judge how it would be elsewhere.”
+
+He rose, and began again to walk around in an excited manner. Adelardi
+remained silently absorbed in anxious, painful thoughts. George soon
+resumed, in a kind of fury: “Here, Adelardi, speak to me only of one
+thing; give me only one hope—death! death! that is all I desire.” And
+touching, with a gesture of despair, the black cravat negligently fastened
+around his neck, he said, in a hoarse voice: “This will be a last resort,
+if in a week I do not succeed in finding some means more worthy of a
+gentleman of escaping from their hands.”
+
+His friend preserved a gloomy silence. What could he say? What reply could
+he make at a time when every earthly hope failed, and there was none felt
+in heaven? Adelardi was now fully conscious; he had a lively sense of what
+was wanting. He was born in a land where the impressions of childhood are
+always religious, and the longest period of indifference or forgetfulness
+seldom effaces them completely from the soul in which they were profoundly
+graven in early life.
+
+“My dear friend,” said he, with a melancholy gravity not habitual to him,
+“to be of service to you at such a time, I feel I should be different from
+what I am. Yes, George; in the fearful temptation that now besets you, in
+your despair in view of the frightful lot that awaits you, there is only
+one resource, and but one. I feel unworthy of suggesting the only remedy.”
+His voice faltered, as he continued, with emotion: “George, you must
+believe—you must pray.”
+
+George was for a moment surprised and affected. After a pause, which
+neither seemed disposed to interrupt, he said, in a softened tone: “Well,
+Adelardi, let it at least be permissible, in praying, to implore a favor
+not refused to a man more guilty than I: Fabiano is dying.”
+
+“I know he cannot recover from his wound.”
+
+“But perhaps he would not be in immediate danger had he not been violently
+attacked with typhus fever the day before yesterday. I hoped something
+myself from the contagion; but, doubtless afraid of shortening our heavy
+chain, they sent him last night to die at a hospital, I know not where.”
+
+At that moment the bolt flew back, the hour had elapsed, and they were
+obliged to separate, but with an effort scarcely lessened by the thought
+that it was not a final farewell, and that this sad interview would be
+repeated more than once before the last.
+
+As the marquis was about to leave the prison, the warden said in a low
+tone, as he was opening the last door:
+
+“I do not think I am acting contrary to my duty in confiding this letter
+to you, sir. The dying prisoner who was taken away last night gave it to
+me one day, begging me to forward it to the address after his departure.
+He has gone away, and I wish to fulfil the poor fellow’s request.”
+
+“Give it to me,” said Adelardi, as he took it. “I will see that it is
+forwarded.”
+
+After leaving the fortress, he looked at the letter confided to him, and
+was greatly surprised to find it addressed to _Mademoiselle Gabrielle
+d’Yves, at Professor Dornthal’s, Heidelberg_.
+
+
+LVII.
+
+
+The Marquis Adelardi entered the sledge awaiting him at the gate of the
+fortress, but gave no orders to his coachman, uncertain where he should
+go. Fleurange by this time must have returned from the palace. Should he
+go to see her, as was agreed upon the evening before, to learn the result
+of the audience, and at the same time remit the letter confided to him?
+This was the plainest course to pursue, and, if he hesitated, it was
+because his interview with George had left a certain dissatisfaction or,
+at least, uneasiness which he feared to betray. In the singular mission
+confided to him, he began to feel that the love and courage of the two
+parties were unequally divided, and he would have anxiously questioned
+whether it was certain that the gratitude of one would finally correspond
+to the devotedness of the other, had he not been reassured by several
+reflections.
+
+It was not, perhaps, very surprising that George depreciated a happiness
+he considered beyond his reach. But if she whom he was by no means
+expecting suddenly appeared in his prison, would he then complain that his
+bride was too beautiful? The marquis thought not. He knew better than any
+one else how Fleurange once charmed him. No woman had ever held such
+empire over George’s mobile heart, and he was sure the very sight of her
+again would suffice to revive the powerful attraction. As to this, his
+perfect knowledge of his friend’s character prevented all doubt, and
+therefore, though wounded by his coldness in speaking of Fleurange, he
+came to the conclusion his indifference would vanish like snow before the
+sun as soon as she appeared. She would never perceive it or suffer from
+it. He regarded this as the most important point.
+
+The interest Fleurange inspired him with was one of the best and purest
+sentiments he had ever experienced in his life. Without suspecting it, and
+without aiming at it, she exercised a beneficent influence over him. A
+thousand early impressions, effaced and almost stifled by the world, awoke
+in the pure atmosphere that surrounded this young girl, and he welcomed
+them with a feeling that surprised himself. Therefore, from the time of
+meeting her again, he seriously assumed, more for her sake than George’s,
+the quasi‐paternal _rôle_ the Princess Catherine had entrusted to him with
+respect to both.
+
+The considerations referred to having, therefore, completely reassured him
+respecting George’s probable if not actual dispositions, he returned to
+his first intentions, and gave orders to be taken to the house on the
+Grand Quay. He had scarcely descended and asked to see Mademoiselle
+d’Yves, when he saw Clement crossing the hall. He bethought himself it
+might be better to consult him first.
+
+Clement was gloomy and preoccupied. He had just seen his cousin return
+from the palace in all the brilliancy that dress and the joy resulting
+from success added to her beauty. But the marquis had not time to notice
+the young man’s physiognomy, nor the effort with which he replied to the
+first questions addressed him as soon as they were alone together in a
+room on the ground floor.
+
+“I wish to speak to. you, Dornthal, about an unexpected incident. But
+first, has your cousin returned from the palace?”
+
+“Yes.”
+
+“Do you know whether she is satisfied with the audience?”
+
+“Yes; the empress promised to have her petition granted by to‐morrow.”
+
+“I did not doubt it. The empress is always so kindly disposed to grant a
+favor; and, were it otherwise, the sight of her who presented the petition
+could not fail to ensure its success.”
+
+Clement made no reply to this observation. “You said, Monsieur le Marquis,
+that an unexpected incident—”
+
+“Yes, I am coming to it. I must first tell you what perhaps you are
+ignorant of.—That miserable Fabiano Dini, who so cruelly compromised
+George, and was confined with him—”
+
+Clement, surprised, interrupted him with emotion. “The unfortunate man is
+actually dying, Monsieur le Marquis. He was removed from the fortress last
+night, and—”
+
+“_Parbleu!_ I know it; that was precisely what I was going to tell you.
+But how did you find it out?”
+
+“I made inquiries respecting him.”
+
+“You knew this Fabiano, then?”
+
+“Yes, a little, and was interested in knowing what had become of him.”
+
+“And do you know now?”
+
+“Yes, I know in what hospital he is, and that, thanks to his illness which
+makes flight impossible, and the fear of contagion which keeps every one
+away from him, he is only guarded by the infirmarians. I hope to get
+admittance to him to‐day.”
+
+“You know him?” repeated the marquis after a moment’s reflection. “Then
+that explains what seemed so mysterious. Your cousin Gabrielle, in that
+case, perhaps knows him also?”
+
+“Yes, she knows him—the same. as I.”
+
+“That explains everything; and, since it is so, here, Dornthal,” said the
+marquis, giving him the letter of which he was the bearer, “have the
+kindness to give her this.”
+
+At the sight of his cousin’s writing, Clement was unable to conceal his
+emotion, and, seeing the marquis’ observant eye fastened on him, it seemed
+useless to conceal the truth. Without any hesitation, therefore, he
+briefly related all the circumstances of the life of him who was now
+expiating his faults by the final sufferings of a miserable death.
+
+“I am not afraid, Monsieur le Marquis, to confide to you the secret of his
+sad life. You will keep it, I am sure, and will never forget, I hope,”
+added he in a faltering tone, “that it is _Fabiano Dini_, and not Felix
+Dornthal, who will be delivered by death from an infamous punishment.”
+
+The marquis pressed his hand. “Rely on my silence, Dornthal.” After a
+moment, he continued: “This unfortunate man showed great courage during
+his trial, and absolute contempt of danger for himself. He only seemed
+preoccupied with the desire of saving him whose destruction he had caused.
+God forgive him!”
+
+“Yes, truly, God forgive him!” gravely repeated the young man.
+
+Adelardi again extended his hand, and was about to leave the room when
+Clement stopped him. “Monsieur le Marquis, will you allow me now to ask
+you a question?”
+
+“Certainly.”
+
+“Well, may I ask if Count George has been informed of Gabrielle’s
+arrival?”
+
+“No, not yet.”
+
+“But he is doubtless aware of her intentions?”
+
+“No, my friend, he is likewise ignorant of them. Though I had no doubt as
+to Gabrielle’s success in her interview with the empress to‐day,
+nevertheless, before giving George such a surprise, I wished to be
+absolutely sure there was no uncertainty to apprehend.”
+
+“Oh! yes, I comprehend you. To lose such a hope, after once conceiving it,
+would indeed be more frightful than death!” said Clement, with a vivacity
+that struck the other. He soon continued in a calmer tone:
+
+“One more question, Monsieur le Marquis—an absurd question, I acknowledge,
+but one I cannot resist asking at such a time. You know my position with
+regard to Gabrielle is that of a brother. Can you assure me that he whom
+she loves, and is thus going to wholly immolate herself for—can you assure
+me on your honor that he is worthy of her?—that he loves her?—that he
+loves her as much as a man ever loved a woman? I certainly cannot doubt
+it, but then I must see her happy in return for so much suffering—I must!”
+repeated he almost passionately, “and I beg a sincere reply to my
+question.”
+
+The marquis hesitated a moment. Clement’s vehemence struck him, and under
+the impression of his recent interview with George, he did not at first
+know how to reply. Should he betray his friend? Ought he to deceive him
+whose noble, upright look was fastened upon him? He remained uncertain for
+some moments; at length, he decided to be frank, and reply as candidly as
+he was questioned.
+
+“You ask for the truth, Dornthal. Well, it is not in my power to affirm
+that George’s love is at this moment all you desire. According to my
+impression, Gabrielle is now only a sweet dream of the past. But be easy,
+my dear friend; as soon as this dream becomes a reality, as soon as she
+appears before him—is with him—his—oh! then there is no doubt but the
+almost extinguished flame will revive and become as brilliant as it once
+was, and this charming creature will have no cause to suspect a shadow of
+forgetfulness had ever veiled her image. What do you expect, Dornthal? As
+to love and constancy, women far surpass us, and they are not the less
+happy for that. Adieu! my dear friend, till to‐morrow.”
+
+Clement only replied by taking the hand the marquis again extended before
+going out. He listened to him, pale and shuddering, but, as soon as he was
+alone, he exclaimed, endeavoring with an effort to suppress the sobs that
+stifled his breast:
+
+“Ah! my God!—my God!—Is that love?”
+
+
+LVIII.
+
+
+Fleurange, to the great regret of Mademoiselle Josephine, laid aside the
+rich dress which seemed to realize the old lady’s dreams of the previous
+night, and had just reappeared clad in the simple high‐necked dress of
+dark cloth which was her usual costume, when Clement, who had told her he
+should not return till late in the evening, suddenly re‐entered the salon
+he left only half an hour before. His intention was to consecrate the
+remainder of the day to the sad duty he felt he owed his cousin, and
+thought it useless to mention it to Gabrielle, from whom he concealed all
+he had learned respecting Felix. But the letter just given him altered the
+case, and made it indispensable to inform her at once.
+
+He therefore explained to her without much preamble the actual situation
+of their unhappy cousin; he informed her of the attempt he was about to
+make to see him, and then related what he had learned from the Marquis
+Adelardi, giving her the letter of which he was the bearer. It was not
+without lively emotion Fleurange broke the seal and hurriedly read it
+aloud:
+
+
+    “COUSIN GABRIELLE: I am condemned to the mines for life, but as,
+    at the same time, I am dangerously wounded, I shall probably have
+    long ceased to exist when this letter reaches you, if it ever
+    does. I regret the misfortunes I have brought on so many, and
+    especially on my last benefactor, and I particularly regret this
+    on your account, for it will perhaps be a source of suffering to
+    you. I should have thought of this sooner, but, seeing you
+    unexpectedly pass by in a calèche one evening at Florence, I
+    waited at the door of the hotel where I saw you stop, and yielded
+    to the irresistible desire of making you think of me by throwing
+    you some lines concealed in a bouquet. A few days after, my
+    patron, who was very far from suspecting my acquaintance with the
+    original, imprudently showed me his beautiful Cordelia. I confess
+    I was seized with a keen desire to tear him away from
+    contemplating it, which irritated me. Lasko opportunely arrived.
+    But I did not think that would go so far. As to the rest,
+    Gabrielle, believe me, my love which you rejected (and I confess
+    you acted wisely) was perhaps more worthy of you than his; for I
+    feel if I had met you sooner, and you could have loved me, you
+    would have made me better, whereas he!—But it is too late to speak
+    to you either of him or myself!—It is all over. It is to you—you
+    alone, dear cousin, I address these last words; you must repeat
+    them to all to whom they are due; uttered by you they will be
+    heard. _Forgive_ and _Farewell_.
+
+    F. D.”
+
+
+Fleurange wiped away the tears that filled her eyes. The letter affected
+her in more than one way, and Clement, it may be imagined, did not listen
+to it with indifference. But now one thought overruled all others, and,
+after a moment’s silence, he said: “This letter was written when he
+expected to die from his wound. Illness is now hastening his end, and
+perhaps he is no longer living while we are talking. This evening, at all
+events, you will know whether I found him dead or alive.”
+
+Fleurange interrupted him: “Clement, listen to me. If Felix is still
+alive, as is by no means impossible, I should like to see him again, and
+will go with you.”
+
+“You!—no, that cannot be; the danger from contagion is too great. That
+hospital! you cannot go there; it is a place provided for criminals and
+miserable creatures of the lowest grade. I cannot expose you to so much
+danger. I will not.”
+
+“But, perchance,” said Fleurange, “this preference, this sort of sympathy
+he has always expressed for me in his way, might give me the power of
+consoling the last moments of his wretched life. Who knows but my voice
+might utter some word to soothe the despair of his last agony? Clement,
+Clement, do you dare tell me I should not attempt it? Can you
+conscientiously venture to dissuade me from it, because thereby I shall
+incur some danger?”
+
+“Gabrielle,” said Clement, with a kind of irritation, “you are always the
+same! Do you not understand that you are merciless towards those that love
+you?”
+
+“Come, reflect a moment,” persisted she, “and answer me, Clement.”
+
+A moment of silent anguish followed these words. Then, with a troubled
+voice, he said: “Be quick; lose no time. You may perhaps have an influence
+over him no one else could have. Make haste, I will wait for you.”
+
+Before he ended, Fleurange was gone from the room. In less time than it
+takes to relate it, she returned wrapped in her cloak, her velvet hat on
+her head, her face concealed by a veil, ready to go. They went down
+without speaking a word. Clement’s sledge was waiting at the door. He took
+a seat beside her, and they set off with the almost frightful rapidity
+which is peculiar to that mode of conveyance. It was no longer light,
+being after four o’clock, but the brilliant clearness of the night,
+increased by the reflection of the snow, sufficiently lighted the way, and
+the horses went as fast as in the daytime. The place of their destination
+was on the opposite bank of the Neva, much lower down than the Princess
+Catherine’s house. They therefore crossed the river diagonally, following
+a road traced out by the pine branches which from time to time indicated
+the path. They were thus transported in the twinkling of an eye from the
+splendor of the city into the midst of what looked like a vast white
+desert. In proportion as they descended the river, the palaces, the
+numerous gilded spires of the churches, with the immense succession of
+buildings whose effect was heightened by the obscurity, were lost in the
+distance, and, when they at length stopped at the very extremity of a
+faubourg on the right bank of the river, they found themselves surrounded
+by wooden hovels, with here and there some larger buildings, but all
+indicating poverty, and none more than a story high. Clement aided his
+cousin in alighting, and looked around for the person he expected as his
+guide. A man approached.
+
+“M. Clement Dornthal?” said he in a low voice.
+
+“It is I.”
+
+“You are not alone.”
+
+“What difference does that make?”
+
+“I have no permission, and a woman—it is forbidden.”
+
+“I suppose, however, more than one has entered the place?”
+
+“Oh! yes, but they must have permission—or else—”
+
+“Here,” said Clement in a low tone, “mine will answer for both.”
+
+The guide seemed to find the reply satisfactory; he pocketed the gold
+piece Clement slipped into his hand and made no further objection. They
+walked swiftly after him towards one of the buildings just referred to
+which was the best lighted. As they approached, they saw the light
+proceeded from a large fire kindled in the open air, around which quite a
+number were warming themselves, some squatting down, others standing, and
+some asleep near enough to the fire not to freeze to death; all lit up
+with the wild light which revealed their bearded faces, their angular fur
+caps, and their sheep‐skin caftans. Here and there were some venders of
+brandy, who furnished them with a more efficacious means of resisting the
+cold even than the fire in the brazier.
+
+Clement and his companion passed rapidly by this group, not, however,
+without being assailed by some annoying words. A vigorous blow from
+Clement sent a curious winebibber flying back who attempted to lift
+Fleurange’s veil. This lesson was sufficient, and they arrived without any
+further annoyance at the door of the building decorated with the name of
+hospital, which was only a long, spacious wooden gallery.
+
+They entered. Passing thus suddenly from the light of the great fire, and
+the sharpness of the extreme cold, into the obscurity and warmth of the
+ambulance, their first sensations were caused by the darkness and stifling
+atmosphere. Fleurange hastily threw back her veil, then took off her hat
+and unclasped her cloak, for she could not breathe; she felt nearly ready
+to faint from the effects of this sudden transition, but she almost
+immediately recovered. Clement was alarmed at first, but soon saw she was
+able to continue their sad search. As soon as their eyes became accustomed
+to the dim light around them, they saw the long row of pallets on which
+lay, in all the frightful varieties of suffering, nearly two hundred human
+beings whose mingled groanings rose on all sides like one sad cry of pain,
+enough to chill the veins with horror, and excite the pity of the most
+courageous and most hardened heart.
+
+That of Fleurange beat painfully as they slowly advanced through the
+obstructed space. Clement was remorsefully regretting his consent to bring
+her to such a place, when all at once a moan, followed by some words
+indicative of delirium, checked every other thought, and kept them
+motionless where they stood. They listened—which of these unfortunate
+beings had uttered those words? They looked around as well as the poor
+light permitted, but on all these sick‐beds so close to each other they
+did not perceive one whose features bore the least resemblance to those of
+the unhappy man whose voice they thought they recognized.
+
+“I beg you to lend me your light only for a moment,” said Fleurange, in a
+low, supplicating tone to an infirmarian to whom she had just heard some
+one speak in German, and who was rudely passing by her, lantern in hand.
+
+The infirmarian stopped at hearing his language spoken, and looked at the
+young girl with surprise, then, as if softened by her aspect, he gave her
+the lantern, saying: “You can have it while I am gone to the other end of
+the ward; I will take it when I return.” As Clement took it, the light
+flashed across Fleurange’s face and uncovered head. Instantly there was a
+cry, an almost convulsive movement, and Gabrielle’s name was pronounced by
+the voice they had just heard. This indicated which of the miserable beds
+contained him whom they sought. They both approached with full hearts. By
+the aid of the lamp they gazed at the dying man. Was it really he?—was
+that Felix? His voice and words left no doubt, and yet there was nothing
+in that face, disfigured by agony and a horrible wound, to recall him whom
+they saw last in all the fulness of strength and the pride of youth. After
+his exclamation, he fell back almost lifeless, and Clement trembled as he
+bent down to ascertain if he still breathed. His heart was beating, though
+feebly and irregularly.
+
+“Felix,” said he, “do you hear me? Do you know me?”
+
+Felix opened his eyes. “What a strange dream!” murmured he. “It seems as
+if they were all here. That vision a moment ago, and now this voice—O my
+God, would I might never awake!”
+
+Fleurange took the dying man’s hand, and bent over him to catch his words.
+Her features thus became distinctly visible in the light, and his eyes
+fastened with frightful tenacity on those of the young girl.
+
+“It is impossible!” said he. “But what illusion is this which makes me see
+and hear what cannot be?”
+
+“Felix,” said Fleurange, with a penetrating accent of sweetness, “it is
+not an illusion. We are here. God has sent us that you may not die alone
+without a friend to pray for you, without begging and obtaining pardon and
+peace.”
+
+A ray of perfect clearness of comprehension now lit up his eyes, hitherto
+fixed or wandering. He seemed to comprehend, but did not reply. Clement
+and Fleurange were afraid to break the solemn silence. Felix’s eyes soon
+wandered from one to the other, and, taking the young girl’s hand and that
+of Clement, he pressed them together upon his heart, saying: “O my God!
+what a miracle!” Then he added in a feeble voice: “What a comfort that it
+is he, and not the other!”
+
+They both understood his mistake, but were not equally affected. Fleurange
+slightly blushed, and withdrew her hand with a faint smile, but Clement’s
+face became almost as pale as that of the dying man. But graver thoughts
+prevailed over both at such a time. After a short silence, Fleurange again
+addressed Felix some words, but he made no reply, and his head, which she
+tried to raise, fell on his shoulder. He continued faint for some moments,
+then opened his eyes, and saw her beside him.
+
+“God be praised!” said he. “The vision is still here!”
+
+“Yes, I am here, Felix,” said Fleurange in a fervent tone: “I am here to
+pray with you. Listen to me,” continued she, speaking softly and very
+distinctly. “Say with me that you repent of all the sins of your life.”
+
+“Of all the sins of my life!”—repeated the dying man.
+
+“And if your strength were restored, you would make a complete and
+satisfactory avowal of them, with a sincere repentance. Do you understand
+me?”
+
+The hand she held pressed hers. A tear ran down Felix’s cheek. A voice
+which was a mere whisper repeated the words: “A sincere
+repentance”—another faintness seemed to announce his end. “O my God!” said
+Fleurange, fervently raising her eyes to heaven, “if the sacred absolving
+words could only be pronounced over him!”
+
+At that moment the infirmarian returned and abruptly took the lantern from
+Clement’s hand. “Excuse me, I need it for some one who has come to visit a
+patient.”
+
+In the narrow space that separated the two rows of beds, there could be
+indistinctly seen a person of majestic, imposing appearance, whose long
+beard and floating hair, whose ample robes of silk and gold cross, clearly
+indicated his character; he was, in fact, a priest of the Greek Church. He
+had not, however, come to this sad place to exercise his ministry. One of
+the poor men suffering from the contagious disease was the object of his
+charity, and he had come to visit him. He was passing along without
+looking around, even turning his eyes away as much as possible from the
+sad spectacle that surrounded him, when Clement’s hand on his arm stopped
+him as he was passing Felix’s bed.
+
+“What do you wish of me, young man?” he asked, with surprise.
+
+“I implore you,” said Clement, “to come to this dying man who is truly
+contrite for his sins, with a sincere desire to confess them if he had the
+strength. Have the kindness to give him sacramental absolution!”
+
+In spite of the place, the hour, the awful solemnity of the moment, the
+young Catholic girl started at hearing these words; her large eyes opened
+with an expression of the keenest surprise, and turned towards Clement
+with a mute glance of anxiety. He understood her, and, while the
+infirmarian was interpreting his words which had been heard but not
+understood, he replied: “This is a priest, Gabrielle, invested with all
+the authority of Holy Orders. In the presence of death, we can avail
+ourselves of it, without regard to anything else.”
+
+He knelt down. Fleurange did the same. The dying man clasped his hands,
+and, whilst the word “forgive” once more trembled on his lips, the Greek
+priest raised his right hand with a majestic air, and pronounced over him
+the merciful, divine words of holy absolution!
+
+To Be Continued.
+
+
+
+
+Cologne.
+
+
+What is more familiar than the name of Cologne? What is more delicious
+than the perfume of the veritable Jean Maria Farina? What is more
+delightful than the receipt of a box, with the stereotyped picture on the
+cover of the Rhine lazily flowing under the bridges, of the cathedral
+looming up to the sky, of the houses clustering around it as though for
+protection?
+
+No one need be ashamed to avow his or her love of it; it is acknowledged
+to be indispensable. Bishop or priest, sage or philosopher, can use it
+without being thought undignified. Imagine a pope, or cardinal, or bishop,
+or priest, or senator, or judge scented with “Mille Fleurs,” or “Jockey
+Club,” or “Bouquet de Nilsson”! The bare thought is revolting! To be sure,
+for some years, “Bouquet d’Afrique” has been the fashion among the
+“potent, grave, and reverend seigniors” at Washington who make our laws
+and amuse themselves by adding “Fifteenth Amendments” to the highly
+respectable and ever‐to‐be‐respected Constitution of the United States.
+
+But that will pass away with Time, the healer and destroyer; the
+reconstructionist will make all right; the “Fifteenth” will be amended
+with the “Sixteenth”; and, with the sway of lovely woman, Cologne, without
+which no well‐bred, well‐dressed woman’s toilette is complete, will resume
+its reign over heads and hearts; and “Bouquet d’Afrique” will perhaps
+return to the hot and happy home where the indefatigable Stanley recently
+discovered the wandering, long‐sought Livingstone—who did not care to be
+found, as he certainly appeared perfectly content among dusky dark‐browed
+brothers and sisters, hunting lions and tigers, and imagining each little
+rivulet and lake the source of the Nile, or Congo, or Niger, or any other
+meandering river taking its rise in the great water‐shed by the Mountains
+of the Moon.
+
+If mothers are to be judged by the character of their sons, the mother of
+Nero, in whose honor Cologne was named, could not have been the mildest
+and gentlest of her sex. Says Lacordaire, “The education of the child is
+commenced in the womb of the mother, continued on her breast, completed at
+her knees.” Sweet must have been the reveries, refreshing the
+instructions, edifying the conduct of Julia Agrippina, who brought into
+the world the finished despot that drenched the soil of Rome with the
+blood of the Christian martyrs, who persecuted unto death the heroes of
+the faith that now people heaven.
+
+Cologne owes its origin to a Roman camp established by Marcus Agrippa. The
+Emperor Claudius, at the request of his wife, Julia Agrippina, daughter of
+Germanicus and mother of Nero, sent a colony of Roman veterans, A.D. 50,
+named the town after her _Colonia Agrippina_, and it then became the
+capital of the Province of Germania Secunda. Vitellius was here proclaimed
+Emperor of Rome, A.D. 69; Trajan here received from Nerva the summons to
+share his throne; the usurper Sylvanus was also proclaimed emperor here in
+353; a few years later Cologne was taken by the Franks; Childeric made it
+his residence in 464; and Clovis was here proclaimed king in 508.
+
+During the reign of Pepin, it was the capital of the kingdoms of Neustria
+and Austrasia. Bruno, Duke of Lorraine, was the first of its archbishops
+who exercised the temporal power, with which he was invested by his
+brother, Otho the Great. From that time the town increased rapidly in
+wealth and splendor, and shortly after became one of the principal
+emporiums of the Hanseatic League; the commerce of the East was here
+concentrated, and direct communication with Italy constantly kept up. In
+1259, the town acquired the privilege by which all vessels were compelled
+to unload here and reship their cargoes in Cologne bottoms.
+
+At this period it had a population of 150,000, and could furnish 30,000
+fighting men in time of war. In the XIIIth century, there was a mutiny
+among the weavers; 17,000 looms were destroyed; the rebellious workmen
+were banished from the city; and that, together with the expulsion of the
+Jews in 1349, did great injury to the town, the number of whose
+inhabitants was reduced in 1790 to 42,000, of whom nearly one‐third were
+paupers. Then came the devastating wars which succeeded the maelstrom of
+the French Revolution, when in the general upheaval empires and kingdoms
+disappeared, new political combinations were made which changed the map of
+Europe, and the Rhine became the frontier of the French Empire.
+
+Cologne was nominally French, but the hearts of the people were German—as
+German as the most ardent worshipper of the “New God,” as Von Bolanden
+calls the new Empire, the child of Bismarck and Von Moltke. After
+Waterloo, the Holy Alliance made another partition of the kingdoms and
+peoples, and Cologne shook off the French yoke, and returned to her
+national ways and customs. One great cause of its decay had been the
+closing of the navigation of the Rhine, which restriction was removed in
+1837, and, since then, trade has greatly revived, and the town been much
+improved.
+
+Many of the old streets have been widened and paved, and a considerable
+portion of waste ground covered with new buildings. The opening of the
+railways to Paris, Antwerp, Ostend, Hamburg, and Berlin has greatly added
+to its commercial prosperity, and Cologne bids fair to resume its former
+position among the chief cities of Europe. Cologne was formerly called the
+“Holy Cologne,” and the “Rome of the North”—titles which she owed to the
+number of relics and churches she possessed.
+
+At one time, the city contained 200 buildings devoted to religious uses.
+These gradually diminished, until in 1790 their number was reduced to 137.
+During the French Revolution, they were shamefully plundered, the convents
+suppressed, and their property confiscated; so that at present there are
+not more than twenty churches and seven or eight chapels; but many other
+ecclesiastical buildings still remain, used as warehouses and chapels.
+
+Maria im Capitol, so named from its having been built on the site of the
+Roman capitol, stands on an eminence reached by a flight of steps. The
+Frankish kings had a palace close by, to which Plectruda, the wife of
+Pepin, retired in 696, having separated from her husband on account of his
+attachment to Alpais, the mother of Charles Martel. In 700, she pulled
+down the capitol, and erected a church on its site, to which she attached
+a chapter of canonesses. Until 1794, the senate and consuls repaired
+hither annually on S. John’s day to assist at Mass, when the outgoing
+Burgomasters solemnly transferred the insignia of office to the newly
+elected, who were each presented with a bouquet of flowers by the abbess.
+
+The convent no longer exists, but there is a large cloister of the XIth
+century at the west end of the church, which was restored a few years ago.
+In this church, there are mural paintings of the early Cologne school,
+representing the wise and foolish virgins, numberless saints, the raising
+of Lazarus, and the founders of the church with their children. As in duty
+bound, Plectruda is properly conspicuous; her effigy in basso‐rilievo
+beneath the great east window is a very interesting work of the Xth
+century, and, on one of the towers, her sculptured figure appears between
+two angels, who are conducting her to her eternal home.
+
+All the churches are more or less interesting, none more so than that of
+S. Gereon, founded in the IVth century. S. Gereon was the commander of a
+Roman legion, and he and his companions, 700 in number, were murdered by
+order of Diocletian upon the spot where the church was built by the
+Empress Helena, the mother of Constantine.
+
+The style is Byzantine, and very singular. The body of the church,
+preceded by a large portico, presents a vast decagonal shell, the pillars
+of whose internal angles are prolonged in ribs, which, centring in a
+summit, meet in one point and form a cupola, one of the latest examples
+known. A high wide flight of steps, rising opposite to the entrance, leads
+to an altar with an oblong choir behind it, from whence other steps again
+ascend to the sanctuary, a semicircular apse, belted, like the cupola, by
+an open gallery with small arches and pillars resting on a panelled
+balustrade.
+
+The rotunda is surrounded by ten chapels, in which are the tombs of the
+martyrs. The walls are encrusted with their skulls, and, in the
+subterranean church, the pavement and walls are formed by the tomb‐stones
+covering the holy dust. In the lower church is the tomb of S. Gereon, and
+in one of the chapels is a mosaic pavement laid in the time of the Empress
+Helena. Behind the stalls of the clergy are hangings of Gobelin tapestry,
+portraying the history of Joseph and his brethren.
+
+The baptismal font of porphyry, immensely large, was a present from
+Charlemagne; and, as the lid is too ponderous for any one to lift, there
+is a little machine that takes it off when required. We remained a long
+while in this very delightful church, and, by the time we left, what with
+Helen and Constantine, Diocletian and Charlemagne, we felt quite like an
+animated verd‐antique, so intensely Roman and Catholic had we become.
+
+Afterwards we proceeded to S. Ursula’s, where the cruel Roman emperor was
+exchanged for the barbarian Huns. S. Ursula’s history was done in English
+by the old sexton, who finished every sentence by assuring us that S.
+Ursula and her eleven thousand virgins met with their untimely fate from
+the barbarian Huns, who massacred them in cold blood. We made a stride of
+a few centuries, became Gothic, and extended our hatred to the barbarian
+Huns. As in S. Gereon, the bones of the martyrs are built in the walls for
+a space of two feet the whole extent.
+
+In the Golden Chamber we saw the shrine of S. Ursula, the relics of S.
+Margaret, a thorn from the crown of Our Lord, and one of the vases used at
+the marriage feast of Cana, that witnessed the first miracle of the God‐
+man. Link by link we were carried to the days when Our Lord was incarnate
+on the earth; we do not need such testimony to assure us of the truth of
+our holy faith, but, when we touch the vase that has been touched by Our
+Lord, our senses are awed by the thought of the God‐like condescension of
+him who became man, who lived like us, who mingled in our joys and
+sorrows, that we might become greater than the angels.
+
+The Cathedral of Cologne, the queen of pointed architecture, erected on
+the site of a church founded in 814 by Archbishop Hildebold, and more
+beautiful than even we could imagine it, familiar as we were with it by
+picture and description, was commenced in August, 1248, by Archbishop
+Conrad, of Hochstaden. The works were for some years pushed on with great
+activity under the direction of Master Gerard von Rile, a builder of whom
+nothing more is known than that he died before 1302.
+
+In 1322, the choir was completed and consecrated; then the building went
+slowly on until 1357, when the works were discontinued for a long time. In
+1796, the cathedral was converted by the French into a warehouse, and it
+had very nearly become a ruin in 1807, when the brothers Sulpice and
+Melchior Boisserée drew attention to it by their illustrated work on its
+history. In 1824, the work of restoration was commenced, but little
+progress was made until, in 1842, the idea of completing the cathedral was
+conceived, and an association was formed to collect subscriptions for this
+purpose; and now the entire edifice will soon be finished if the works are
+carried on as zealously as they have been of late.
+
+The glorious roof, arching 150 feet in the air, is magnificent; every day
+new beauties are added; four hundred men are daily at work, the stones are
+all cut, and in ten years at least this triumph of genius will be ready to
+receive the homage of all true lovers of art. The shrine of the Three
+Kings is superb—gold adorned with precious stones. There are the heads of
+the three men who came in faith, and bowed in all their pride and majesty
+before the infant Jesus in the manger; their names, Gaspar, Melchior, and
+Balthazar, are encrusted in rubies above the crowns that encircle their
+brows. Their bodies were brought from S. Eustorgio, in Milan, by the
+Emperor Frederick Barbarossa, after the taking of that city, and presented
+by him to Archbishop Rainoldo, who deposited them in the ancient cathedral
+July 23, 1164; from whence they were removed into the present chapel in
+1337.
+
+Among the treasures of the cathedral is a splendid ostensorium, one of the
+finest in the world, presented by some sovereign; another, not so
+handsome, sent by Pius IX.; and the cross and ring, given to the present
+archbishop by Kaiser William; both are of diamonds and emeralds, the ring,
+an immense emerald, surrounded by four circles of diamonds. The man who
+showed the church prided himself upon his English; would call the
+archbishops architects: “This is the statue of Engelbert, the first
+_architect from_ Cologne.” And when we innocently inquired if the
+architects wore mitres and copes, he impressively repeated his remark; so
+we are still in doubt whether the archbishops built the cathedral or the
+architects dressed like bishops!
+
+Wandering one day through the aisles of the cathedral, we paused for a
+while to gaze upon something beautiful that attracted our attention. It
+was behind the high altar; we were standing between it and the Chapel of
+the Magi, when, by chance, we looked down, and on the slab at our feet we
+saw in large letters, “Marie de’ Medici”—no date, no epitaph. So much for
+human greatness! Under that stone, trodden daily by hundreds, was the
+heart of Marie de’ Medici, one of the powerful family that gave to the
+church Leo X. and Clement VII., the descendant of Lorenzo the Magnificent,
+the widow of Henri Quatre, the mother of Louis XIII., the ex‐Regent of
+France. Banished from France, the inexorable hostility of Richelieu
+pursued her wherever she sought refuge. No crowned head dared shelter her.
+
+One heart was true, one man was found who remembered in her adversity that
+she had favored him in the days of her prosperity. When, in the zenith of
+her power, she built the Luxembourg, she sent for Rubens to adorn it with
+the creations of his genius; she loaded him with favors, sent him on
+diplomatic missions to restore peace between Philip IV. of Spain and
+Charles I. of England. Both monarchs responded to her wishes, showered
+honors upon the artist‐diplomat, and Charles I. knighted him, and then
+presented him with the sword which had been used for the ceremony.
+
+Genius is a power. Richelieu could command kings on their thrones, and the
+refugee queen was abandoned by all—by those who should have been bound to
+her by the ties of kindred, of position, by the claims of misfortune.
+England, Spain, Holland, refused her entrance; only in the free city of
+Cologne could she find sanctuary, and that sanctuary was the house of the
+noble, chivalric artist, Pierre Paul Rubens, whose brave heart quailed not
+before the wrath of the most powerful man of his age.
+
+With loving care and respect he watched over her, soothed her in her dying
+agony, and held her in his arms when she breathed her last sigh. The house
+of Rubens still remains, and the room in which Marie de’ Medici died is
+preserved with the greatest care. When we visited it, we felt as though we
+were treading on holy ground, as in a shrine made sacred by a noble deed;
+for what more royal, more heroic, more Christian, than the brave, grateful
+heart that dared power to shelter misfortune?
+
+Meanwhile that Marie de’ Medici lived and died in poverty in Cologne,
+Richelieu was at the apogee of his glory. King, nobles, courts, cowered
+beneath his glance. The conspiracy of Cinq‐Mars was quelled; his head had
+paid the penalty of his youthful folly. Richelieu, satisfied and avenged,
+left Lyons for Paris, carried on the shoulders of his attendants in a kind
+of furnished room, for which the gates of the cities through which he
+passed were demolished if they were too narrow to admit it. But the
+triumph was short‐lived. A few months after the death of Marie de’ Medici,
+her relentless persecutor followed her to the tomb, and her poor wearied
+body was removed to France and buried in S. Denis; but the heart was left
+in the Cathedral of Cologne—a mausoleum sufficiently splendid for any
+mortal dust.
+
+Soon after leaving the house of Rubens, we came to another famous in
+Cologne; a large building, where, from one of the windows of the third
+story, two stone horses were contemplating the busy scene in the Neumarkt
+below; and then we heard the legend of the horses. Once upon a time this
+house was the residence of the wealthy family d’Andocht. Richmodis, the
+wife of Herr Mengis d’Andocht, died during the plague of 1357, and was
+buried with great pomp in the Church of the Apostles on the Neumarkt.
+
+Her dressing attracted the notice of the sexton. He fancied he would like
+to have some of the gold and silver adornments; so the night after she was
+put into the vault he descended into it, opened the coffin, and took off
+some of the jewels. One of the rings would not move. To make the task
+easier, he cut her finger; she was only in a trance, and this summary
+process restored her; she sat up; the man rushed off affrighted. She
+managed to get out of the coffin. In his haste he had left his lantern
+behind; with it she made her way out of the church, and reached her home
+near by.
+
+She knocked at the door; a servant opened it, and scampered off half dead
+with terror. She went to her husband’s room. He thought she was a ghost or
+devil; she told him she was his wife, as surely as that their horses would
+come up‐stairs and jump out of the window. As she spoke, the horses
+galloped up‐stairs, threw themselves out of the window; whereupon the
+husband acknowledged her to be his veritable wife. She soon recovered her
+health, lived for many years, and, to commemorate the wonderful event, the
+husband had the two horses done in stone and put in their respective panes
+of glass, where they have ever since remained, looking out of the window.
+
+Now the house is a hospital, and we hope the patients are as much amused
+as we were at the effigies of the two well‐bred, obedient horses, who were
+as good at vouching for identity as Dame Crump’s little dog. In the Church
+of the Apostles, a faded Lent hanging is still preserved that was
+presented by Richmodis in gratitude for her wonderful deliverance from a
+living death.
+
+The Rathhaus or Town Hall is a curious building, erected at different
+periods; the Hansa‐Saal is a fine room on the first floor, in which the
+meetings of that once powerful mercantile confederation were held; and at
+one end of it are nine statues holding escutcheons emblazoned with the
+arms of the Hanse Towns.
+
+The _Musée_, a comparatively new creation, erected partly by the
+government, and partly by private subscription, contains many works of
+art. In the lower story are numerous Roman antiquities, found in or near
+Cologne; amongst them are busts of Cæsar, Germanicus, Agrippina, a
+statuette of Cleopatra, and a very fine head of Medusa, said to be larger
+and more beautiful than the Medusa Rondinini in the Glyptotheca at Munich.
+One gallery is filled with exquisite specimens of stained glass; the upper
+rooms are devoted to statuary and paintings, many of which are of the
+Düsseldorf school.
+
+We were particularly struck with one, the “Triumph of S. Michael over
+Lucifer.” S. Michael is radiant, his sword flaming; and Lucifer, who is
+sinking into darkness, is terrible. There he is—no horned demon, but the
+beautiful fallen archangel, majestic and powerful; profound despair and
+gloom on his noble features, as the darkness overshadows him, and hell
+opens to receive him.
+
+The people of Cologne are gay and sociable; in the afternoons, the
+Zoological Gardens are filled with children and nurses admiring the
+giraffes, elephants, and every other kind of animal belonging to earth,
+air, or water. An immense lion was a particular object of interest, as he
+had distinguished himself the day before we had the pleasure of seeing him
+by devouring his keeper. The Flora or Winter Garden is charming—a crystal
+palace, filled with fragrant plants, green vines garlanding the sides and
+roof, fountains playing, beautiful music well rendered by a good
+orchestra, and hundreds of people drinking coffee and smoking, who don’t
+bother themselves by receiving at home, but meet and gossip in the Flora,
+or the Opera House, to which they generally adjourn.
+
+The Opera House is very pretty but miserably lighted, only two feeble gas‐
+lights by the door. Prussian officers, however, abounded, and the
+glittering uniform shone in the _clair‐obscur_ like fire‐flies in Florida
+on summer evenings. Perhaps it was to add to the effect of “La Dame
+Blanche,” which was the opera we chanced to hear, that we were kept in
+such gloomy darkness; but, as the music was well executed, the time passed
+pleasantly.
+
+One extraordinary event must be chronicled—we did not buy one bottle of
+Cologne in Cologne; we left the city of Jean Maria Farina, and only saw
+the outside of his shop. What with Gothic churches and relics, Roman
+towers and antiquities, time flew, and we found ourselves also flying off
+from Cologne on an express train, without one drop of the veritable _Eau‐
+de‐Cologne_ in our possession. _Mirabile dictu!_
+
+
+
+
+John.
+
+
+In beauty, not above criticism; in courage, undaunted; in love, most
+generous and most forgiving; in patience, rivalling Job; in constancy,
+unswerving; in humility, without an equal.
+
+After the above enumeration of qualities, it should be superfluous to add
+that John is a dog. It would be ridiculous to expect so much of a man. He
+is, moreover, a Skye‐terrier, well‐born and well‐bred.
+
+To announce to John’s acquaintances that one was about to eulogize the dog
+would be to incur and deserve some such reply as that made by the Spartan
+to a rhetorician who announced his intention to pronounce an eulogium on
+Hercules: “An eulogium on Hercules?” repeated the Spartan. “Who ever
+thought of blaming Hercules?”
+
+Our reply would be that we write, not for those who deny, but for those
+who never heard.
+
+There is no shifting of scenes in our little drama. The unities are
+preserved with almost Grecian strictness; the writer, however, as chorus,
+claiming the privilege of being occasionally discursive.
+
+_Scene._—A suburban summer residence in that most magnificent of seasons,
+autumn, “in that month of all months in the year,” October; furthermore,
+the most perfect of Octobers. The stone‐colored house is the only neutral
+bit in the landscape; all else is a glow of color. The fresh greensward
+recedes under flower‐bosses of solid brilliancy. A flower carpet, gayer
+than any loom of Turkey, Brussels, or France ever wove, lies under the
+clump of evergreens in a far corner of the estate. Tapestries of woodbine
+hang over balconies, and porches, and bay‐windows; and the noble trees
+that stand, two and two, in stately pairs, all about the place, and up the
+avenue, are a torchlight procession, which sunshine, instead of quenching,
+fires to a still more dazzling blaze. It is that picturesque time when
+ladies throw gay scarfs over the summer dresses they still wear; when the
+sky shakes out her violet mists to veil the too divine beauty of earth;
+that season of exquisite comfort when one has open windows and open fires;
+that delicious season when fruit is brought to the table still warm with
+the sunshine in which it finished ripening five minutes before. Above all,
+it is that season when people who are at all sympathetic are inclined to
+silence.
+
+Mrs. Marcia Clay was not at all sympathetic. She was simply herself, a
+frivolous woman, with a strong will, and a Chinese wall of selfishness and
+self‐complacence built up on all sides of her. The soft “Hush!” on the
+lips of the Indian summer, when the soul of Nature plumes her wings for
+flight, she heard not. The suspense, the regret, the melancholy, the
+fleeting rapture of the season she perceived not. To her it was surely the
+fall of the year, when people get ready for the winter, lay in coal, buy
+new clothes, and go back to town.
+
+Flounced to the waist in rattling silk, her fair hair furbelowed all over
+her head, and, apparently, pounds of gold hanging from her ears, thrust
+through her cuffs, dangling at her belt, strung about her neck, and
+fastened to the pin that held her collar, this lady sat in one of the
+pleasant parlors of her house, and talked as fast as her tongue could run.
+
+The woman who listened was of another kind, one who might have come to
+something if she had been possessed of will and courage, but who, having a
+small opinion of herself, was only somebody by little spurts, which did no
+good, since they were always followed by unusual self‐abasement. She was
+not without a despairing sense of this incongruity, and had more than once
+bewailed in her own mind the fact that she was neither fish, flesh, nor
+fowl, but inclined to each in turn; had little wings which, as she spread
+them, changed to little fins, which, as she moved them, became little
+feet, that, when she would have walked, collapsed utterly, and left her
+floundering—a woman without moral vertebræ, who had been all her life the
+prey of people in whom the moral vertebræ were in excess. She was nothing
+in particular, physically, either, being gayish, oldish, tallish, weakish,
+and dressed in that time‐honored, thin plain black silk gown which is the
+infallible sign of genteel poverty, and which, at this instant, adorns the
+form that owns the arm that moves the hand that holds the pen that writes
+this history.
+
+_Mrs. Marcia Clay._—“It is very provoking, my dear, but it can’t be
+helped. If I should intimate to him that our trunks are all packed to go
+in town, he would leave instantly. He is the most touchy of mortals. To be
+sure, I have invited him here again and again, but I expected him in
+summer‐time, not when we were on the point of moving, and had our very
+beds half made in the city. There’s nothing for it but to unpack, and
+pretend to be delighted. Fortunately, he amuses himself.”
+
+The uncertain person in the black silk gown ventured to suggest that Mr.
+Bently might accompany them to town, and was met by a little shriek which
+made her jump.
+
+“Fancy him in my blue satin or pink satin chamber! Why, my dear, he
+smokes, and—_chews! chews_, dear! Between you and me, he is a bear in his
+habits, a positive bear. If you will believe me, I have seen him wear
+slipshod shoes and crumpled linen. You should see him at home, in his den.
+An inky dressing‐gown that he wipes his pens on, old slippers with holes
+in them, books piled all about, and dust that you could write your name
+in! In that state he sits and writes hour after hour.”
+
+Ah! Mrs. Clay & Co., who look at littleness through magnifying glasses,
+and are blind to all true greatness, the sole of this man’s slipshod shoe
+is cleaner than your tongue. There is no dust on his thoughts; there are
+no holes in the fabrics his brain weaves; and when he writes, far‐away
+lands that know you not, and kindred greatness nearer by, feel the
+electric spark that slips from his pen’s point.
+
+“What a shocking person he must be!” says Miss Uncertainty, meaning to
+please. “I don’t wonder you won’t have him in town.”
+
+“Goodness gracious, Miss Bird!” cried the lady, coloring up. “What can you
+be thinking of! Why, Mr. Bently is famous. He can afford to be eccentric.
+It is an honor to have him in one’s house. People have turned and looked
+at me when they heard that I am his cousin; and his name opens to me
+places that—well, everybody can’t enter. Then it is a very fine thing to
+have a gentleman in one’s parlors who can talk to those lions whom one
+doesn’t know what to say to, and who can tell what one’s pictures, and
+bronzes, and marbles mean, and translate from every language under the
+sun. I well remember a time when he won for me a perfect triumph over Mrs.
+Everett Adams. It was delicious. Mrs. Everett Adams is always picking up
+lions, especially learned and scientific ones, and, when Professor Porson
+came here, she monopolized him at once. You cannot conceive how odiously
+she behaved, nor what airs she assumed. One heard nothing but Porson,
+Porson, till I was sick of the name; and it was impossible to go anywhere,
+to theatre, opera, or concert, without seeing her sail down to the most
+conspicuous place, after everybody was seated, with Prof. Porson in her
+train. Well, one evening she brought him to our house, just to plague me,
+and we had half a dozen or so persons to meet him. It was an evening of
+torment, my dear. The professor was in the clouds, with Mrs. Everett Adams
+fluttering behind him, like a tail after a kite, and all the rest were in
+raptures, except me—I was extinguished. The professor knew what every
+bronze and marble was, and who made it, and if it was an original or a
+copy; and, in short, everything I had seemed as common as possible. As a
+last desperate resort, I brought out some old books in foreign languages
+that poor dear Clay had picked up. He was always collecting things of that
+sort. The professor turned them over with the tips of his fingers, and
+read a word here and there. Oh! he knew all about them. Yes; he had read
+them when he was a boy. But I had begun to suspect him. My poor husband
+used to say that, when a man will not own that there is anything he
+doesn’t understand, root and branch, he was always sure that that man was
+an impostor. So I took up two of the books that I saw he had passed over,
+and asked him to translate a passage for me. They looked about as much
+like a printed language as the figures on my carpet do. To my joy, he had
+to own that he couldn’t. They were Chaldaic, he said, and he had made but
+little study in that language. Mrs. Adams glanced angrily at me, and I
+smiled. Just at that moment, as good luck would have it, the door opened,
+and in came Cousin Bently. I flew at him with the books. Triumph, my dear!
+Never did I have such a rapturous moment. Cousin took the books up in his
+slow way, put up his eye‐glasses, and looked them over in such a superior
+manner that really my hopes rose. They were Arabic, I’ve forgotten what
+about, and he read out some passages, and translated them, all the company
+looking on. My dear, the Porson and Adams stock sank to less than one per
+cent. in an instant. The professor was red, and Mrs. Adams was pale. I
+could have hugged Cousin Bently on the spot, though his boots were not
+blacked, and his collar was in a positively shocking state.”
+
+“How charming it must be to have him visit you!” says Miss Bird, wheeling
+about as the wind veered.
+
+Poor thing! She did not mean to be insincere. She merely wanted to say the
+right thing, and didn’t care a fig about the matter, one way or the other.
+
+“Charming!” repeated Mrs. Clay, with emphasis. “It gives a _tone_.
+Besides, it draws some people one likes to know. You should see Madame de
+Soi, the most exclusive of women, flutter round him like a butterfly round
+a—round a—well, really, I am at a loss for the word. It is impossible to
+call Cousin Bently a flower, unless one should make a pun about the seedy
+contents of his valise. I studied botany once, and I know a pun can be
+made of it. Madame knows no more and cares no more about his learning than
+a cat does, but she has tact, and does contrive to smile at the right
+time. I never could do that. When I smile, Cousin Bently is sure to push
+out his under lip, and stop talking. But she will look and listen with
+such rapture that you would positively think he were describing the dress
+the empress wore at the last ball; and sometimes she even says something
+that he will seem pleased with. That very evening of the Porson collapse
+she talked with him half an hour of _molecules_, whatever they are. I
+actually thought they were speaking of people. Fancy being called a
+molecule! Yes, Cousin Bently is a great credit, and a great convenience to
+me. Why, but for him, I couldn’t have gone to those stupid exclusive
+lectures of Mr. Vertebrare’s, where I yawned myself to death among the
+very cream of society.”
+
+The lady paused for breath, and her companion, feeling obliged to say
+something, faltered out that she always feared those very clever persons.
+
+“I should think you would after the experience you had with that dragon,”
+replied Mrs. Clay significantly.
+
+Miss Bird colored, and was silent. “That dragon” was a rather difficult
+old lady, a Miss Clinton, with whom she had lived and suffered many years,
+and who had lately died.
+
+“And so,” Mrs. Clay summed up, “I have Cousin Bently on my hands for a
+week or ten days, and must make the best of it. And”—suddenly lowering her
+voice—“speak of angels—ahem! Cousin Bently, allow me to make you
+acquainted with Miss Bird, an old schoolmate of mine.”
+
+Miss Bird rose with a frightened air, dropped her eyes, blushed deeply,
+half extended her hand, and half withdrew it again, and stammered out,
+“Good‐morning, sir!” which was not a very felicitous greeting, the time of
+day being near sunset.
+
+Mr. Bently acknowledged the introduction with rather a stately bow, gave
+the person before him a calm and exhaustive glance, protruded his under
+lip very slightly, without meaning to, and walked to the further end of
+the room.
+
+“Why need people be such fools?” he muttered, half philosophical, half
+impatient. He had been, as all learned and even merely clever people must
+be, too much looked on as an ogre by the simple. It was rather provoking
+to see people shaking at his approach, as if he were going to compel them
+to talk Greek and calculus, or have their lives.
+
+As the gentleman seated himself in an arm‐chair before a delightful bay‐
+window, and facing the window, there was another addition to the company,
+and—enter our hero!
+
+Reader, John!
+
+A longish, curly‐haired quadruped with bright dark eyes full of merriment
+and kindliness, and teeth so beautifully white and even that it would be a
+privilege to be bitten by them. Of course he has undergone those
+improvements which man finds it necessary to make in the old‐fashioned
+plan of the Creator, and his clipped ears stand up pointed and pert, and
+his clipped tail is indeed less a tail than an epigram. But the bounding
+grace of his motions no scissors can curtail.
+
+Do not imagine that John has entered the room properly, and stood still to
+be presented and described. Far from it. He bounced in through the window,
+as though shot from a mortar, and, while we have been writing this brief
+sketch of his person, has flown into the learned gentleman’s arms, kissed
+him enthusiastically a dozen times, pawed his hair into fearful disorder,
+made believe bite his nose and hands, with the utmost care not to hurt him
+in the least, pulled one end of his cravat out of knot, and threatened to
+overturn him, chair and all, by drawing back and rushing at him again like
+a little blue and yellow battering‐ram. His manner was, indeed, so
+overpowering that Mr. Bently had half a mind to be vexed, and could not
+help being disconcerted. His affection for dogs was entirely Platonic, and
+he had a theory that bipeds and quadrupeds should have separate houses
+built for them; but this creature had struck him as being the most honest
+and sensible being in the house, and had, moreover, taken to him.
+
+Miss Bird looked askance at the scene in the bay‐window, and Mrs. Clay
+looked askance at Miss Bird, and wondered at her impudence and folly. Bird
+had blushed and dropped her eyes when she was introduced to the gentleman,
+and she was now watching him out of the corners of her eyes. Bird was an
+old maid, with a moderate annuity; Mr. Bently was an old bachelor, with
+next to nothing beside brains and a name. Bird must be set to rights. So
+much the lady’s actions told of her thoughts.
+
+“I wish I dared send for Marian Willis here,” she whispered
+confidentially, watching the effect of her words. “Nothing would please me
+better than to bring those two together again. But Cousin Bently would
+suspect my drift, and, as likely as not, start off at once. Nothing annoys
+him so much as to see that any one is trying to get him married. Marian is
+in every way suitable, and between you and me, dear, I think they would
+both be glad to have a mediator, only they are too proud to own it.
+Everybody thought about ten years ago that they were engaged, and they
+certainly were in a fair way to be, when some lovers’ quarrel occurred,
+and they parted. You have never seen Miss Willis, have you?”
+
+Yes; Bird had seen her at Miss Melicent Yorke’s wedding, and she was the
+grandest looking lady there. She wore a black velvet dress, buttoned up
+high with diamonds, and not another jewel about her. She had a pink half‐
+open camellia in her bosom, and a wide‐open one in her hair. Clara Yorke
+said that the beautiful plainness of Miss Willis’ toilet made everybody
+else look all tags and ends. She gave the bride a rare engraving of some
+picture of The Visitation, which Miss Melicent didn’t half like, because
+the S. Elizabeth was on her knees, and because there was a crown carved in
+the frame just over the Virgin’s head. But the bridegroom had reconciled
+her to it, saying that motherhood is a crown to any woman. Mrs. Edith
+Yorke, Carl’s wife, who is now abroad, was very fond of Miss Willis, and
+used to call her “Your Highness.”
+
+“Oh! their intimacy was because Mr. Carl Yorke was a Catholic,” interposed
+Mrs. Clay rather abruptly.
+
+When Bird got talking of the Yorkes, she never knew when to stop; and the
+subject was not pleasant to her listener. Mrs. Clay had tried to be
+intimate with the family, and had signally failed. Always kind and
+courteous, there still seemed to be an invisible crystalline wall between
+them and her.
+
+“Marian’s religion is her one fault. It may be possible that she and
+Cousin Bently disagreed about that, though it would be hard to find out
+what he believes, or if he believes anything. He defends every religion
+you attack, and attacks every religion you defend.”
+
+“But do you think she would marry him?” asked Bird incredulously; and her
+glance toward the window became depreciatory and critical, instead of
+awful.
+
+Mr. Bently, as a learned man, was to be regarded with fear and admiration;
+but as a bridegroom—that was another thing.
+
+“Why, she is handsome and rich.”
+
+“What if she is?” asked the other tartly. “It only makes her more
+suitable. But she is not rich, though she lives with a rich old uncle, who
+may leave her something. She is in every way suited to Cousin Bently. He
+would never marry an inferior woman.”
+
+This last assertion Mrs. Clay made very positively, for the reason that
+she was mortally afraid it was not true. Her private opinion was that Mr.
+Bently must have been very lonely in his bachelor lodgings before he came
+to visit her, and that he might easily be induced to marry even Bird,
+rather than live alone any longer.
+
+Meantime, the object of their conversation, having put the vociferous John
+away, and induced him to lie at his feet, instead of pervading his neck
+and face, sat gazing out through the window. He certainly was not an
+eminently beautiful man, neither was he a pink of nicety in his dress,
+though he abhorred untidiness in others, particularly in women. His form
+was rather fine, but his features were too strong for grace, his hair was
+growing gray, and his teeth were discolored by his odious beloved tobacco.
+There was something a little neglected in his appearance. Evidently he
+needed some one with authority to remind him, when occasion demanded, that
+his cravat was horribly awry, that he had forgotten to smooth his hair
+down since the last time he combed it up with his ten fingers, and that,
+really, that collar must come off. In fine, he needed an indulgent wife,
+who would look out for him constantly, but with discretion, never
+intruding the cravat and collar question into his sublime moments.
+
+Was he conscious of something lacking in his life, that his expression was
+less the gravity of the man of thought than the sadness of the lonely man?
+Something ailed him—physical sickness, no doubt, for his face was flushed,
+and his eyes heavy—but some trouble of the mind also. He looked across the
+lawn, that was bounded by a dense line of autumn‐colored trees, with a sky
+of brilliant clearness arching over. Betwixt sapphire and jasper the low
+purple dome of a mountain pushed up, making a background for a shining
+cross that might be suspended in air for any support visible to him who
+gazed on it. But he had seen that cross before, and his mind, leaping over
+the few intervening miles, followed down from its sunlighted tip and
+touched a slim gray tower and a vine‐covered church, and, looking through
+the gay rose‐window over the chancel, saw a tiny lambent flame floating in
+and fed by sacred oil of olives. Mentally he stood before the church door,
+saw the grove of beeches that hid it from the road, saw through those
+heavy boughs the green slope of a lawn near by and the mansion that
+crowned its summit. But in one respect the eyes of the seer were less true
+to the present than to the past, for they beheld roses, instead of autumn
+colors, wreathing pillar, porch, and balcony.
+
+In this house Marian Willis lived. He sat and recollected all his
+intercourse with her, from the first pleasant dawn of friendly regard and
+sympathy, growing up to something brighter and closer, yet scarcely
+defined, to its sudden extinguishment. His acquaintance with her had been
+like a day that breaks in silent and cloudless light, and is shut in by a
+cold and smothering fog before its noon. What had been expressed to her of
+all that sweetness he found in her society? What to him of the pleasure
+she seemed to feel in his? Nothing that had other utterance than silent
+looks and actions. What had separated them? A mist, a fog, an impalpable
+yet irresistible power. Some tiny wedge had been inserted that gave a
+chance for pride to rush in and thrust their lives apart. There had been a
+slight reserve that grew to coldness and thence to alienation. Who does
+not know how those many littles make a mickle? Possibly a certain gallant
+officer, just home from the wars, with his arm in a sling, and a sabre‐
+scar across his temple, had had something to do with the trouble.
+Certainly the last mental picture Mr. Bently had carried away from his
+last visit at Mr. Willis’ was of this same officer walking in the garden
+with Marian Willis leaning on his sound arm, and listening to the tale of
+his adventures as women always do and always will listen to soldiers who
+bring their wounds to illustrate their stories.
+
+On that occasion, Mr. Bently had returned to his cousin’s house and
+behaved in what he considered a very reasonable manner. He locked himself
+into his chamber, let in all the light possible, placed himself before the
+mirror, and critically examined the reflection he saw there. There was no
+glorious sabre‐wound across his temple, showing where he had once wrestled
+with death, and come off conqueror; but, instead, there were long, faint,
+horizontal lines beginning to show on his forehead—mementoes of the silent
+combat with time, and of anxious quest in search of hidden truth. There
+were no crisp, fair curls shining over his head; the brown hair was
+straight and short, and here and there a white hair rewarded the search
+for it. The soldier’s large violet eyes flashed like jewels; but these
+eyes in the mirror were no brighter than wintry skies, a calm, steady blue
+that a planet might look through, perhaps, but that were not used to
+lightning. The soldier was clad in a trim uniform that set off well a form
+of manly grace, the stripe that glimmered down the leg, the band, like a
+lady’s bracelet, that bound the sleeve, the golden eagle outspread on
+either shoulder, all helping to make a gallant picture; the raiment
+reflected with pitiless fidelity by the mirror before him was decidedly
+neutral. No one could call it picturesque nor even elegant of its kind. It
+was simply calculated to escape censure.
+
+Having made a full survey and, as he thought, a fair comparison, this
+self‐elected judge then pronounced sentence on the person whose reflection
+he gazed at.
+
+“You are a fool!” he said, with a conviction too deep for bitterness.
+“What is there in you that a fair and charming woman could prefer? Bah!
+She prizes you as she does those vellum Platos and Homers that she admires
+because others do, but cannot read a word of. When she sinks into her arm‐
+chair for that hour of rest before dressing for dinner, does she take with
+her a book of Greek or of logic? No; she reads the poet or the novelist.
+You have nothing to do with her more intimate life.”
+
+Thus had the scholar decided, gazing at his own reflection in the mirror,
+seeing there only the shell of the man, and that not at its best, at its
+worst rather. The kindling of intelligence, the scintillating of sharp
+intellectual pursuit, the soft radiance which dawning love gave him when
+he was shone upon by the beloved object—those he saw not. He saw only a
+fool.
+
+So far, so good. But he had not finished the work. A fool may be
+miserable, may be ruined by his folly, even while owning it. He must not
+only prove the vanity of hoping, but the vanity of loving. He must remove
+the halo from his idol’s brow, not rudely, but with all the coolness and
+gentleness of reason. What, after all, were beauty and grace, a sweet
+voice and smile, and gracious speaking? He set himself to analyze them,
+physiologically, chemically, and morally.
+
+So the botanist analyzes a flower, and when he has destroyed its ravishing
+perfume, and that exquisite combination which constituted its
+individuality—a combination man can separate, but which only God can
+form—he points to the fragments, and says, “That is a rose!”
+
+But suppose that, even while he speaks, those withering atoms should stir
+and brighten, the anthers should gather again their golden pollen, and
+hang themselves once more on each slender filament, the petals blush anew,
+and rustle into fragrant crowding circles, and a most rosy rose should
+rise triumphantly before him!
+
+Some such experience had Mr. Bently when he had finished his work of
+demolition. Turning coldly away from the ruins of what had been so fair,
+he walked to the window to take breath, and saw there before him the
+living woman complete, her soul welding with immortal fire every
+characteristic and mood into a being irresistibly lovely, baffling,
+and—disdainful. She stood in the garden where Mrs. Clay had purposely
+detained her beneath his window, and she stood there unwillingly. Only a
+social necessity had brought her to the house, and she had determined that
+she would not, if it could be helped, meet that gentleman who, from being
+a daily visitor of her own, had suffered three days to pass during which
+he had once or twice talked with her uncle over the gate, but had never
+approached her.
+
+Since that hour when, looking from his window, he had seen her sail past
+without raising her eyes, Mr. Bently had been haunted at times by two
+antagonistic visions—the rose dissected, which he viewed with
+indifference, succeeded by the rose full‐blown, triumphant in unassailable
+sweetness.
+
+He thought it all over now as he sat looking out of Mrs. Clay’s eastern
+bay‐window. And having thought it over once, it began to go through his
+mind again, and still again. The various scenes passed, one by one,
+slowly, like persons in a procession, and he gazed at them from first to
+last; and there was the first again! He had had enough of it, but it would
+not stop. His head was aching, and feeling somewhat light besides. He
+pressed his forehead with his hands, and tried to think of something else,
+even if it were no more pleasant subject than the cold he must have taken
+to make him so sore from head to foot. But still that procession moved
+with accelerating speed. He spoke to John, tired and annoyed himself a
+little with the creature’s antics, then leaned back in his chair, and let
+his brain whirl.
+
+Certainly he was ill; but nothing else was certain. Whether to go or stay,
+to speak or remain silent, he could scarcely decide. When dinner was
+announced, instinct kept him conventional. He ate nothing, but he went
+through all the proper forms, with no more abstraction than might be
+attributed to his intellectual oddities. But dinner, with its inanities,
+over, he made haste to escape to his own room.
+
+“Going out for a walk, cousin?” asked Mrs. Clay, as he passed her.
+
+How the trivial question irritated him! He bowed, afraid to utter a word,
+lest it should be an offensive one. His nerves felt bare, his teeth on
+edge.
+
+Miss Bird looked more deeply than her friend had, and in the one timid
+glance she gave the gentleman saw a painful trouble underneath his cool
+exterior.
+
+“I hope he didn’t hear what we were saying of him before dinner,” she
+remarked apprehensively.
+
+“No, indeed!” was the confident response. “He scarcely hears what you say
+to him, still less what is said of him.”
+
+“But he looked displeased,” persisted the anxious Bird.
+
+Mrs. Clay cast a sarcastic glance on her subordinate. “My dear,” she said
+with decision, “the less you occupy yourself with my cousin’s feelings,
+the better for you. Your solicitude will be quite thrown away.”
+
+Bird sighed faintly, and resigned herself to being snubbed.
+
+Mr. Bently walked up‐stairs slowly, dreading to be alone, and shut himself
+into his room; and, when there, desolation settled upon him. It is not
+pleasant to be sick in one’s own home, with loving and solicitous friends
+surrounding one with their cares, and taking every task from the weak
+hands; it is still less pleasant when, though friends are near, they are
+powerless to lift the burden which only those helpless hands can carry;
+but how far more miserable, how far more cruel than any other desolation
+on earth, is it when sickness falls upon one who must work, and the sick
+one is not only oppressed by the burden of duties unperformed, but is
+himself a burden, coldly and grudgingly tended, or tended not at all? Mr.
+Bently knew well the extent of his cousin’s friendship, and the worth of
+her Chinese compliments, and he would far rather have fallen in the
+street, and been left to the tender mercies of strangers, than fall ill in
+her house.
+
+Morning came, and it was breakfast‐time, by no means an early hour. Mrs.
+Clay had put off the meal half an hour on her cousin’s account. “He has at
+least one polite habit—he does not rise early,” she said. “But then he is
+as regular as a clock in his late hour.”
+
+He was not prompt this morning, however, for they waited ten minutes after
+breakfast was on the table, and rang a second bell, and still their
+visitor did not appear.
+
+Miss Bird suggested that he had looked unwell the evening before, and
+might be unable to come down.
+
+“Really, how thoughtful you are!” Mrs. Clay said with cutting emphasis. “I
+had quite forgotten. Perhaps, my son, you will go up and see if Miss Bird
+is right.”
+
+“My son” objected to being made a messenger of. “If the old fellar wanted
+to sleep, let him sleep. Don’t you say so, Clem?”
+
+Clementina always agreed with her brother; the two prevailed, and the “old
+fellar” was left to sleep, or toss and moan, or be consumed with fever and
+thirst, or otherwise entertain himself as he or fate should choose, while
+the family breakfasted at their leisure.
+
+It is scarcely worth while to put Clementina and Arthur Clay in print.
+They are insignificant and, in a small way, disagreeable objects, and
+their like is often met with to the annoyance of many. The mental
+ignorance and lack of capacity which we lose sight of when they are
+overmantled by the loveliness of good‐will, in such as these become
+contemptible by being placed on pedestals of presumption and ill‐nature,
+and hateful when they are set as obstacles and stumbling‐blocks in the way
+of souls who would fain walk and look upward.
+
+Breakfast over, and no Mr. Bently appearing, Mrs. Clay felt called on to
+make inquiries, and, accordingly, dispatched a servant to her cousin’s
+door, while she herself listened at the foot of the stairs. She heard a
+knock, but no reply, then a second knock, followed by the servant’s voice,
+as if in answer to some one within.
+
+“Paper under the door, sir? Yes, sir!”
+
+She was half way up the stairs by this time, and snatched the slip of
+paper which the man had found pushed out under Mr. Bently’s door. “What in
+the world can be the matter? Where are my eye‐glasses? Cousin Bently is
+such a frightful writer that, really—”
+
+While the lady is adjusting her glasses, and her children and companion
+are gathering about her, we will read this document, for there will be no
+time afterward. It is short, and is strongly scented with camphor.
+
+“I am ill, and, it is possible, may have small‐pox. It has been where I
+was a fortnight ago. Keep away from me, and send for a doctor.”
+
+Confusion ensued. Screams resounded from the parlor; orders and counter‐
+orders were given, only one fixed idea penetrating that chaos—to get away
+from the house as quickly as possible. Carriages were got out, silver and
+valuables piled into them by Bird, who alone would go upstairs, and who
+was made to do everything, and in less than half an hour the whole family
+started for the city. The servants, all but the gardener, had already
+fled.
+
+“But who is to take care of Mr. Bently?” Bird asked, pausing at the
+carriage door.
+
+“I shall give the gardener orders to get a doctor and nurse,” Mrs. Clay
+said impatiently, fuming with selfish terror.
+
+“But I’m not afraid,” Bird hesitated. “I’ve been vaccinated. And it’s hard
+to leave him alone.”
+
+“Nonsense!” cried the lady. “I shall allow nothing of the sort. It is not
+necessary, and, besides, it is not proper. Do get in, if you are going to
+town. It really seems to me, Miss Bird, that you are altogether too much
+interested in Mr. Bently.”
+
+Then, at last, Bird perceived what was in the speaker’s mind, and, as most
+women would in such circumstances, laid down her better impulses at the
+feet of meanness. Crushed and ashamed, and, at the same time, weakly and
+despairingly angry, she took her place in the carriage, and listened in
+silence to the lamentations and complaints of her companions.
+
+“How could Cousin Bently do such a thing? How could he come to me when he
+knew he had been so exposed?”
+
+That Mr. Bently had only learned from the paper of the evening before to
+what he had been exposed, and had only thought during the night what might
+be the meaning of his illness, the lady did not inquire into.
+
+At the garden gate stood James, the gardener. Mrs. Clay stopped long
+enough to give him hurried directions to get a doctor and nurse, and do
+all that was necessary for the invalid, then ordered the coachman to drive
+on.
+
+“I hope John isn’t with us,” one of the young ones said presently. “He was
+round Cousin Bently all day yesterday.”
+
+No; Bird, recollecting that fact also, had shut John into one of the
+chambers, and left him there. She ventured to hope that he would not be
+left to starve, but no one responded to her merciful wish.
+
+The cause of all this terror and confusion had seen the departure of the
+family without being surprised at it. He had not undressed, but had lain
+on a sofa all night, and, when morning came, had written the warning which
+proved so effectual, and then sank into an arm‐chair near the window,
+longing for air. He expected the family to keep away from him, and was
+neither sorry nor indignant that they had removed themselves still
+further. Of course a doctor would be sent, and of course there was some
+one to take care of him. He sat and waited for that some one to enter.
+Perhaps it was James. He saw the gardener shut and fasten the gate after
+the carriage went out, and he heard the locking of the stable door. He
+waited, but no one came. Well, the house must be attended to first, and he
+would be patient, though thirst, and alternate fever and chills, and
+racking pains were tormenting him. He was annoyed, too, by John’s efforts
+to escape from the next room, and would have gone to release the creature
+but for the fear of spreading contagion.
+
+A distant door opened and shut; he heard a distant heavy step, and thanked
+God that relief and companionship were at hand. But the sounds ceased, and
+no one came near him. He saw James, the gardener, laden with packages,
+hurry down the avenue, and disappear into the public road, and a thrill of
+fear shot through him. The scene outside swam before his eyes, and grew
+dark for a moment. Could it be that they had all gone away, and left him
+to die alone? No; he could not believe it! James had perhaps gone to bring
+the doctor. He would wait patiently, since wait he must.
+
+An hour passed, and no one came. There was no sound in the house but that
+occasional whining and barking from the next room; no sound outside except
+when a carriage rolled swiftly by in the road. He saw no person coming. It
+was impossible to endure that thirst any longer. He went into the
+bathroom, and wet his hands and face, and drank of the tepid water there.
+His head reeled at sight of the stairs, and he did not dare to attempt to
+descend. Returning to his chamber, he fell on to the sofa, and, for the
+first time in his life, fainted; coming back to life again as though
+emerging from outer darkness, but not into light—into a sickening half‐
+light, rather. So hours passed, and he knew without a doubt that he was
+utterly deserted, and that a lonely and terrible death threatened him.
+Could he do nothing to avert it? He recollected that Mrs. Clay had a
+medicine closet in the bathroom. Possibly, if he could reach it, something
+might be found there to relieve, if not to cure, him. What mountains
+molehills can change into sometimes! This man, so strong and full of life
+but a day before, now lay and gave his whole mind to planning how he
+should save himself a few steps in going to the bathroom again, how he
+could avoid the stairs, lest he should fall, and whether he could this
+time cross the corridor to release that troublesome, whining dog.
+Whenever, weary and confused, he lost himself a moment in a half sleep,
+that whining and scratching assumed terrible proportions in his
+imagination, and became the fierce efforts of wild beasts to reach him. He
+started up now and then, with wide‐open eyes, to assure himself that he
+was not in a menagerie; to fix in his mind the picture of that airy
+chamber, with its clear tints of green and amber, its open windows showing
+the long veranda outside, and the bright perspective of foliage and sky.
+
+But when his eyelids drooped again, and he sank back into half sleep and
+half fainting, back came the painful phantoms to torment him till they
+were once more chased away for a time.
+
+Toward evening he roused himself to make that difficult pilgrimage of
+fifty paces in search of healing and refreshment, bathed eagerly his face
+and head, and found his cousin’s medicine closet. But when he had reached
+that, his strength was nearly exhausted. He had only enough left to take
+down the laudanum bottle, and get back to his room with it. Laudanum might
+dull this pain, and quiet the excited nerves. Once more John must wait. He
+could not stop to release him.
+
+The room in which the dog was confined had a window on the balcony that
+ran past Mr. Bently’s room. That window was open, but the blind was shut,
+and John, despairing of escape through the door, had turned all his
+efforts toward unfastening this blind, and had several times been near
+success, when the spring, flying back, had defeated him.
+
+The invalid’s bath of cold water had refreshed him somewhat. He hated to
+take the laudanum. He had never been an intemperate man, and had always
+shrunk from swallowing anything which could in the least degree isolate
+his mind from the control of his will. He would bear the pain a little
+longer.
+
+He lay there and thought, and visions of happy homes rose up before him.
+At this hour of early twilight, the lamps were being lighted, or people
+sat by firelight, and children, grown languid and sleepy with the long
+day’s play, leaned silent on their mothers’ laps. At this hour, men of
+thought, intellectual workers, laid aside the weightier labors of their
+profession to indulge in an exhilarating contention of wits, so much
+happier than other workers, in that their recreations do not retard, but
+rather accelerate their work. It is but dancing at evening with
+Terpsichore, or pacing with Calliope along the margin of the same road
+which he had travelled by day in a dusty chariot, or walked encumbered by
+his armor. In their lighter intellectual contests, what sparks were
+sometimes struck out to live beyond the moment that gave them birth! What
+random beams of light shot now and then into seeming nothingness, and
+revealed an unsuspected treasure!
+
+All these scenes of social comfort and delight rose before the sufferer’s
+mind with tantalizing distinctness, fairer and fuller in the vision than
+he had ever known the reality to be. He felt like a houseless wanderer
+who, freezing and starving in the street, sees through lighted windows the
+warmth and joy of the home circle.
+
+Mr. Bently was not a pious man. He had a deep sentiment of reverence, and
+a firm belief that somewhere there is an inflexible truth that deserves an
+obedience absolute and unquestioning. But controversy had spoiled him for
+religious feeling, which is, perhaps, too delicate for rough handling, and
+in the clash of warring creeds some freshness and spontaneity had been
+lost to his convictions. Reaching truth, winning battles for truth, he had
+been like a traveller at the end of a long journey, when he scarcely cares
+in his weariness for the goal attained, but must needs eat and sleep. He
+had spent too much time and strength in wiping away the mire flung on the
+garments of religion to be any longer quick in enthusiastic homage. “Pity
+’tis, ’tis true.” The butterfly you would save from the net loses the down
+from its wings with your most careful handling; the friend you defend from
+calumny you dethrone even while defending. The feeling that dictated that
+brutal egotism, “Cæsar’s wife must not be suspected,” dwells in a less
+arrogant form in most human hearts, and rare indeed is that soul which
+sets its love as high, after even the most triumphantly refuted
+accusation, as it was before.
+
+Desertion and imminent death chilled this man’s heart, and he had no mind
+to turn to God, save in a cold recognition of his power and wisdom. Love
+entered not into his thoughts, but despair did.
+
+The pain increased, the dizziness came back. He stretched his hand for the
+glass and vial of laudanum, and tried with a shaking hand to pour out what
+he could guess to be an ordinary potion. There was no reason why he should
+suspect that that bottle might have been standing in the house so long as
+to have made even the smallest dose of its contents deadly. As he
+measured, and tried to recollect how much he should take, pouring out
+unknowingly what would have been for him Lethe indeed, a louder rattle and
+bang at the blind of the next room proclaimed the success of the four‐
+footed prisoner. There was a scampering on the veranda, a dog’s head,
+eager and bright‐eyed, was thrust in at the window of the sick‐room, then,
+with an almost human cry of joy, John flew at its occupant.
+
+Away went bottle and glass, breaking and spilling—no laudanum for Mr.
+Bently that day. Down went Mr. Bently among the sofa pillows, prostrated
+by the unexpected onset; and love, and delight, and absolute devotion, in
+the form of an uproarious Skye terrier unconscious and uncaring for risks,
+nestled in the breast of the deserted man, were all over his face and
+neck, and through his hair, and speaking as plainly as though human speech
+had been their interpreters.
+
+When the man comprehended, recovering from his first confusion, reason and
+endurance stood aside and veiled their faces, and a greater than they took
+their place.
+
+Through a gush of tears which were but the spray of a subsiding wave of
+bitterness, this soul raised its eyes, and beheld a new light. It lost
+sight of the Almighty in a vision of the Heavenly Father.
+
+The flight that followed was painful, but not unsoothed. The dog,
+perceiving at once that his friend was ill, became quiet. He lay with head
+pressed close to the restless arm, and, if the sick man moaned, he
+answered with a pitying whine. Once he left the room, and wandered through
+the whole house in search of help, whined and scratched at every closed
+door, and, finding no one, came back with an air of distress and
+perplexity. Later, when Mr. Bently seemed very ill, John ran out onto the
+balcony, and barked loudly, as if calling for relief.
+
+Morning came again, and the sick man’s pain gave place to a deathlike
+faintness, resulting from lack of nourishment. For thirty‐six hours
+nothing had passed his lips but water, and that no longer ran from the
+faucet when he tried it. He crept down‐stairs, stair by stair, holding by
+the balusters, like a little child. There was no water to be seen in the
+dining‐room, and he did not know where to find any. He reached the parlor,
+lay down on the floor, and prayed for death or for life—anything to put an
+end to that nightmare of misery. It seemed that death was coming. His
+hands and feet grew cold with an unnatural chill, and, though the morning
+sunshine poured through the windows, all looked dim to his eyes. His
+senses seemed to be slowly receding, without pain, without any power or
+wish on his part to recall them. He lay and waited for death.
+
+And while he waited, as one hears sounds in a dream he heard a door open
+and shut, then a quick, light step that ran up‐stairs. John, standing over
+his friend, left him, and rushed to the parlor door, barking wildly, but
+was unable to get out, the door having swung to. In vain he tried it with
+his paws, and thrust his small nose into the crack. It was too heavy for
+him to move.
+
+Suddenly, while Mr. Bently gazed with languid, half unconscious eyes at
+the creature, the door was pushed wide open, and a woman stood on the
+threshold. She was neither young nor old, but simply at the age of
+perfection, which is a variable age, according to the person. Her face was
+a full oval, but white now as hoar‐frost. All its life seemed to centre in
+the large hazel eyes that were piercing with a terrified search. She wore
+her fair hair like a crown, piled high above the forehead in glossy coils
+like sculptured amber. Over one temple a black and gold moth was poised,
+as though it had just alighted there, its wings widespread. The long black
+folds of a velvet robe fell about her superb form, sweeping far back from
+her swift but suddenly arrested step. Scintillating fringes of gold
+quivered against the large white arms, edged the short Greek jacket, and
+ran in a single flash down either side of the train. A diamond cross lay
+like a sunbeam on her bosom, a single diamond twinkled in each small ear.
+
+There was but an instant’s pause, then she crossed the room quickly, and
+knelt by him.
+
+“My God! my God!” she murmured, and lifted his head on her arm. “What
+fiendish cruelty!”
+
+Her touch and voice recalled him to himself. He tried to put her away.
+“Leave me, Marian, I beg of you! Do not endanger yourself for me!”
+
+But even while bidding her go, every nerve in him grew alive with the
+joyous conviction that he would not be obeyed, and that, danger or no
+danger, she would not desert him. Here were strength, help, and the power
+to command. She brought the world with her, this queenly woman, who had
+not even snatched the gloves from her hands since last night’s ball, but
+had hurried to seek news of him, after the first confused rumor, to call
+doctor and nurse, to rush to him herself with all the speed her panting
+horses could make.
+
+“Leave you? Never!”
+
+He asked no questions, but resigned himself. How delightful the sickness,
+how sweet the pain, that led to this! How thrice blessed the desertion
+that gave her to him!
+
+In half an hour, the doctor had come and given his decision. Mr. Bently’s
+illness was merely a violent cold with fever, and a few days of careful
+nursing would make all right. In another half hour, he was established in
+a pleasant chamber in Mr. Willis’ house, with a nurse in close attendance,
+the whole family anxiously ministrant, John an immovable fixture in the
+sick‐room; and, later, Mrs. Marcia Clay besieging the house for news of
+poor dear Cousin Bently, and protesting and explaining to the very coldest
+of listeners, declaring that nothing but her duty to her family, etc.; and
+what was the meaning of that broken bottle and glass, and ineradicable
+laudanum stain on the carpet in her house? Was it possible that Cousin
+Bently had thought of taking any of that terrible stuff that she meant to
+have thrown away ages before? And would they bring down John? Arthur had
+asked for him.
+
+Some one went to Mr. Bently’s room for John, but came back without him.
+The invalid was reported to have flown into something like a passion on
+learning the messenger’s errand, and to have held the dog firmly in his
+arms.
+
+John was his! No one else should have him. Whatever crime it might be
+called to refuse to give him up—stealing, embezzling, false
+imprisonment—he was ready to be accused and convicted of it, and would go
+to jail for it with the dog in his arms.
+
+Mrs. Clay was enchanted to be able to oblige her cousin in such a trifle,
+and would he speak freely when he wanted anything? and then went home and
+told all her family in confidence that Mr. Bently was a raving maniac.
+
+Reader, according to our promises at the beginning of this history, we
+should stop here. The scene has changed, the time already exceeds twenty‐
+four hours, and only the characters remain the same. But we have not done.
+There is something more which we are pining to tell. Shall we stop, then,
+and perish in silence, rather than transgress rules made by a people “dead
+and done with this many a year,” whose whole country, with themselves on
+it, could have been thrown into one of our inland seas without making it
+spill over? No! Perish the unities!
+
+_Scene II._—Large parlor, rosy‐tinted all through with reflections from
+sunset, from firelight, and from red draperies. After‐dinner silence
+pervading, open folding‐doors giving a view through a suite of rooms, in
+the furthest of which an old gentleman sleeps in his arm‐chair. Or,
+perhaps, it is a picture of a library, with an old gentleman asleep in it.
+The stillness is perfect enough for that. Mr. Bently, convalescent, first
+dinner down‐stairs since his illness, stands near a window looking out,
+but watchful of the inside of the parlor, and of a lady who sits at an
+embroidery‐frame near the same window. The lady is superficially dignified
+and tranquil, but there is an unusual color in the cheeks, and a slight
+unsteadiness in the fingers, which tell her secret conviction that
+something is going to happen. This is the first time the two have met
+since Miss Willis found the deserted man lying half senseless on Mrs.
+Clay’s parlor floor.
+
+He is thinking of that time now, and that an acknowledgment is due, and
+wondering how it is to be made, half a mind to be angry, rather than
+grateful, for the service. Such is man. All the bitterness of his lonely
+life rises up before him. Gray hairs are on his head, lines of age mark
+his face, but his heart protests against being set aside as too old for
+anything but dry speculation and love of abstract truth.
+
+“I have been seeking for some proper terms in which to express to you my
+grateful sense of your humanity in coming to me when I was left sick and
+alone, but I cannot find them,” he said at length, facing her.
+
+“There is no need to say anything about it,” she replied quietly, setting
+a careful silken stitch. “I could not have done otherwise.”
+
+Having begun, the gentleman could not stop, or would not.
+
+“I am sure you meant well, but did you do well?” he went on. “Could you
+not have been content to send the doctor, without coming yourself? Did you
+reflect that you were apparently incurring peril, and that for a man who
+had a heart as well as a head, and, worse yet, for a man whose heart had
+for years striven vainly to forget you? You have deprived me of the shield
+and support of even attempted indifference. I can no longer try to forget
+you, or think of you coldly, without the basest ingratitude.”
+
+Will the reader pardon Mr. Bently for expressing himself so grammatically?
+It was through the force of a long habit, which even passion could not
+break. It is true that, according to Gerald Griffin, Juno herself, when
+angry, spoke bad Latin; but then, Juno was a woman.
+
+_Allons, donc._ We are ourselves interested in this conversation, and are
+pleased to observe that, though the speaker’s moods and tenses are not
+flagrant, his eyes and cheeks are.
+
+The lady glanced up swiftly with that smile, half shy, half mirthful, with
+which a woman who knows her power, and means to use it kindly, receives
+the acknowledgment of it.
+
+“Why should you think coldly of me, or forget me?” she asked.
+
+Mr. Bently met her glance with stern eyes. “Does a man willingly submit to
+slavery?” he demanded. He had not suspected Marian Willis of coquetry.
+
+She looked down at her work again, the smile fading, but the mouth still
+sweet, slowly threaded her needle with a rose‐pink floss, and said as
+slowly, “I do not wish you to forget me.”
+
+One who has seen the sun strike through a heavy fog, stop a moment, then
+fling it asunder, all in silence, without breath of breeze, but making a
+bright day of a dark one, knows how Mr. Bently’s clouded face cleared at
+those words, and the look of her who spoke them.
+
+No more was said then. Enough is as good as a feast, and both tasted in
+that moment the full sweetness of a happiness the more perfect because
+apparently incomplete.
+
+On one point our mind is made up—this story shall not end with a marriage.
+A marriage there was, at seven o’clock one spring morning, in the little
+suburban church, with only three visible witnesses; and the marriage feast
+was—be it said with all reverence and adoration—manna from heaven, the
+Bread of Angels!
+
+Mrs. Clay was, of course, shocked at this affair. Where was the
+_trousseau_, where the fuss, the presents that might have been, the
+rehearsal at a fashionable church, the organ music, the crowd of dear
+criticising friends, the reception, cake and wine, journey, what not—all
+the parade, weariness, and extravagance which have so often changed a
+sacrament into a ceremony? Where, indeed? They had no existence outside of
+the lady’s disappointed wishes.
+
+She did not even see what she called this “positively shabby affair,” and
+we will not dwell on it. Turn we to the final scene.
+
+Does the reader object that John bears too small a part in the story named
+for him? On the contrary, the whole story is because of John. You have,
+perhaps, seen a painting of the procession at the coronation of George
+IV., pages and pages of magnificent persons, names, and costumes, the
+brilliant pageant of the long‐extended _queue_, all because of one person
+in it. The figure is rather large, apparently, for use in this place, but
+only apparently; for John’s record is better than any king’s, in that it
+is unstained.
+
+A year has passed. In the midst of a fair area of gardens and trees stands
+a pleasant house. Only a window or two are open, for the spring is not yet
+far advanced. Underneath a large old pine, tree not far from the porch, a
+hole has been dug, and at one side of it stands Mr. Bently, spade in hand,
+and at the other his wife. This little pit is lined with green boughs, and
+the lady stoops and carefully and soberly adds one more. On the heap of
+earth thrown up rests a box.
+
+This much is visible to a young man who comes strolling up the path from
+the gate. He pauses, and looks on in astonishment. He recollects of having
+heard somewhere that Cousin Bently’s dog John was accidentally shot, and
+that Mrs. Bently cried about it. Can it be possible that they are making a
+funeral over John? That would be too funny.
+
+Mr. Bently stooped, took the box in his arms, and placed it carefully down
+among the green boughs. Standing upright then, he wiped his eyes, and
+muttered a trembling, “Poor fellow!”
+
+“Good‐morning!” said a brisk voice at his elbow. “I’m sorry Johnnie met
+with a mishap. Are you burying him here?”
+
+The vapid, mean, supercilious face gave them both such a shock that they
+reddened and frowned. No one could have been less welcome at that moment
+than Arthur Clay.
+
+Mrs. Bently answered his question with a brief, “Yes.”
+
+“Oh! well, there are dogs enough in the world,” said the young man,
+meaning to be consoling.
+
+“There are puppies enough!” muttered Mr. Bently, and began shovelling the
+earth savagely into the grave.
+
+“Please go into the house, and wait for us, Arthur,” the lady said, with
+polite decision. She had no mind to have this last touching rite spoiled
+by such an intrusion.
+
+But young Mr. Clay was in an obliging mood. “Thank you; I’d just as lief
+stay, and rather. I never attended a canine funeral before.”
+
+There was a momentary silence, then Mrs. Bently spoke again, with still
+more decision and far less suavity: “On the whole, you must excuse us from
+seeing you any longer this morning. If you had gone to the door, the
+servant would have told you that we do not receive any one to‐day.”
+
+The young man gave an angry laugh. “Oh! certainly! I wouldn’t for the
+world intrude on your sorrow. Good‐morning! It’s a pity, though, that dogs
+are not immortal, isn’t it? You might have John canonized.”
+
+Mr. Bently flashed his eyes round at the speaker. “What!” he thundered,
+“_you_ immortal, and _my_ DOG NOT!”
+
+If they had been two Parrott guns, instead of two eyes and a mouth, Mr.
+Arthur Clay could not have retreated more precipitantly.
+
+The grave was filled in and covered over with boughs, two sighs were
+breathed over it, then the couple walked, arm in arm, slowly toward the
+house.
+
+“He was a perfect creature!” Mr. Bently said, after a silence.
+
+“Yes!” assented the wife. “Only he would bounce at one so.”
+
+“Marian,” said her husband solemnly, “if it hadn’t been for John’s habit
+of bouncing at his friends, you would have had no husband.”
+
+It was well meant, but unfortunately worded. The lady pouted, being by no
+means an ideal, perfect, pattern woman, but only a natural and charming
+one, with varying moods and whims playing, spraylike, over the deeps of
+principle and religion. “Don’t be too sure of that!” she made answer to
+him.
+
+Mr. Bently never bristled with virtues when his wife made such remarks. He
+smiled now, full of kindness. “I meant to say that I should have had no
+wife,” he corrected himself.
+
+At that, the pout, which was only a rebellious muscle, not a rebellious
+heart, disappeared. “It means the same thing, you most patient of men!”
+exclaimed his wife fervently.
+
+They reached the porch, and stood there a moment, looking back to the
+mound under the pine‐tree.
+
+“It is a comfort to think,” said the wife, “that for one year of his life
+we made him such a happy dog.”
+
+Then they went in, and the door closed behind them.
+
+
+
+
+The International Congress Of Prehistoric Anthropology And Archaeology.
+
+
+From La Revue Generale De Bruxelles.
+
+The International Congress of Prehistoric Anthropology and Archæology held
+its sixth meeting at Brussels, in 1872. The idea of this congress
+originated in Italy. Some eminent Swiss, Italian, and French naturalists,
+assembled at Spezzia in 1865, resolved to hold the first session the
+following year at Neufchâtel. This meeting, entirely confined to
+explorations, created no sensation out of the scientific world, but it was
+agreed there should be another at the time of the International Exposition
+at Paris in 1867. The congress, thenceforth established, appointed a
+committee to organize the next meeting. More than four hundred savants
+responded to the invitation. At Paris it was decided to meet again the
+next year at Norwich, at the same time as the British Association for the
+Advancement of Science. The programme of questions proposed for discussion
+at Norwich presents a striking similarity to that at Paris. The congress
+held at Copenhagen in 1869 was distinguished by a more local and practical
+character than the preceding. Finally, the Congress of Bologna, in 1871,
+enlarged still more the extent of its programme; according, however, the
+first place to objects that particularly interested Italy.
+
+The programme of the Congress of Brussels was, so to speak, determined by
+M. E. Dupont’s important discoveries in the caverns of the province of
+Namur, and the questions were drawn up from the Belgian point of view, in
+order to give our savants an opportunity of acquainting foreign scientific
+men with the researches and facts relating particularly to our country.
+Similar proceedings had taken place at Copenhagen and Bologna. But the
+programme of Brussels by no means excluded points of general interest.
+Here is the list of those proposed:
+
+I. What discoveries have been made in Belgium to attest the antiquity of
+prehistoric man?
+
+II. What were the manners and pursuits of the people who lived in the
+caverns of Belgium? Did their manners and pursuits vary during the
+quaternary epoch? What analogy is there between their manners and
+pursuits, and those of the troglodyte population in other parts of Western
+Europe and of the savages of the present day?
+
+III. What were the pursuits of the people who inhabited the plains of
+Hainault during the quaternary epoch? Can it be proved they held any
+communication with their contemporaries of the caverns of the provinces of
+Liége and Namur, or with the quaternary peoples of the valleys of the
+Somme and the Thames?
+
+IV. What characterized the age of polished stone in Belgium? What was its
+connection with previous ages, and with the age of polished stone in
+Western Europe?
+
+V. What were the anatomical and ethnical characteristics of man in Belgium
+during the age of stone?
+
+VI. What characterized the age of bronze in Belgium?
+
+VII. What characterized the appearance of iron in Belgium?
+
+Excursions to the caverns of the valleys of the Lesse, the flint‐works of
+Spiennes and Mesvin, and the entrenched camp of Hastedon near Namur,
+formed a practical demonstration of the problems discussed at the meeting.
+
+Many illustrious co‐workers responded to the invitation of the Committee
+of Arrangements. England was represented by Messrs. Prestwich, Owen, the
+great palæontologist, Dawkins, Lubbock, Franks, the Director of the
+Department of Antiquities and Ethnography at the British Museum, etc.;
+France, by her most eminent anthropologists, archæologists, and
+geologists, Messrs, Quatrefages, Broca, Belgrand, Hébert, De Mortillet and
+Bertrand of the Musée de S. Germain, General Faid’herbe, the Marquis de
+Vibraye, Cartaillac, De Linas, Doctors Lagneau et Hamy, one President and
+the other Secretary of the Society of Anthropology, Deshayes, Gaudry,
+Gervais, the Abbés Bourgeois and Delauny, one Superior and the other
+Professor at the College of Pont‐Levoy, Oppert, the celebrated explorer of
+Khorsabat, and many others, among whom we must not omit the inevitable
+Mlle. Clemence Royer, at least as a curiosity. The northern countries sent
+the founders of prehistoric archæology in the North—Messrs. Worsaœ,
+Engelhardt, De Wichfeld, Steenstrup, Waldemar‐Schmidt, from Denmark;
+Messrs. Hildebrand, Landberg, Lagerberg, Nillson, D’Oliviecrona, from
+Sweden; Italy was brilliantly represented by Messrs. Capellini, Fabretti,
+Biondelli, Count Conestabile, Gozzadini, etc.; Spain and Portugal by only
+a few; Holland by several, among whom was M. Leemans, Director of the
+Museum of Leyden; Austria by Count Wurmbrand; Germany by the Baron de
+Ducker, Professors Fraas, of Stuttgart, Schafthausen, of Bonn, the
+celebrated Virchow, of Berlin, Lindenschmidt, of Mayence; Switzerland by
+Desor, one of the founders of prehistoric archæology. Belgian science was
+represented in the committee by Messrs. d’Omalius d’Halloy, the venerable
+President of the congress, Van Beneden, De Witte, Dupont, with the élite
+of our savants, attended by a constellation of archæologists _de
+circonstance_ belonging to the various orders of the literary, artistic,
+and political world, and even the commercial; for philosophy does not
+daunt M. Jourdain in these days. As for the rest, it was a spectacle of no
+slight interest to behold the extraordinary concourse of hearers that
+thronged the sessions at the ducal palace, attentively listening to
+discussions sometimes very abstract, and again participating in the
+excursions of the learned assembly with a genuine interest apart from the
+mere pleasure of the excursions themselves. In proportion as man adds to
+his knowledge of the globe he inhabits, instead of being satisfied, the
+greater ardor and interest he manifests to know more. “The surface of both
+land and water explored in every sense of the word; mountains measured;
+oceans sounded, and their secrets brought to light; inorganic substances
+and organized bodies analyzed and described; plants, animals, and the
+human races studied under every aspect; historical traditions investigated
+and revised; the dead languages brought into use, and the words derived
+from them traced back to their original roots—all this is not enough.
+Knowing what he is, and with a thousand theories as to his destination,
+man wishes to pierce the mystery of his origin; he asks whence he came,
+and how he began the career so laboriously pursued, and into which he was
+thrust by a destiny of which he had no consciousness.”(219) The truths
+that we grasp in our day were perhaps only guessed at by the ancients.
+Lucretius has drawn a very correct picture, for those days, of the
+wretched condition of the earlier races, their struggles with the
+elements, and even the primitive weapons of stone which they wrought
+before the age of bronze and iron. But this is only a poetical conception
+to which must be attached no more importance than it merits. The science
+of prehistoric ages then had no existence. This science, scarcely known
+twenty years ago, has now quite a literature of its own, several reviews,
+and an annual International Congress (in future it will be biennial),
+splendid museums in all our capitals, and a society whose labors have
+contributed not a little to so prodigious a result—the Society of
+Anthropology.
+
+Some persons are troubled at the discussion of grave and delicate
+questions that seem to set revelation and science at variance. As for us,
+who can never admit the possibility of a conflict between the Bible and
+nature—those two divine revelations—or that they ought ever to be
+completely separated, we deeply regret the complete absence of our clergy
+at these great sessions, while those of France and Italy were represented
+in a brilliant manner.
+
+“I am well aware,” says M. Chabas, in an able preface, “that the
+materialistic tendency of savants of very considerable attainments in
+anthropology and other branches of prehistoric research, withholds many
+men whose concurrence would be of value to science from entering the arena
+where such points are discussed.” But timid minds are becoming more
+reassured. Therefore, as the Abbé Bourgeois happily remarked at the
+Congress of Paris, “We shall perhaps have to add to the antiquity of man,
+but we ought also to detract from that of fossils.” Besides, hitherto, in
+spite of so much research, man alone has been found intelligent and with a
+moral sense of his acts; and in the animal kingdom there is not a single
+proof to confirm even remotely Lamarck’s theory of transmutation revived
+by Darwin. When so many are appealing to science to the exclusion of God
+from the universe, it would be well for others to endeavor to make him
+manifest by the aid of science.
+
+“What!” exclaims Mgr. Meignan, in his brilliant work on _The World and
+Primitive Man according to the Bible_, “ought the exegete to make no
+account of the progress of human knowledge? Can the savant find neither
+profit nor light in the wisdom of Holy Writ? We think otherwise. The
+theologian who first studies nature will be better enabled to explain
+certain passages of the Bible; and the naturalist and archæologist, in
+their turn, will find it advantageous to study the real meaning of
+Genesis.” The human mind enters upon a course of examination more or less
+legitimate in subjecting religion itself to the trial of controversy; it
+is almost a duty imposed on the conscience of all who are not vainly
+endowed with reason to enable themselves to give a reason for the belief
+that is within them. “The task of the apologist,” says the eminent prelate
+just quoted, “is never at an end in our restless age.” The disagreement
+that some seem to apprehend only exists in superficial or sceptical minds.
+
+If the Bible is not a scientific revelation, neither does it contradict
+science, and especially in the bold outlines drawn by Moses. Science, as
+it progresses, sets up its landmarks, so to speak, beside the immutable
+bounds of faith; it is so with the laws of light, as well as the
+fundamental principles of geology. Revelation assigns no limits to the
+antiquity of the world, and allows _the beginning_ in which God created it
+to recede to as remote a period as is wished, and geology corroborates the
+Scripture account of successive creations. Is not the unity of origin of
+the human species, distinctly declared in both Testaments, connected with
+all the hypotheses that have excited so much opposition in our day? I do
+not mean the unity of the human species, a doctrinal question very
+different from the other, and not necessarily connected with it. But the
+unity of origin of the human race is now taught and demonstrated by the
+greater part of those versed in natural history; it is a scientific truth.
+As to the existence of man in the tertiary epoch, it is far from certain,
+though sustained by many highly respectable men.(220) M. Evans, the
+Secretary of the Geological Society of London, whose name is an authority
+on things pertaining to anthropology and palæontology, expressed himself
+in these terms at a meeting of the British Association at Liverpool last
+year [1871]: “We cannot,” said he, “possibly make any prediction as to the
+discoveries that still await us in the soil beneath our feet; but we
+certainly have no reason to conclude that the most ancient traces of man
+on the earth, or even on the soil of Western Europe, have been brought to
+light. At the same time, I must confess that the existing evidence of man
+in the miocene period, and even in the pliocene, in France (it will be
+seen further on that this has since been asserted in Portugal), appears to
+me, after the most careful examination on the spot, very far from
+convincing.”
+
+Besides, the word _prehistoric_ has only a relative exactness of meaning.
+In Belgium, prehistoric man comes down to the century before the Roman
+Conquest. A vast number of the monuments and remains so discussed in our
+day might be included in the historic period. In most cases, too absolute
+a signification is given to the word prehistoric, conveying an idea of
+remote antiquity far beyond the bounds of chronology. It is under the
+influence of this preconceived opinion that the most distinguished and
+independent investigators have allowed themselves to be carried away with
+the apparent revelation of an entirely new world. In hearing of the
+millions of ages attributed to quaternary man, one feels greatly behind
+the times, and asks himself anxiously if there really is a science that
+has a good right to make man so old, and that affords means of
+ascertaining, as has been stated, what our ancestors were observing in the
+heavens on the 29th of January, 11,542 years before Christ. This feeling
+of astonishment must be still livelier in those for whom the insoluble
+problems of antiquity extend back to less than two thousand years. We do
+not know the site of _Alesia_, and we pretend to know the habitat and
+manners of villages of more than three hundred thousand years before the
+downfall of the Gallic nationality! It should be confessed that the
+science which has so recently sprung up, and which has for its object the
+study of human labor anterior to the use of metals, is neither so firmly
+established nor so positive in its deductions that we should blindly
+accept such bold theories. This is one of the reasons that should
+encourage more men of serious pursuits to take a part in these debates, as
+to which it is allowable to hope that the truth will some day be
+discovered at an equal distance from any exaggeration.
+
+We shall have occasion to return to these questions which occupied the
+Congress of Brussels. This preamble appeared necessary as a justification
+for confining ourselves to a plain, simple analysis of the proceedings of
+the congress—others can review them better than we.
+
+We will only add one word more. The field for discussion had been prepared
+in a wonderful manner by the recent publication of the excellent work in
+which the learned and active director of our Royal Museum of Natural
+History has condensed his researches.(221)
+
+The opening session took place the 22d of August. The day was spent in
+receptions, speeches of welcome, replies, the installation of the board,
+and other official courtesies which we spare the reader. The following
+days there were two sessions a day. The morning of the 23d of August was
+devoted to the first question in the programme. There was no one better
+fitted to develop it than M. Dupont, the Chief Secretary of the congress,
+and the most active of its organizers. He had already given a clear
+outline of its history in his discourse at the first session of the day
+before. It was started in Belgium in 1829, and kept up by the researches
+of Schmerling, who may be regarded as the Champollion of prehistoric
+anthropology; but our illustrious fellow‐citizen was not encouraged in his
+discoveries, and it may be said that he was, to a certain degree, a martyr
+to the scientific prejudices of his time. His labors, occurring at a time
+when Cuvier’s authority was at its height, could not counterbalance the
+influence of that great genius, who declared that man could not be found
+among fossils’ bones, and that the vestiges of the human race in the
+caverns came under the general rule. No one then could have dreamed of
+referring these remains to the epoch of the mammoth, and it was scarcely
+admitted, till within a dozen years, that man was contemporary with the
+animals of the geological periods which preceded ours. Schmerling, but
+little befriended by circumstances, was deceived as to what caused the
+introduction of this _débris_ into the caverns. He attributed it to sudden
+inundations. Some years later, Mr. Spring opened the way to the true
+theory, which allows the reconstruction of the ethnography of geological
+epochs; but he could not continue his researches, and it was not till 1861
+that Lartet’s report concerning the caverns of Aurillac at length
+established a collection of decisive facts. In 1863, M. Dupont was
+appointed to explore the caverns of the province of Namur, which gave
+promise of discoveries of unusual interest; it was important that our
+country, after having taken so large a part in establishing the first
+principles of this new science, should not remain inactive in the movement
+to which it had led. The immense result of researches continued without
+relaxation for seven years, summer and winter, and the valuable remains
+thus found, which are the ornament of our principal museum, prove that the
+direction of the task could not have been confided to better hands.
+
+M. Dupont, laying aside the arbitrary classifications that had hitherto
+been adopted for determining the antiquity of remains found in caverns,
+introduced the geologic method in his researches, which is founded upon
+principles almost incontestable and evidences of indubitable truth. The
+chronological data furnished by this method are generally of mathematical
+exactitude. “With this point to start from,” says M. Dupont, “I was sure
+of clearly determining the fauna and ethnographical remains of each epoch
+to which the objects discovered in the various subterranean explorations
+belonged.”(222) In pursuing the application of this method, our young and
+already illustrious savant was enabled to show the evolution of physical
+and biological phenomena, and to reconstruct the ethnography of the age of
+stone. Whatever may be thought of the reality of the facts brought
+forward, it must be confessed that no ordinary mind could have formed such
+bold conceptions.
+
+After a communication from Dr. Hamy on the flint‐works of France and
+England at the time of the mammoth, the Abbé Bourgeois discussed the
+question of tertiary man. The learned professor’s clear, fluent language,
+the distinction of his manners, and his open, animated countenance so
+completely won the goodwill of the audience that thenceforth, whenever he
+spoke, his appearance in the tribune was hailed with unanimous applause.
+
+The Abbé Bourgeois and M. de Launay, his colleague, are the true heralds
+of tertiary man. The chronological discussion they so boldly excite seems
+to embarrass them but little; on the other hand, they almost banish the
+hope some still seem to cling to of finding the man‐monkey. In 1866, M.
+Bourgeois described and presented to the Academy of Sciences some wrought
+flints found in the tertiary deposits in the commune of Thenay near Pont‐
+Levoy (Loir‐et‐Cher). M. Desnoyers had already, in 1863, pointed out bones
+found in strata incontestably pliocene, on which were striæ, or very
+distinct and regularly marked incisions. Worked flints are beginning to be
+found, we are assured, in the bottom of the calcareous deposits of Beauce;
+that is to say, in chalk. They are identical in form with those found on
+the surface; as in other places, there are utensils for cutting, piercing,
+scraping, and hammering. Many of these instruments have been injured by
+the action of fire. Finally, says the Abbé Bourgeois, “I find in them
+almost every proof of man’s agency, to wit: after‐touches, symmetrical
+grooves, grooves artificially made to correspond with natural ones, and
+especially the multiplied reproduction of certain forms. This is a
+peculiar, unheard‐of fact of the highest importance, but, to me, an
+indubitable one.” M. Bourgeois exhibited to the competent judges assembled
+at Brussels what he considered the proofs of the authenticity of his
+discovery. To him they are convincing, but what he seeks, above all, is
+truth, and he asked that a special committee be appointed to elucidate the
+question. This committee pronounced a verdict two days after, without
+deciding the point. Of thirty‐two specimens presented for examination,
+some appeared to them evidently wrought, but most of them were unanimously
+rejected. There was no difference of opinion as to M. Bourgeois’ sincerity
+of belief, but they were divided as to the authenticity of the deposit.
+Those who have seen the place had no doubts; the remainder were
+incredulous. M. Capellini proposed that a new committee be appointed to
+make researches on the spot. The general conclusion was that no solution
+is at present possible.
+
+The existence of prehistoric man in Greece next became the subject of
+lively discussion, giving rise to the most contradictory opinions. The
+conclusion was that there are no decided proofs. The same doubt was
+manifested with respect to a skull from California, said to have been
+found in tertiary formation. It is not even certain it is a human skull.
+
+The second session of the day opened with an account from M. Rivière of
+the discovery of a complete skeleton in a grotto at Menton, found among
+the remains of various animals of the quaternary epoch, such as the lion,
+bear, rhinoceros, etc. Then M. de Mortillet gave a detailed description of
+the fauna, and the utensils, arms, pursuits, manners, and even the first
+manifestation of art, of man in the quaternary period, and he proposed a
+still further subdivision of the classes than is now admitted. The speaker
+mentioned a very singular circumstance calculated to excite reflection—an
+inexplicable hiatus between the last period of the age of cut stone and
+the age of polished stone, in which new races appeared of greater industry
+and more intelligence, agriculture was developed, the industrial pursuits
+were extended, and art disappeared. It is the era of lacustrine villages
+and of dolmens. M. de Mortillet’s sketch of prehistoric civilization was
+picturesque but far from convincing.
+
+The Abbé Bourgeois did not think M. de Mortillet’s classification correct,
+because the progress of civilization in France and Belgium was unequal.
+“The Belgians,” he said, “were more advanced.” And the orator added with
+charming bonhomie: “I cannot say it is otherwise now.”
+
+M. Fraas, professor at Stuttgart, stated that he had made some
+explorations in the grotto of Hollenfelz near Ulm, in Würtemberg. The
+_Homo unius cavernæ_ was refuted in his conclusions by M. Hébert, the
+celebrated professor at the Sorbonne, and by other savants. M. d’Omalius
+was of the opinion that two geologists of different countries, desirous of
+identifying beds contiguous to their fields of exploration, were never
+able to agree. Between two strata there are always deposits that partake
+of the distinctive characteristics of both.
+
+We pass from the grave to the entertaining. The following day, at seven
+o’clock in the morning, all the learned assembly, glad, it may be
+imagined, to get away from the pretentious paintings of the ducal palace,
+took flight by steam for the valley of the Lesse. We would be the first to
+confess that, if the country excited the sincere admiration of the
+excursionists, the latter were equally a delightful source of curiosity to
+the native inhabitants. They will not readily forget the picturesque sight
+of our long caravan traversing the good town of Dinant all decked out with
+flags, parading in elegant equipages lost among the _coucous_, _fiacres_,
+and _calèches_ of wondrous construction, or perched on the imperials of
+the most extraordinary vehicles, omnibuses, and _pataches_ truly
+prehistoric, filing along the banks of the Meuse towards the valleys amid
+laughter, jests, joltings, and the vociferations of our _Automedon_.
+Charming landscapes, but detestable roads. This region has been so often
+described that I need not attempt to depict it; it is with the pencil and
+brush it should be undertaken. Sometimes the road winds around with
+disagreeable undulations through the deep ravines bordered by apple‐trees
+whose fruit‐laden branches sweep the imperials of the carriages,
+endangering the silken hat; sometimes rolling over broad grassy roads
+walled in by immense cliffs crowned with ruins and verdure, or affording
+vistas through the neighboring valleys, lit up by the sun streaming
+through the woods with a mild radiance that recalls the Elysian Fields of
+mythological memory. At length we come to the Lesse, which bars the way
+with its clear, rapid current. The carriages have to ford the capricious
+and petulant waters of the little winding torrent. The horses sheer in the
+very middle of the stream, causing a deafening noise of laughter, shouts
+of alarm, and blows of the whip. All ends by crossing without any great
+difficulty, but the same scene is reproduced five or six times with varied
+incidents; for there are that number of fords to cross. It was in one of
+these places, where we were obliged to cross the river in boats in order
+to reach the grottoes, that we saw the overloaded skiff capsized that bore
+among others M. d’Omalius and Mlle. Royer. The apostle of woman’s
+emancipation clung with shrill screams to the neck of a small gentleman,
+her _chevalier servant_ for the time, and, when she found a footing with
+the water up to her chin, she contributed somewhat to save her assistant
+by keeping his head out of water—a fine opportunity for quoting La
+Fontaine, with a kind variation: “That is nothing; it is not a woman that
+is drowning.” The nonagenarian president of the congress was taken out
+safe and sound, and it was with extreme difficulty he was induced to
+change his _chaussures_, but nothing could prevail upon him to accept dry
+garments. Happily, the weather was superb, and the shipwrecked travellers
+could get dry in the sun.
+
+We returned by way of the plateaux that overlook the valley. Nothing could
+be imagined more fantastically beautiful than that immense panorama bathed
+in the purple light of the setting sun. The visitors, under the guidance
+of M. Dupont, had been through all the principal caverns described in his
+book. His learned explanations were greatly relished, and added a keen
+interest to an excursion of which the unexpected and the amusing had
+heightened the charm. We will not speak of the banquet that crowned so
+delightful a day, or of the ovations that were lavished on the savants and
+others. For such details, we refer you to the newspapers that published
+the reports.
+
+To Be Concluded In Our Next Number.
+
+
+
+
+The See Of Peter.
+
+
+    Not unto hirelings, Prince of Shepherds, leave
+    This distant flock. The wolf, long kept at bay,
+    No longer in sheep’s clothing seeks its prey,
+    Nor prowls at midnight round the fold’s low eave,
+    Its weak, unwary victim to deceive;
+    But rampant in the flock at noon of day,
+    Careering leaps, to scatter, mangle, slay,
+    While from afar the banished shepherds grieve.
+    How long must sycophants wax blandly wise,
+    And meek‐faced aspirants rebuke the cries
+    Of outraged faith! On Peter, “Feed my sheep,
+    My young lambs feed,” the charge benignant lies,
+    And we whose vigils cheat the night of sleep,
+    On Peter, still, calm eyes expectant keep.
+
+
+
+
+Atlantic Drift—Gathered In The Steerage.
+
+
+By An Emigrant.
+
+To most of the sons and daughters of Columbia the few days they pass in
+returning from the Old Country represent but a period of wearisome
+delay—an interval sometimes nauseous and always irksome between the
+pleasures of travel and those of their own fireside, passed perhaps in
+recollection of the pleasures of Paris, the classic grandeurs of the
+Eternal City, or the picturesque beauties of Switzerland and the Rhine;
+not unfrequently, perhaps, by our belles, whose elegance and social value
+have received their last gilding in the grand tour of Europe, in
+anticipation of the effect of their costumes at Newport or Saratoga, or of
+their adventures and experiences in the great circle of their country
+friends. All that wealth and skill can do is lavished on the
+accommodations of ocean steamers, and nothing is spared to make the
+traveller independent of the caprice or ill‐temper of the watery god; and
+nowadays a passage from the Mersey to our Empire City is to the ordinary
+passenger almost as comfortable and quite as devoid of unusual interest as
+a sojourn of so many days at the St. Nicholas or the Fifth Avenue. There
+is, however, another class of voyagers whose hard‐earned savings form the
+staple of the receipts of the owners of these splendid vessels; they
+usually belong to a sphere where literature hardly penetrates and whence
+come few who wield a ready pen; hence perhaps the general ignorance that
+seems to prevail as to their treatment and accommodation. The cabin
+passenger sees them only in squalid groups, encumbering the decks of the
+great ship, beyond the middle enclosure reserved to the saloon; and if he
+dives into the close and half‐lit steerage, a very brief glance round its
+dim precincts satisfies his curiosity. Believing, however, that many of
+our adopted countrymen will feel some interest in knowing how the great
+army of emigrants who flock in hundreds of thousands to our shores fare on
+their ocean transit, one of us lifts a voice from the steerage to relate
+some of the realities of life in an emigrant ship. Naught have we
+extenuated or aught set down in malice, and, such as it is, our little
+narrative is a true history of personal and actual experience.
+
+To the reader it matters little what ill‐fortune cast from his quiet
+anchorage a London clerk who had already seen three decades, and whose
+life had hitherto run in the tranquil groove of uniform official duty,
+sufficiently well remunerated to furnish the comforts of a middle‐class
+English home. Unable to regain a similar position in his native land, he
+goes to seek his fortune in the West, and, thither wending, finds himself
+in the steerage of one of our principal ocean steamers. Candor requires
+this avowal, for those interested in the great liners think they dispose
+of the numerous complaints as to their treatment of their emigrant
+passengers, by retorting that they provide for the working‐classes, and
+not for clerks out of place or penniless gentlemen. Hence what is here
+stated as to their discomfort deals not with the writer’s own feelings,
+but speaks of what he saw endured by others, and he gives voice not merely
+to his own opinions, but to the sentiments of the mechanics, artisans, and
+farm laborers who were his fellow‐voyagers.
+
+Every emigrant has to provide himself with bedding, plate, basin, drinking
+and water can, and a knife and fork. Our first experience of emigrant life
+consisted in the purchase of these articles at a Liverpool slop‐shop; some
+ten shillings covered the entire outlay, except for the blanket, the most
+indispensable of all; for this purpose, the dealer persuaded us to buy a
+horse‐rug, which he solemnly assured us was worth double the money across
+the Atlantic: as a copy of the _Times_ would give about as much warmth and
+shelter as the common covering sold with the bed, we invested in it. An
+addition to our comfort it certainly has been in the bunk, and in the long
+nights in the emigrant trains, and it still remains our property; no
+market have we been able to discover for the article, and we conclude that
+a certain spice of Americanism had communicated itself to the mercantile
+mind of the seller. Many of the inmates of our steerage dispensed with all
+or most of these domestic utensils. One gentleman’s luggage, whose world‐
+wide travels we may hereafter refer to, consisted of a limited brown‐paper
+parcel; in his subsequent oceanic career his Irish suavity usually
+procured him the loan of one of the tins of an acquaintance; that failing,
+he borrowed any neighboring utensil whose owner was not for the moment at
+hand; or, driven to his last resource, abjured coffee or soup and ate his
+portion of meat on a piece of brown paper. Some had but one vessel which
+served indifferently for a drinking‐can, soup‐basin, plate, tea‐cup, or
+wash hand‐basin, while a few comfort‐loving people, more frequently,
+however, in the after or family steerage than in our bachelor quarters,
+carried heavy loads of comfortable bedding and neatly‐arranged baskets of
+table‐ware.
+
+Nearly all this apparatus of bedding and tin‐ware is thrown overboard or
+given to the crew when the vessel arrives at its destination; only the
+frugal Germans carefully preserve their vessels, and, shaking out its
+straw or moss contents, preserve the ticking of the bed either as a
+wrapping for their baggage or some ulterior purpose. It certainly seems
+strange that an expenditure of from two to three hundred pounds should be
+incurred by every ship‐load of emigrants for articles of such brief
+utility. Could not this outlay be converted to the benefit of the ship‐
+owners by the permanent provision of requisites of this description at a
+moderate charge?
+
+The great landing stage at Liverpool on the morning of our embarkation was
+crowded with some two thousand persons—the passengers of three mail
+steamers, their friends, and the swarm of porters, carters, and pedlers in
+attendance on them. Everything was confusion; here mothers seeking a stray
+little one, there the husband anxiously gathering together his motley
+property of boxes, bedding, cans, baskets, and packages of every
+description, as they were roughly tossed out of the cart from some
+boarding‐house. The boxes had to be placed in one tender, the passengers
+and lighter luggage in another; porters drove greedy bargains with females
+helplessly encumbered with immovable boxes. Women with baskets full of
+articles for sale—combs and brushes, knives, scissors, and soap—pushed
+their way here and there. To single men, careful of small change, it was a
+problem how to move the box or trunk in one direction and yet secure the
+safety of the other articles while doing so. We despaired of solving the
+problem, and trusted to the honesty of a badge porter, who undertook for
+sixpence to place our box on the luggage tender; afterwards, nervous as to
+the actual presence there of our little all, we spent two weary hours in
+watching the baggage discharged into the hold. A thousand trunks and
+chests of every conceivable size, shape, color, and dimensions passed down
+the hatchway before us—handsome American boxes, ribbed and gay with bright
+nails; immense iron‐bound chests of unpainted deal, containing the whole
+household goods of some Swedish or Norwegian family, directed in quaint
+letters to some far‐off town in Minnesota or Wisconsin; flimsy papered
+trunks, with sides already creaking and gaping, threatening to disgorge
+their finery before they touch the ground in Castle Garden; and German
+packs of strong ticking or canvas about the size of a small haystack—and,
+with a sigh of relief, we at last saw our property shot with a crash into
+the hold. Nearly two long hours did we spend on the open stage under a
+drizzling rain, that soaked the beds and blankets before the tenders
+moored alongside; then all made for the gangways, tugging their luggage
+with them; produced their tickets as they passed on, and pushed, tumbled,
+and scrambled pell‐mell on board; a similar scene was enacted at the
+steamer’s side; and when at last we reached her spacious decks we felt
+like soldiers passed unscathed through some hard‐fought field; not all
+unscathed, however; a considerable number of missing tins, blankets, and
+even beds attested the severity of the struggle and gave zest to the
+satisfaction of the more fortunate.
+
+Arrived at last on our floating home for the coming fortnight, we pushed
+our way into the steerages to find our berths and enter into possession:
+and here let us try to describe. The steamer was a magnificent vessel,
+advertised to be of 3,700 tons, and celebrated for the luxury of her
+saloon accommodation and her almost unrivalled speed—qualities, as
+experience taught us, attained somewhat at the expense of the comfort of
+her emigrant passengers. Right aft the forecastle or forward part of the
+deck was roofed over with what sailors call a whale‐back, to the entrance
+of the forward steerage; a small deck house, with doors on each side, and
+on one side a small closet with a half door and a few racks for clothes
+served as a deck bar; behind it, that is, towards the stern, was the
+forward _fresh_ water pump; walking still sternwards, we next encounter
+another small house containing the wash‐house for the forward steerage,
+entered from below, and two or three cabins for some of the officers or
+petty officers opening on the deck; on one side of this was a hot water
+tap; a few feet further is the main deck house, extending about half the
+length of the ship; in the street‐like passages between its sides and the
+bulwarks—open iron railings in our vessel—are the doors to the galleys,
+boilers, engine‐rooms, officers’ berths, and saloon, which, unlike most
+other steamships, is in this situated amidships; from the saloon a
+handsome double staircase led on to the deck above, which, however, like
+the tops of all the other deck houses, was tabooed ground to the
+emigrants. At the end of the main deck house was the entrance to the
+forward or sternmost steerage, and at the side of it the after fresh water
+pump; still further aft another deck house contained the wash‐house
+belonging to this steerage, and, as in case of the forward steerage,
+entered from below, and one or two officers’ berths, and provided outside
+with a second hot water tap; still further, the stern deck house contained
+the wheel house, with the engine for working the rudder, the butcher’s
+shop, ice and meat house, and vegetable storehouse; and between its
+semicircular end and the bulwark round the stern ran a low gallery, always
+considered among us as the most desirable place to settle for the day. We
+were free to ramble or squat ourselves on the deck where we listed, except
+the extreme forecastle forward of the entrance to the sailors’ cabin;
+there an incautious intruder paid his footing with the penalty of a bottle
+or two of beer to the nearest sailor who could catch him. Under the
+whaleback, also, either by custom or some rule of the ship, was forbidden
+ground to children or the fair sex, and always the chosen resort of old
+hands who liked to smoke a quiet pipe sheltered from the wind, chat with
+those of the crew who were off duty, and be comfortably near the deck bar.
+
+Enter the forward or bachelors’ steerage—the after one being reserved to
+married couples and single women; leaving the bright day, we can hardly
+distinguish the objects in the dim light, and feel our way down the first
+flight of steps; this brings us on the main deck; here it is not open to
+the sides of the ship, along which run the berths of the saloon
+passengers. Entered from the saloons at the fore part, where they
+terminate by the hospital, two neat rooms, each with three or four bunks
+with bedding, wash‐basins, etc., similar to those of a saloon berth, and
+in one of which, in the absence of patients, our two stewards sleep; and
+at the other or after end a narrow flight of steps leads up to the wash‐
+house on deck. The main deck is lighted only by the stairs and the
+hatchway; when the wooden grating covering the latter is in its place, it
+is dim; when it is covered with tarpaulin to prevent the entrance of the
+rain or spray, too dark to see. We have still another flight of steps to
+descend to reach the cavernous abyss of the steerage itself, which is
+situated between‐decks; when our eyes grow accustomed to the obscurity, we
+see a central open space about ten feet wide, running from end to end; in
+this are three narrow wooden tables with benches, two lengthwise and one
+crosswise, each capable of seating about twenty people; on each side are
+the bunks, reaching to the roof, entered by narrow streets or passages
+leading off on either hand, and again benches in the central space all
+round the outer side of the bunks.
+
+Each street of bunks contained twenty upper and lower rows of five each,
+on either hand; the inmates therefore, lay side by side, parallel with the
+ship’s length, with their feet to their own street, and their heads
+adjoining those of their neighbors in the adjoining street. The bunks
+themselves consisted simply of shelves of unpainted boards, with an
+opening of about an inch between each, and were about six feet and a half
+wide, and divided into the spaces for each bunk, and fenced at the foot by
+upright boards about a foot high; in short, an emigrant’s bunk means a
+slightly fenced off space of hard board rather more than six feet by two.
+The lower row are about two feet from the ground; the upper about three
+feet above the lower, and the same distance from the roof. They are not
+attached to the side of the ship, but to a framework a few inches from it,
+the interstices of which served to stow hats or tins. Inside this
+coffinlike area of the bunks you stow bed, bedding, cans, and all smaller
+_impedimenta_, while such boxes as found their way down are pushed under
+the lower berths, piled in corners of the central space, or serve in the
+streets as seats or footsteps to the upper berths. In our steamer the
+bunks seemed to have been just put up; they were free from vermin, the
+timbers had nothing dirtier about them than sawdust; indeed, as we
+believe, the number of steerage passengers who cross eastwards is much
+less than in the other direction, the greater part of the boards are often
+knocked down on the ship’s arrival in New York, and the steerage filled
+with cargo, and then re‐erected when she is again prepared for the
+westward trip. The berths next to the central space were the most in
+request, on account of their being nearer the fresh air, and the lower
+range everywhere objected to; but nearly all the tickets had a number
+affixed, and no liberty of choice was permitted. Ours was in the upper
+berth in one corner, and consequently very far removed from any
+ventilation; as a slight compensation, being next to the side of the ship,
+we could look through the little window over the surging water, with which
+it was almost level and frequently covered. The gaps between the planks
+were very annoying, as small articles readily fell through them, and if
+they fell beneath the lower range it was too dark and the space too narrow
+to readily recover them. From about nine till twelve every day the
+steerage was closed, all the inmates sent on deck, and the floor brushed
+and laid down with fresh sawdust; this process, we think, was confined to
+the central space and the streets, and did not extend to the spaces
+underneath the bunks; and it was daily inspected or supposed to be
+inspected by one of the doctors, of whom there were two on board.
+
+The wash‐house to the forward steerage was of decent size, with tiled
+floor, and contained eight closet pans, five wash hand‐basins, each with a
+tap of cold water and one with a hot water tap, and four sinks, also with
+salt water taps: putting aside the absence of any privacy, the
+arrangements were suitable, and the fittings generally clean; but, as in
+so many other instances, the carelessness or inattention of the crew made
+the admirable equipments of the ship almost useless. Except early in the
+morning there was rarely any water in the taps, and in the hot water
+cistern, which also supplied the hot‐water tap outside, often none for two
+or three days: the engineer, the steward told us, would not waste the
+steam by putting his cistern into communication with the boilers; and then
+often, when turned on, the tap poured out so much more hot steam than
+water that one was likely rather to get scalded hands than a full can.
+
+The after‐steerage was similar in character to that of the single men, but
+much larger, occupying both the main and between‐decks; the married men
+and women slept on one side, the single women on the other; their privacy
+being supposed to be secured by a canvas curtain let down at night the
+whole length of the cabin. In the other lines, we believe the men and
+women, married or single, are quite separated, but ours put it forward as
+one of their attractions that husbands and wives are berthed together; as
+this simply means that their bunks are allotted side by side, the wife is
+really no more berthed with her own husband than with the spouse of her
+next neighbor. Many of the more respectable women complained much of being
+misled by the announcement, and of their being unable to undress to rest
+during the whole of the voyage, as they might have done if a cabin had
+been really and exclusively reserved for children and females. To the
+after steerage two wash‐houses were attached, one for the women with
+closed private closets, and one for the men similar to ours.
+
+The routine of one day’s life may serve for all. As the mornings were
+generally damp and chilly, like most in our steerage we slept till towards
+eight o’clock, and did not rise till breakfast was announced; as dressing
+consisted in knocking off the rugs and donning coat, waistcoat, and boots,
+it was not a long process; then we scramble down into our street, seize
+our can and wait; in our corner we are too far removed from the
+tables—which would not seat half the number the cabin contains—to try to
+obtain seats at them; so we sit in the bunks on the chests in our street,
+or stand till the steward comes round to the entrance, and sings out, “Who
+is for coffee?” Each holds out or passes on his can, and he ladles into it
+about a pint of a boiling hot decoction, sweetened but without milk, and
+bearing a distant but still recognizable relationship to the article one
+had hitherto known under the name. A few minutes afterwards he comes round
+with the fresh bread, and over its distribution there were always much
+squabbling and bad language, partly because the bakers disliked the
+trouble of baking more than the strictly necessary quantity, and were
+given to restricting both the number and size of the loaves, and partly
+because many could neither eat the waxy potatoes nor hard sea‐biscuits; so
+that all sorts of tricks were resorted to to secure additional loaves for
+their dinner or tea. Of all the articles of diet the warm fresh bread
+every morning was decidedly the favorite, and any shortcoming in its
+supply more resented than any other infliction; both in size and quality
+the loaves varied very much according to the caprice of the bakers, but
+they were generally good. Great pyramids of butter were placed in tins on
+the tables; most of the men would not eat it on account of its tallow‐like
+flavor; for our own part, on obtaining our coffee and bread, we cut the
+latter open, put a lump of butter to melt inside, and pressed it together
+to distribute it equally as it melted, and then proceeded on deck, and
+under the influence of the keen sea air rarely failed to eat with a good
+appetite this not very luxurious fare in some quiet corner out of the
+wind. After breakfast, warmed with the steaming coffee, we obtained a can
+full of fresh water from the pump, produced the toilet requisites from our
+satchel, and in one corner of our street performed our ablutions; we
+always took as near an approach to a sponge‐bath as circumstances
+permitted, and found the practice more refreshing even than sleep. Though
+the steward never interfered with me, it was, however, we believe, against
+the rules to wash elsewhere than in the wash‐house, or to use fresh water
+for the purpose. The first day or two we had to wash in the wash‐house
+before breakfast, but the crowd there for various purposes was so great
+and there was so little convenience for putting down the different
+articles that we gave it up; and after breakfast there was rarely water
+for the purpose.
+
+The decks always presented a more crowded and busy appearance in the
+forenoon than in any other period of the day; the steerages were empty,
+and all their inmates perforce on deck, huddled here and there, wherever
+the deck houses offer shelter from the winds, in compact groups three or
+four deep. The German and Scandinavian mothers perform the ablutions of
+their numerous families deliberately and in public—an amusing, if to some
+disgusting, process; first, the white‐headed urchin is held between his
+mother’s or perhaps his eldest sister’s knees, and his poll carefully and
+methodically examined with the fingers—not a comb, and any strangers
+summarily executed. Then he is taken to the scuppers by the side of the
+ship, his head held over a tin of hot water and lathered till he is red in
+the face and his eyes full of soap; then washed and taken back again, his
+head combed down into smoothness, and released for the day with a weight
+off his mind, the process being varied in the case of a little girl by the
+plaiting of her long flaxen locks into ribbon‐adorned tails. The majority,
+however, treated their abode on shipboard as a time when the ordinary
+rules of civilized life were temporarily suspended, and eschewed washing,
+shaving, and all the vanities of dress until they again felt themselves on
+terra firma.
+
+Dinner took place at twelve; we mustered as for breakfast, but with a more
+careful marshalling of cans, for two, if not three, were necessary, and a
+sharp watch was requisite to prevent some hungry but tireless prowler from
+summarily appropriating the nearest ware; first came the soup, dealt out
+as the coffee at breakfast—a hot compound with a faint reminiscence of
+gravy and mutton bones, some grains of barley, and fragments of celery and
+cabbage; sometimes, instead, a thick mixture of ground peas; such as it
+was, with plenty of salt which one of our street usually fetched from the
+table for the general benefit, it was the most reliable part of the
+dinner; it was always drinkable, and many came down to obtain it who would
+taste no other article provided by the ship beyond the soup and bread.
+Next came the meat, cut up into chunks in an immense tin, and shovelled
+out by the steward with a saucer on to the tin plates. Sometimes it was
+eatable; say, perhaps, on five out of the ten days a hungry stomach and a
+stern will could manage it; and once or twice we had fresh beef as good,
+allowing for the roughness with which it was served, as any one could
+desire; the salt junk and salt fish, however—and the latter, in deference
+to the feelings of the Catholic passengers, always appeared on Friday—were
+vile; the junk could not be cut with a knife, and had to be torn into
+shreds along the grain, while the fish in taste and smell was simply
+abominable.
+
+The potatoes were one of our standing grievances; as there were but two
+stewards to assist some hundred and sixty people, they had to form a
+course of themselves, or the meat got cold while waiting for them; and
+instead of being boiled, they were steamed by some hasty process into the
+taste and consistency of a tallow candle. To the natives of the Emerald
+Isle, accustomed to consider their potato the _pièce de resistance_ of
+their humble fare, this misusage of their favorite food was particularly
+aggravating, and their complaints were loud and endless. Boiled rice was
+generally served after the potatoes with coarse sugar or treacle; as long
+as the latter lasted it was palatable, but the sweetening generally bore
+the same relation to the rice as did Falstaff’s bread to his sack, and our
+ingenuity had to be taxed to procure a double or treble allowance of the
+sugar by changing places while the serving took place or holding the plate
+over the shoulders of the steward who carried it. On Sundays plum duff, a
+heavy pudding pretty liberally supplied with raisins, was dealt out, and
+to stomachs accustomed to steerage fare seemed something faintly
+approaching the luxuries of the table appropriate to the day. The tea,
+which took place at five, may be dismissed in two words: taste it had
+none, and its smell was beastly; however, it was always boiling hot, and
+in the cold, damp evenings anything warming was grateful. With it we had
+biscuits and butter.
+
+Without a detailed notice of that indispensable and omnipresent article
+the sea‐biscuit, any account of our food would be incomplete; a barrel of
+them always stood at the head of the staircase on the main deck, and any
+one could help himself as often and as liberally as he thought proper;
+they formed our sole fare at tea, and our _dernier ressort_, when the
+dinner was, as it usually was every other day, altogether uneatable. More
+fortunate than most of our fellow‐passengers, we could combine recreation
+and humble fare by gnawing at their hard sides. Of wooden consistency they
+certainly were; to make any impression on their hard edges it was
+necessary first to break them with a smart blow of the fist, put a piece
+between two sound molars, shut your eyes, hold fast to one of the
+stanchions of the bulwarks, and bring your jaws together with a determined
+and persevering grind! The result, to our taste, was not unsatisfactory;
+they were perfectly sweet, and when once pulverized not ill tasted; and on
+several occasions, when we found the other provisions inedible, two or
+three biscuits, washed down with a bottle of porter, served us for a
+tolerable meal. Few, however, shared our liking or would touch them,
+except at the last extremity, and by those whose teeth were not in first‐
+rate order they were unassailable. As a souvenir, we pocketed a couple on
+leaving the ship, and as we munched them on the following night on the
+platform of the emigrant car jolting along the side of the broad and mist‐
+clad Hudson, hoped that Dame Fortune would never reduce us in the Far West
+to more unpalatable fare.
+
+On the whole, it was possible to subsist on the ship’s provisions,
+particularly when the transit was regarded in a purgatorial or penitential
+sense; and that statement, too, must be qualified by the admission of the
+necessity of malt liquor: without two or three bottles of beer or porter a
+day, we could not have survived; they served as a tonic, which made greasy
+meat digestible, and biscuits possible to swallow; few, however, lived
+entirely on the steerage fare, nor must it be supposed that the grumblers
+or discontented were generally those who had, as it is termed, seen better
+days. Men of that class were slow to complain, because ignorant of what
+they ought to tolerate or endure in their altered circumstances. It was
+the well‐to‐do artisans or workingmen who showed the greatest disgust and
+were the bitterest in their complaints. Many families were provided with
+well‐filled baskets of good bread, ham, and bottles of preserves, and had
+their own store of tea and sugar, for which they obtained hot water from
+the galley; while others bought the whole of their food.
+
+Buying, begging, and stealing food was one of the most interesting and to
+some the most engrossing of occupations; it required a little money, a
+deal of diplomacy, and very hardened feelings, and was accomplished in
+very various ways. At the commencement of the voyage, little cliques were
+formed of four or five people, who made up a purse of two or three pounds
+for one of the cabin stewards, who in return sold to or stole for them a
+regular supply of cabin provisions; we were asked to join a little party
+of this sort, but declined; nor did we observe much of their subsequent
+fortune, except that they professed to have plenty of good food, and
+seemed to spend most of their time in watching for the opportunity when
+their steward could safely convey it to them; others peeled potatoes or
+apples and carried water for the galleys, and got fed in return; some
+reduced it to a system, bought meat from the butchers, and got it cooked
+in the galley, or, for a consideration, got liberty to go in at an idle
+time and cooked it themselves; the ordinary way, however, was to buy a
+bottle of beer at our deck‐bar, hand it in to one of the cooks with a tin,
+and ask him to give you something, the best time being immediately after
+breakfast, when the hot scouse or Irish stew—far better food than any
+provided for us—was served out for the sailors’ breakfast, or after the
+saloon dinner; you then slunk about the galley door, cursed for being in
+their way by all the cooks except the recipient of the beer, until that
+gentleman saw the head cook or chief steward out of the way, filled the
+tin with anything at hand—generally scouse in the morning, cold beef and
+chicken in the evening—shoved it under your coat, and told you to clear
+out instantly. One’s feelings suffered much in this process; but a few
+days of steerage fare blunt the sensibilities and whet the animal appetite
+to an extent that requires to be experienced to be appreciated.
+
+Another want that is keenly felt in consequence of the salt food and dry
+biscuit is that of something green or succulent. One craves an apple or an
+orange or lemon; and so well aware were the experienced travellers among
+us of this want that fresh fruit generally occupied a large space in their
+well‐stuffed baskets. We had only the slender resource of pulling pieces
+of celery through the grating of the vegetable store, peeling them and
+eating them as an addendum to the coffee and bread of our breakfast.
+Unfortunately either the demand for that cool vegetable was unexpectedly
+great in the saloon, or we emigrants were too successful in extracting it
+through the bars of the always open store; for before the voyage was half
+over the supply was exhausted, we then had raw carrots and onions from the
+same source, but the result was not satisfactory.
+
+Many of the passengers who had no money suffered much from their inability
+to cope with our daily fate. One young man of about twenty‐two or three
+years of age particularly attracted our attention. Short and slight, of
+perfectly gentlemanly manners and quiet address, he had little of the
+typical American about him, though as we afterwards learned from himself
+he belonged to a Western family engaged in commerce and of considerable
+means. Some strange star must have presided over his birth, for he had the
+rarest of all dispositions in the New World, a dislike to traffic and
+money‐making, and an unconquerable yearning for a life of literary labor.
+He was returning westward after residing in Dresden and Florence, full of
+enthusiasm for Goethe and Schiller, Tasso and Dante, and proudly conscious
+of a vocation himself as a dramatic poet. He had shot, he said, in the
+lakes of Minnesota, hunted in the Adirondacks, become familiar with the
+most beautiful and intellectual of the European capitals, and now felt
+that his endowment for his career was enriched by the novel experiences of
+the steerage of an emigrant ship. Fine conceptions, except perhaps among
+saints or hermits, do not thrive on an empty stomach.
+
+Our poet looked daily more pallid and spiritless. He listened
+uninterestedly to everything except prospects of better fare or prophecies
+of the speedy diminution of the irksome voyage. One night one of the cooks
+in the emigrant galley gave us a tin crammed to overflowing with fragments
+of meat and fowl, and, additionally armed with a bottle of porter and a
+biscuit, we had settled in a quiet leeward corner to make a hearty supper,
+when we thought of the famishing poet. We found him tending a little
+singing‐bird he was taking out with him, and invited him to share our
+meal; and the enjoyment with which he ate the broken meat—a biscuit
+serving for a plate, and a clasp‐knife for an instrument—was quite
+refreshing. We took alternate pulls at the porter, and felt pleased with
+ourselves and the world. His inner man refreshed, our poet became another
+person. The charm of his conversation well repaid our little sacrifice,
+and we talked art and literature, music and the drama, until the
+loneliness of the deck, the chill night breeze, and the bright moon
+mounted high in the star‐spangled heaven warned us of the approach of
+midnight. A few hours after we had landed in New York, we met our poet in
+Broadway, in all the elegance of clean raiment, and happily conscious of a
+well‐lined purse. Though our rough garb assorted ill with his gentility,
+he insisted on our drinking glasses together to the memory of our meeting.
+As we drank, he expatiated on the advantages of a varied experience of the
+many‐sided life of our poor humanity. Nevertheless, we opine, to cross the
+Atlantic in the steerage of an emigrant ship with an empty pocket, is one
+of those phases of existence which he will never voluntarily again
+investigate. Another instance of suffering was that of an Englishman—a
+quiet‐visaged, silent man, past middle age, whose velveteen coat and
+corduroy trowsers bespoke him a ploughman or gamekeeper from some Old
+World country neighborhood. He had with him his little daughter, a fair‐
+haired, sweet‐faced little girl of about twelve, genteelly dressed.
+Neither he nor his child could eat the ship’s food, and the little girl
+used to sit all day quietly pining by her father’s side. They met,
+however, worse fortune on shore. Bound to some town in Ohio, he was
+apparently ignorant that a long journey separated it from their landing‐
+place, and landed in Castle Garden penniless. Too shy or too proud to beg,
+the man and his little girl starved for a day, until some fellow‐passenger
+accidentally found out their condition and supplied them with food.
+
+No account of a sea voyage would be faithful without noticing the dread
+malady, the sufferings of which form the traveller’s introduction to the
+domain of Neptune; but it is a life over which we must perforce draw a
+veil. To the voyager who has a comfortable berth, every convenience that
+wealth can produce, attentive stewards, and the command of each luxury
+that his fancy or fears can suggest, the horrors of sea‐sickness are
+sufficiently nauseous. What they are in the steerage of an emigrant ship,
+where your pangs are intensified by the maladies and filth, the groans and
+curses, of some scores of other victims, can be better imagined than
+described; it is too disgusting. For the first two or three days, to eye,
+ear, and nose our steerage was insufferable; there was no remedy but to
+avoid it as much as possible, and either abandon the meals altogether, or
+rush down, snatch a hasty portion of whatever came nearest to hand, and
+beat a hasty retreat to the fresh air of the deck before your rising gorge
+added you to the ranks of the inconsolable.
+
+But this rough initiation had its practical advantage. Many of the younger
+passengers of the better class at the commencement of their voyage
+endeavored to keep up appearances in spite of all difficulties, and to
+present themselves on deck fresh from a careful toilette and in all the
+neatness of clean linen and well‐arranged dress; but, when they had once
+succumbed to the qualms of the malady, their vanity went overboard.
+Languid and weary, they crowded on deck, unwashed and uncombed, muffled in
+a waterproof, or huddled in twos and threes in a corner in the warm folds
+of a blanket or horse‐rug; and as their spirits revived they thought no
+more of struggling against adverse circumstances, and were content to “peg
+along” (pardon, kind reader, the expression) until their feminine
+instincts revived at the welcome sight of the wished‐for land.
+
+To Be Concluded In Our Next Number.
+
+
+
+
+A Daughter Of S. Dominic.
+
+
+If she had been condemned to have her life written, and been given the
+choice of a name under which to appear before the world, this would
+probably have been the one she would have taken. But who could have
+persuaded the humble child of the grand S. Dominic that such a fate was in
+store for her, or induced her humility to accept it? Well, it matters
+little to her now whether men speak of her or for her, she is alike beyond
+the reach of their hollow praise and their jealous criticism. But to us it
+matters much. The teaching of such a life as Amélie Lautard’s is too
+precious to be lost; it is a lesson to be sought out and hearkened to, for
+it is full of beauty, and light, and encouragement to those whom she has
+left behind.
+
+Amélie was born at Marseilles on the 12th of April, 1807. Her father was a
+medical man, eminent in his profession, an honorable man, and a good
+Christian. She lost her mother at the age of seventeen. Early in life she
+met with an accident which injured her spine so seriously as to render her
+by degrees quite humpbacked; the progress of the deformity was slow and
+very gradual, but even when it had grown to its worst it never looked
+grotesque or repulsive, nor did it, strange to say, take away from the
+singular dignity of her appearance or from the grace of her movements. In
+person she was tall and dark, not handsome, though her features had so
+much charm and expression that most people considered her so. Her
+intelligence was of a very high order, and pre‐eminently endowed with that
+delightful and untranslatable gift called _esprit_. From her earliest
+childhood she began to develop an angelic spirit of piety and a
+sensitiveness to the sufferings of others that is generally the outgrowth
+of maturer years. The sufferings of the poor claimed her pity especially,
+but not exclusively. The range of her sympathies was wide enough to
+embrace every kind and degree of sorrow that came within her knowledge.
+This characteristic of her charity, as rare as it is attractive, may be
+considered as the keynote of her life, and explains, humanly speaking, the
+extraordinary influence she exercised over all classes indiscriminately.
+
+After her mother’s death Amélie became the chief delight and interest of
+her father, and she repaid his tenderness by the most absolute devotion.
+Offers of marriage were not wanting for the accomplished and _spirituelle_
+young lady, but Amélie turned a deaf ear to them all; filial duty as much
+as filial love had wedded her to her father, and she declared her
+intention never to separate from him, or let any other love and duty come
+between those she had vowed unreservedly to him. It was probably at this
+period of her life that she bound herself exclusively to the service of
+God by a vow of perpetual virginity.
+
+During many years Dr. Lautard’s health was such as to require constant and
+unremitting care. Amélie nursed him with the tenderest affection, never
+allowing her devotions or her work amongst the poor to interfere with her
+first duty to him. He expired in her arms, blessing her and declaring that
+she had been the model of filial piety, the joy and solace of his
+widowhood. Amélie generously made the sacrifice of this one great
+affection to God, she drank the chalice with a broken heart, but with an
+unmurmuring spirit, and entered bravely on the new life that was before
+her. Hers was to be the mission of an apostle, and she must go forth to it
+unshackled by even the holiest and purest of natural ties. She had long
+been a member of the Third Order of S. Dominic, to whom from her childhood
+she had had a great devotion. To her previous vow of virginity she now
+added a vow of poverty, which, in the midst of abundance, she observed
+rigorously to the end of her life. Dr. Lautard, knowing her propensities,
+and suspecting rightly that, if her fortune were left completely in her
+own power, she would despoil herself of everything and leave herself
+without the means of subsistence, tied it up in annuities which could not
+be alienated. But while binding herself henceforth to the practice of the
+most rigid austerities, Amélie did not break off from her accustomed
+intercourse with her friends. She continued to receive them as hitherto in
+her father’s house. Dr. Lautard used to say that hospitality was a virtue
+which it behooved Christians living in the world to exercise towards each
+other, and he imbued Amélie with the same idea. Mindful of his precepts
+and example, she went on inviting her friends, and enjoyed having them
+with her, and surrounding them with attentions and seeing them well and
+hospitably served; at table she endeavored to disguise her own abstinence
+under a semblance of eating, or would sometimes apologize on the plea of
+her health, which had always been extremely delicate, for not setting them
+a good example.
+
+Some rigid persons, unable to reconcile this frank and genial sociability
+with the crucifying life of penance and prayer and unremitting service of
+the poor and the sick which Amélie led, ventured to remonstrate with her
+on the subject. She replied with unruffled humility that it was a pleasure
+to her to continue to cultivate the friendships contracted for her and
+bequeathed to her by her father, and that she felt satisfied there was
+nothing wrong in her doing so, and that it did neither her nor them any
+harm; on the contrary, hospitality was often a means to her of doing good;
+a worldly man or woman who would fly from her if she approached them with
+a sermon, accepted an invitation to dinner without fear or _arrière‐
+pensée_, thus enabling her to bring them under desirable influences in a
+way that awoke no suspicion and roused no antagonism, and often led to the
+most salutary results; a friendly dinner was, moreover, not unfrequently
+an opportunity of bringing people together and reconciling those who were
+at variance; in fact, Amélie pleaded so convincingly the cause of
+Christian hospitality as it was practised in the Rue Grignan, that the
+critics withdrew thoroughly converted and rather ashamed of their
+censoriousness. This thirst for doing good was, moreover, so unobtrusive
+and so free from anything like an assumption of superiority, that it was
+impossible to resent it; the tact and simplicity that accompanied all her
+efforts to benefit others prevented their ever being looked upon as
+indiscreet or meddling. She had a way of rousing your sympathies in a
+charitable scheme, or your indignation against some act of injustice or
+cruelty, and drawing you into assisting in the one or redressing the other
+without your suspecting that she had laid a trap for you; never preaching,
+never dictating, she had that rare grace, whose absence so often foils the
+most praiseworthy intentions, of doing good without being disagreeable.
+Her conversation was so sympathetic, and, owing to her mind being so
+abundantly stored by reading under her father’s direction, could be, when
+the opportunity occurred, so brilliant, that the most distinguished men
+delighted in it, and flocked to the Rue Grignan, counting it a privilege
+to be invited to its unpretending hospitalities. Amongst the many
+illustrious men who admired Amélie’s _esprit_ and virtues and who courted
+her co‐operation in their apostolic labors, one of the most prominent was
+the Père Lacordaire. The history of their first work in common deserves
+special record, not only because of its being associated with “the cowled
+orator of France,” but because it is peculiarly identified with the
+history of Provence, that land so dear to us all as the birthplace and
+cradle of the devotion to S. Joseph. “Beautiful Provence! It rose up in
+the west from your delightful land like the cloud of delicate almond
+blossoms that seems to float and shine between heaven and earth over your
+fields in spring. It rose from a confraternity in the white city of
+Avignon, and was cradled by the swift Rhone, that river of martyr‐
+memories, that runs by Lyons, Orange, Vienne, and Arles, and flows into
+the same sea that laves the shores of Palestine. The land which the
+contemplative Magdalen had consecrated by her hermit life, and where the
+songs of Martha’s school of virgins had been heard praising God, and where
+Lazarus had worn a mitre instead of a grave‐cloth, it was there that he
+who was so marvellously Mary and Martha combined first received the glory
+of his devotion.” We all know the passage by heart, but we quote it not so
+much for its sweetness as because it so appropriately introduces the story
+of the work in question, viz., the restoration of the pilgrimage of Ste.
+Baume, a pilgrimage once so celebrated throughout Christendom, but of late
+years fallen into neglect and almost total oblivion. Tradition tells us
+the story of its origin, its growth, its glories, and its decay. Its
+origin dates from a little bark that eighteen centuries ago came floating
+down the sunny waters of the Nile and rode into the blue Mediterranean,
+freighted with a legacy from Palestine to France, bearing in its frail
+embrace none other than the family who had their dwelling on the shores of
+the Lake of Galilee, and whose names have come down to us with the halo of
+that simple and unrivalled title, “Friends of Jesus of Nazareth.”
+Villagers and the simple folk of the place welcomed the exiles more
+kindly, let us hope, than Bethlehem had welcomed the Virgin Mother and
+reputed father of their Friend some five‐and‐thirty years before; at any
+rate, Lazarus and his sisters remained in Provence. The people gathered
+round the dead man whom Jesus had wept over and raised to life, and
+hearkened to his teaching; he planted the cross upon their soil, and sowed
+the seeds of the Gospel in their hearts, and in return they thanked him as
+the Jews had thanked his Master, by putting him to death. Lazarus opened
+the first page of the martyrology of France. Martha on her side withdrew
+to Avignon, where, on the ruins of a pagan temple situated on the Rocher
+des Doms, she built a Christian church, and dwelt there in the midst of a
+school of virgins, teaching the Gospel. She died at an advanced age,
+venerated as a saint, and renowned as much for her sublime gift of
+eloquence and her bountiful hospitality as for the austere sanctity of her
+life. We are not told how far, if at all, Magdalen shared the apostleship
+of her brother in Marseilles; the only trace of her that remains in that
+city is an altar in the vaults of the Abbey of S. Victor. These vaults are
+like catacombs, and the most ancient monument of Christian faith that
+Marseilles possesses. The legend says that Magdalen, immediately on
+landing on the shores of Provence, took up her abode upon the rocky
+heights of Ste. Baume and lived there for thirty years, her life divided
+between agony and ecstasy, between tears that had never ceased to flow
+since that day when at Simon’s house she broke the alabaster vase over the
+feet of Jesus, and heard from his lips those words that have been the
+strength and the hope of sinners ever since: much had been forgiven her
+because she had loved much, and kept long vigils that were but a
+continuation of her faithful watch under the cross and at the door of the
+sepulchre. It seems strange, when we think of it, that she should have
+left the country where Jesus had lived and died, the home at Magdala that
+he had hallowed so often by his presence, and whose friendly hospitality
+had often been a rest and a comfort to him in his weary journeys round
+Jerusalem; that she should, above all, have torn herself from the
+companionship, or at least the neighborhood, of his Mother and the
+disciple whom he loved; for surely the one remaining solace of her
+purified passionate heart must have been to speak of her brother’s Friend
+and her own dear Saviour with those who had known and loved him best, to
+revisit the places he had frequented, the site of his miracles and his
+sufferings, and that hill of solemn and stupendous memories where she and
+they had stood together in a common agony of woe, hushing their breaths to
+catch the last throb of his sacred heart. But perhaps this voluntary exile
+from those beloved associations was the last sacrifice, the crowning act
+of renunciation, that Jesus asked of her before he bade her farewell?
+Perhaps he expressed a wish that she and Lazarus should be in a humble way
+to the West what Mary and S. John were to be to the East, and that they
+should forsake the land and the friends of their youth and go forth
+bearing the good news of his Gospel to France? He had raised her once to
+the rank of an apostle that morning after the resurrection, when he gave
+her a message to the disciples and bade her go and tell them and Peter
+that he was risen, and before ascending to his Father he may have told her
+once more to go and be the harbinger of his resurrection to disciples who
+knew him not and were yet dwelling in darkness. We shall one day know,
+please God, what her motive was, but meantime we may reverently conjecture
+that there was some such understanding between Our Lord and Magdalen which
+induced her to leave the country that was so full of the fragrance of his
+divine humanity, and where his Immaculate Mother still lingered in
+childless desolation. Magdalen came to Provence, and withdrew to a wild
+and barren spot, upon a mountain called, in memory no doubt of her first
+interview with Jesus, Ste. Baume; it rises above a valley that runs
+towards the Alps from the busy city of Marseilles. Here she dwelt in
+solitude, communing only with her Saviour, and shut away from cruel men
+who had crucified him. Many and beautiful are the legends grouped by the
+simple piety of the inhabitants around the lonely watcher of Ste. Baume;
+they tell you still in reverent and awestricken tones how seven times a
+day the saint was rapt into ecstasy, and carried from her cave in the
+mountain side to the summit of the mountain, and held there suspended
+between heaven and earth by angels, but seeing more of heaven than of
+earth, and hearing the music of the angelic choirs. The peasants show you,
+even in these unmystical days of ours, the precise spot of an abrupt sally
+of the mountain where the angels used to come every day at their appointed
+hours to commune with the penitent and lift her off the earth. For thirty
+years she lived here in penance and expectation, then the term of her
+exile closed, the day came when she was to be set free from the bondage of
+the flesh, and admitted once and for ever into the presence of her risen
+Lord. Perhaps Jesus himself whispered the glad tidings to her in prayer;
+or perhaps it was only the angels who were charged with the message; but
+anyhow, tradition tells us—and who dreams of doubting it?—that Magdalen
+knew by divine inspiration when the hour of her death was at hand, and
+that she was filled with a great longing to receive the body and blood of
+her Redeemer before entering his presence as her Judge. S. Maximin, who
+had been the companion of Lazarus and shared his labors and his
+pilgrimage, dwelt in the narrow plain which forms the base of the three
+adjoining mountains, Ste. Baume, St. Aurelian, and Ste. Victoire—Ste.
+Victoire under whose shadow Marius fought and defeated the Teutons and the
+Cimbrians. The dying penitent was unable to traverse herself the distance
+that separated her own wild solitude from the hermitage of S. Maximin, so
+the kindly angels came and performed a last office of love for the friend
+of their King, and bore her across the hills and the floods and the
+valleys to the oratory of the saint: he too had been warned, and was ready
+waiting for her. He heard her confession, pronounced again the words of
+pardon that had been spoken first to her contrite soul by Jesus himself,
+and gave her the holy communion. Then she died, and S. Maximin laid her in
+an alabaster tomb that stood ready prepared for her in his oratory. The
+piety of the faithful surrounded the tomb with enthusiastic reverence and
+devotion; pilgrims flocked from all parts of the world to venerate the
+remains of the queen of penitents, and to visit the grotto where she had
+lived and the oratory where she died. Cassian, the monk, who was himself a
+native of Marseilles, after graduating in the school of the Egyptian
+anchorites, returned to his native city, and raised the Abbey of S. Victor
+over the crypt where Lazarus slept. Ste. Baume and St. Maximin soon drew
+him with irresistible attraction; he founded two noble monasteries there,
+and he and his monks kept vigilant guard for a thousand years, from the
+IVth to the XIIIth century, over the ground where Magdalen had wept, and
+over the tomb where she rested. At the beginning of the VIIIth century,
+the Saracens invaded the fair land of Provence, and for nearly three
+hundred years it was a prey to their devastating fury. During this long
+period of invasion, the Cassianites, terrified lest the precious remains
+of Magdalen should be discovered by the enemy and desecrated, thought best
+to remove them from the place where they were known to be to one of
+greater secrecy and safety. They took the body, therefore, out of its
+famous alabaster tomb and laid it in the tomb of S. Sidonius, having
+previously translated elsewhere the relics of the holy bishop. With a view
+to future verification, the monks placed on the coffin an inscription
+testifying to the two translations, and narrating the manner of their
+accomplishment and the circumstances which led to it. The entrance to the
+crypt itself was then walled up with plaster, and overlaid further with a
+quantity of rubbish. But six centuries were to roll over the arid heights
+of St. Maximin before the entrance was to be broken open and the written
+testimony of the Cassianites invoked. When the wars of the Saracens were
+over, and men began to breathe in peace, and turn their thoughts once more
+to the worship of God and the veneration of his saints, the fact of the
+translation of the body of Magdalen from its original resting‐place to the
+sarcophagus of S. Sidonius had faded from their recollection; it was only
+repeated in a vague sort of way that the illustrious penitent had been
+removed to a place of safety, which was supposed to be at a distance; some
+local coincidences pointed to the Abbey of Vezelay as the spot which had
+been privileged to receive and shelter her. By degrees this belief took
+root in the public mind, and the stream of pilgrims began to flow once
+more and with renewed enthusiasm towards the venerable old Abbey of
+Burgundy; crusaders met there to invoke before starting for the defence of
+the Holy Sepulchre the protection of her whom the evangelists had handed
+down to us as the heroine of the Sepulchre; kings and prelates, warriors
+and poets, sinners and saints, flocked to the supposed tomb of Magdalen,
+“till,” in the words of a chronicler of the time, “it seemed as if all
+France were running to Vezelay.” God is slow to tell his secrets. It was
+not until the close of the XIIIth century that the illusion, which had
+evoked so much piety and so many manifestations of faith from Christendom,
+was dispelled, and the truth revealed. This is how it happened. We will
+translate from the Père Lacordaire, whose _Sainte Marie Madeleine_ has
+supplied us almost exclusively with the foregoing details:
+
+“S. Louis had a nephew born of his brother, Charles of Anjou, King of
+Sicily, and Count of Provence. This nephew, who was likewise called
+Charles, and who on the death of his father became king of Sicily and the
+county of Provence, under the title of Charles II., had for S. Magdalen a
+tenderness which he inherited from his race, and which, though common to
+all the chivalry of France, attained in him the highest degree of ardor
+and sincerity. While he was still Prince of Salerno, God inspired him with
+a great desire to solve the mystery which for six centuries had hung over
+the grave of her whom he loved for the sake of Jesus Christ. He set out
+therefore to St. Maximin without any display, and accompanied only by a
+few gentlemen of his suite, and having interrogated the monks and the
+elders of the place, he caused the trenches of the old basilica of Cassian
+to be opened. On the 9th of December, 1279, after many efforts which up to
+that time had been fruitless, he stript himself of his chlamyde, took a
+pickaxe, and began to dig vigorously into the ground with the rest of the
+workmen. Presently they struck upon a tombstone. It was that of S.
+Sidonius, to the right of the crypt. The prince ordered the slab to be
+raised, and it was no sooner done than the perfume which exhaled from it
+announced to the beholders that the grace of God was nigh. He bent down
+for a moment, then caused the sepulchre to be closed, sealed it with his
+seal, and at once convoked the bishops of Provence to assist at the public
+recognition of the relics. Nine days later, on the 18th of December, in
+the presence of the archbishops of Arles and of Aix, and of many other
+prelates and gentlemen, the prince broke the seals which he had prefixed
+to the sarcophagus. The sarcophagus was opened, and the hand of the
+prince, in removing the dust which covered the bones, encountered
+something which, as soon as he touched it, broke with age in his fingers.
+It was a piece of cork from which fell a leaf of parchment covered with
+writing that was still legible. It bore what follows: ‘L’an de la Nativitè
+du Seigneur 710, le sixième jour du mois de Décembre, sous le règne
+d’Eudes, très pieux Roi des français, au temps des ravages de la perfide
+nation des Sarrasins, le corps de la très chère et venerable Marie
+Madeleine a été très secrètement et pendant la nuit transféré de son
+sépulchre d’albâtre dans celui‐ci, qui est de marbre et d’où l’on a retiré
+le corps de Sidoine, afin qu’il y soit plus caché et à l’abri de la dite
+perfide nation.’(223) A deed setting forth this inscription and the manner
+of its discovery was drawn up by the prince, the archbishops, and bishops
+present, and Charles in great joy, after placing his seals again upon the
+tomb, summoned for the fifth of May of the following year an assembly of
+prelates, counts, barons, knights, and magistrates of Provence and the
+neighboring counties to assist at the solemn translation of the relics
+which he had been instrumental in raising from the obscurity of a long
+series of ages.”
+
+The news of the event was hailed with a shout of joy by all Christendom;
+kings and prelates vied with each other in doing honor to the new‐found
+treasure; gold and precious stones poured in in quantities to adorn the
+shrine which was destined to replace the alabaster tomb of S. Maximin.
+“When the appointed day arrived,” continues the Père Lacordaire, “the
+Prince of Salerno, in the presence of a vast and illustrious assembly,
+opened for the third time the monument which he had sealed, and of which
+the seals were certified to be intact. The skull of the saint was whole
+except for the lower jaw‐bone, which was wanting;(224) the tongue
+subsisted, dried up, but adhering to the palate; the limbs presented only
+bones stripped of the flesh; but a sweet perfume exhaled from the remains
+that were now restored to light and to the piety of souls.... The fact had
+already been made known of a sign altogether divine having been seen upon
+the forehead of Magdalen. This was a particle of soft, transparent flesh
+on the left temple, to the right, consequently, of the spectator; all
+those who beheld it, inspired at the same moment by a unanimous act of
+faith, cried out that it was there, on that very spot, that Jesus must
+have touched Magdalen when he said to her after the resurrection, _Noli me
+tangere!_ There was no proof of the fact, but what else could they think
+who beheld on that brow so palpable a trace of life which had triumphantly
+resisted thirteen centuries of the grave? Chance has no meaning for the
+Christian; and when he beholds Nature superseded in her laws, he ascends
+instinctively to the Supreme Cause—the Cause that never acts without a
+motive, and whose motives reveal themselves to hearts that do not reject
+the light.... Five centuries after this first translation, the _noli me
+tangere_, as that instinct of faith had irrevocably named it, subsisted
+still in the same place and with the same characters; the fact was
+authenticated by a deputation of the Cour des Comptes of Aix. It was not
+until the year 1780, on the eve of an epoch that was to spare no memory
+and no relic, that the miraculous particle detached itself from the skull;
+and even then the medical men who were called in by the highest authority
+in the county certified that the _noli me tangere_ had adhered to the
+forehead by the force of a vital principle which had survived there.”
+
+The piety of Charles of Anjou raised a stately temple to the penitent of
+Bethany on the site of the oratory of S. Maximin. Boniface VIII., who had
+beheld with his own eyes the miraculous presence of the _noli me tangere_,
+endowed the basilica munificently, and authorized the king to transfer the
+custody of the relics from the Order of Cassianites, who had formerly held
+it, to that of the Sons of S. Dominic, since become renowned through the
+world under the name of _Frères prêcheurs_. A great number of popes
+visited the shrine, and every king of France held it a duty and a
+privilege to come to S. Maximin and Ste. Baume, and invoke the aid and
+protection of the saint; up to Louis XIV., hardly a sovereign neglected
+this public tribute of respect and devotion to her; but with the _Grand
+Monarque_ the procession of royal pilgrims came to an end. The red tide of
+revolution arose, and waged war against men’s faith, and destroyed its
+most touching manifestations and its noblest monuments. It broke, however,
+harmless, at the foot of S. Maximin. Not a stone of the grand old pile was
+touched, not an altar profaned, not even a picture stolen from the mouldy
+and unguarded walls; the most precious part of its treasure, the relics of
+Magdalen, which had been carefully concealed, were found intact, and duly
+authenticated as before. Ste. Baume was less fortunate; the storm that
+respected the tomb showed no mercy to the grotto which had witnessed
+Magdalen’s ecstatic communings with her Lord; the hospital, the convent,
+and the church adjoining it were completely destroyed; nothing remained
+but a barren rock and a portion of the neighboring forest. In 1822, a
+partial restoration was effected; the vast and massive monastery was
+replaced by a temporary building of the lightest and cheapest materials,
+little better than a lath and plaster shed, to keep the monks under cover;
+the grotto itself, once so sumptuously adorned by the piety of pilgrims,
+was left in a state of nakedness and neglect, its costly lamps once
+abundantly fed with aromatic oils were gone, their lights extinguished,
+like the faith that had kindled them. The church was rebuilt in the same
+superficial style as the convent, and solemnly reconsecrated in the
+presence of forty thousand souls assembled in the forest and down in the
+plain. But the material temple, great or small, is more easily rebuilt
+than the spiritual one; the temple of stone was raised up again, but where
+was the temple of the spirit which had animated it? Where was the
+architect who would rebuild this, who would collect the scattered
+fragments, and breathe upon the dead bones, and make them live, and bind
+them as of yore into a body of devout and simple‐hearted worshippers?
+Many, remembering the bygone glories of Ste. Baume, wished that a prophet
+would arise and work this wonder in Provence. Perhaps the wish took the
+form of a prayer in some loving hearts, and so brought about its
+accomplishment. The valiant‐hearted son of S. Dominic, the Père
+Lacordaire, was to be the prophet of their desires. He rose up and
+upbraided the people of Provence for their ingratitude to the memory of
+their illustrious patroness, and for their decayed faith, and exhorted
+them to stir up the dead embers of a devotion that had formerly been the
+edification and joy of Christendom to repair and beautify the deserted
+grotto of Mary Magdalen, and rekindle its lamps, and restore the
+pilgrimage of Ste. Baume in its ancient fervor. The work was one that
+appealed strongly to the sympathies of the Marseillese; but this was not
+enough to ensure its success. In order to make the sympathy effectual, the
+Père Lacordaire needed a helpmate who would go about amongst the people
+and put their good‐will into a practical form for him—some one who would
+second his exertions by docile and zealous and intelligent co‐operation.
+He looked around him, and his choice fell upon Amélie. He knew her, and
+thought she was of all others the person best suited to his purpose. It
+was no easy or pleasant task the setting on foot of a movement such as
+this; the preliminaries were sure to be full of difficulties, often of the
+sort that make self‐love wince and smart; there was plenty of ridicule in
+store, a goodly harvest of sneers and snubs to be garnered at the outset,
+rude opposition to be endured from those who had no faith at all, and
+chilling indifference from those who looked upon anything like a return to
+the forms and symbols of the middle ages as poetic enthusiasm not
+practicable in the XIXth century. It was just the kind of work to put the
+daughter of S. Dominic to. She did not disappoint the Père Lacordaire; but
+responded as promptly to the call as his own fiery spirit could have
+wished. It was in Amélie’s house that the eloquent Dominican inaugurated
+the _œuvre_ of S. Baume, and told the story of the great penitent’s life
+and death. From the salon in the Rue Grignan the burning words of the
+orator went forth to all Provence and stirred many hearts. A committee was
+soon formed for raising the necessary funds towards the restoration of the
+grotto as a preliminary to the reopening of the pilgrimage. The Père
+Lacordaire, as if the more prominently to record the services Amélie had
+rendered in the work so far, and to associate her name with its progress,
+desired that the meetings should be held at her house; and so they were,
+and continued to be regularly until she left Marseilles for Rome. She
+lived to see their joint labors crowned with success; the grotto assumed
+gradually something of its ancient beauty; an inn was built on the plain
+at the foot of the mountain for the accommodation of travellers who came
+from a distance, pilgrims were once more seen toiling in great numbers up
+the steep paths of the forest leading to the grotto, and filling the glade
+with the sound of canticles, and the feast of S. Magdalen, the 22d of
+July, was again celebrated with something of the pomp and fervor of olden
+times.
+
+But events of this stirring and, so to speak, romantic interest were rare
+in Amélie’s life. Her path lay rather along the valleys than upon the
+heights above. The doors of the Rue Grignan were often open indeed to the
+wise and learned, and occasionally to the great ones of the earth; but the
+visits of these were few and far between compared to those of the poor and
+humble, who besieged it at all hours of the day and night. The poor looked
+upon it as a centre of their own, where they had a right to come at all
+times and seasons and make themselves at home. They did this at last so
+completely that Amélie was sometimes obliged to slip out by a back door in
+order to escape from their precious but pitiless importunity. But no
+importuning, however persistent or unseasonable, could ruffle her
+unalterable sweetness, or surprise her into a sharp answer or an abrupt
+ungraciousness of manner. Hers was the charity that is not easily
+provoked: it made her stern to self, but long‐suffering towards others,
+slow to see evil, softly forbearing to the weaknesses of all.
+
+This home work was only an episode in her everyday labors. There was not a
+mission, or a hospital, or a refuge, or a good work of any sort in the
+town, that she had not to do with in one way or another. Just as we often
+hear it said of a woman of the world, “She is of every _fête_,” so it used
+to be said in Marseilles of Amélie, “She is of every charity.” One of the
+most venerable fathers of the Society of Jesus declared that it was
+chiefly to her zeal and intelligent exertions that the Jesuits owed the
+establishment of their mission at Marseilles. The Père de Magdalon looked
+upon her as his right hand; he enlisted her co‐operation in all his
+undertakings, and he used to say that it was to her he owed in a great
+measure the success of the Maison de Retraite of S. Barthélémy, the last
+work of his apostolate, and which he lived to see blessed with such
+abundant fruits. The _Filles de la Charité_ were long the special objects
+of her liberality and devoted exertions; then came the Sisters of Hope,
+whose services to the sick are so praiseworthy, and whose presence amongst
+them was hailed so gratefully by the Marseillese. When the _Petites Sœurs
+des Pauvres_ were in any difficulty, they looked to Amélie to help them
+out of it, and they speak with effusion still of the many proofs of
+generosity they received from her, and of her unfailing readiness to
+assist them whenever they appealed to her. She seemed to hire herself out
+as a beast of burden to do the work and the bidding of every one who
+wanted her. When there was a question of establishing the _Frères
+Prêcheurs_ at Marseilles, she multiplied herself tenfold. No obstacles
+could deter her in the service of the sons of her beloved S. Dominic; she
+found a house for them, and paid all the expenses of their installation.
+But whatever the work was that came under her hand, she did it, and as
+promptly and earnestly as if it were the one of all others she most
+delighted in; there was no exclusiveness, no narrowing of her sympathies
+to an _idée fixe_ either in piety or in charity; those who had the
+privilege of being her fellow‐laborers for many years declare they never
+once knew her charity to flag or fail to answer a fresh demand upon it;
+the supply was inexhaustible, and seemed to increase in proportion as it
+spent itself. Her health was wretched and kept her in almost constant
+physical pain; yet her activity was extraordinary, and, considering the
+chronic sufferings she had to contend with for the greater part of her
+life, the amount of work she contrived to get through may be regarded as
+little short of miraculous. She rose habitually at five, spent several
+hours in prayer, and assisted at the Holy Sacrifice before beginning the
+active duties of the day. These lay wherever there were sick to be tended,
+and sorrowing ones to be comforted, and sinners to be converted. She was a
+member of the Congregation of S. Elizabeth for visiting the hospitals, and
+gave a good deal of time to this work, for which she had a particular
+devotion. Her gentleness and singularly attractive manner fitted her
+especially for dealing with aching bodies and sorrowing hearts, and it was
+not a very rare thing to see Amélie succeed in melting the heart of some
+obdurate sinner with whom the entreaties and repeated efforts of the
+chaplain and the nuns had failed. The same sympathetic responsiveness that
+she threw into so many different good works marked her intercourse with
+individuals; those whom she was tending or consoling or advising always
+felt that for the time being they were the chief object of interest to her
+in life, and that she was giving her whole heart to them. She made this
+impression perhaps more especially on the poor, to whom the sympathy of
+those above them has such a charm and such a gift of consolation. An
+amusing instance of it occurred once in the case of an old woman whom
+Amélie had been nursing for some time; she put so much goodwill into all
+she did, and performed the offices of a sick‐nurse so affectionately, that
+the poor old soul believed she had inspired her with some unaccountable
+personal attachment; she returned it enthusiastically, and was never tired
+testifying her gratitude and love. One day, however, Amélie arrived in the
+poor little garret—tidy and clean, thanks to her—but, instead of being
+welcomed with the usual smiles and embraces, the old woman set her face
+like a flint, and preserved a sullen silence. For some time she
+obstinately refused to say what was amiss with her, but finally, shamed by
+the coaxing and evident distress of her nurse, she confessed that the day
+before she had had a bitter disappointment. “I thought,” she said, “that
+you loved me, but I find I was under a delusion; you don’t care a straw
+for me; they tell me you do for every sick body in the town just what you
+have been doing for me.” It was with great difficulty that Amélie was able
+to console her and obtain her forgiveness for being so universal in her
+charity.
+
+But though her creed dealt in no exclusions, there were two classes of her
+fellow‐creatures who above the rest had a decided attraction for Amélie:
+these were prisoners and soldiers. She yearned towards the former with the
+true spirit of him who loved the publicans and sinners, who gave the
+first‐fruits of his death to one of them on Calvary, and who prayed for
+them all with his last breath, saying: “Father, forgive them, for they
+know not what they do!” The wonders that Amélie worked in the gloomy cells
+of the Fort St. Nicholas, the sudden and admirable returns to God that she
+obtained from the condemned, are not to be counted; not by men, at least.
+Day after day she was to be found in the midst of them, teaching old men
+their catechism, comforting and exhorting all, preparing them for death,
+washing and dressing their sores, combing their hair, performing
+cheerfully and affectionately the most disgusting offices. Her labors in
+behalf of the troops are perhaps the most remarkable part of her life. She
+had for many years been very zealous in her endeavors to promote religious
+instruction amongst the soldiers, but her mission in this direction dates
+chiefly from the Crimean war. During this brilliant campaign, which
+brought so much glory and cost so much blood to the Allied armies, the
+thought of the sufferings of the soldiers in the trenches and on the
+battle‐fields filled Amélie’s heart to the momentary exclusion of all
+other interests and preoccupations. Her whole time was spent working for
+them, and begging and praying for them. She inspired all who came near her
+with something of her own ardor and tenderness in the cause. She set up
+societies among her friends for making clothes and lint for the sufferers,
+and for collecting money to procure all that could comfort and alleviate
+them. Her efforts were crowned with abundant success. Now, as on many
+other occasions, money flowed in to her from all sides, sometimes from
+strangers at a distance, for the fame of her charity had spread much
+further than the humble daughter of S. Dominic herself suspected, and many
+benevolent people who wished to give, and knew not how to apply their
+offerings, sent them to her, satisfied that they would be well and wisely
+employed. The way in which large sums of money sometimes dropped into her
+lap, as it were from the sky, at some opportune moment when she was in
+dire want of it for some case of distress, led many of her humble
+_protégés_ to believe that it came to her miraculously. But, while mindful
+of their bodies, Amélie’s first solicitude was for the souls of the brave
+fellows who were going out to face death in the service of their country;
+while working so hard to procure all that could heal and solace their
+temporal sufferings, she was laboring still more assiduously in behalf of
+their spiritual interests. Nor did her efforts confine themselves
+exclusively to the soldiers, they extended to the officers as well, and
+much more difficult she often found them to manage than the rough‐and‐
+ready men under their command. Many a droll story is still told at
+Marseilles of the tricks by which they sometimes evaded her attempts to
+catch them in her zealous toils and make them remember that they had
+another enemy to fight and to conquer besides the soldiers of Holy Russia.
+Once two young officers of good family and fortune, whose lives were not
+the most edifying to the community, were pointed out to Amélie by one of
+their brother officers, a fervent Catholic, as fitting subjects for her
+zeal. He undertook to bring them to the Rue Grignan under the pretence of
+introducing them to an old and charming friend of his, if Amélie would
+promise to try and convert them. She promised of course to _try_, and the
+two scapegraces made their appearance, never suspecting that a trap had
+been laid for them. The conversation dwelt upon the great topic of the
+day, the war, Amélie carefully avoiding the most distant allusion to the
+spiritual condition of her visitors. The young men were charmed with her
+affability and _esprit_, and, when she asked them to return with their
+friend in a few days and dine with her, they accepted her invitation with
+delight. During dinner their hostess alluded to the numerous pilgrimages
+that were being performed every day to Notre Dame de Garde; few of the
+soldiers or sailors started for the Crimea from Marseilles without
+climbing up the hill to salute Our Lady and ask her blessing on their
+arms. The young men confessed that they had never made the pilgrimage and
+evinced little admiration for their more devout comrades; Amélie seemed
+surprised, but not at all scandalized, at the frank admission, and
+proposed that they should both make the pilgrimage next morning and hear
+Mass there with her at eight o’clock. They assented with ready courtesy,
+inwardly treating the expedition as a harmless joke, and took leave of
+their hostess, very much delighted with her, and not much terrified by the
+salutary projects that might be lurking in her breast with regard to the
+morrow. They were at the bottom of the hill punctually at half‐past seven,
+and toiled up to the church, where they expected to see Amélie already on
+the lookout for them. But they looked round the church and saw no sight of
+her. Taking for granted that she was not there, and that something had
+interfered to prevent her keeping the appointment, they took themselves
+off with the comfortable feeling of having done their duty, and behaved
+like gentlemen, and come safe out of it. The morning was raw and cold, and
+they were both tired after the long pull uphill, so on their way down they
+turned into a little dairy where hungry pilgrims were comforting
+themselves with cups of coffee. There was a good fire in the place, and
+they sat down to enjoy it, and dawdled a good while over their hot coffee,
+wondering what kind trick of Fortune had prevented the enemy from
+appearing in the field; when lo! looking up suddenly, they beheld the
+truant peering in at them through the window. The pair started as if they
+had seen a ghost. But Amélie knew human nature too well to press her
+advantage at such a moment; she smiled, shook her finger threateningly,
+and went her way down the hill, leaving the two young men less triumphant
+than she had found them, and very anxious to clear themselves of having
+broken their word to a lady, and eager to redeem it a second time if
+Amélie desired. She did desire it, and it was not long before one of the
+two blessed her for having done so. He was ordered off with his regiment
+soon after, and before setting sail ascended once more to the shrine of
+Notre Dame de Garde in a different spirit and with a very different
+purpose.
+
+Her intercourse with the troops during this period gave Amélie an insight
+into the deplorable ignorance in matters of faith that existed in the
+majority of them, and the absence of all religious instruction in the
+army; it filled her with surprise and grief, and she determined to set to
+work and bring about a change in both.
+
+Reforms are proverbially difficult, and in any branch of the public
+service pre‐eminently so. But difficulties only stimulate strong hearts to
+more strenuous efforts. Amélie was, owing to her high intelligence, her
+well‐known virtue, and her widespread relations, better calculated than
+most people perhaps to succeed in the undertaking; besides, whatever the
+obstacles were, she never reckoned with human means when God’s work was to
+be done; she called him to the rescue, and left the issue in his hands. It
+would be impossible to recount all she did and suffered in this most
+arduous undertaking, the journeys she took, the petitions she drew up, the
+letters she wrote, the disappointments and antagonism that attended it in
+the beginning, and the physical and moral fatigue that it involved all
+through. The frequent and successive journeys of eighteen hours to Paris
+and the same back would have been a serious trial of strength to a strong
+person; but to Amélie, whose health was extremely delicate, and who hardly
+ever knew the sensation of being without pain, most frequently acute and
+intense pain, the wear and tear of those journeys in the sultry heat of
+summer and the bitter cold of winter alike must have been terrible. But
+she made small account of her body, she drove it on like a beast of
+burden, goading it with the ardor of her spirit, and never gave in to its
+lamentations until it positively refused to go on. Her own shortcomings
+were, however, the lightest portion of her difficulties. She had obstacles
+to overcome on every side, especially in quarters where it was most
+essential for her to find approval and assistance. Silvio Pellico said it
+was easier to traverse a battle‐field than the antechamber of a king, and
+the same may be said most likely of the antechamber of a minister. At
+least Amélie found it so. Many a brave spirit might well have given up in
+despair before the contemptuous rudeness and petty opposition of small
+functionaries, and the inaccessible coldness of great ones, and the
+disheartening predictions of well‐wishers who had gone through similar
+experiences, and knew what it was to want anything, even in the natural
+course of things, done at the War Office; but Amélie’s courage never
+flagged for a moment. By degrees her perseverance began to meet with some
+signs of success. It was known that one military man in high repute
+supported her views, and was doing his best to enable her to carry them
+out; this converted others. Several who had in the first instance treated
+her project as impracticable, or unnecessary, or simply absurd, one after
+another came over to her; it was not always because she convinced them,
+but she won them; they might resist her arguments, but it was impossible
+to come often in contact with her without feeling the contagion of her
+earnestness and sincerity of purpose. Her labors were finally crowned with
+abundant success. She obtained all the concessions she asked, and every
+facility for carrying them out and improving the spiritual condition of
+the soldiers. One of her chief anxieties had been for the condemned
+prisoners in the Fort St. Nicholas. She obtained permission for one of the
+dungeons to be turned into a chapel there, and it was henceforth her
+delight to go there on the great feasts and decorate the altar, and make
+it gay with lights and flowers for the captives. A chaplain was appointed
+to the fort, and he was allowed every facility for the exercise of his
+ministry.
+
+The little _enfants de troupe_ whose youth recommended them to Amélie’s
+solicitude were provided with the needful means of religious instruction
+by the establishment of a school, over which she herself presided from
+time to time, cheering on the pupils by good advice, and occasional
+presents to the most industrious and deserving. General de Courtigis, who
+commanded the garrison for many years at Marseilles, and left behind him a
+memory respected by all good men, had been from the first a staunch ally
+of Amélie’s in her endeavors to introduce a Christian spirit amongst both
+the officers and men. At her suggestion he organized a military Mass every
+Sunday at the Church of S. Charles, and there a great number of men, with
+the general at their head, assisted regularly at the Holy Sacrifice. It
+was a great treat to Amélie, whenever she could find time, to go and
+assist at it with them. She enjoyed the martial appearance and reverent
+bearing of the soldiers with a sort of motherly pride, and the sharp word
+of command, and the clanking of the bayonets when they presented arms at
+the solemn moment of consecration, used to send a thrill of emotion
+through her frame that often melted her to tears.
+
+“Oh!” she was heard once to exclaim, on coming out of S. Charles’, “what a
+grand and consoling spectacle it is, to see our soldiers publicly
+worshipping God! One feels that they must be invincible in battle when
+they set out with the blessing of God on their arms.”
+
+The troops, on their side, repaid her interest in them by the most
+enthusiastic affection. They used to call her _notre mère_ amongst
+themselves, and it delighted Amélie to hear a grizzly old veteran address
+her by this familiar name. Sometimes the brave fellows’ gratitude
+expressed itself in a way that was rather trying to their adopted mother.
+A regiment which had been quartered at Marseilles, and received many
+proofs of zeal and kindness from Amélie during its stay there, happened to
+hear, when passing through Lyons some years later, that she was stopping
+there. They started off at once in full force, and gave her a military
+serenade under her windows. Amélie, of course, showed herself at the
+window, and acknowledged the honor, but this did not satisfy the soldiers:
+nothing would do them but she should come out and shake hands with every
+man in the regiment.
+
+Much as Amélie shrank from public notice or praise, her humility could not
+prevent her extraordinary exertions in behalf of the troops, and the
+success which had attended them, from shining out before men. The nature
+of the undertaking had necessarily brought her in contact with the most
+influential military men of the day, both at Marseilles and in Paris.
+These gentlemen had ample opportunity to appreciate her character and
+judge of the value of her services; and though so many had opposed her in
+the beginning, when they saw her labors triumphant, success raised her so
+highly in their estimation that they thought it would be becoming to offer
+a public tribute of their esteem and gratitude by decorating her with the
+Cross of the Legion of Honor. Accordingly, a letter was despatched one day
+from the War Office, informing the quiet, unpretending friend of the poor
+soldier that the government, to testify their approval of her conduct,
+invested her with the most honorable mark of distinction it was in their
+power to bestow. Amélie received the announcement at first as a joke. The
+idea of her going about the world with the Cross or the red ribbon
+fastened to her black gown, and being greeted with the military salute and
+presented arms to whenever the symbol caught the eye of a soldier or a
+sentry, while she threaded her way through the busy streets of Marseilles,
+struck her as so altogether comical that she could only laugh at it. But
+neither the authorities nor her friends saw any laughing matter in it; the
+latter combated her refusal so strongly that Amélie was perplexed; she
+knew not how to reconcile her deference to their wishes with what appeared
+to her little short of an act of treason to Christian humility and common
+sense; they argued that, by accepting the Cross, she would excite a good
+feeling in the minds of many towards the government, a result which in
+those turbulent and antagonistic times was always desirable, and, in the
+next place, it would invest her with a half‐official position in certain
+circumstances that she might find very useful to others in her relations
+with minor functionaries. This last consideration had some weight with
+Amélie; she turned it to account, though not in the way her friends
+desired. She wrote to the minister, declining gratefully an honor which
+she did not feel qualified to accept, but requested that he would reward
+what he was pleased to call her services by granting her a _droit de
+grace_. This would entitle her to present petitions for a commutation of
+sentence in case of military prisoners, and even on certain specified
+occasions to commute the sentence herself. The privilege was granted at
+once, and, if ever virtue had a sweet reward in this world, it was when
+Amélie exercised it for the first time in favor of one of the captives of
+Fort St. Nicholas. Her friends rejoiced with her, and almost forgave her
+for refusing the sterile honor of the Cross of the Legion of Honor. They
+never knew, so carefully did her humility keep its secret, that the
+government, when granting her the _droit de grace_, exacted as a condition
+that she should submit to become a member of the Legion of Honor. It was
+years after that a friend, who had heard something in high quarters which
+aroused his suspicions, and who was intimate enough with Amélie to take
+the liberty of catechising her on the subject, asked point‐blank if she
+was decorated, and under promise of secrecy learned the truth.
+
+To Be Concluded In Our Next.
+
+
+
+
+The Progressionists.
+
+
+From The German Of Conrad Von Bolanden.
+
+
+
+Chapter IX. Progress Grows Jolly. Concluded.
+
+
+In passing near the tables Gerlach overheard conversations which revealed
+to him unmistakably the communistic aspirations and tendencies prevailing
+among the lower orders, their fiendish hatred of religion and the clergy,
+their corruption and appalling ignorance. On every hand he perceived
+symptoms of an alarmingly unhealthy condition of society. He heard
+blasphemies uttered against the Divinity which almost caused his blood to
+run cold; sacred things were scoffed at in terms so coarse and with an
+animus so plainly satanical that his hair rose on his head. It was clear
+to him that the firmest supports, the only true foundations of the social
+order, were tottering—rotted away by an incurable corruption.
+
+In Gerlach’s life, also, as in that of many other men, there had been a
+period of mental struggle and of doubt. He, too, had at one time found
+himself face to face with questions the solution of which involved the
+whole aim of his existence. During this period of mental unrest, he had
+thought and studied much about faith and science, but not with a silly
+parade of superficial scepticism. He had resolutely engaged in the soul
+struggle, and had tried to end it for once and all. Supported by a good
+early training and a disposition naturally noble, instructed and guided by
+books of solid learning, he had come out from that crisis stronger in
+faith and more correct in his views of human science. The scenes which he
+was witnessing reminded him vividly of that turning‐point in his life;
+they were to him an additional proof that man’s dignity disappears as soon
+as he refuses to follow the divine guidance of religion. Grave in mood, he
+returned to the table around which were gathered the chieftains. The marks
+of respect shown to the millionaire were numerous and flattering. Even the
+bluff Sand exerted himself unusually in paying his respects to the wealthy
+landholder, and Erdblatt, whose embarrassed financial condition enabled
+him beyond them all to appreciate the worth of money, filled a glass with
+his own hand, and reached it to Mr. Conrad with the deference of an
+accomplished butler. Gerlach was pleased to speak in terms of praise of
+the nut‐brown beverage, which greatly tickled Belladonna, the fat brewer.
+Naturally enough, the conversation turned upon the subject of the
+celebration.
+
+“I confess I am not quite clear respecting the purpose of your city in the
+matter of schools,” said Mr. Conrad. “How do you intend to arrange the
+school system?”
+
+“In such a way as to make it accord with the requirements of the times and
+the progressive spirit of civilization,” answered Hans Shund. “An end must
+be put to priest rule in the schools. The establishment of common schools
+will be a decided step towards this object. For a while, of course, the
+priests will be allowed to visit the schools at specified times, but their
+influence and control in school matters will be greatly restricted.
+Education will be withdrawn from the church’s supervision, and after a few
+years we hope to reach the point when the school‐rooms will be closed
+altogether against the priests. There is not a man of culture but will
+agree that children should not be required to learn things which are out
+of date, and the import of which must only excite smiles of compassion.”
+
+“Whom do you intend to put in the place of the clergy?” inquired Mr.
+Conrad.
+
+“We intend to impart useful information and a moral sense in harmony with
+the spirit of the age,” replied Hans Shund.
+
+“It seems to me the elementary branches have been very competently taught
+heretofore in our schools, consequently I do not see the need of a change
+on this head,” said Gerlach. “But you have not understood my question. I
+mean, who are to fill the office of instructors in morals and in
+religion?”
+
+The chieftains looked puzzled, for such a question they had not expected
+to hear from the wealthiest man of the country.
+
+“You see, Mr. Gerlach,” said Sand bluntly, “religion must be done away
+with entirely. We haven’t any use for such trash. Children ought to spend
+their time in learning something more sensible than the catechism.”
+
+“I am not disposed to believe that what you have just uttered is a correct
+expression of the general opinion of this community on the subject of the
+school question,” returned the millionaire with some warmth. “It is
+impossible to bring up youth morally without religion. You are a
+housebuilder, Mr. Sand. What would you think of the man who would expect
+you to build him a house without a foundation—a castle in the air?”
+
+“Why, I would regard him as nothing less than a fool,” cried Sand.
+
+“The case is identically the same with moral education. Morality is an
+edifice which a man must spend his life in laboring at. Religion is the
+groundwork of this edifice. Moral training without religion is an
+impossibility. It would be just as possible to build a house in the air,
+as to train up a child morally without a religious belief, without being
+convinced of the existence of a holy and just God.”
+
+“Facts prove the contrary,” maintained Hans Shund. “Millions of persons
+are moral who have no religious belief.”
+
+“That’s an egregious mistake, sir,” opposed the landholder. “The
+repudiation of a Supreme Being and the violent extinction of the idea of
+the Divinity in the breast are of themselves grave offences against moral
+conscience. I grant you that, in the eyes of the public, thousands of men
+pass for moral who have no faith in religion. But public opinion is
+anything but a criterion of certainty when the moral worth of a man is to
+be determined. A man’s interior is a region which cannot be viewed by the
+eye of the public. You know yourselves that there are men who pass for
+honorable, moral, pure men, whose private habits are exceedingly filthy
+and corrupt.”
+
+Hans Shund’s color turned a palish yellow; the eyes of the chieftains
+sank.
+
+“Besides, gentleman, it would be labor lost to try to educate youth
+independently of religion. Man is by his very nature a religious being. It
+is useless to attempt to educate the young without a knowledge of God and
+of revealed religion; to be able to do so you would previously have to
+pluck out of their own breasts the sense of right and wrong, and out of
+their souls the idea of God, which are innate in both. Were the attempt
+made, however, believe me, gentlemen, the yearning after God, alive in the
+human breast, would soon impel the generation brought up independently of
+religion to seek after false gods. For this very reason we know of no
+people in history that did not recognize and worship some divinity, were
+it but a tree or a stone, that served them for an object of adoration. In
+my opinion, it would be far more indicative of genuine progress to adhere
+to the God of Christians, who is incontestably holy, just, omnipotent, and
+kind, whilst to return to the sacred oaks of ancient Germany or to adopt
+the fetichism of uncivilized tribes would be a most monstrous reaction,
+the most degrading barbarism.”
+
+The chieftains looked nonplussed. Earnest thinking and investigation upon
+subjects pertaining to religion were not customary among the disciples of
+progress. They looked upon religion as something so common and trivial
+that anybody was free to argue upon and condemn it with a few flippant or
+smart sayings. But the millionaire was now disclosing views so new and
+vast, that their weak vision was completely dazzled, and their steps upon
+the unknown domain became unsteady.
+
+Mr. Seicht, observing the embarrassment of the leaders, felt it his duty
+to hasten to their relief. His polemical weapons were drawn from the
+armory of bureaucracy.
+
+“The progressive development of humanity,” said Mr. Seicht, “has revealed
+an admirable substitute for all religious ideas. A state well organized
+can exist splendidly without any religion. Nay, I do not hesitate to
+maintain that religion is a drawback to the development of the modern
+state, and that, therefore, the state should have nothing whatever to do
+with religion. An invisible world should not exert an influence upon a
+state—the wants of the times are the only rule to be consulted.”
+
+“What do you understand by a state, sir?” asked the millionaire.
+
+“A state,” replied the official, “is a union of men whose public life is
+regulated by laws which every individual is bound to observe.”
+
+“You speak of laws; upon what basis are these laws founded?”
+
+“Upon the basis of humanity, morality, liberty, and right,” answered the
+official glibly.
+
+“And what do you consider moral and just?”
+
+“Whatever accords with the civilization of the age.”
+
+A faint smile passed over the severe features of Mr. Conrad.
+
+“I was watching the procession,” spoke he. “I have seen the religious
+feelings of a large number of citizens publicly ridiculed and grossly
+insulted. Was that moral? Was it just? You are determined to oust God and
+religion from the schools; yet there are thousands in the country who
+desire and endeavor to secure a religious education for their children. Is
+it moral and just to utterly disregard the wishes of these thousands? Does
+it accord with a profession of humanity and freedom to put constraint on
+the consciences of fellow‐citizens?”
+
+“The persons of whom you speak are a minority in the state, and the
+minority is obliged to yield to the will of the majority,” answered
+Seicht.
+
+“It follows, then, that the basis of morality and justice is superior
+numbers?”
+
+“Yes, it is! In a state, it appertains to the majority to determine and
+regulate everything.”
+
+“Gentlemen,” spoke Gerlach with great seriousness, “as I was a moment ago
+strolling over this place, I overheard language at several tables, which
+was unmistakably communistic. Laborers and factorymen were maintaining
+that wealth is unequally distributed; that, whilst a small number are
+immensely rich, a much greater number are poor and destitute; that
+progress will have to advance to a point when an equal division of
+property must be made. Now, the poor and the laboring population are in
+the majority. Should they vote for a partition, should they demand from us
+what hitherto we have regarded as exclusively our own, we, gentlemen, will
+in consistency be forced to accept the decree of the majority as perfectly
+moral and just—will we not?”
+
+There was profound silence.
+
+“I, for my part, should most emphatically protest against such a ruling of
+the majority,” declared Greifmann.
+
+“Your protest would be contrary to morals and equity; for, according to
+Mr. Seicht, only what the majority wills is moral and just,” returned the
+landowner. “And, in mentioning partition of property, I hinted at a red
+monster which is not any longer a mere goblin, but a thing of real flesh
+and bone. We are on the verge of a fearful social revolution which
+threatens to break up society. If there is no holy and just God; if he has
+not revealed himself, and man is not obliged to submit to his will; if the
+only basis of right and of morals is the wish of the majority, this
+terrible social revolution must be moral and just, for the majority wills
+it and carries it out.”
+
+“Of course, there must be a limit,” said the official feebly.
+
+“The demands of the majority must be reasonable.”
+
+“What do you understand by reasonable, sir?”
+
+“I call reasonable whatever accords with the sense of right, with sound
+thinking, with moral ideas.”
+
+“Sense of right—moral ideas? I beg you to observe that these notions
+differ vastly from the sole authority of numbers. You have trespassed upon
+God’s kingdom in giving your explanation, for ideas are supersensible;
+they are the thought of God himself. And the sense of right was not
+implanted in the human breast by the word of a majority; it was placed
+there by the Creator of man.”
+
+The official was driven to the wall. The chieftains thoughtfully stared at
+their beer‐pots.
+
+“It is clear that the will of the majority alone cannot be accepted as the
+basis of a state,” said Schwefel.
+
+“The life of society cannot be put at the mercy of the rude and fickle
+masses. There must be a moral order, willed and regulated by a supreme
+ruler, and binding upon every man. This is plain.”
+
+“I agree with you, sir,” said the millionaire. “Let us continue building
+on Christian principles. As everybody knows, our civilization has sprung
+from Christianity. If we tear down the altars and destroy the seats from
+which lessons of Christian morality are taught, confusion must inevitably
+follow. And I, gentlemen, have too exalted an opinion of the German
+nation, of its earnest and religious spirit, to believe that it can be
+ever induced to fall away completely from God and his holy law. Infidelity
+is an unhealthy tendency of our times; it is a pernicious superstition
+which sound sense and noble feeling will ultimately triumph over. We will
+do well to continue advancing in science, art, refinement, and industry,
+in true liberty and the right understanding of truth; we will thus be
+making real progress, such progress as I am proud to call myself a
+partisan of.”
+
+The chieftains maintained silence. Some nodded assent. Hans Shund gave an
+angry bite to his pipe‐stem, and puffed a heavy cloud of smoke across the
+table.
+
+“I have confidence in the enlightenment and good sense of our people,”
+said he. “You have called modern progress ‘a pernicious superstition and
+an unhealthy tendency of the times,’ Mr. Gerlach,” turning towards the
+millionaire with a bow. “I regret this view of yours.”
+
+“Which I have substantiated and proved,” interrupted Gerlach.
+
+“True, sir! Your proofs have been striking, and I do not feel myself
+competent to refute them. But I can point you to something more powerful
+than argument. Look at this scene; see these happy people meeting and
+enjoying one another’s society in most admirable harmony and order. Is not
+this spectacle a beautiful illustration and vindication of the moral
+spirit of progress?”
+
+“These people are jubilant from the effect of beer, why shouldn’t they be?
+But, sir, a profound observer does not ‘suffer himself to be deceived by
+mere appearances.’ ”
+
+An uproar and commotion at a distance interrupted the millionaire. At the
+same instant a policeman approached out of breath.
+
+“Your honor, the factorymen and the laborers are attacking one another!”
+
+“What are you raising such alarm for,” said Hans Shund gruffly. “It is
+only a small squabble, such as will occur everywhere in a crowd.”
+
+“I ask your honor’s pardon: it is not a small squabble, it is a bloody
+battle.”
+
+“Well, part the wranglers.”
+
+“We cannot manage them; there are too many of them. Shall I apply for
+military?”
+
+“Hell and thunder—military!” cried Hans Shund, getting on his feet. “Are
+you in your senses?”
+
+“Several men have already been carried off badly wounded,” reported the
+policeman further. “You have no idea how serious the affray is, and it is
+getting more and more so; the friends of both sides are rushing in to aid
+their own party. The police force is not a match for them.”
+
+Women, screaming and in tears, were rushing in every direction. The bands
+had ceased playing, and noise and confusion resounded from the scene of
+action. Louise ran to take her brother’s arm in consternation. The wives
+and daughters of the chieftains huddled round their natural protectors.
+
+“Hurry away and report this at the military post,” was Seicht’s order to
+the policeman. “The feud is getting alarming. One moment!”
+
+Tearing a leaf from a memorandum book, he wrote a short note, which he
+sent by the messenger.
+
+“Off to the post—be expeditious!”
+
+Louise hastened with her brother and Gerlach senior to their carriage, and
+her feeling of security returned only when the noise of the combat had
+died away in the distance.
+
+The next day the town papers contained the following notice: “The
+beautiful celebration of yesterday, which, on account of its object, will
+be long remembered by the citizens of this community, was unfortunately
+interrupted by a serious conflict between the laborers and factorymen. A
+great many were wounded during the _mêlée_, of whom five have since died,
+and it required the interference of an armed force to separate the
+combatants.”
+
+
+
+Chapter X. Brown Bread And Bonnyclabber.
+
+
+Seraphin had not gone to the celebration. He remained at home on the plea
+of not feeling well. He was stretched upon a sofa, and his soul was
+engaged in a desperate conflict. What it was impossible for himself to
+look upon, had been viewed by his father with composure: the burlesque
+procession, the public derision of holy practices, the mockery of the
+Redeemer of the world, in whose place had been put a broken bottle on the
+symbol of salvation. He himself had been stunned by the spectacle; and his
+father? Was it his father? Again, his father had accompanied the brother
+and sister to the infamous celebration. Was not this a direct confirmation
+of his own suspicions? His father had become a fearful enigma to his soul!
+And what if, upon his return from the festival, the father were to come
+and insist upon the marriage with Louise, declaring her advanced notions
+to be an insufficient ground for renouncing a pet project? A wild storm
+was convulsing his interior. He could not bear it longer, he was driven
+forth. Snatching his straw hat, he rushed from the house, ran through the
+alleys and streets, out of the town, onward and still onward. The August
+sun was burning, and its heat, reflected from the road, was doubly
+intense. The perspiration was rolling in large drops down the glowing face
+of the young man, whom torturing thoughts still kept goading on. Holt’s
+whitewashed dwelling became visible on the summit of a knoll, and gleamed
+a friendly welcome as he came near it—a welcome which seemed opportune for
+one who hardly knew whither he was hastening. The walnut‐tree which could
+be seen from afar was casting an inviting shade over the table and bench
+that seemed to be confidingly leaning against its stem. A flock of
+chickens were taking a sand‐bath under the table, flapping their wings,
+ruffling their feathers, and wallowing in the dust. Seated on the sunny
+hillock, the cottage appeared quiet, almost lonesome but for a ringing
+sound which came from the adjoining field and was made by the sickle
+passing through the corn. A broad‐brimmed straw hat with a blue band could
+be noticed from the road moving on over the fallen grain, and presently
+Mechtild’s slender form rose into view as she pushed actively onward over
+the harvest field. Hasty steps resounded from the road. She raised her
+head, and her countenance first indicated surprise, then embarrassment.
+Whom did her eyes behold rushing wildly by, like a fugitive, but the
+generous rescuer of her family from the clutches of the usurer Shund. His
+hat was in his hand, his auburn locks were hanging down over his forehead,
+his face was aglow, his whole being seemed to be absorbed in a mad
+pursuit. To her quick eye his features revealed deep trouble and violent
+excitement. She was frightened, and the sickle fell from her hand. Not a
+day passed on which she would not think of this benefactor. Perhaps there
+was not a being on earth whom she admired and revered as much as she did
+him. All the pure and elevated sentiments of an innocent and blooming girl
+united to form a halo of affection round the head of Seraphin. At evening
+prayer when her father said, “Let us pray for our benefactor Seraphin,”
+her soul sent up a fervent petition to God, and she declared with joy that
+she was willing to sacrifice all for him. But behold this noble object of
+her admiration and affection suddenly presented before her in a state that
+excited the greatest uneasiness. With his head sunk and his eyes directed
+straight before him, he would have rushed past without noticing the
+sympathizing girl, when a greeting clear and sweet as the tone of a bell
+caused him to look up. He beheld Mechtild with her beautiful eyes fixed
+upon him in an expression of anxiety.
+
+“Good‐morning, Mr. Seraphin,” she said again.
+
+“Good‐morning,” he returned mechanically, and staring about vaguely. His
+bewilderment soon passed, however, and his gaze was riveted by the
+apparition.
+
+She was standing on the other side of the ditch. The fear of some unknown
+calamity had given to her beautiful face an expression of tender
+solicitude, and whilst a smile struggled for possession of her lips her
+look indicated painful anxiety. Mechtild’s appearance soon directed the
+young man’s attention to his own excited manner. The dark shadow
+disappeared from his brow, he wiped the perspiration from his face, and
+began to feel the effect of his walk under the glowing heat of midsummer.
+
+“Ah! why, here is the neat little white house, your pretty country home,
+Mechtild,” he said pleasantly. “If you had not been so kind as to wish me
+good‐morning, I should actually have passed by in an unpardonable fit of
+distraction.”
+
+“I was almost afraid to say good‐morning, Mr. Seraphin, but—” She faltered
+and looked confused.
+
+“But—what? You didn’t think anything was wrong?”
+
+“No! But you were in such a hurry and looked so troubled, I got
+frightened,” she confessed with amiable uprightness. “I was afraid
+something had happened you.”
+
+“I am thankful for your sympathy. Nothing has happened me, nor, I trust,
+will,” he replied, with a scarcely perceptible degree of defiance in his
+tone. “This is a charming situation. Corn‐fields on all sides, trees laden
+with fruit, the skirt of the woods in the background—and then this
+magnificent view! With your permission, I will take a moment’s rest in the
+shade of yon splendid walnut‐tree planted by your great‐grandfather.”
+
+She joyfully nodded assent and stepped over the ditch. She shoved back the
+bolt of the gate. Together they entered the yard, which a hedge separated
+from the road. The cock crew a welcome to the stranger, and led his
+household from the sand‐bath into the sunshine near the barn.
+
+“This is a cool, inviting little spot,” said the millionaire, as he
+pointed to the shade of the walnut‐tree. “No doubt you often sit here and
+read?”
+
+“Yes, Mr. Seraphin; but the dirty chickens have scattered dust all over
+the bench and table. Wait a minute, you’ll get your clothes dusty.”
+
+She hurried into the house. His eyes followed her receding form, his ears
+kept listening for her departing steps, he heard the opening and closing
+of doors: presently she reappeared, dusted the bench and table with a
+brush, and spread a white cloth over the table. Seraphin looked on with a
+smile.
+
+“I do not wish to be troublesome, Mechtild!”
+
+“It is no trouble, Mr. Seraphin! Sit down, now, and rest yourself. I am so
+sorry father and mother are not at home. They will be ever so glad to hear
+that you have honored us with a visit.”
+
+“Is nobody at home?”
+
+“Father is in town, and mother is at work with the children in the harvest
+field.”
+
+“Are you not afraid to stay here by yourself?”
+
+“What should I be afraid of? There are no ghosts in daytime,” she said
+with a bewitching archness; “and as for thieves, they never expect to find
+anything worth having at our house.”
+
+She was standing on the other side of the table, looking at him with a
+beautiful smile.
+
+“Won’t you have a seat on this bench?” said he, making room for her. “You
+need rest more than I do. You have been working, and I am merely an idle
+stroller. Do take a seat, Mechtild.”
+
+“Thank you, Mr. Seraphin—I could not think of doing so! It would not be
+becoming,” she answered with some confusion.
+
+“Why not becoming?”
+
+“Because you are a gentleman, and I am only a poor girl.”
+
+“Your objection on the score of propriety is not worth anything. Oblige me
+by doing what I ask of you.”
+
+“I will do so, Mr. Seraphin, since you insist upon it, but after a while.
+I would like to offer you some refreshments beforehand, if you will allow
+me.”
+
+“With pleasure,” he said, nodding assent.
+
+A second time she hurried away to the house, whilst he kept listening to
+her footsteps. The extraordinary neatness and cleanliness which could be
+seen everywhere about the little homestead did not escape his observation.
+On all sides he fancied he saw the work of Mechtild. The purity of her
+spirit, which beamed so mildly from her eyes and was revealed in the
+beauty of her countenance and the grace of her person, seemed embodied in
+the very odor of roses wafted over from the neighboring flower garden. He
+was unconscious of the rapid growth within his bosom of a deep and tender
+feeling. This feeling was casting a warm glow, like softest sunshine, over
+all that he beheld. Not even the chickens looked to him like other fowls
+of their kind; they were ennobled by the reflection that they were objects
+of Mechtild’s care, that she fed them, that when they were still piping
+little pullets she had held them in her lap and caressed them. He
+abandoned himself completely to this sentiment; it carried him on like a
+smooth current; and he could not tell, did not suspect even, why so
+wonderful a reaction had in so short a time taken place in his interior.
+Beholding himself seated under the walnut‐tree surrounded only by
+evidences of honorable poverty and rural thrift, and yet feeling a degree
+of happiness and peace he had never known before, he fancied he was
+performing a part in some fairy tale which he was dreaming with his eyes
+open. And now the fairy appeared at the door having on a snowy‐white
+apron, and carrying a shallow basket from which could be seen, protruding
+above the rest of its contents, a milk jar. She set before him a pewter
+plate, bright as silver. Then she took out the jar and a cup, next she
+laid a knife and spoon for him, and finished her hospitable service with a
+huge loaf of bread.
+
+“Don’t get dismayed at the bread, Mr. Seraphin! I am sorry I cannot set
+something better before you. But it is well baked and will not hurt you!”
+
+“You baked it yourself, did you not?”
+
+“Yes, Mr. Seraphin!”
+
+He attacked the loaf resolutely. From the dimensions of the slice which he
+cut off, it was plain that both his appetite and his confidence in her
+skill were satisfactory. She raised the jar of bonnyclabber, which lurched
+out in jerks upon his plate, whilst he kept gayly stirring it with the
+spoon. Then she dipped a spoonful of rich cream out of the cup and poured
+it into the refreshing contents of the plate.
+
+“Let me know when you want me to stop, Mr. Seraphin.” Mechtild poured
+spoonful after spoonful; he sat immovable, seemingly observing the spoon,
+but in reality watching her soft plump fingers, then her well‐shaped hand,
+next her exquisitely turned arm, and, when finally he raised his eyes to
+her face, they were met by a mischievous smile. The cup was empty, and all
+the cream was in his plate.
+
+“May I go and fetch some more?” she asked.
+
+“No, Mechtild, no! Why, this is a regular yellow sea!”
+
+“You wouldn’t cry ‘enough!’ ”
+
+“I forgot about it,” he replied, somewhat confused. “To atone for my
+forgetfulness, I will eat it all.”
+
+“I hope you will relish it, Mr. Seraphin!”
+
+“Thank you! Where is your plate?”
+
+“I had my dinner before you came.”
+
+“Well, then, at any rate you must not continue standing. Won’t you share
+this seat with me?”
+
+She seated herself upon the bench, took off her hat, smoothed down her
+apron, and appeared happy at seeing him eating heartily.
+
+“Don’t you find that dish refreshing, Mr. Seraphin?”
+
+“You have done me a real act of charity,” he replied. “This bread is
+excellent. Who taught you how to make bread?”
+
+“I learned from mother; but there isn’t much art in making that sort of
+bread, Mr. Seraphin. The food which people in the country eat does not
+require artistic preparation. It only needs good, pure material, so that
+it may give strength to labor.”
+
+“I suppose you attend to the kitchen altogether, do you not?”
+
+“Yes, Mr. Seraphin. That’s not very difficult, our meals are of the
+plainest kind. We have meat once a week, on Sundays. When the work is
+unusually hard, as in harvest time, we have meat oftener. We raise our own
+meat and cure it.”
+
+“You have assumed household cares at quite an early age, Mechtild.”
+
+“Early? I am seventeen now, and am the oldest. Mother has a great deal of
+trouble with the small ones, so the housework falls chiefly to my share.
+It does not require any great exertion, however, to do it. Plain and
+saving is our motto. Mother specially recommends four things: industry,
+cleanliness, order, and economy. She advises me not to neglect any one of
+these points when once I will have a household of my own.”
+
+“Do you think you will soon set up a separate household?” asked he with
+some hesitation.
+
+“Not for some time to come, Mr. Seraphin, yet it must be done one day. If
+my own inclination were consulted, I would prefer never to leave home. I
+should like things to continue as they are. But a separation must come.
+Death will pay us a visit as it has done to others, father and mother will
+pass away, and the course of events will sever us from one another.”
+
+Her head sank, the brightness of her face became obscured beneath the
+shadow of these sombre thoughts, and, when she again looked up, there
+appeared in her eyes so touching and childlike a sadness that he felt
+pained to the soul. And yet this revelation of tenderness pleased him, for
+it made known to him a new phase of her amiable nature.
+
+For a long time he continued conversing with the artless girl. Every word
+she uttered, no matter how trifling, had an interest for him. Besides her
+charming artlessness, he had frequent occasions to admire the wisdom of
+her language and her admirable delicacy. The setting sun had already cast
+a subdued crimson over the hilltops, hours had sped away, the chickens had
+gone to roost, still he remained riveted to the spot by Mechtild’s grace
+and loveliness.
+
+“Father is just coming,” she said, pointing down the road. “How glad he
+will be to find you here!”
+
+His head bent forward, Holt came wearily plodding up the road. His right
+hand was hidden in the pocket of his pantaloons, and his head was bowed,
+as if beneath a heavy weight. As Mechtild’s clear voice rang out, he
+raised his head, caught sight of his high‐hearted benefactor, and smiled
+in joyful surprise.
+
+“Welcome, Mr. Seraphin; a thousand times welcome!” he cried from the other
+side of the road. “Why, this is an honor that I had not expected!”
+
+He stood uncovered, holding his cap in the left hand, his right hand was
+still concealed. Mechtild at once noticed her father’s singular behavior,
+and her eye watched anxiously for the hidden hand.
+
+“Your daughter has been so kind as to offer refreshments to a weary
+wanderer,” said Gerlach, “and it has been a great pleasure for me to sit
+awhile. We have been chatting for several hours under this glorious tree,
+and may be I am to blame for keeping her from her work.”
+
+Holt’s honest face beamed with satisfaction. He entirely forgot about his
+secret, he drew his hand out of his pocket, Mechtild turned pale, and a
+sharp cry escaped her lips.
+
+“For mercy’s sake, father!” And she pointed to the broken chain.
+
+“What are you screaming for, foolish girl? Don’t be alarmed, Mr. Seraphin!
+this chain has got on my arm in an honorable cause. I will tell you the
+whole story; I know you will not inform on me.”
+
+Seating himself on the bench, he related the adventures of the day.
+
+The mock procession passed before Mechtild’s imagination with the
+vividness of reality. The narration transformed her. Her mildness was
+changed to noble anger. She had heard of the vicar of Christ being
+insulted, of holy things being scoffed at, of the Redeemer being derided
+by a horde of wretches. With her arms akimbo, she drew up her lithe and
+graceful form to its full height, and with flashing eyes looked at her
+father while he related what had befallen him. Seraphin could not help
+wondering at the transformation. Such a display of spirit he had not been
+prepared to witness in a girl so gentle and beautiful. When her father had
+ended his account, she seized his hand passionately, pressed it warmly
+between her own hands, and kissed the chain.
+
+“Father, dear father,” she exclaimed in a burst of feeling, “I thank you
+from my heart for acting as you did! Those wretches were scoffing at our
+holy religion, but you behaved bravely in defence of the faith. For this
+they put chains on you, as the heathen did to S. Peter and S. Paul.”
+
+Once more she kissed the chain, then, turning quickly, hastened across the
+yard to the house.
+
+“Mechtild isn’t like the rest of us,” said Holt, smiling. “There’s a great
+deal of spirit in her. I have often noticed it. But I am not astonished at
+her being roused at the mock procession—I was roused myself. I declare,
+Mr. Seraphin, it is a shame, a crying shame, that persons are permitted to
+rail at doctrines and things which we revere as holy. One would almost
+believe Satan himself was in some people, they take so fanatical a delight
+in scoffing at a religion which is holy and enjoins nothing but what is
+good.”
+
+“It is incontestable that infidelity hates and opposes God and religion,”
+replied Gerlach. “The boasted culture of those who find a pleasure in
+grossly wounding the most sacred feelings of their neighbors, is wicked
+and stupid.”
+
+Mechtild returned with a file in her hand.
+
+“Right, my child! I was just thinking of the file myself. Here, cut the
+catches of the lock.”
+
+He laid his arm across the table. A few strokes of the file caused the
+lock and remnant of chain to fall from his wrist.
+
+“We will keep this as a precious memento,” said she. “Only think, father,
+that wicked official ordered you to be manacled, and he is the
+representative of authority. How can one respect or even pray for
+authorities when they allow religion to be ridiculed?”
+
+“Pray for your enemies,” answered the countryman gravely.
+
+“I will do so because God commands me; but I shall never again be able to
+respect the official!”
+
+Her anger had fled; she appeared again all light and loveliness. He did
+not fail to observe a searching look which she directed upon him, but its
+meaning became clear to him only when, as he was taking leave, she said in
+a tone of humility: “Pardon my vehemence, Mr. Seraphin! Don’t think me a
+bad girl.”
+
+“There is nothing to be forgiven, Mechtild. You were indignant against
+godless wretches, and they who are not indignant against evil cannot
+themselves be good.”
+
+“We are most heartily thankful for this visit,” spoke Holt. “I need not
+say that we will consider it a great happiness as often as you will be
+pleased to come.”
+
+“Good‐night!” returned the young man, and he walked away.
+
+Deeply immersed in his thoughts, Seraphin went back to town. What he was
+thinking about, his diary does not record. But the excitement under which
+he had rushed forth was gone—dispelled by the magic of a rural sorceress.
+He walked on quietly like a man who seems filled with confidence in his
+own future. The recent painful impressions seemed to his mind to lie far
+back in the past; their place was taken up by beautiful anticipations
+which, like the aurora, shed soft and pleasing light upon his path. He
+halted frequently in a dream‐like reverie to indulge the happiness with
+which his soul was flooded. The full moon, just peering over the hills,
+shed around him a mystic brightness that harmonized perfectly with the
+indefinable contentment of his heart, and seemed to be gazing quizzingly
+into the countenance of the young man, who almost feared to confess to
+himself that he had found an invaluable treasure.
+
+As he stopped before the Palais Greifmann, all the bright spirits that had
+hovered round about him on the way back from the little whitewashed
+cottage, fled. He awoke from his dream, and, ascending the stairs with a
+feeling of discomfort, he entered his apartment, where his father sat
+awaiting him.
+
+“At last,” spoke Mr. Conrad, looking up from a book. “You have kept me
+waiting a long time, my son.”
+
+“I was in need of a good long walk, father, to get over what I witnessed
+this morning. The country air has dispelled all those horrible
+impressions. There is only one thing more required to make me feel
+perfectly well, dear father, which is that you will not insist on my
+allying myself to people who are utterly opposed to my way of thinking and
+feeling.”
+
+“I understand and approve of your request, Seraphin. The impressions made
+on me, too, are exceedingly disagreeable. The advancement of which this
+town boasts is stupid, immoral, detestable. How this state of society has
+come about, is inexplicable to me who live secluded in the country.
+Society is diseased, fatally diseased. Many of the new views professed are
+sheer superstition, and their morality is a mere cloak for their
+corruption and wickedness. All the powers of progress so‐called are
+actively at work to subvert all the safeguards of society. And what your
+diary reports of Louise, I have found fully confirmed. Though it cost the
+sacrifice of a long cherished plan, a son of mine shall never become the
+husband of a progressionist woman.”
+
+“O father! how deeply do I thank you!” cried the youth, carried away by
+his feelings.
+
+“I must decline being thanked, for I have not merited it,” spoke Mr.
+Conrad earnestly. “A father’s duty determines very clearly what my
+decision upon the matter of your marriage with Louise, ought to be. But I
+am under obligations to you, my son, which justice compels me to
+acknowledge. Your discernment and moral sense have prevented a great deal
+of discord and unhappiness in our family. Continue good and true, my
+Seraphin!”
+
+He pressed his son to his bosom and imprinted a kiss on his forehead.
+
+“To‐morrow we shall start for home by the first train. Fortunately your
+prudent behavior makes it easy for us to get away, and the final breaking
+off of this engagement I will myself arrange with Louise’s father.”
+
+
+    Seraphin Gerlach To The Author.
+
+    DEAR SIR: Two years ago, I took the liberty of sending you my
+    diary, with the request that you would be pleased to publish such
+    portions of its contents as might be useful, in the form of a tale
+    illustrative of the times. I made the request because I consider
+    it the duty of a writer who delineates the condition of society,
+    to transmit to posterity a faithful picture of the present social
+    status, and I am vain enough to believe that my jottings will be a
+    modest contribution towards such a tableau.
+
+    The meagre account given by the diary of my intercourse with
+    Mechtild, will probably have enabled you to perceive the germ of a
+    pure and true relation likely to develop itself further. I shall
+    add but a few items to complete the account of the diary, knowing
+    that poets, painters, and artists have rigorously determined
+    bounds, and that a twilight cannot be represented when the sun is
+    at the zenith. I am emboldened to use this illustration because
+    your unbounded admiration of pure womanhood is well known to me,
+    and because the brightness of Mechtild’s character, were it
+    further described, would no more be compatible with the sombre
+    colorings in which a true picture of modern progress would have to
+    be exhibited, than the noonday sun with the shadows of evening.
+
+    My memoranda concerning Mechtild, which, despite studied
+    soberness, betrayed a considerable degree of admiration, made
+    known to my parents, naturally enough, the secret of my heart.
+    Hence it came that a quiet smile passed over my father’s face
+    every time I commenced to speak of Mechtild. Holt’s manly deed at
+    the mock procession had already gained for him my father’s esteem,
+    and, as I spoke a great deal about Holt’s thoroughness as a
+    cultivator, my father began to look upon him as a very desirable
+    man to employ.
+
+    “We want an experienced man on the ‘green farm,’ ” said father,
+    one day. “Offer the situation to Holt, and tell him to come to see
+    me about it. I want to talk with him.”
+
+    “Give the good man my compliments,” said mother; “tell him I would
+    be much pleased to become acquainted with Mechtild, who
+    sympathized with you so kindly on that memorable day!”
+
+    I wrote without delay. Holt came, and so did Mechtild. But few
+    moments were necessary to enable mother to detect the girl’s fine
+    qualities. Father, too, was delightfully surprised at her modesty,
+    the beauty of her form, and grace of her manner. He visited the
+    farm accompanied by Holt. The cultivator’s extraordinary
+    knowledge, his practical manner of viewing things, and the
+    shrewdness of his counsels in regard to the improvement of worn‐
+    out land and the cultivation of poor soil, completely charmed my
+    father. A contract containing very favorable conditions for Holt
+    was entered into, and three weeks later the family took charge of
+    the “green farm.”
+
+    Upon mother’s suggestion, Mechtild was sent to an educational
+    institution, where she acquired in ten months’ time the learning
+    and culture necessary for associating with cultivated people.
+
+    Father and mother had received her on her return like a daughter.
+    This reception was given her not only in consideration of Holt’s
+    skilful and faithful management of business, but also on account
+    of Mechtild’s own splendid womanly character—perhaps, too, partly
+    on account of my unbounded admiration for the rare girl.
+
+    “The girl is an ornament to her sex,” lauded my father. “Her
+    polished manner and ease in company do not suffer one to suspect
+    ever so remotely that she at any time plied the reaping‐hook, and
+    came out of a stubblefield to regale a weary wanderer with brown
+    bread and bonny‐clabber. I am quite in harmony with your secret
+    wishes, my dear Seraphin! At the same time, I am of opinion that a
+    step promising so much happiness ought not to be longer deferred.
+    I think, then, you should ask the father for his daughter without
+    delay, so that I may soon have the pleasure of giving you my
+    blessing.”
+
+    From my father’s arms, into which I had thrown myself in
+    thankfulness, I hastened away to the “green farm,” where Mechtild
+    with maidenly blushes, and Holt in speechless astonishment, heard
+    and granted my petition.
+
+    I am now four months married. I am the blest husband of a wife
+    whose lovely qualities are daily showing themselves to greater
+    advantage. Mechtild presides over Chateau Hallberg like an angel
+    of peace. Towards my father and mother she conducts herself with
+    filial reverence and never‐ceasing delicate attentions. Mother
+    loves her unspeakably, and no access of ill humor in father can
+    withstand her charming smile and prudent mirth. Concerning the
+    banking‐house of Greifmann, I have only sad things to tell. Carl’s
+    father had entered into very considerable speculations which
+    failed and drove him into bankruptcy. Carl saw the blow coming,
+    and saved himself in a disgraceful manner. There was a savings
+    institution connected with the bank in which poor people and
+    servants deposited the savings of their hard labor. Carl
+    appropriated this fund and made off a short time before the
+    failure of the house. Thousands of poor persons were robbed of the
+    little sums which they were saving for old age, by denying
+    themselves many even of the necessaries of life.
+
+    The maledictions and curses of these unfortunate people followed
+    across the ocean the thief whose modern culture and progressive
+    humanity did not hinder him from committing a crime which no
+    Christian can be guilty of without losing his claim to the title.
+    Carl, however, still continues to pass for a man of culture and
+    humanity notwithstanding his deed. And why should he not, since
+    without faith in the Deity moral obligations do not exist, and
+    consequently every species of crime is allowable? The old
+    gentleman Greifmann died shortly after his ruin; Louise lost her
+    mind.
+
+    My father felt the misfortune of the Greifmanns deeply, without,
+    however, regretting in the smallest degree the wise determination
+    which their godless principles and actions had driven him to.
+    Formerly he could never find time to take part in the elections.
+    But now he is constantly speaking about the duty of every
+    respectable man to oppose the infernal machinations and plans of
+    would‐be progress. He intends at the next election to use all his
+    influence for the election of conscientious deputies, so that the
+    evil may be put an end to which consists in trying to undermine
+    the foundations of society.
+
+    Accept, dear sir, the assurance of the esteem with which I have
+    the honor to be
+
+    our most obedient servant,
+
+    SERAPHIN GERLACH.
+
+    CHATEAU HALLBERG, Jan. 4, 1872.
+
+
+[Two chapters have been omitted in this translation of “The
+Progressionists.”—ED. C. W.]
+
+
+
+
+F. James Marquette, S.J.
+
+
+Among the names that have become immortalized in the history of our
+country, there are few more certainly destined for perpetual fame than
+those connected with the discovery and exploration of that mighty river
+which courses so boldly and majestically through this vast continent. Thus
+it is probable that there never will be a time when even children at
+school will not be familiar with such names as De Soto, Marquette, and La
+Salle.
+
+James Marquette was born in the city of Laon, near a small branch of the
+Oise, in the department of Aisne, France, in the year 1637. His family was
+the most ancient of that ancient city, and had, during many generations,
+filled high offices and rendered valuable services to their country, both
+in civil and military life. We have accounts of eminent services rendered
+to his sovereign by one of his ancestors as early as 1360. The usefulness
+and public spirit of the family, we may well suppose, did not expire with
+the distinguished subject of this memoir; for we find that, in the French
+army that aided our fathers in the achievement of American Independence,
+there were no less than three Marquettes who laid down their lives in the
+cause of liberty. His maternal name was no less distinguished in the
+annals of the church. On the side of his mother, Rose de la Salle, he was
+connected with the good and venerable John Baptist de la Salle, founder of
+the Brothers of the Christian Schools, so distinguished for their
+successful services in the cause of popular religious education. It was
+this pious mother that instilled into her illustrious son that tender and
+fervid devotion to the Blessed Virgin which so ravished his soul and
+adorned his whole life. In 1654, when but seventeen years old, he entered
+the Society of Jesus, in which the time of his novitiate, the terms of
+teaching and of his own theological studies, consumed twelve years. He had
+chosen for his model S. Francis Xavier, and in studying his patron’s life,
+and meditating on his virtues, the young priest conceived a holy longing
+to enter the field of missionary toil. He was enrolled in the province of
+Champagne; but, as this had no foreign missions, he caused himself to be
+transferred to the province of France. His cherished object was soon
+attained. In 1666, he was sent out to Canada, and arrived at Quebec on the
+20th of September of that year.
+
+F. Marquette was at first destined for the Montagnais mission, whose
+central station was at Tadousal, and on the 10th of October he started for
+Three Rivers, in order to study the Montagnais language, a key to many
+neighboring Indian tongues, under that celebrated philologist as well as
+renowned missionary, F. Gabriel Druilletes. His intervals of leisure were
+here employed in the offices of the holy ministry. F. Marquette was thus
+occupied till April, 1668, when his destination was changed, and he
+received orders to prepare for the mission on Lake Superior, known as the
+Ottawa mission. He accordingly returned to Quebec, and thence set out for
+Montreal on the 21st of April, with Brother Le Boesme and two other
+companions; and from the latter place he embarked on the Ottawa flotilla.
+He was accompanied by other missionaries on this toilsome and dangerous
+voyage up the Ottawa, through French River, to and across Lake Huron, and
+to the Sault St. Mary. This region had long before been dedicated to God
+by the erection of the cross by Fathers Jogues and Raymbault, and twenty
+years later, 1660, F. Ménard became the founder of the Ottawa mission; and
+when F. Marquette arrived in Canada, F. Allouez was then pushing his
+spiritual conquests beyond any points reached by his zealous predecessors.
+On the advent of F. Marquette to the shores of Lake Superior, it was found
+expedient to establish two missions, one of which should be located at the
+Sault St. Mary, and the other at Green Bay. Erecting his cabin at the foot
+of the rapids on the American side, F. Marquette opened his mission at the
+Sault, where he was joined the following year by F. Dablon, Superior of
+the Ottawa mission. These two zealous missionaries soon gathered a
+Christian flock around them, and the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass was now
+offered up in that wild region in “a sanctuary worthy of the faith.” “It
+is,” says Bancroft, “the oldest settlement begun by Europeans within the
+present limits of the commonwealth of Michigan.” So rich was the harvest
+which the enthusiastic and apostolical Marquette saw before him that he
+writes in one of his letters: “Two thousand souls were ready to embrace
+the faith, if the missionary were faithful to his task.” Yet knowing the
+uncertainty of the Indian character, he proceeded cautiously and prudently
+in his undertakings. Though his ardent hopes were not fully realized, the
+harvest was not a fruitless one; and Fathers Dablon and Marquette labored
+on with undaunted courage and undiminished zeal, instructing the people,
+baptizing such as were in danger of death, and laying the solid
+foundations of a future Christian commonwealth.
+
+In August of 1669, F. Marquette was transferred from the Sault to
+Lapointe, to conduct the missions of the Holy Ghost among the Ottawas, and
+to fill the place recently occupied by F. Allouez, who had gone to Green
+Bay. After a perilous and exhausting navigation, amid snow and ice, of a
+month’s duration, he reached Lapointe in safety, and full of ardor for the
+work before him. A few extracts from the account of this mission, which F.
+Marquette gave to his superior in his letter of the following year, will
+be more acceptable to the reader than any synopsis we could prepare from
+it:
+
+
+    “Divine Providence having destined me to continue the mission of
+    the Holy Ghost begun by Allouez, who had baptized the chiefs of
+    the Kiskakonk, I arrived there on the thirteenth of September, and
+    went to visit the Indians who were in the clearings, which are
+    divided into five towns. The Hurons, to the number of about four
+    or five hundred, almost all baptized, still preserve some little
+    Christianity. A number of the chiefs assembled in council were at
+    first well pleased to see me; but I explained that I did not yet
+    know their language perfectly, and that no other missionary was
+    coming, both because all had gone to the Iroquois, and because F.
+    Allouez, who understood them perfectly, did not wish to return
+    that winter, as they did not love the prayer enough. They
+    acknowledged that it was a just punishment, and during the winter
+    held talks about it, and resolved to amend, as they tell me.
+
+    “The nation of the Outaouaks Sinagaux is far from the kingdom of
+    God, and being above all other nations addicted to lewdness,
+    sacrifices, and juggleries. They ridicule the prayer, and will
+    scarcely hear us speak of Christianity. They are proud and
+    undeveloped, and I think that so little can be done with this
+    tribe that I have not baptized healthy infants who seem likely to
+    live, watching only for such as are sick. The Indians of the
+    Kinouché tribe declare openly that it is not yet time. There are,
+    however, two men among them formerly baptized. One, now rather
+    old, is looked upon as a kind of miracle among the Indians, having
+    always refused to marry, persisting in this resolution in spite of
+    all that had been said. He has suffered much, even from his
+    relatives, but he is as little affected by this as by the loss of
+    all the goods which he brought last year from the settlement, not
+    having even enough left to cover him. These are hard trials for
+    Indians, who generally seek only to possess much in this world.
+    The other, a new‐married young man, seems of another nature than
+    the rest. The Indians, extremely attached to their reveries, had
+    resolved that a certain number of young women should prostitute
+    themselves, each to choose such partner as she liked. No one in
+    these cases ever refused, as the lives of men are supposed to
+    depend on it. This young Christian was called; on entering the
+    cabin, he saw the orgies that were about to begin, and, feigning
+    illness, immediately left, and, though they came to call him back,
+    he refused to go. His confession was as prudent as it could be,
+    and I wondered that an Indian could live so innocently, and so
+    nobly profess himself a Christian. His mother and some of his
+    sisters are also good Christians. The Ottawas, extremely
+    superstitious in their feasts and juggleries, seem hardened to the
+    instructions given them, yet they like to have their children
+    baptized. God permitted a woman to die this winter in her sin; her
+    illness had been concealed from me, and I heard it only by the
+    report that she had asked a very improper dance for her cure. I
+    immediately went to a cabin where all the chiefs were at a feast,
+    and some Kiskakonk Christians among them. To these I exposed the
+    impiety of the woman and her medicine men, and gave them proper
+    instructions. I then spoke to all present, and God permitted that
+    an old Ottawa rose to advise granting what I asked, as it made no
+    matter, he said, if the woman did die. An old Christian then rose
+    and told the nation that they must stop the licentiousness of
+    their youth, and not permit Christian girls to take part in such
+    dances. To satisfy the woman, some child’s play was substituted
+    for the dance; but this did not prevent her dying before morning.
+    The dangerous state of a sick man caused the medicine men to
+    proclaim that the devil must be invoked by extraordinary
+    superstitions. The Christians took no part. The actors were these
+    jugglers and the sick man, who was passed over great fires lighted
+    in every cabin. It was said that he did not feel the heat,
+    although his body had been greased with oil for five or six days.
+    Men, women, and children ran through the cabins, asking, as a
+    riddle, to divine their thoughts, and the successful guesser was
+    glad to give the object named. I prevented the abominable lewdness
+    so common at the end of these diabolical rites. I do not think
+    that they will recur, as the sick man died soon after.
+
+    “The nation of Kiskakous, which for three years refused to receive
+    the Gospel preached them by F. Allouez, resolved in the fall of
+    1668 to obey God. This resolution was adopted in full council, and
+    announced to that father, who spent four winter months instructing
+    them. The chiefs of the nation became Christians, and, as F.
+    Allouez was called to another mission, he gave it to my charge to
+    cultivate, and I entered on it in September, 1669.
+
+    “All the Christians were then in the fields harvesting their
+    Indian corn; they listened with pleasure when I told them that I
+    came to Lapointe for their sake and that of the Hurons; that they
+    never should be abandoned, but be beloved above all other nations;
+    and that they and the French were one. I had the consolation of
+    seeing their love for the prayer and their pride in being
+    Christians. I baptized the new‐born infants, and instructed the
+    chiefs whom I found well disposed. The head chief having allowed a
+    dog to be hung on a pole near his cabin, which is a kind of
+    sacrifice the Indians make to the sun, I told him that this was
+    wrong, and he went and threw it down.
+
+    “Having invited the Kiskakous to come and winter near the chapel,
+    they left all the other tribes, to gather around us so as to be
+    able to pray to God, be instructed, and have their children
+    baptized. They all call themselves Christians; hence in all
+    councils and important affairs I address them, and, when I wish to
+    show them that I really wish what I ask, I need only address them
+    as Christians; they told me even that they obeyed me for that
+    reason. They have taken the upper hand, and control the three
+    other tribes. It is a great consolation to a missionary to see
+    such pliancy in savages, and to live in such peace with the
+    Indians, spending the whole day in instructing them in our
+    mysteries, and teaching them the prayers. Neither the rigor of the
+    winter nor the state of the weather prevents their coming to the
+    chapel; many never let a day pass, and I was thus busily employed
+    from morning till night, preparing some for baptism, some for
+    confession, disabusing others of their reveries. The old men told
+    me that the young men had lost their senses, and that I must stop
+    their excesses. I often spoke to them of their daughters, urging
+    them to prevent their being visited at night. I knew almost all
+    that passed in two tribes near us; but, though others were spoken
+    of, I never heard anything against the Christian women, and when I
+    spoke to the old men about their daughters, they told me that they
+    prayed to God. I often inculcated this, knowing the importunities
+    to which they are constantly exposed, and the courage they need to
+    resist. They have learned to be modest, and the French who have
+    seen them perceive how little they resemble the others from whom
+    they are thus distinguished.
+
+    “After Easter, all the Indians dispersed to seek subsistence; they
+    promised me that they would not forget the prayer, and earnestly
+    begged that a father should come in the fall when they assemble
+    again. This will be granted, and, if it please God to send some
+    father, he will take my place, while I, to execute the orders of
+    my father‐superior, will go and begin my Illinois mission.
+
+    “The Illinois are thirty days’ journey by land from Lapointe by a
+    difficult road; they lie south‐southwest of it. On the way you
+    pass the nation of the Ketchigamins, who live in more than twenty
+    large cabins; they are inland, and seek to have intercourse with
+    the French, from whom they hope to get axes, knives, and ironware.
+    So much do they fear them that they unbound from the stake two
+    Indian captives, who said, when about to be burned, that the
+    Frenchman had declared that they wished peace all over the world.
+    You pass then to the Miamiwek, and by great deserts reach the
+    Illinois, who are assembled chiefly in two towns containing more
+    than eight or nine thousand souls. These people are well enough
+    disposed to receive Christianity. Since F. Allouez spoke to them
+    at Lapointe to adore one God, they have begun to abandon their
+    false worship; for they adored the sun and thunder. Those seen by
+    me are apparently of good disposition, and they are not night‐
+    runners, like the other Indians. A man kills his wife if he finds
+    her unfaithful. They are less prodigal in sacrifices, and promise
+    me to embrace Christianity, and do all I require in their country.
+    In this view, the Ottawas gave me a young man recently come from
+    their country, who initiated me to some extent in their language
+    during the leisure given me in the winter by the Indians at
+    Lapointe. I could scarcely understand it, though there is
+    something of the Algonquin in it; yet I hope, by the help of God’s
+    grace, to understand and be understood if God by his goodness
+    leads me to that country.
+
+    “No one must hope to escape crosses in our missions, and the best
+    means to live happily is not to fear them, but, in the enjoyment
+    of little crosses, hope for others still greater. The Illinois
+    desire us, like Indians, to share their miseries and suffer all
+    that can be imagined in barbarism. They are lost sheep, to be
+    sought amid woods and thorns, especially when they call so
+    piteously to be rescued from the jaws of the wolf. Such, really,
+    can I call their entreaties to me this winter. They have actually
+    gone this spring to notify the old men to come for me in the fall.
+
+    “The Illinois always come by land. They sow maize, which they have
+    in great plenty; they have pumpkins as large as those of France,
+    and plenty of roots and fruit. The chase is very abundant in wild
+    cattle, bears, stags, turkeys, duck, bustard, wild pigeon, and
+    cranes. They leave their towns at certain times every year to go
+    to their hunting‐grounds together, so as to be better able to
+    resist if attacked. They believe that I will spread peace
+    everywhere if I go, and then only the young will go to hunt.
+
+    “When the Illinois come to Lapointe, they pass a large river
+    almost a league wide. It runs north and south, and so far that the
+    Illinois, who do not know what canoes are, have never yet heard of
+    its mouth; they only know that there are very great nations below
+    them, some of whom raise two crops of maize a year. East‐southeast
+    of the country is a nation they call Chawawon, which came to visit
+    them last summer. They wear beards, which shows intercourse with
+    Europeans; they had come thirty days across land before reaching
+    their country. This great river can hardly empty in Virginia, and
+    we rather believe its mouth is in California. If the Indians, who
+    promise to make me a canoe, do not fail to keep their word, we
+    shall go into this river as soon as we can, with a Frenchman and
+    this young man given me, who knows some of these languages, and
+    has a readiness for learning others; we shall visit the nations
+    which inhabit it, in order to open the way to so many of our
+    fathers who have long awaited this happiness. This discovery will
+    give us a complete knowledge of the southern or western sea.
+
+    “The Illinois are warriors; they make many slaves, whom they sell
+    to the Ottawas for guns, powder, kettles, axes, and knives. They
+    were formerly at war with the Nadouessi, but, having made peace
+    some years since, I confirmed it, to facilitate their coming to
+    Lapointe, where I am going to await them, in order to accompany
+    them to their country.”
+
+
+Much as he loved his children at Lapointe, and faithfully as he had served
+them, the voice of his superior had ordered him to this new, vaster, and
+more laborious field, which to his true Jesuit obedience was a task of
+love. The Illinois at once become dear to his heart as his future
+children; he studies their language, loses no opportunity of learning all
+about their country, its tribes and their customs, sends them presents of
+pious pictures and the loving messages of a father, welcomes every member
+of their nation who might visit Lapointe with open arms, and presses him
+to his heart, and devotes every moment of leisure afforded him from his
+labors to sedulous preparation for the contemplated mission of the
+Immaculate Conception. His intelligent mind fully comprehended the vast
+importance of the undertaking in its relations to the church and the
+civilized world, and conceived at once the bold and daring project of a
+thorough exploration of the great river around which so much mystery,
+intermingled with romantic fables and dim traditions, still hung. It is
+with equal truth and justice that Bancroft writes: “The purpose of
+discovering the Mississippi, of which the tales of the natives had
+published the magnificence, sprang from Marquette himself.”
+
+It has already been stated that F. Marquette had sent some pious pictures
+to the Illinois, and by the same messenger to the Sioux, whom he expected
+to be embraced in his intended mission. The messenger who carried the
+father’s presents also bore his request for protection and a safe‐conduct
+to such European missionaries as might visit or pass through their
+country, and a message, “That the black‐gown wished to pass to the country
+of the Assinipoils and Kilistinons; that he was already among the
+Outagamis; and that he himself was going in the fall to the Illinois.”
+
+Sad indeed must have been the feelings of the good father, when, early in
+the winter, the Sioux returned to him the pious pictures he had sent them,
+in which he saw an ominous forerunner of impending war. The Ottawas and
+Hurons had by their insolence aroused the indignation of the Sioux, and
+the latter had seized the tomahawk and prepared for the bloody and
+revengeful strife. His hopes of reaching the cabins of the Sioux by an
+overland route now vanished before the approaching storm. The Indians at
+Lapointe could not withstand the fierce onsets of the Dakotah war‐parties,
+and first the Ottawas, abandoning their village, launched their canoes
+upon the lake, and were soon gathered in Ekaentoulon Island. The Hurons
+remained alone at Lapointe, and F. Marquette remained in the midst of them
+to minister to their spiritual wants, share their dangers, and uphold
+their faith and courage. And when they too were forced to depart, the good
+father, ever true to his spiritual flock, was content to “turn his back on
+his beloved Illinois to accompany his Hurons in their wanderings and
+hardships.” The Hurons settled at Mackinaw, a bleak and desolate spot, but
+the abundance of fish the neighboring waters afforded was certain to
+secure the fugitives from starvation, while the very desolation of the
+scene seemed a protection from hostile bands. Scarcely had the Hurons
+thrown up their cabins on this dreary shore, when a rude sylvan chapel,
+surmounted by a cross, graced and cheered the scene, and became the cradle
+of religion at the mission of S. Ignatius. Such was the early origin of
+Michilimackinac. Beside the enclosure of cabins and chapel arose a
+palisade fort for defence. For several years F. Marquette labored in this
+remote and arduous station, cheered only by the consolations which spring
+from faith and by the bountiful harvests of souls he reaped.
+
+Though longing to proceed on his mission to the Illinois, as all his
+letters so earnestly manifest, F. Marquette found ample work both for his
+mind and hands in arranging matters at Lapointe, so that his departure
+should cause as little damage as possible to that mission, to which he had
+been so faithful and devoted, and which he was now about to confide to the
+care of another, and in making the necessary preparations for his
+departure; for his time seemed now near at hand. The dreary days of winter
+were enlivened by recounting the projected plans of the coming spring, and
+in gathering all the information within his reach concerning the
+Mississippi and the nations inhabiting its banks. Most of the actual
+knowledge then possessed on the subject was derived from the accounts and
+relations of the Jesuit missionaries of the Northwest, and from the
+reports of the Canadian traders among the Indians. His inquiries of the
+more northern tribes were eagerly answered by startling fables of various
+hues and contradictory generalities, but nothing definite could be learned
+from them as to the course of the great river, its direction or outlet, or
+of the natives along its course. All was conjecture and theory. As early
+as 1639 the Sieur Nicolet, who was the interpreter of the French colony of
+New France, had penetrated westward to the furthest grounds of the
+Algonquins, and had encountered the Winnebagoes, “a people called so
+because they came from a distant sea, but whom the French erroneously
+called Puents.” And we learn from F. Vimont that “the Sieur Nicolet, who
+had penetrated furthest into those distant countries, avers that, had he
+sailed three days more on a great river which flows from that lake (Green
+Bay), he would have found the sea.” And although the Indians called the
+Mississippi itself “the sea,” and the Sieur Nicolet may have fallen into
+the same error, in either case it seems quite certain that he was the
+first to reach the waters of that river. In 1641, Fathers Isaac Jogues and
+Charles Raymbaut carried their missionary labors to the Sault St. Mary,
+and received distinct accounts of the Sioux, and of the great river on
+whose banks they lived. In 1658, after F. Garreau had suffered martyrdom
+on the St. Lawrence on his way to renew the Western missions destroyed by
+the recent Iroquois war, De Groseilles and another Frenchman penetrated to
+Lake Superior, and passed the winter on its shores. They visited the
+Sioux, learned with greater clearness and particularity of the course of
+the great river on whose banks they stood. Their annalist writes: “It was
+a beautiful river, large, broad, and deep, which would bear comparison,
+they say, with the St. Lawrence.” The missionaries of the Saguenay had
+also “heard of the Winnipegouek, and their bay whence three seas could be
+reached.” And war parties of the Iroquois told the missionaries of New
+York of their wars with the Ontoagannha, “whose towns lay on a beautiful
+river (Ohio), which leads to the great lake, as they called the sea, where
+they traded with Europeans who pray to God as we (the French) do, and have
+rosaries and bells to call men to prayer.”(225) F. Ménard, the founder of
+the Ottawa mission, also heard, in 1660, of the Mississippi and the
+nations on its banks, and was only prevented from visiting them by meeting
+with a martyr’s death while prosecuting his work. F. Allouez, his
+successor, also writes of the great river, “which empties, as far as I can
+conjecture, into the sea of Virginia,” and was the first to reveal to
+Europeans its Indian name; for, in speaking of one of its tribes, he says:
+“They live on a great river called Messipi.” At the time that F. Dablon
+was appointed Superior of the Ottawa missions, and F. Marquette appointed
+to establish the intended Illinois mission, and the exploration of the
+river was about to be undertaken, the latter, as already stated, was for
+some time engaged in gathering information concerning its course and
+outlet. Three principal conjectures prevailed at this time: first, that it
+ran towards the southwest, and entered the Gulf of California; second,
+that it flowed into the Gulf of Mexico; third, that it took a more
+easterly direction, and discharged itself into the Atlantic Ocean,
+somewhere on the coast of Virginia. To F. Marquette belonged the glory of
+solving the problem, and thus of opening the interior of the continent to
+Christianity and civilization.
+
+The war which was raging in the country rendered it impossible for the
+missionaries of themselves to undertake the opening of the long‐desired
+mission of the Illinois, and they had accordingly applied for assistance
+to the French government to further this great enterprise. F. Marquette,
+as we have seen from his letters, remained ever ready at a moment’s notice
+from his superiors to advance into this dangerous field. He was not
+deterred by a consciousness of his own declining health, already enfeebled
+by labors and exposures, nor by the hostile character of the nations
+through whose country he would have to pass, nor by the danger of a cruel
+death at the hands of the fierce Dakotah. This last only made the prospect
+more enticing to one whose highest ambition was to win the glorious crown
+of martyrdom in opening the way for his brother Jesuits to follow in the
+battle of the faith. The same flotilla that carried his letter to F.
+Dablon to Quebec in the summer of 1672, on its return conveyed to him the
+joyous news that the petition of the missionaries had found favor with the
+government; that the Sieur Jolliet was designated to undertake the
+exploration of the Mississippi; and that F. Marquette was chosen the
+missionary of the expedition. It was the Blessed Virgin whom, F. Marquette
+says, “I had always invoked, since my coming to the Ottawa country, in
+order to obtain of God the favor of being able to visit the nations on the
+Mississippi River.” It was on the feast of the Immaculate Conception of
+the same Blessed Virgin Mary that he received the glorious tidings that
+the realization of his hopes and prayers was at hand. He bestowed upon the
+great river the name of the Immaculate Conception, which, however, as well
+as its earlier Spanish name of River of the Holy Ghost, has since yielded
+to its original Indian appellation.
+
+The exploring party, consisting of “the meek, single‐hearted,
+unpretending, illustrious Marquette, with Jolliet for his associate, five
+Frenchmen for his companions, and two Algonquins as guides, lifting their
+canoes on their backs, and walking across the narrow portage that divides
+the Fox River from the Wisconsin,” set out upon their glorious expedition.
+Mr. J. G. Shea, to whom we are so much indebted for his researches into
+this interesting part of the history of our country, describes the voyage
+in the following graphic and eloquent manner:
+
+
+    “In the spring they embarked at Mackinaw in two frail bark canoes;
+    each with his paddle in hand, and full of hope, they soon plied
+    them merrily over the crystal waters of the lake. All was new to
+    Marquette, and he describes as he went along the Menonomies, Green
+    Bay, and Maskoutens, which he reached on the 7th of June, 1673. He
+    had now attained the limit of former discoveries; the new world
+    was before them; they looked back a last adieu to the waters
+    which, great as the distance was, connected them with Quebec and
+    their countrymen; they knelt on the shore to offer, by a new
+    devotion, their lives, their honor, and their undertakings to
+    their beloved Mother, the Virgin Mary Immaculate; then, launching
+    on the broad Wisconsin, sailed slowly down its current, amid its
+    vine‐clad isles and its countless sand‐bars. No sound broke the
+    stillness, no human form appeared, and at last, after sailing
+    seven days, on the 17th of June they happily glided into the great
+    river. Joy that could find no utterance in words filled the
+    grateful heart of Marquette.
+
+    “The broad river of the Conception, as he named it, now lay before
+    them, stretching away hundreds of miles to an unknown sea. Soon
+    all was new; mountain and forest had glided away; the islands,
+    with their groves of cottonwood, became more frequent, and moose
+    and deer browzed on the plains; strange animals were seen
+    traversing the river, and monstrous fish appeared in its waters.
+    But they proceeded on their way amid this solitude, frightful by
+    its utter absence of man. Descending still further, they came to
+    the land of the bison, or pisikiou, which, with the turkey, became
+    sole tenants of the wilderness; all other game had disappeared. At
+    last, on the 25th of June, they descried footprints on the shore.
+    They now took heart again, and Jolliet and the missionary, leaving
+    their five men in the canoes, followed a little beaten path to
+    discover who the tribe might be. They travelled on in silence
+    almost to the cabin‐doors, when they halted, and with a loud
+    halloa proclaimed their coming. Three villages lay before them;
+    the first, roused by the cry, poured forth its motley group, which
+    halted at the sight of the new‐comers and the well‐known dress of
+    the missionary. Old men came slowly on, step by measured step,
+    bearing aloft the all‐mysterious calumet. All was silence; they
+    stood at last before the two Europeans, and Marquette asked, ‘Who
+    are you?’ ‘We are Illinois,’ was the answer, which dispelled all
+    anxiety from the explorers, and sent a thrill to the heart of
+    Marquette; the Illinois missionary was at last amid the children
+    of that tribe which he had so long, so tenderly yearned to see.
+
+    “After friendly greetings at this town of Pewaria, and the
+    neighboring one of Moing‐wena, they returned to their canoes,
+    escorted by the wondering tribe, who gave their hardy visitants a
+    calumet, the safeguard of the West. With renewed courage and
+    lighter hearts, they sailed in, and, passing a high rock with
+    strange and monstrous forms depicted on its rugged surface, heard
+    in the distance the roaring of a mighty cataract, and soon beheld
+    Pekitanoui, or the Muddy River, as the Algonquins call the
+    Missouri, rushing like some untamed monster into the calm and
+    clear Mississippi, and hurrying in with its muddy waters the trees
+    which it had rooted up in its impetuous course. Already had the
+    missionaries heard of the river running to the western sea, to be
+    reached by the branches of the Mississippi, and Marquette, now
+    better informed, fondly hoped to reach it one day by the Missouri.
+    But now their course lay south, and, passing a dangerous eddy, the
+    demon of the Western Indians, they reached the Waboukigou, or
+    Ohio, the river of the Shawnees, and, still holding on their way,
+    came to the warm land of the cane, and the country which the
+    mosquitoes might call their own. While enveloped in their sails as
+    a shelter from them, they came upon a tribe who invited them to
+    the shore. They were wild wanderers, for they had guns bought of
+    Catholic Europeans at the East.
+
+    “Thus, after all had been friendly, and encouraged by this second
+    meeting, they plied their oars anew, and, amid groves of
+    cottonwood on either side, descended to the 33d degree, when, for
+    the first time, a hostile reception was promised by the excited
+    Metchigameas. Too few to resist, their only hope on earth was the
+    mysterious calumet, and in heaven the protection of Mary, to whom
+    they sent up fervent prayers. At last the storm subsided, and they
+    were received in peace; their language formed an obstacle, but an
+    interpreter was found, and after explaining the object of their
+    coming, and announcing the great truths of Christianity, they
+    embarked for Akamsea, a village thirty miles below on the eastern
+    shore.
+
+    “Here they were well received, and learned that the mouth of the
+    river was but ten days’ sail from this village; but they heard,
+    too, of nations there trading with Europeans, and of wars between
+    the tribes, and the two explorers spent a night in consultation.
+    The Mississippi, they now saw, emptied into the Gulf of Mexico,
+    between Florida and Tampico, two Spanish points; they might, by
+    proceeding, fall into their hands. Thus far only Marquette traced
+    the map, and he put down the names of other tribes of which they
+    heard. Of these, in the Atotchasi, Matora, and Papihaka, we
+    recognize Arkansas tribes; and the Akoroas and Tanikwas, Pawnees
+    and Omahas, Kansas and Apiches, are well known in after‐days.
+
+    “They accordingly set out from Akensea, on the 17th of July, to
+    return. Passing the Missouri again, they entered the Illinois,
+    and, meeting the friendly Kaskaskias at its upper portage, were
+    led by them in a kind of triumph to Lake Michigan; for Marquette
+    had promised to return and instruct them in the faith. Sailing
+    along the lake, they crossed the outer peninsula of Green Bay, and
+    reached the mission of S. Francis Xavier just four months after
+    their departure from it.
+
+    “Thus had the missionaries achieved their long‐projected work. The
+    triumph of the age was thus completed in the discovery and
+    exploration of the Mississippi, which threw open to France the
+    richest, most fertile and accessible territory of the New World.
+    Marquette, whose health had been severely tried in this voyage,
+    remained at St. Francis to recruit his strength before resuming
+    his wonted missionary labors; for he sought no laurels, he aspired
+    to no tinsel praise.
+
+    “The distance passed over by F. Marquette on this great
+    expedition, in his little bark canoe, was two thousand seven
+    hundred and sixty‐seven miles. The feelings with which he regarded
+    an enterprise having so grave a bearing on the future history and
+    development of mankind may be appreciated from the following
+    closing passage of the ninth section of his _Voyages and
+    Discoveries_:
+
+    “ ‘Had all this voyage caused but the salvation of a single soul,
+    I should deem all my fatigue well repaid. And this I have reason
+    to think; for, when I was returning, I passed by the Indians at
+    Peoria. I was three days announcing the faith in all their cabins,
+    after which, as we were embarking, they brought me to the water’s
+    edge a dying child, which I baptized a little before it expired,
+    by an admirable Providence, for the salvation of that innocent
+    soul.’ ”
+
+
+F. Marquette prepared a narrative of his voyage down the Mississippi (from
+which the foregoing quotation is taken), and a map of that river; and on
+his return transmitted copies to his superior, by the Ottawa flotilla of
+that year. It is also probable that Frontenac, the Governor of New France,
+as he had promised, sent a copy of them to the French government. The loss
+of Jolliet’s narrative and map gave an inestimable value to those of
+Marquette. Yet the French government did not publish them, probably in
+consequence of the discontinuance of the publication of the Jesuit
+_Relations_ about this time; and thus the great interests involved in the
+discovery were neglected. Fortunately, F. Marquette’s narrative fell into
+the hands of Thevenot, who had just published a collection of travels, and
+such was his appreciation of it that he issued a new volume, entitled
+_Recueil de Voyages_, in 1681, containing the narrative and map of the
+Mississippi.(226) Mr. Sparks, in his life of F. Marquette, speaks thus of
+the narrative:
+
+
+    “It is written in a terse, simple, and unpretending style. The
+    author relates what occurs, and describes what he sees, without
+    embellishment or display. He writes as a scholar and as a man of
+    careful observation and practical sense. There is no tendency to
+    exaggerate, nor any attempt to magnify the difficulties he had to
+    encounter, or the importance of his discovery. In every point of
+    view, this tract is one of the most interesting of those which
+    illustrate the early history of America.”
+
+
+Having reached Green Bay, the exhausted voyager sank down under the
+effects of his recent travels and exposures. His disease was so obstinate
+and protracted that he suffered during the entire winter, though with
+patience and resignation, and did not recover before the end of the
+following summer. Having received from his superior the necessary orders
+for the establishment of the Illinois mission, he started on the 25th of
+October, 1674, for Kaskaskia. He was accompanied and assisted by two
+faithful and devoted Frenchmen, and by a number of Pottawattomies and
+Illinois Indians. They coasted along the mouth of Fox River, and then,
+advancing up as far as the small bay breaking into the peninsula, they
+reached the portage leading to the lake. As the canoes proceeded along the
+lake shore, the missionary walked upon the beach, returning to the canoes
+whenever the beach was broken by a river or stream; and their provisions
+were obtained from the abundant yield of the chase. On the 23d of
+November, the courageous missionary found his malady returning, but pushed
+on, amid cold and snow, until, on the 4th of December, he reached the
+Chicago River, which was closed with ice. Here again the unpropitious
+elements and his own infirmities compelled him to stop and spend the
+winter. But his time was not idly spent during this detention, for his
+missionary zeal found occupation in the spiritual care of his Indian
+companions, whom he instructed as well as he could, and sent them forward
+on their journey. His faithful Frenchmen remained now alone with him; but
+at a distance of fifty miles was an Illinois village, where there were two
+Frenchmen, traders and trappers; and these, hearing of the forlorn
+condition of the missionary, arranged that one of them should go and visit
+him. They had prepared a cabin for him, and the Indians, alarmed for his
+safety, were also anxious to send some of their tribe to convey their
+father and his effects to their village. Touched by their attentions, he
+sent them every assurance of his visiting them, intimating, however, the
+uncertainty of his doing so in the spring, in consequence of his continued
+illness. These messages only added to the alarm of the Indians, and the
+sachems assembled and sent a deputation to the black‐gown. The presents
+they bore were three sacks of corn, dried meat, and pumpkins, and twelve
+beaver skins. The objects of their visits were, first, to make him a mat
+to sit on; second, to ask him for powder; third, supply him with food;
+fourth, to get some merchandise. The good father made answer in
+characteristic terms, as follows: “First, that I came to instruct them by
+speaking of the prayer; second, that I would not give them powder, as we
+endeavor to make peace everywhere, and because I did not wish them to
+begin a war against the Miamis; third, that we did not fear famine;
+fourth, that I would encourage the French to bring them merchandise, and
+that they must make reparation to the traders there for the beads taken
+from them while the surgeon was with me.” Presenting them with some axes,
+knives, and trinkets, he dismissed them with a promise to make every
+effort to visit them in a few days. Bidding their good father to “take
+heart,” and beseeching him to “stay and die in their country,” the
+deputation “returned to their winter camps.”
+
+The ensuing winter months, though marked by every bodily suffering and
+privation, were replete with religious consolation. His whole time was
+spent in prayer. Admonished by his disease that his last end could not be
+far off, he offered his remaining days entirely to God. He lost sight of
+the sufferings of his body in the overflow of heavenly consolations with
+which his soul was ravished. Still the recollection that he had been
+appointed missionary of the Illinois, and the duty this seemed to impose
+upon him of laboring for the conversion of those noble but benighted
+souls, filled his heart with the desire of visiting them, if it should be
+the will of God, and the establishment of the Illinois mission became the
+absorbing thought of his mind and the burden of the prayers which he
+addressed to the throne of heaven. His sufferings he bore not only with
+patience, but with joy; if he prayed for their cessation, it was only with
+the view that he might thus be enabled to encounter the new sufferings,
+labors, and hardships of his mission, and that he might devote his
+remaining days to the salvation of his beloved Illinois. To obtain this
+privilege from heaven, he induced his companions to unite with him in a
+novena of prayers in honor of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed
+Virgin Mary. Some time after Christmas, 1675, his Patroness in heaven
+obtained the desired boon of health for her devoted client; for he soon
+began to recover from his disease, and, though still feeble, was enabled
+by the 29th of March, when the snow and ice began to melt, and the
+inundations compelled them to move, to set out for Kaskaskia, in the Upper
+Illinois. He arrived at that Illinois town on the 8th of April, but his
+journal was discontinued from the 6th of April, and we have no record of
+his movements from that time. He was received by his children as an angel
+from heaven, for they scarcely supposed he had escaped alive the rigors of
+the winter. It was Monday in Holy Week, and the good man immediately
+commenced his work. He visited the chiefs and ancients of the town, and
+gave them and the crowds who assembled in the cabins he visited the first
+necessary instructions in the Gospel. So great were the throngs that
+assembled to hear him preach that the narrow accommodations of the cabins
+could not hold them. On Maundy Thursday he called a general assembly of
+the people in the open field, a beautiful prairie near the town, which was
+decorated after the fashion of the country, and spread with mats and bear
+skins. He formed a little rustic altar by suspending some pieces of Indian
+taffety on cords, to which were attached, so as to be seen on all four
+sides, four large pictures of the Blessed Virgin, under whose invocation
+the mission was placed. The assembly was immense; composed of five hundred
+chiefs and ancients seated in a circle around the missionary, and around
+these stood fifteen hundred young men. Besides these, great numbers of
+women and children attended. He addressed his congregation with ten words
+or presents, according to the Indian fashion, associating each word or
+present, which represented some great truth or mystery, with one of the
+ten beads on the belt of the prayer which he held in his hand. He
+explained the object of his visit to them, preached Christ crucified—for
+it was the eve of Good Friday—and explained to them the principal
+mysteries of the Christian religion. The Holy Mass was then celebrated for
+the first time in this new mission. On each of the following days he
+continued his instructions, and on Easter Sunday he celebrated the great
+Feast of the Resurrection, offering up Mass for the second time. He took
+possession of the land in the name of his risen Lord, and bestowed upon
+the mission the name of the Immaculate Virgin Mary.
+
+His former malady now returned with renewed violence. His strength was
+wasting away. To remain would accomplish no good for his children, for he
+was unable to discharge the duties of the missionary, and no alternative
+was left but to make an effort to reach his former mission, Mackinaw,
+where he hoped to die in the midst of his fellow‐members of the Society of
+Jesus. He was the more willing now to seek rest in the bosom of his
+Redeemer and in the Society of his Blessed Mother in Heaven, because he
+had performed his promise, the mission of the Illinois had been founded,
+his words had been lovingly received by his people, the good seed had been
+sown in their hearts, the Holy Sacrifice had been offered up in their
+presence and for their salvation, and future missionaries might now
+advance to cultivate the field and reap the harvest he had prepared. His
+docile Indians, with the devotion of children, begged him to return to
+them as soon as his health should permit. He repeatedly promised them that
+he or some other missionary would come to continue the good work amongst
+them. The people followed him on his journey, escorted him thirty leagues
+on his way with great pomp, showing him every mark of friendship and
+affection, and many contended among themselves for the honor of carrying
+the scanty baggage he possessed. Taking the way of the St. Joseph’s River
+and the eastern shore of Lake Michigan, along which he had yet to travel
+over a hundred leagues through an unknown route, his strength soon began
+to fail entirely. He could no longer help himself; his two faithful French
+companions had to lift him in and out of his canoe when they landed at
+night; and so exhausted had he become under his wasting disease that they
+had to handle and carry him like a child. In the midst of his sufferings
+and the hardships of such a journey in his enfeebled health, his
+characteristic equanimity, joy, and gentleness never for a moment left
+him. He could even forget his own sufferings to console his companions. He
+encouraged them to sustain the fatigues of the way, assuring them that God
+would protect and defend them. His native mirthfulness was even in this
+extreme crisis conspicuous in his conversations. He now calmly saw the
+approach of death, and joyfully and heroically welcome it as the reward of
+his toils and sacrifices. He had some time before prepared a meditation on
+death, to serve him in these last hours of his life, which he now used
+with great consolation. He said his office to his last day. His devotions
+frequently assumed the shape of colloquies with his merciful Lord, with
+his Holy Mother, with his angel guardian, and with all heaven. He
+repeatedly pronounced with fervor the sublime words, “I believe that my
+Redeemer liveth”; and again, “Mary, Mother of grace, Mother of God,
+remember me.” Perceiving a river on whose banks loomed up a prominent
+eminence, he ordered his companions to stop, that he might die and be
+buried there. He pointed out the spot on this eminence in which he desired
+them to inter his remains. This river, until recent years, bore his name.
+His companions still desired to press forward, in the hope of reaching
+Mackinaw; but they were driven back by the wind, and, entering the River
+Marquette by its former channel, they erected a bark cabin, under which
+Marquette, like his great model, S. Francis Xavier, was stretched upon the
+shore, and, like him, sighed only to be dissolved and to be with Christ.
+So cheerfully did he realize his approaching dissolution that he gave all
+the necessary directions to his companions touching his burial. He had a
+week before blessed some water, which he instructed them how to use on the
+occasion, how to arrange his hands, feet, and head, with what religious
+ceremonies to bury him, even telling them that they should take his little
+altar bell, and ring it as they carried him to the grave. On the eve of
+his death, he told them with a countenance radiant with joy that the
+morrow would be his last day on earth. Still mindful of his sacred
+ministry, and anxious to be doing good, he administered the sacrament of
+penance to his two companions for the last time. He thanked them for their
+charity to him during this arduous and eventful voyage, begged their
+pardon for the trouble he had given them, and directed them to ask pardon
+for him and in his name of all the Fathers and Brothers of the Society of
+Jesus in the Ottawa country; he also gave them a paper in which he had
+written all his faults since his last confession, which he begged them to
+give to his superior, that he might pray the more earnestly for him. He
+promised not to forget them in heaven. Ever mindful of others in this
+trying moment, and overflowing with charity for his neighbor, he insisted
+upon his companions taking some rest, leaving him to commune with heaven,
+assuring them that his hour was not yet at hand, and that he would call
+them in due time. This he did; summoning them to his side, just as his
+agony was approaching. Hastening to him, they fell melting into tears at
+his feet. He embraced them for the last time, called for the holy water he
+had blessed and his reliquary, and, taking his crucifix from around his
+neck, and handing it to one of them, he requested him to hold it up before
+him, so that he could behold it every moment he had yet to live. Clasping
+his hands, and fixing his eyes affectionately on the image of his expiring
+Saviour, he pronounced aloud his profession of faith, and thanked God for
+the favor he enjoyed in dying a Jesuit, a missionary of the cross, and,
+above all, in dying in a miserable cabin, amid forests, and destitute of
+all human consolation and assistance. He then communed secretly for some
+time with his Creator, but his devotion from time to time found vent in
+the ejaculations, “Sustinuit anima mea in verba ejus,” and “Mater Dei,
+memento mei.” These were his last words before he was taken with the agony
+of death. His companions frequently pronounced the names of Jesus and
+Mary, as he had previously requested them to do, and, when they saw he was
+about to expire, they called out “Jesus, Maria,” whereupon he repeated
+those enrapturing names several times with distinctness, and then
+suddenly, as if his Saviour and Mother had appeared to him, he raised his
+eyes above the crucifix, gazing with a countenance lit up with pleasure at
+those blissful apparitions. He expired as peacefully and gently as a child
+sinking into its evening slumber.
+
+
+    “Thus he died, the great apostle,
+      Far away in regions West;
+    By the Lake of the Algonquins
+      Peacefully his ashes rest;
+    But his spirit still regards us
+      From his home among the blest.”
+
+
+The devoted companions of the illustrious missionary, happy, in the midst
+of their bereavement, in the privilege of witnessing one of the most
+heroic and saintly deaths recorded in the history of our race, carried out
+every injunction of their departed father, and added every act that love
+and veneration could suggest, and that their impoverished condition in the
+wilderness could afford. They laid out his remains as he had directed,
+rang the little altar bell as they carried him with profound respect to
+the mound of earth selected by himself, interred him there, and raised a
+large cross to mark the sacred spot.
+
+The surviving companions of the deceased now prepared to embark. One of
+them had been ill for some time, suffering with such depression of spirits
+and feebleness of body that he could neither eat nor sleep. Just before
+embarking he knelt at the grave of his saintly friend, and begged him to
+intercede for him in heaven as he had promised, and, taking some earth
+from the breast of the departed, and placing it upon his own breast, it is
+related that he felt his sadness and bodily infirmity immediately depart,
+and he resumed his voyage in health and gladness. Many are the pious
+traditions of miraculous results attributed to the sanctity of F.
+Marquette; many of them are still handed down among the Western
+missionaries, and some of them have found a place in the pages of serious
+history.
+
+The remains of the saintly Jesuit were, two years afterwards, disinterred
+by his own flock, the Kiskakons, while returning from their hunting‐
+grounds, placed in a neat box of bark, and reverently carried to their
+mission. The flotilla of canoes, as it passed along in funeral solemnity,
+was joined by a party of the Iroquois, and, as they approached Mackinaw,
+many other canoes, including those of the two missionaries of the place,
+united in the imposing convoy, and the deep, reverential chant, _De
+Profundis_, arose heavenward from the bosom of the lake until the body
+reached the shore. It was carried in procession with cross, burning
+tapers, and fragrant incense to the church, where every possible
+preparation had been made for so interesting and affecting a ceremony;
+and, after the Requiem service, the precious relics were deposited in a
+vault prepared for them in the middle of the church, “where he reposes,”
+says the pious chronicler, “as the guardian angel of our Ottawa missions.”
+“Ever after,” says Bancroft, “the forest rangers, if in danger on Lake
+Michigan, would invoke his name. The people of the West will build his
+monument.”
+
+The following notice of the character of F. Marquette is from the gifted
+pen of Mr. Shea:
+
+
+    “Such was the edifying and holy death of the illustrious explorer
+    of the Mississippi, on Saturday, the 18th of May, 1675. He was of
+    a cheerful, joyous disposition, playful even in his manner, and
+    universally beloved. His letters show him to us as a man of
+    education, close observation, sound sense, strict integrity, a
+    freedom from exaggeration, and yet a vein of humor which here and
+    there breaks out in spite of all his self‐command.
+
+    “But all these qualities are little compared to his zeal as a
+    missionary, to his sanctity as a man. His holiness drew on him in
+    life the veneration of all around him, and the lapse of years has
+    not even now destroyed it in the descendants of those who knew
+    him. In one of his sanctity we naturally find an all‐absorbing
+    devotion to the Mother of the Saviour, with its constant
+    attendants, an angelical love of purity, and a close union of the
+    heart with God. It is, indeed, characteristic with him. The
+    privilege which the Church honors under the title of the
+    Immaculate Conception was the constant object of his thoughts;
+    from his early youth he daily recited the little offices of the
+    Immaculate Conception and fasted every Saturday in her honor. As a
+    missionary, a variety of devotions directed to the same end still
+    show his devotions, and to her he turned in all his trials. When
+    he discovered the great river, when he founded his new mission, he
+    gave it the name of the Conception, and no letter, it is said,
+    ever came from his hand that did not contain the words, ’Blessed
+    Virgin Immaculate’; and the smile that lighted up his dying face
+    induced his poor companions to believe that she had appeared
+    before the eyes of her devoted client.
+
+    “Like S. Francis Xavier, whom he especially chose as the model of
+    his missionary career, he labored nine years for the moral and
+    social improvement of nations sunk in paganism and vice, and, as
+    he was alternately with tribes of varied tongues, found it was
+    necessary to acquire knowledge of many American languages: six he
+    certainly spoke with ease; many more he is known to have
+    understood less perfectly. His death, however, was, as he had
+    always desired, more like that of the apostle of the Indies; there
+    is, indeed, a striking resemblance between their last moments; and
+    the wretched cabin, the desert shore, the few destitute
+    companions, the lonely grave, all harmonize in Michigan and
+    Sancian.”
+
+
+
+
+Prayer Of Custance, The Persecuted Queen Of Alla Of Northumberland.
+
+
+    Mother, quod she, and maiden bright, Mary!
+    Soth is that through womanne’s eggement
+    Mankind was lorn, and damned aye to die,
+    For which thy Child was on a cross yrent:
+    Thy blissful eyen saw all his torment;
+    Then is there no comparison between
+    Thy woe and any woe man may sustain.
+        Thou saw’st thy Child yslain before thine eyen,
+    And yet now liveth my little child parfay,
+    Now, lady bright! to whom all woful crien,
+    Thou glory of womanhood, thou faire May,
+    Thou haven of refute, bright star of the day!
+    Rue on my child, that of thy gentleness
+    Ruest on every rueful in distress.
+
+    —_Chaucer._
+
+
+
+
+Acoma.
+
+
+“Mr. S——, would you like to visit Acoma?” asked the commandant.
+
+“Most assuredly,” I replied; “I came out here to see all I could see. But
+what or who is Acoma?”(227)
+
+“A town built on the top of a rock rising from a level plain to a height
+of over two hundred feet is Acoma—the home of the Acoma Indians, a tribe
+of the great Pueblo family. I am ordered thither to have a talk with the
+principal men, and induce them to give up some Navajo
+children—captives—they are said to have taken in a recent skirmish.”
+
+I had been enjoying the hospitality of the commandant for some days at old
+Fort Wingate, near the Ojo del Gallo, in the northwestern part of New
+Mexico. Acoma lies about fifty miles to the southeast of the fort, by a
+very rough trail across the mountains. It was somewhat further by the
+regular trail.
+
+As we started, the sun was creeping over the brow of lofty San Mateo. The
+party consisted of the commandant, Don Juan Brown, a Castilianized
+American, who speaks Spanish like a native, and went with us as volunteer
+interpreter; Messrs. Jim Durden and Joe Smithers, gentlemen loafers; a
+sergeant and twenty cavalry as escort in case of unexpected and undesired
+rencounters with hostile Apaches or Navajoes; last, the writer, a denizen
+of the city of Gotham, general tourist, grand scribe and chronicler.
+
+We all rode on horseback, except Don Juan Brown, who, being a trifle over
+225 lbs., divided his weight between a pair of good horses attached to a
+light buggy. The order of march was: two cavalrymen five hundred yards in
+advance; the commandant, with Jim and Joe and the writer; the main body of
+the escort; Don Juan Brown with his buggy, and a rear guard of two
+cavalrymen five hundred yards behind.
+
+A brisk trot of three miles brought us to the Puertocito, or Little Door,
+which leads from the Valley of the Gallo into the Mal Païs, a petrified
+sea of lava, which lies between the Puertocito and the mountains. The lava
+stream seems to have been suddenly turned to stone by a wave of some
+enchanter’s wand while it was a raging, seething torrent.
+
+We halted and dismounted, tightened girths, etc. Jim and Joe, unused to
+the equitating mood, and evidently disliking particularly the trotting
+tense, had fallen back to the rear guard, and looked somewhat shaken. The
+relief of a walk of some miles was in store for them, as the trail through
+the Mal Païs admitted only of that gait and of single file.
+
+The Puertocito is formed by two rocks about twenty feet high. We wound our
+way through tortuous passages, through lava spires, at a slow walk. We
+could not see more than a few yards ahead. It was a dreary pathway. The
+knowledge that it was a haunt for Indians bound on robbery or revenge gave
+imagination an opportunity to put her darkest colors on the natural gloom.
+An hour’s slow walking brings us to the Bajada, or Descent, where our path
+is up and down the steep sides of a lava rock thirty feet high. We
+dismount and lead our horses carefully down. Half a dozen men holding on
+to the buggy behind make sufficient drag to let it down in safety, though
+with some wrenching of the wheels in the channelled surface of the rock.
+
+Thence our way lies on the eastern skirt of the lava, which runs along
+with the stream known as the San José through a deep and winding gorge
+named Los Rémanzos. I have seen some wild scenery in my time, but never
+before nor since so savage a piece of landscape as Los Rémanzos. The
+mountains rise perpendicularly on either hand—their barren sides dotted
+with huge boulders which seem ready to fall instantly on the traveller
+beneath. You wonder why they do not fall. The winding cañon shuts out all
+view beyond twenty yards in advance. A trail barely wide enough for one
+vehicle to pass creeps between the San José and the mountains on one side;
+and from the stream to the mountains on the other the lava piles up its
+grim and threatening forms.
+
+We halted at the picket to wait for the escort, the buggy, and Jim and
+Joe, beguiling the time by a comforting draught of hot coffee from a
+military quart cup which the commander of the picket hospitably offered
+us. The laggards soon arrived. Jim and Joe took advantage of the pause
+before starting again to enter a solemn protest against trotting:
+
+“For heaven’s sake, commandant!” said they with one voice and in a tone
+that showed acute feeling, “either walk or lope; we cannot endure that
+confounded trot. We shall be as raw as uncooked beefsteaks.”
+
+A bright thought struck them both simultaneously, and, without any further
+ceremony, they rushed to the buggy, leaving their horses to take care of
+themselves or be taken care of by some good‐natured dragoon.
+
+Another mile brought us to the crossing of the San José. Here was a check
+to our proceedings: the crossing was not fordable. The stream, usually
+about two feet wide and three inches deep at the crossing, had in
+consequence of recent heavy rains and the melting of snows filled its
+steep bed and overflowed its banks for fifty yards on either side. A
+powerful eddy made it impossible for a horse to strike ground on the other
+side. A dragoon dashed in and tried it, but it was with great difficulty
+we saved him and his horse from being carried down the swollen stream, and
+got them safe on our side again.
+
+“That settles it, gentlemen,” said the commandant; “we shall have to cross
+the mountains—a rough trail, but we have no choice.”
+
+It was now proposed to leave the buggy behind, but Joe would not hear of
+it. The commandant was too polite to insist, as he ought to have done.
+
+Crossing a narrow but steep cut, however, the buggy went over, spilling
+Don Juan and Jim over the mountain‐side. The buggy stood on its top—wheels
+in the air. The horses—good and gentle animals—came to a full stop and
+stood perfectly quiet. Otherwise, there would have been as little left of
+the buggy as of Dr. Holmes’ one‐horse shay, the last time the deacon rode
+in it. Neither the Don nor Jim was hurt, though the latter was somewhat
+frightened. Don Juan took the matter with the coolness of an old hand. The
+buggy was uninjured; it had merely met with a reverse. It was soon put
+upon its legs—or, rather, its wheels—again. Its progress was so
+aggravatingly slow when even our fastest possible gait was a walk, that,
+dividing the escort, we went on, leaving it to proceed at its leisure.
+
+It was about nightfall when we reached the edge of a precipitous descent
+where all marks of a trail disappeared. The descent was probably two
+hundred feet in perpendicular height, and alarmingly steep.
+
+“The buggy can never go down there,” was the general remark.
+
+“Confound the buggy, we shall have to sleep out in the cold all night with
+nothing but a saddle‐blanket, on account of it,” also translates a very
+general sentiment.
+
+“We cannot desert them, however,” said the commandant; “as the buggy has
+come with us we must stand by it. We shall wait here until it comes up.”
+
+We had a long and weary wait for that anathematized buggy. At length, as
+the shades of night were falling, the long‐looked‐for buggy was seen, its
+top bumping up and down like a buffalo with a broken foreleg. The don
+walked on one side of the vehicle holding the reins; Joe walked on the
+other side as gloomily as a chief mourner. The remainder of the escort
+with dismal visages followed behind.
+
+A glance over the steep brink did not give any radiance to their gloomy
+countenances. Don Juan expressed his regrets that we should have been
+detained by the slow and difficult progress of the buggy. Joe said
+nothing, but evidently felt ashamed of himself.
+
+We were still twenty miles from Acoma. Within about five miles, the
+commandant said there was a little Indian hut—a sort of outpost of the
+Pueblo—the owner of which, old Salvador, was one of the notables of the
+Pueblo. The commandant had notified Salvador by courier some days before
+of our intended visit. He had proposed to meet us at the ranchito and
+guide us over the remainder of the mountain trail. Here we could pass the
+night under cover at least, though we should be pretty closely packed.
+
+Joe had resumed the saddle after the steep descent had been accomplished.
+He and Jim now led the party, and, as the rest of us stayed with Don Juan
+and the buggy, they got considerably in advance. Thus they had reached the
+ranchito some twenty minutes before we did. We found them knocking at the
+door and calling loudly and indignantly on the inmates to open.
+
+“We have been knocking and shouting here for half an hour, and the
+confounded old Indian has not taken the slightest notice of us. I believe
+he would let us freeze.”
+
+“Salvador does not know you,” said the commandant. “He is too wise an
+Indian to open his doors to strangers in this country after nightfall.
+Salvador is reputed wealthy, and it behooves him to be careful what
+nocturnal visitors he receives. I think I can get Salvador to open. Is
+Señor Don Salvador within?” asked the commandant, in Spanish.
+
+“Is it the Señor Comandante who is without?” asked Don Salvador, in the
+same language, with the usual Pueblo peculiarities of pronunciation—the
+use of _l_ for _r_, etc.
+
+Being satisfied on this point, Salvador opened the door to receive us.
+
+Salvador was a stout, middle‐sized, gray‐headed Indian of the Pueblo type.
+The presence of the commandant being a voucher for the rest, Salvador now
+proceeded to shake hands with the whole party—in the order of rank, as he
+understood it—taking first the commandant, next the bugler, then the
+sergeant and the men of the escort, and then the civilians, Don Brown and
+the writer, and lastly Jim and Joe; conscientiously repeating in each
+individual case, “_Como le va!_” and “_Bueno!_” Indians believe in
+uniforms and brass buttons. They don’t understand official dignity without
+outward and visible signs.
+
+The ranchito was a little structure of _tierrones_, or sods, roofed with
+poles laid across from wall to wall, and covered with brush and earth.
+There were no windows. The door was the only aperture, I think. I am not
+quite sure whether there was a hole in the roof to let out a little of the
+smoke; there may have been. The edifice was about large enough for a fair‐
+sized poultry‐house. It was perched on the steep mountainside, the earth
+being cut away on the upper side to give an approach to a level
+foundation. There was a small shed for animals, the fodder for whose use
+being piled on top of it. There was the usual corn‐crib. Our best horses
+were honored with the hospitality of the shed, Salvador’s pony and burros
+being turned out to make room for them. The other animals were tied to
+logs in front of the ranchito, and a guard placed over them.
+
+It required some stooping to enter Salvador’s residence. This was very
+hard on the stout Don, who had not seen his own knee for a number of
+years, but he accomplished it as if he had been in the daily habit of
+touching his toes without bending his knees. But a further trial still
+awaited him. The hut was divided into two rooms. The passage between the
+two rooms was a blighted door, cut short in its youth to the proportions
+of a small fireplace. We had to come down to all‐fours to get into the
+inner chamber. When the commandant, the staunch Don, and the writer had
+entered, the place seemed full. But Salvador, on hospitable thoughts
+intent, insisted on Jim and Joe entering. Then Salvador wriggled in. The
+room was replete.
+
+After a meagre supper and a quiet smoke, we arranged the details of the
+morrow’s trip. With our saddles for pillows, and our saddle‐blankets and
+overcoats for beds and bed‐covering, we lay down to sleep. Brown, with Jim
+and Joe, in the inner room; the commandant, the old Pueblo, and myself in
+the outer. Jim and Joe lay perpendicularly to Brown, and Salvador
+described a horizontal to the commandant and myself. I slept well,
+considering, though I was waked two or three times by a roaring noise,
+which seemed to me to be that of the house falling, as I was endeavoring
+to force myself through the passage between the two apartments, in which,
+more than once during the night, I dreamt that I was stuck fast. On
+waking, I discovered that the sound proceeded from the resounding Aztec
+nose of our host, Salvador.
+
+We were roused before day by the old Indian. Dressing took no time, as we
+had not undressed the night before—a great saving of time, labor, and
+discomfort. Breakfast was to be got ready, however. Salvador made the
+fire. The commandant detailed himself and myself as cooks for the morning.
+At supper‐time, Don Juan, assisted by Jim and Joe, would officiate
+culinarily. Slices from a haunch of bacon we had brought with us, cooked
+on the end of a stick, with “hard tack” and coffee, made in a camp kettle,
+furnished a delicious breakfast. What is there in the odor of unctuous
+bacon that makes it so pleasant to the nostrils when one is camping out or
+“roughing it”? There are people who cannot abide the smell of bacon within
+the confines of civilization. But put them on the Plains, or in the field,
+and a daily dose of the appetizing grease is necessary to “settle their
+stomachs.” I have known men who, in long trips in the wilds, forsook
+chickens and returned to first principles and bacon.
+
+We made an early start. The buggy was left behind. Don Juan saddled one of
+his horses. He borrowed from the old Indian a saddle, so angular and so
+full of sharp points that it must have been hard even for an Indian’s
+seat. But Brown, though heavy, was a good horseman, and he bore the
+infliction like a hero.
+
+Salvador was our guide. When we were all mounted, and ready to start, we
+looked around for him. After some hunting we saw him above us, mounted,
+and seemingly emerging from the roof of the ranchito. He went straight up
+the side of the mountain, beckoning to us to come on, and shouting
+“_Caballeros! por aquí!_”(228)
+
+An Indian does not understand flank movements. He does not go around
+obstacles. He goes straight over them on the direct line of his objective.
+We followed our guide, dismounting, however, leading our horses, and
+zigzagging up the steep ascent like Christians and white men.
+
+Our course was over mountain and across ravine on a bee‐line of ascent or
+descent for Acoma. There was some growling by Jim and Joe, but as our
+general gait was a slow walk, and they made much of their progress on
+foot, they did not grumble much.
+
+I noticed moccasin tracks in several places where the ground was soft. The
+distance between the foot‐prints was very great. It astonished me. I rode
+to the commandant’s side, and called his attention to the wonderful
+tracks. He pointed them out to Salvador, who said they were the tracks of
+a _muchacho_ he had sent to the Pueblo last night with the news of our
+arrival at the ranchito. What a stepper that _muchacho_ must have been!
+His average bound must have been at least ten feet.
+
+“How long will it take him to go to the Pueblo, Salvador?” asked the
+commandant.
+
+“Oh! not long,” replied Salvador, “long as a good horse.”
+
+_Experientia docet._ Before I saw those tracks I used to set down the
+accounts I read in my Grecian history of wonderful time made by messengers
+to Athens and other classic centres as antique yarns. I now believe in the
+fastest Grecian time reported. Thus, the torch of faith is often lit by
+the merest straying spark—a lesson to us not to limit our belief to what
+is within the scope of our knowledge. We know so little.
+
+Jim and Joe had begun to growl over the continual ups and downs of the
+journey when we saw Salvador, who was some three or four hundred yards
+ahead, dismount at the foot of what seemed to be the steepest ascent yet.
+
+“This must be a stiff one,” said the commandant. “I see Salvador has
+dismounted. It takes a pretty steep ascent to make an Indian or a Mexican
+dismount. They hold to the saddle until the animal begins to bend
+backward.”
+
+It was a steep and toilsome ascent, winding in and out through huge
+boulders just wide enough apart to let a horse squeeze through. It was not
+always easy to convince the horses that there was room enough for them to
+pass. They would refuse to be convinced, and obstinately draw back, to the
+discomfort and danger of those leading them, and more so of those
+following.
+
+At last we reached the top of the ascent. The descent on the other side
+was a worthy pendant to it. We halted on the crest to enjoy the landscape
+before us. From the base of the height a level plain spread away for
+miles, unbroken save by a cluster of lofty perpendicular white rocks, each
+rising independently from the level plain. On the top of the highest of
+these rocks stood a little town, the smoke from its chimneys mingling with
+the clouds. This was Acoma.
+
+We descended slowly and carefully. A brisk trot of about two miles brought
+us to two lofty natural columns, through which the trail passed. They
+seemed the pillars of a gigantic portal—a resemblance which had struck the
+Indians, for they named it El Puerto: The Gate. We had now reached the
+base of the inhabited rock. An excavation near the base was pointed out to
+us by Salvador as the trace of an attempt to mine the position by the
+Spanish invaders! I think the story rather a doubtful one.
+
+I judged the rock to be about two hundred and fifty feet in height. The
+path up the rocky side to the village was steep and narrow. No wheeled
+vehicle has ever entered the Pueblo. The primitive _carreta_, with its
+clumsy wheels of solid disks cut from the trunk of some gigantic cotton‐
+wood, stopped short at the base—going thus far and no further. Provisions
+and other necessaries are packed up on the backs of surefooted donkeys.
+Water for drinking purposes is carried up on the heads of the Indians in
+large earthen vessels named _tinajas_; for other uses rain‐water is
+carefully gathered in natural tanks or hollows in the summit of the rock.
+There is a bypath or short‐cut up to the Pueblo which the Acomas generally
+use when unburdened or in a hurry. A glance showed us that it was only
+practicable for Acoma Indians. This short‐cut is in the most nearly
+perpendicular of any of the rocky sides. It consists of holes in the
+smooth and vertical side of the rock, in which the Indians place their
+hands and feet, and climb up after the fashion of sailors clambering up
+rigging, and with no less rapidity.
+
+We returned to the common highway, which now seemed by comparison a
+flowery path of dalliance. It was slow and tiresome work, however. After a
+rest or two, to breathe our animals and ourselves, we finally reached the
+comparatively level space, some acres in area, on the summit of the rock.
+
+Here we were met by Francisco, our guide’s son, the governor, matadores,
+alguazils, and other functionaries of the Pueblo. This is as good a place
+as any other to say that the governor and all other officials are elected
+annually. They were dressed in the usual Pueblo fashion. Their heads were
+uncovered. They were draped in large blankets, which gave them a very
+dignified appearance.
+
+We received a most cordial reception. The commandant had been a good
+friend to the Acomas—had protected them in their little trading
+operations, and helped them in the long, hard winters when their granaries
+were empty. The entire male population was assembled in the Plaza or
+central square. The squaws and children were at their front doors, that is
+to say, on the roofs, for the entrance to a Pueblo’s dwelling is from
+above.
+
+A fire for the dragoons to cook their rations by was made in the centre of
+the Plaza. The horses were picketed around. A contribution of corn and
+firewood was levied by the governor for the use of the escort. The Indians
+came in cheerful, laughing groups, bearing their _costals_ of corn or
+their bundles of wood. The escort being provided for, we went to the house
+of Francisco, the most comfortable house in the Pueblo; for Francisco was
+the wealthiest member of the little community. The governor’s dwelling was
+a poor one, and himself a poor man who was unable to entertain us as
+comfortably as Francisco could. He accompanied us thither.
+
+Francisco’s dwelling, like most of the others in the Pueblo, was a two‐
+storied adobe building, whitewashed inside and out. The mode of access was
+a ladder placed against the outer wall of the lower story. Having reached
+the top of this, you walk across the roof and enter the house by a door on
+the second story, the façade of which is somewhat retired from the front
+line of the first.
+
+Here we found some rosy, apple‐faced squaws, engaged in culinary and other
+domestic operations. One was kneeling grinding corn with the primitive
+_matata_. They smiled with all their countenances on us; and a half‐dozen
+of the whitest sets of teeth, that dentist or dentifrice never touched,
+gleamed a bright welcome to us. They wore the usual dark woollen robe,
+made of two pieces, about five feet long and three broad, sewed together
+at one of the narrow ends, but with an aperture for the head to pass
+through. The robe is then gathered round the waist and tied with a string.
+Their nut‐brown arms were bare, and encircled at the wrist by from one to
+a dozen brass rings; their feet were bare. The thick swathing of buckskin,
+with which they wrap their lower limbs when journeying, and which gives
+them the appearance of being terribly swollen, were laid aside, much to
+the furthering of a graceful effect.
+
+We were invited to descend to the sitting‐room, situated beneath, through
+a very narrow trap‐door. Don Juan walked fearlessly toward the aperture.
+We begged him to pause before he rushed into a place whence he could never
+hope to return. The Indians understood the joke, and enjoyed it hugely.
+
+So the Don entered the aperture, and by judicious squeezing actually
+succeeded in passing. His coat‐tails got through about the same time as
+his head. The others, being of the lean and hungry‐looking kind, had no
+difficulty in descending.
+
+From the room into which we had descended ventilation was completely
+excluded. Light was only admitted through one or two small panes of glass
+in apertures like port‐holes in the walls.
+
+We took seats on sheep‐skins spread in a circle around the floor. The
+commandant made known his business in passable Spanish; the governor
+replied, through Francisco, as interpreter. The worthy Don intervened,
+from time to time, between the high contracting parties, when there was a
+lack of language or danger of misunderstanding. The business was completed
+satisfactorily and in short order.
+
+While the floor was being set for dinner—tables not being in vogue here—we
+endeavored to obtain the Acoma’s idea of the antiquity of the Pueblo.
+Francisco, though he had learned to read and write, had not got beyond the
+Indian idea of time, space, or number. There is no medium between “many”
+and “few”—very far, _muy lejos_; and near, _cerca_.
+
+“How many years old is the Pueblo?”
+
+“_Muchos años._—Many years.”
+
+“About how many?”
+
+“Who knows, señor?” with a shrug. “A great many.”
+
+“Who is the oldest man in the Pueblo?”
+
+“The cacique.”
+
+The cacique, we were informed, is the official historian of the Pueblo.
+His records consist only in oral traditions, which he teaches to a youth
+selected for the purpose, who is to succeed him in his office when he
+dies.
+
+“Is the cacique very old?”
+
+“Si, señor! Very old.”
+
+It is useless to ask an Indian how old he or any other Indian is, as he
+never knows. So we did not ask how old the cacique was.
+
+“Was the cacique he succeeded very old?”
+
+“Yes, sir; very old.”
+
+“Was the Pueblo in existence as long as he can remember?”
+
+“Yes, sir; and as long as the cacique before him and the cacique before
+him could remember. But we shall have the cacique here shortly, and then
+after dinner we’ll have a good big talk about the many years ago.”
+
+Francisco, the governor, and his father now engaged in an earnest
+conversation in their Indian tongue, the result of which was that
+Francisco unlocked a vast trunk, of antique form and solidity, and took
+therefrom a pile of manuscript, which he handed us with great solemnity.
+The Indians looked upon this venerable pile with great reverence. It was
+probably the first time it had been touched by “outsiders.” We owed the
+permission to examine it to the many kind acts the commandant had
+performed for the Acomas.
+
+The first portion of the manuscript examined was a Missal. The Office of
+the Mass was copied in Latin in a fair plain hand, the work of some
+Spanish missionary. The ink had turned yellow, but the text was clear and
+legible throughout. Nothing in the MS. Missal indicated the date of its
+writing. A further examination of the venerable pages furnished us some
+information. Besides the Missal, they comprised a register in Spanish of
+births, marriages, and deaths. The earliest written record of the Pueblo
+which we found is the record of a baptism, 1725.
+
+Having gleaned what knowledge we could from the precious manuscripts, they
+were carefully and reverently put away in the ponderous chest, and secured
+by a padlock nearly as large as a travelling satchel.
+
+Dinner was now served. It was very good. It consisted of a chicken stew,
+good white bread, and very passable tea. The stew was made so intensely
+hot, however, by _chile colorado_,(229) that I did not enjoy it as much as
+I might have done had it been less fiery. I never could relish _chile_
+either _colorado_ or _verde_. But on this occasion, I determined to eat it
+if it burned me to a shell to show my appreciation of Acoma hospitality!
+
+The cacique—an old, white‐haired, blear‐eyed Indian, at least ninety—came
+in toward the close of the meal, accompanied by the youth whom he was
+instructing in the historical and legendary lore of the Pueblo. He evinced
+no inclination to be communicative, but showed a determination to make a
+rousing meal—something to which he was evidently not accustomed. After
+dinner he devoted himself to smoking our cigars; but not a word could we
+get out of him about the history of Acoma. Joe said that as a story‐teller
+he considered the cacique a decided failure.
+
+The governor signified that he was now ready to show us the church. So
+thither we proceeded.
+
+The church is, of course, of adobe. It was unused at the time we visited
+it. No priest had been attached to the Pueblo for some years. But it was
+not suffered to fall into decay. On one side of the altar was a painting
+of the Virgin and Child; on the other, one of S. Joseph. On the ceiling
+above the altar were large paintings of the sun and moon. Here we got
+another chronological glimmer—the last we found. It was an inscription
+which stated that the church had been renovated in 1802. The Indians told
+us it was done by some artist‐priest who came from far away—probably Spain
+or Italy. There are a pair of bells in the belfry. The Acoma tradition is
+that these bells were a gift to the Pueblo from a Queen of Spain. Of
+course they do not know the date of their reception. They say, however,
+that it was some time before the renovation of the church.
+
+We next went to the southern edge of the rock to look at the “short cut”
+from above. This was not easy or pleasant pedestrianism. The rock here
+ceased to be level, throwing up sharp craggy points. The Indians stepped
+from point to point, erect and graceful and without difficulty. The pale
+faces were compelled by a due discretion to abandon erect attitudes, and
+proceed bending down, and using hands as well as feet. A look down the
+rocky side was sufficient. The commandant shook his head, and said in
+Spanish:
+
+“That is no way for a white man to come up”—a remark which the Indians
+seemed to consider remarkably humorous. They laughed and “how‐how”‐ed
+vehemently.
+
+As we returned, we remarked that on one side of the rock it was bevelled
+down from the summit about forty or fifty feet, and then resumed its
+general steep and vertical character. Some houses were situated near the
+superior edge of this bend. A thrill ran through me from head to foot as I
+saw a child roll from the front of one of the houses down the incline.
+
+“He will be dashed to atoms!” I cried in horror.
+
+The Indians looked in the direction to which I frantically pointed, and
+then united in a good‐humored laugh.
+
+Soon another urchin, and another, and another followed the first, who
+picked himself up just at the deadly brink, and mounted the incline, to
+roll down again and again, as we used to on a hillside in snow with our
+sleds, in our younger days. This was play for the infantine Acomas. They
+were “keeping the pot a‐bilin’.”
+
+The Indians told us that no fatal accident had ever happened to any Acoma
+either while rolling down the dread incline “in pretty, pleasant play,” or
+climbing the steep path the mere sight of which had made us dizzy.
+Tradition records that only one Indian ever “went over the side.” He was
+saved by a projecting stump catching him by the breech‐clout and holding
+him suspended until he was rescued—unhurt.
+
+Our next visit was the _Estufa_. Here the sacred fire was burning. The
+_Estufa_ was an underground apartment. We descended through a trap‐door,
+which also served as a chimney, and down a smoke‐begrimed ladder. The
+chamber was some thirty feet in length and perhaps fifteen in width. We
+were informed that it was the general place of meeting—the public hall—the
+club‐room of the Pueblo. It was pretty hot and not very sweet down there.
+We found four Indians seated around the fire, each with a loom in front of
+him, weaving a blanket. Their only covering was the breech‐clout. The
+Indians told us, through Don Juan, that these men watched the fire, which
+was always kept burning—waiting for the coming of Montezuma. They were
+relieved by four others at stated times. We shook hands with the naked
+watchers, and “how‐how”‐ed with them in the usual way.
+
+“Do you think Montezuma will come?” asked Joe, through Don Juan, of one of
+the vigilants.
+
+The worthy, shrugging his naked shoulders, looked up sidewise at Joseph,
+and replied:
+
+“_Quizas? Quien sabe?_—May be! Who knows?”
+
+Joe withdrew. We all followed him. We had now seen all the lions of the
+Pueblo of Acoma. “Boots and saddles” and “to horse” were sounded, and with
+many hand‐shakes, some embraces, and general “how‐hows,” we bade adieu to
+the hospitable Acomas and their rocky home, and began our return march.
+
+
+
+
+New Publications.
+
+
+    THE LIFE OF DEMETRIUS AUGUSTIN GALLITZIN, PRINCE AND PRIEST. By
+    Sarah M. Brownson. With an Introduction by O. A. Brownson, LL.D.
+    New York: Pustet. 1872.
+
+
+Women of talent and cultivation make admirable biographers. In religious
+biography we know of nothing more charming than the lives written by Mère
+Chauguy. In recent English literature, the Lives of Mother Margaret Mary
+O’Halloran, by a lady whose name is unknown to us, and of S. Jane Frances
+de Chantal, by Miss Emily Bowles, are among the most perfect specimens of
+this very agreeable species of writing which we have met with in any
+language. This new and carefully prepared biography of a priest who was
+illustrious both by birth and Christian virtue, by a lady already known as
+the author of several works of fiction, well deserves to be classed with
+the best of its kind in English Catholic literature. It is a work of
+thorough, patient, and conscientious labor, and for the first time
+adequately presents the history and character of Prince Gallitzin in their
+true light. Certainly, we never knew before how truly heroic and admirable
+a man was this Russian prince who came to pass his life as a missionary in
+the forests which crowned in his day the summit of the Alleghanies in
+Pennsylvania. The charm of a biography is found in a certain fulness and
+sprightliness of style and manner, a picturesqueness and ideality of
+ornament and coloring, a warmth and glow of sentiment, which give life and
+reality to the narrative. Miss Brownson still possesses the juvenile
+_élan_ which naturally finds its expression in the style we have
+indicated, and has also attained that sobriety and maturity of judgment
+which give it the rightly subdued tone and finish. In several matters of
+considerable delicacy which she has been obliged to handle, we think she
+has shown tact and discretion, while at the same time using enough of the
+freedom of a historian to bring out the truth of facts and events which
+needed to be told in order to make a veritable record and picture of the
+life of her subject. The prince is fortunate in his biographer. Would it
+were the lot of every great man in the church to find a similar one! Miss
+Brownson’s book seems to us the best religious biography which has been
+written by anyone of our American Catholic authors. We would like to see
+more works of this sort from feminine writers, to whom we are already so
+much indebted for works both of the graver and the lighter kind, and
+particularly from Miss Brownson, who has fully proved her ability in the
+volume before us.
+
+
+    BIBLIOGRAPHIA CATHOLICA AMERICANA. A list of works written by
+    Catholic authors and published in the United States. By Rev.
+    Joseph M. Finotti. Part I., 1784 to 1820 inclusive. New York: The
+    Catholic Publication Society. 1872. 8vo. pp. 319.
+
+
+It was said of Bartlett’s _Dictionary of Americanisms_ that it was the
+first dictionary that a man could read through with pleasure. The same in
+the way of bibliography may be said of this; for, if any of our readers
+supposes that the title tells the truth, he is mistaken. It is not a mere
+_list_, as the author modestly calls it. Some twelve years ago, Mr. Shea
+published in one of our Catholic papers a list of titles of “The First
+Catholic Books printed in this County,” coming down to the same date and
+including the same period as our author, and giving sixty‐eight titles.
+This meagre beginning of American Catholic bibliography has in F.
+Finotti’s hands grown to nearly five hundred titles, including some few
+imprints later than 1820.
+
+It is not merely a collection of titles of Catholic works, but of all
+works by Catholic authors printed in the country, with notes of the
+highest interest to Catholics who care at all for what was done by our
+fathers in the faith in this republic. Biographical notices, notices of
+celebrated books, accounts of controversies of the time, anecdotes
+illustrative of Catholic life in the earlier days, notes of Catholic
+printers and journalists, all find their place in these notes, in which
+the abundant knowledge of our earlier men and times, and things acquired
+by the patient and loving research of years, fairly bubble out
+spontaneously. It is not a history indeed, but to the historian will be
+invaluable as an authority and a guide.
+
+On some points this work is absolutely exhaustive. The collection of
+pamphlets and works growing out of the Hogan affair in Philadelphia,
+considering their perishable nature, is perfectly wonderful, and his
+library alone can enable any one to go thoroughly into the history of that
+unhappy matter which was destructive to so many souls.
+
+Of the writings and publications of the celebrated Mathew Carey, we have
+also here by far the most accurate and comprehensive account ever drawn
+up, comprising nearly twenty‐five pages.
+
+Many will be amazed to see how many sterling Catholic books were issued
+early in the century, and thus be able to judge of the zeal and true
+religious feeling of the little body of Catholics who so generously
+sustained the publishers, as well as of the public spirit of a man like
+Bernard Dornin—in our mind, as in F. Finotti’s, the type of what a
+Catholic publisher should be. Of him as of many other Catholics our author
+gives biographical notices that we should look for in vain in all the
+cyclopædias and biographical dictionaries. Book notices often end with the
+assertion that the book should be in every family; we hardly suppose the
+publishers ready to supply every Catholic family in the country with a
+copy, for the edition is small, and must be taken up at once. It is by no
+means merely a book for the Dryasdust collector or antiquarian. It must
+find its place in the libraries of many of our gentlemen who love their
+religion and love books, as well as in our college libraries. We trust
+that it will impel all to endeavor to have some of the early printed
+Catholic books, as matters of laudable pride. If they can even find some
+that have escaped the Argus eyes of the reverend collector and his
+associate book‐hunters, they will, we trust, be good enough Christians to
+bear with equanimity even that severe trial to a bibliographer.
+
+This _Bibliography_ commends itself to those interested in the
+bibliography of the country or the history of printing in the United
+States.
+
+In the _Historical Magazine_ some months since there was a Bibliography of
+works on Unitarianism, but it was silent as to Father Kohlmann’s work, and
+to a sermon by a Catholic clergyman of Pittsburg. So, too, Sabin’s
+_Bibliopolist_ recently gave a list of books printed in Brooklyn, but was
+silent as to a _Catholic Doctrine_ printed there in 1817, as well as of
+Coate’s very curious _Reply_ to Rev. F. Richards’ supposed reasons for
+becoming a Catholic.
+
+There is one strange point about American bibliography, and that is that
+the laborers in it have been almost exclusively from Europe. Ludewig gave
+the _Bibliography of Indian Languages_ and that of Local History;
+O’Callaghan, that of American Bibles; Harisse, that of the earliest
+American; Rich was a pioneer in the same field; and now Finotti gives us
+the Catholic element. Where are our native bibliographers?
+
+
+    LE LIBERALISME. LECONS DONNEES A L’UNIVERSITE LAVAL. Par l’Abbé
+    Benjamin Paquet, Docteur en Theologie, et Professeur à la Faculté
+    de Theologie. Quebec: De l’Imprimerie du _Canadien_. Brochure, pp.
+    100. 1872.
+
+
+Lower Canada, considered both in respect to the condition of the Catholic
+Church therein, and to the political well‐being of its people, is an
+eminently fortunate region, despite the rigor of its climate. It is
+especially pre‐eminent in respect to the Catholic education given to young
+men of the leisured classes, and others who go through the intermediate
+and higher courses. Laval University is truly a splendid institution among
+many others which make Quebec an _unique_ city in Northern America. These
+remarks are suggested by the pamphlet before us, which is a specimen of
+the sound and opportune instruction given at the Laval University. The
+Lectures contained in it give an exposition which is both learned and
+clear of that most important portion of the Syllabus which relates to the
+errors of modern liberalism condemned in the Pontifical Acts of Pius IX.
+When will the Catholics of the United States enjoy privileges similar to
+those which are the portion of the Catholics of Lower Canada? The Abbé
+Paquet’s Lectures were delivered as a part of his course on the law of
+nature and of nations, and were attended not only by his pupils, but by a
+numerous and select audience, several of whom requested their publication.
+We have already sufficiently expressed our approbation of their doctrine
+and style, and they have been favorably noticed in Europe. We are
+confident that a considerable number of our readers will hasten to procure
+them, and receive great profit from their perusal.
+
+
+    CARDINAL WISEMAN’S WORKS. New Edition, first 3 vols. New York: P.
+    O’Shea.
+
+
+This is a reissue of a new London edition which we most cordially commend.
+The first two volumes, containing the _Lectures on the Connection between
+Science and Revealed Religion_, have already been noticed in these pages.
+The third volume contains the splendid treatise on the Holy Eucharist.
+Cardinal Wiseman was a great writer, a great prelate, and a remarkably
+devout and holy man. His works are among our choicest treasures, and as
+such ought to be everywhere circulated and continually perused by those
+who wish to imbue their minds with the purest doctrine and the most
+valuable knowledge.
+
+
+    THE LIFE OF S. AUGUSTINE, BISHOP, CONFESSOR, AND DOCTOR OF THE
+    CHURCH. By P. E. Moriarty, D.D. Ex‐Assistant General O.S.A.
+    Philadelphia: Cunningham. 1873.
+
+
+This is a popular biography, though proceeding from the pen of a learned
+man, and showing marks of erudition. The sketch is a complete one, and
+shows great power of generalization and condensation in the writer, with
+vigor and impetus of style. It is not, however, minute in respect to the
+saint’s public life, or his great work as a philosopher and doctor of the
+church. This could not be expected in a work of moderate size adapted for
+popular reading. There is, however, a brief summary of the saint’s
+writings, with a synopsis, and an account of the Augustinian Order, all of
+which are of interest and value to the general reader.
+
+
+    PHOTOGRAPHIC VIEWS; OR, RELIGIOUS AND MORAL TRUTHS REFLECTED IN
+    THE UNIVERSE. By F. X. Weninger, D.D., S.J. New York: P. O’Shea.
+    1873.
+
+
+A handsomely printed volume, with a very ornamental title‐page quite
+appropriate to the nature of the book. The views of truth presented in
+this book are expressed in aphorisms. Good taste, poetic sensibility,
+spiritual wisdom, and the purest Christian feeling are their chief
+characteristics. We are disposed to think this the best of F. Weninger’s
+works. There are many persons who take great delight in aphorisms of this
+kind, and we think all such readers will like this book. It is good also
+as a help to meditation, and a treasury of short spiritual readings for
+those who have not time for long ones; and will be useful to those who
+like to stop occasionally in more laborious occupations of the mind, and
+gather a little spiritual nosegay.
+
+
+    MEMOIRS OF MADAME DESBORDES‐VALMORE. By the late C. A. Sainte‐
+    Beuve. With a Selection from her Poems. Translated by Harriet W.
+    Preston. Boston: Roberts Brothers. 1873.
+
+
+Madame Valmore was one of those poets of the affections who
+
+
+    “Learn in suffering what they teach in song.”
+
+
+No one can look for a moment at her portrait as depicted in this touching
+book without feeling that the thorn is continually pressing against her
+gentle breast. Her poetry and her letters are the very outcry of
+impassioned love and grief. “I am like the Indian that sings at the
+stake,” she says. One of her volumes is entitled _Tears_, every line of
+which is a pensive sigh. Her poems are full of “the charm of that
+melancholy which M. de Segur calls _the luxury of grief_.” M. Michelet
+says: “She alone among us had the _gift of tears_—that gift which smites
+the rock and assuages the thirst of the soul!” M. Sainte‐Beuve calls her
+“the _Mater Dolorosa_ of poetry,” but that title, consecrated to a higher,
+diviner type of sorrow, is one that most of us would shrink from applying
+to ordinary mortals.
+
+It would almost seem as if the highest, purest notes—“half ecstasy, half
+pain”—only spring from the soul overshadowed by sorrow, as the eyes of
+some birds are darkened when they are taught to sing. Mme. Valmore
+herself, in allusion to a brother poet, wonders “if actual misery were
+requisite for the production of notes that so haunt one’s memory.”
+
+The tombs among which she used to play as a child in the old churchyard at
+Douai seem to have cast their funereal shadows over her whole life—shadows
+that lend to her sad muse so attractive a charm. One of her poems thus
+begins:
+
+
+    “Do not write. I am sad and would my life were o’er.
+      A summer without thee?—Oh! night of starless gloom!—
+    I fold the idle arms that cannot clasp thee more—
+      To knock at my heart’s door, were like knocking at a tomb.
+                Do not write.”
+
+
+Mme. Valmore’s nature was eminently feminine. Her heart was her guide. She
+was a being of impulse and sympathy. But her instincts were so delicate
+and true that they were to her what reason and philosophy are to colder
+natures. Her imagination was thoroughly Catholic. It is only Catholicity
+that develops souls of such tender grace and beauty, and she was brought
+up under its influences. A cheerful piety, Catholic in tone, seems to have
+pervaded her life, and consoled and sustained her in its many dark hours.
+She loved to pray in the deserted aisle of some shadowy church full of
+mystery and peace. “She had her Christ—the Christ of the poor and
+forsaken, the prisoner and the slave, the Christ of the Magdalen and the
+good Samaritan, a Christ of the future of whom she herself has sung in one
+of her sweetest strains:
+
+
+    ‘He whose pierced hands have broken so many chains,’ ”
+
+
+—a line that appeals to all who have sinned and been forgiven!
+
+In her last years she thus writes: “I see at an immense distance the
+Christ who shall come again. His breath is moving over the crowd. He opens
+his arms wide, but there are no more nails—no more for ever!”
+
+Her devotion to Mary is constantly peeping out in her letters. After
+visiting a church at Brussels, she writes thus to her daughter: “To‐day we
+saw the black Virgin with the Child Jesus also black like his mother.
+These Madonnas wring my heart with a thousand reminiscences. They are
+nothing in the way of art, but they are so associated with my earliest and
+sweetest faiths that I positively adore those stiff pink‐lined veils and
+wreaths of perennial flowers made of cambric so stout that all the winds
+of heaven could never cause a leaf to flutter.”
+
+She writes her brother: “Lift up your hat when you pass the Church of
+Notre Dame, and lay upon its threshold the first spring flowers you find.”
+
+One of the most touching features of her life is her devotedness to this
+brother, an old soldier and pensioner in the hospital at Douai, whom she
+aided out of her own scanty purse, and still more by the moral support she
+was continually giving him in the most delicate manner; trying to ennoble
+his unfortunate past so as to give him dignity in his own eyes—a thing so
+often forgotten in our intercourse with those who are in danger of losing
+their self‐respect.
+
+Mme. Valmore’s charity and sympathies were not confined to her own
+kindred. They responded to every appeal. The condemned criminal and
+prisoners of every degree excited the compassion of her heart. At a time
+of great distress at Lyons, she says she is “ashamed to have food and fire
+and two garments when so many poor creatures have none.” And yet she seems
+not to have had too many of the comforts of life herself. One Christmas
+eve she speaks of kneeling on her humble hearth—“a hearth where there is
+not much fire save that of her own loving, anxious heart—” to pray.
+
+It is sad to see a woman with such a refined, poetical nature, and a heart
+sensitive to the last degree, condemned to a fate so chilling and unkind.
+But she never lost courage. Living in narrow lodgings, and on limited
+means, she contrived to give a certain artistic air to everything around
+her, and received her visitors with polished ease and self‐possession,
+hiding her griefs under the grace of her manner and the vivacity of her
+conversation. Her courage and fortitude were admirable under adverse
+circumstances and such afflictions as the loss of her daughters. No book
+not strictly religious could teach a more forcible lesson of patient,
+cheerful endurance—how “to suffer and be strong.” The work is elegantly
+translated, and is a welcome addition to the lives of celebrated French
+ladies already issued by the same publishers.
+
+
+    THE ENGLISH IN IRELAND IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY. By James Anthony
+    Froude, M.A. In 2 vols. Vol. I. New York: Scribner, Armstrong &
+    Co. 1873.
+
+
+We have here the first volume of a new and very elaborate work by the
+adventurous historian of England, and chivalrous champion of Henry VIII.
+and his daughter Elizabeth. It might perhaps have been hoped that enough
+had been said of Mr. Froude in these columns, and that our readers had
+done with him. His reputation as a faithful historian had been sorely
+damaged, and indeed irretrievably ruined, by several indignant critics in
+England, in Scotland, and in Ireland, as well as in the United States (by
+the short, sharp and decisive onslaught of Mr. Meline); so that it has
+been an actual surprise to the literary world to find him once more
+tempting Providence in a new book, heralded and advertised by a course of
+lectures in New York. But this is the nature of the man: he must surprise
+and startle, or he dies; he must provoke the most wondering and angry
+contradiction and comment, and gratify the small feminine spite that
+possesses him, provided he can sting and wound like a hornet. For him, to
+scold is to live.
+
+The present volume, although entitled _The English in Ireland in the
+Eighteenth Century_, is in fact occupied, for more than two hundred pages,
+with an account of the dealings of his country with Ireland during the
+XVIIth century, and presents his views of Irish history at the notable
+periods of the insurrection—or alleged “massacre”—in 1641, as well as the
+short reign of James II. The narrative ends at the time of the small
+French invasion under Thurot, shortly after the middle of the XVIIIth
+century; leaving Still to be treated the whole era of the Volunteering,
+the Insurrection of ’98, and the Union, so‐called. Indeed, if the author
+carry forward his subject into the present century, as he has carried it
+backward into the one before the last, he will have the great famines to
+deal with, and the multitudinous emigration; so that we may expect a vast
+picture, covering the whole canvas, portraying from the strictly English
+point of view that ghastly history in its full perspective. The Froude
+theory is, on the whole, quite simple; nothing can be more easily
+understood. It is, in few words, that the English nation having been
+“forced by situation and circumstances” to take charge of Ireland and its
+people, when it suited the English to change their religion, or to come
+back to it, or to change it again, they were bound in duty to compel the
+Irish to change along with them each time, by means of pains and
+penalties, from heavy fines to transportation and death on the gallows;
+also that the English having a strong wish to possess themselves of all
+the lands of Ireland, everything was lawful and right to effect that
+object. The reader will remark, with surprise (and the more surprise, the
+better for Froude), that in his lectures lately delivered in New York,
+which were a kind of abstract of the work then in press, he did not
+venture _to say_ before an intelligent audience of freemen some of the
+things which he has dared to print in the book then just ready to burst
+upon the world. For example, he did not say, even before the “Christian
+young men,” such words as these which are found in the book (p. 609):
+
+“The consent of man was not asked when he was born into the world: his
+consent will not be asked when his time comes to die. _As little_ has his
+consent to do with the laws which, while he lives, he is bound to obey.”
+
+This sentiment he perhaps thought it unnecessary to enunciate here;
+because, in fact, he intended it solely for the Irish, not by any means
+for the Americans, although it reads like a universal maxim for the human
+race. Again, he did not think it necessary to say in so plain words what
+he has laid down clearly enough in this passage (p. 213):
+
+“No government need _keep terms_ with such a creed [meaning the Catholic
+Church] when there is power to abolish it. To call the repression of
+opinions which had issued so many times in blood and revolt _by the name
+of religions persecution_ is mere abuse of words.”
+
+
+    ELEVATIONS POÉTIQUES ET RELIGIEUSES. Par Marie Jenna. Deuxième
+    Edit. 2 vols. Paris: Adrien le Clerc et Cie. 1872.
+
+
+As the eye lingers upon a beautiful landscape, spring clad and fair in the
+clear light of the new‐risen sun; as the ear loiters unwilling to lose the
+last echoed link of some simple melting melody; as the hand tarries loth
+to quit the gentle grasp that speaks unspoken sympathy, so have
+we—reluctant to lose such fair pictures, such moving lays, such deep and
+tender feeling—lingered and loitered and tarried with Marie Jenna, “the
+Poet of the Vosges.” Gifted with the nice perception of a true poet, Marie
+Jenna clothes the simplest ideas in language of such rare delicacy, so
+fresh, tender, vivid, and withal so musical, that mind, heart, eye, and
+ear, all are at once engaged. A bird, a butterfly, a flower, gains new
+interest in her hands; she flings a grace around it, she vests it with a
+dignity it never had before; she makes it live again. Take, for instance,
+the opening stanzas of “Le Papillon”:
+
+
+    “Pourquoi t’approcher en silence
+      Et menacer mon vol joyeux?
+    Par quelle involontaire offense
+      Ai‐je pu déplaire à tes yeux?
+
+    “Je suis la vivante étincelle
+      Qui monte et descend tour à tour;
+    La fleur à qui Dieu donne une aile,
+      Un souffle, un regard, un amour.
+
+    “Je suis le frère de la rose;
+      Elle me cache aux importuns,
+    Puis sur son cœur je me repose
+      Et je m’enivre de parfums.
+
+    “Ma vie est tout heureuse et pure,
+      Pourquoi désires‐tu ma mort?
+    Oh! dis‐moi, roi de la nature,
+      Serais‐tu jaloux de mon sort?
+
+    “Va, je sais bien que tu t’inclines
+      Souvent pour essuyer des pleurs,
+    Que tes yeux comptent les épines
+      Où je ne vois rien que des fleurs.
+
+    “Je sais que parfois ton visage
+      Se trouble et s’assombrit soudain,
+    Lorsqu’en vain je cherche un nuage
+      Au fond de l’horizon serein.
+
+    “Mais Celui dont la main divine
+      A daigné nous former tous deux,
+    Pour moi parfuma la colline,
+      Et de loin te montra les cieux.
+
+    “Il me fit deux ailes de flamme,
+      A moi, feu follet du printemps;
+    Pour toi, son fils, il fit une âme
+      Plus grande que le firmament.
+
+    “Ecoute ma voix qui t’implore,
+      Loin de moi détourne tes pas...
+    Laisse moi vivre un jour encore,
+      O toi qui ne finiras pas!
+
+    “Mon bonheur à moi, c’est la vie,
+      La liberté sous le ciel bleu,
+    Le ruisseau, l’amour sans envie:
+      Le tien ... c’est le secret de Dieu.”
+
+
+What can be fresher or more charming than this naïve, earnest appeal for
+life and liberty? And again, in “Pour un Oiseau,” beginning with:
+
+
+    “Il est à toi, c’est vrai ... Frère, veux tu qu’il meure?
+      Sa beauté, sa chanson, tout est là ... dans ta main;
+    Et l’arbuste où sa voix gazouillait tout à l’heure
+      Au bosquet, si tu veux, sera muet demain.
+
+    “Tu le tiens: sa faiblesse à ta force le livre;
+      Mais aussi ta pitié peut le laisser aller;
+    Ne le fais pas mourir! il est si bon de vivre
+      Lorsque l’été commence et qu’on peut s’envoler,”
+
+
+we find the same delicacy of thought, the same rippling, flowing language;
+and what joyousness and how cheery it sounds: _il est si bon de vivre_.
+
+But Marie Jenna strikes deeper chords, awakes more solemn strains, than
+these; and through them all, the graver as the lighter, binding them in
+one harmonious whole, there sings out the same clear note of firm,
+enlightened faith that never wavers; it penetrates each thing she handles,
+giving that breadth and largeness to her field of view that it alone can
+give. In some beautiful stanzas, “Beati qui lugeant,” she draws near to
+one bowed down with sorrow, and fearlessly, yet oh! how tenderly touching
+the wound because she knows its cure, she speaks:
+
+
+    “Va, ton sein cache en vain le glaive qui le blesse:
+    J’ai compris ton silence et j’ai prié pour toi.
+    Laisse aller ta fierté comme un poids qui t’oppresse,
+                Et pleure devant moi.
+
+    “Il est, je le sais bien, des jours où la souffrance
+    Trouve en sa solitude une âpre volupté;
+    Et le monde léger voit passer en silence
+                Sa pâle majesté.
+
+    “Et la main d’un ami s’arrètant incertaine,
+    N’ose écarter les plis de son voile de deuil.
+    Il est des maux si grands, que la parole humaine
+                Expire sur le seuil.
+
+    “Mais deux jours sont passés; il est temps que je vienne;
+    Oh! laisse un front d’ami penché sur ta douleur!
+    Ne te détourne pas: Mets ta main dans la mienne,
+                Ton âme sur mon cœur.
+
+    “Si je ne t’apportais qu’une amitié fidèle,
+    Mes pas avec respect s’éloigneraient d’ici.
+    J’attendrais que la tienne enfin se souvint d’elle,
+                Mais j’ai souffert aussi...
+
+    “Je ne te dirai point cette vaine parole
+    Que la douleur accueille en son muet dédain.
+    Non, ce que j’ai pour toi, c’est un mot qui console,
+                C’est un secret divin.”
+
+
+Already we seem to see awaked attention, a gleam of hope flit across the
+stern, wan face that marks such helpless, hopeless misery; now softening
+the hard, cold look that bid defiance to all sorrow, repelled all
+sympathy; now changing it to one of anxious longing and of mute entreaty
+for the proffered gift, _le mot qui console_. And see, or is it fancy
+only, or are there really tears now falling, “gemlike, the last drops of
+the exhausted storm”? Space forbids us to give it in its fulness, this
+_secret divin_, to curtail it would spoil it: so we send the reader to the
+original, and would ask him only if in the last stanza he does not hear
+two voices singing:
+
+
+    “Heureux les affligés! dit la Vérité même.
+    Heureux, c’est vrai, mon Dieu! quand vous avez parlé.
+    Nous voulons bien souffrir si le bonheur suprême,
+                Est d’être consolé.”
+
+
+Then look at this exquisite little picture, “L’Enfant Ressuscité.” Rarely
+have we met with one more pathetic. It is very delicately painted, with
+shades so subtile that, in the simplicity of the whole, we are apt to
+overlook them. And here also we have a glimpse of that reverential love
+for childhood that is by no means the least characteristic trait of Marie
+Jenna:
+
+
+    “Elle avait tant gémi, sa mère, et tant pleuré!
+    Tant pressé sur son sein le front décoloré,
+    Que dans le corps glacé l’âme était revenue,
+    Et qu’en bénissant Dieu, palpitante, éperdue,
+    Comme un trésor qu’on cache elle avait emporté
+    Dans ses deux bras tremblants l’enfant ressuscité!
+    Trois mois s’étaient passés depuis.....mais, chose étrange!
+    On eut dit que le ciel avait fait un échange.
+    L’enfant penchait son front comme un bouton flétri,
+    Et depuis ces trois mois, jamais il n’avait ri.
+    Il préférait aux jeux l’ombre silencieuse;
+    Sa mère en l’embrassant n’osait pas être heureuse....
+
+    “Des volets entr’ouverts s’élancent des chansons;
+    Dans les clochers frémit la voix des carillons.
+    Ecoute, mon Louis, ces chants, ces joyeux rires....
+    Vois; c’est le jour de l’an; dis ce que tu désires.
+    Chaque enfant pour étrenne a des jouets nouveaux.
+    En veux‐tu de pareils? en veux‐tu de plus beaux?
+    Veux‐tu ce bélier gris qu’on traîne et qui va paître
+    Au printemps dans les prés l’herbe qui vient naître?
+    Mais regarde plutôt; des pinceaux, des couleurs,
+    Qui d’un papier tout blanc font un bouquet de fleurs.
+    Oh! vois donc ce ballon de laine tricolore
+    Qui s’élève et retombe et se relève encore!
+    Tu n’aimes pas courir..... Que puis‐je te donner?
+    Dis.....ta mère à présent ne sait plus deviner.
+    Veux‐tu ce sabre d’or qui déjà ferait croire
+    Que mon petit Louis médite une victoire?
+    Aimes‐tu ce chalet d’un long toit recouvert?
+    Mais non....qu’en ferais‐tu? Veux‐tu ce livre ouvert,
+    Où près de chaque histoire on regarde une image,
+    Ou l’on rit, où l’on pleure, où l’on devient plus sage?
+    Ah! voici des oiseaux! tu les aimerais mieux!
+    Les oiseaux sont vivants; tu les ferais heureux!
+    Si tu voulais des lisandes roses fleuries,
+    J’en saurais bien trouver, Louis, pour que tu ries.
+    Réponds; je t’aime tant! n’oses‐tu me parler?
+    Tu pleurais ce matin; je veux te consoler.
+    Dis‐moi ce doux secret pendant que je l’embrasse.
+    Que veux‐tu, mon Louis? Et l’enfant, à voix basse:
+            Des ailes pour m’envoler!”
+
+
+No one can fail to be struck with the sudden stillness that follows the
+mother’s anxious striving to drive away the cloud that would hang over her
+little one; with the awe and fear, too, that fill her heart; with the
+mystery in the whispered answer of the strange mysterious child given back
+from death in answer to her passionate prayer. It sets us thinking of that
+other mother whose grief so touched the Master’s heart that he spoke the
+word, “and he that was dead sat up and began to speak. And he delivered
+him to his mother.” Did that young man go home so grave, with never a
+smile to light his face, so strangely altered, that, after the first burst
+of gladness, his mother, clasping him to her bosom, dared not rejoice?
+
+Of the more serious pieces, perhaps not one equals in force “La plus
+grande Douleur.” It is the old tale, always new though so oft repeated:
+the old tale that startles, shocks, and brings sharp pain as for the first
+time it comes home to each one, telling that that strong bond which binds
+friends closer, draws classes nearer, makes nations firmer, has snapped
+and riven two hearts asunder; that the newly‐awakened intellect first
+meeting early faith has turned aside, has chosen a road far other than
+that on which till now both friends had travelled hand in hand; that that
+“little superficial knowledge of philosophy that inclines man’s mind to
+atheism” has come between them like an icy barrier, chilling the old
+friendship and making everything so dark and strange which before was
+warmth and light between them; and with effect so drear, so piercing, too,
+and sharp, that the unchanged heart feels any pain than that would be
+light to bear:
+
+
+    “Oui mon Dieu! nous pouvons, sans que l’âme succombe,
+    Laisser notre bonheur à ce passé qui tombe;
+    Nous pouvons au matin former un rêve pur,
+    Tout d’amour et de paix, tout de flamme et d’azur,
+    Puis livrer les débris de sa beauté ravie
+    A ce vent du désert, qui laisse notre vie
+    Sans fleur et sans épi comme un champ moissonné;
+    Meliner notre front pâle et découronné,
+    Et devenir semblable à cette pauvre plante
+    Qui n’est pas morte encore, et qui n’est plus vivante,
+    Nous pouvons voir gisant sur un lit de douleur,
+    Celui qui nous restait, l’ami consolateur,
+    Compter chaque moment de son heure dernière,
+    Poser nos doigts tremblants sur sa froide paupière,
+    Et baiser son visage, et nous dire; Il est mort!
+    Nous le pouvons, mon Dieu! Parfois le cœur est fort.
+
+    “Mais aimer une autre âme, et la trouver si belle
+    Qu’on frémit de bonheur en se penchant vers elle,
+    Puis un jour contempler d’un regard impuissant
+    Sur sa beauté céleste une ombre qui descend;
+    De cette âme où passaient les souffles de la grâce,
+    Sentir parfois monter quelque chose qui glace,
+    Douter, prier tous bas, pleurer d’anxiété,
+    Craindre, espérer..... Longtemps marcher à son côté
+    Sans oser voir au fond.... Puis un jour où l’on ose,
+    Reculer de partout où le regard se pose,
+    Où fut le feu sacré toucher de froids débris,
+    Murmurer en tremblant un langage incompris
+    Où Dieu passa, chercher sa lumineuse trace,
+    Et n’y trouver plus rien ... rien! pas même un soupir,
+    Pas un cri douloureux vers l’aube qui s’efface,
+            C’est trop souffrir!”
+
+
+The two volumes before us contain many poems, both short and long, of such
+great freshness and beauty, so full of original turns and delicate
+touches, that it is difficult to choose from amongst them. However, we
+have said enough to give a fair notion of Marie Jenna’s style, and quite
+enough to show that it is her own, with its own peculiar charm. And so our
+task is done. If it be said that, having uttered only praise and found no
+fault, we have but half fulfilled the critic’s task, we answer that we
+never meant the tone of criticism. All know that man’s most perfect work
+is not without its blemish; but in our first walk through so fair a
+garden, meeting new beauties on every side, it would have been ungracious
+in us to have sought defects: that task we leave to others. Ours has been
+to welcome, and to tell of fresh flowers of much loveliness offered to us
+from across the sea, with the certainty that no one can read her
+“Elévations Poétiques” without feeling that he is indebted for some real
+enjoyment to the charming “Poet of the Vosges.”
+
+
+    THE TWO YSONDES, AND OTHER VERSES. By Edward Ellis. London:
+    Pickering. 1872.
+
+
+It takes but a short while to read this thin volume; nor will any one with
+a taste for true poetry find the perusal a task. The author undoubtedly
+possesses “the vision and the faculty divine,” and belongs to the
+subjective school of which Tennyson is king—a school peculiarly capable of
+teaching a subjective age. The more the pity, then, say we, that Mr. Ellis
+should have made his chief poem, “The Two Ysondes,” hang on the idea that
+love is fate. His “Two Ysondes” are the two “Isolts” of Tennyson; but
+Tennyson does not attempt to excuse the passion of Mark’s wife for
+Tristrem. Our author makes it originate in Tristrem and Ysonde having
+“drunk,” “by an evil chance,” a philtre which had been placed “in
+Tristrem’s charge” as “a wedding‐gift for Ysonde and King Mark” (p. 7).
+Now, it may be said that this does away with the guilty aspect of the
+romance, and throws over the whole a veil of faëry. Yes; but we insist
+that it is, therefore, the more mischievous, as teaching the doctrine of
+fatality.
+
+Neither is this the only, or even the most, objectionable feature of the
+poem; for, together with descriptions of emotions and caresses which would
+be chaste if the theme were lawful love, all idea of sin is kept away, and
+especially as regards its eternal consequences. There is not a word about
+remorse during life, or of repentance at death. But Tristrem dies in
+despair of beholding the object of his passion; and Ysonde, in turn,
+expires on the breast of her dead lover, declaring that she will “go with
+him _beyond the bars of fate_.”
+
+Now, we should not have troubled ourselves to make these strictures but
+that Mr. Ellis shows powers for the misuse of which he will be very
+responsible. Moreover, as is clear from some of his shorter lyrics,
+particularly “At a Shrine,” his mind has a religious bent, with (of
+course) Catholic sympathies.
+
+With regard to his verse, it is less Tennysonic than his thought. Better
+if, while originating metres (with which we have no quarrel whatever), he
+modelled both his lines and his diction on the peerless accuracy of
+England’s laureate.
+
+
+
+Books And Pamphlets Received.
+
+
+    From KELLY, PIET & CO., Baltimore: The Money God. By M. A.
+    Quinton.
+
+    From LYNCH, COLE & MEEHAN, New York: English Misrule in Ireland: A
+    Course of Lectures. By V. Rev. T. N. Burke, O.P. 12mo. pp. 299.
+
+    From J. A. MCGEE, New York: “Thumping English Lies”: Froude’s
+    Slanders on Ireland and Irishmen. With Preface and Notes by Col.
+    J. E. McGee, and Wendell Phillips’ Views of the Situation. 12mo.
+    pp. 224.—Half Hours with Irish Authors: Selections from Griffin,
+    Lover, Carleton, and Lever. 12mo. pp. 330.
+
+    From A. D. F. RANDOLPH, New York: Christ at the Door. By Susan H.
+    Ward. 12mo, pp. 232.
+
+    From J. B. LIPPINCOTT & CO., Philadelphia: Expiation. By Mrs.
+    Julia C. R. Dorr.
+
+    From J. R. OSGOOD & CO., Boston: The Romance of the Harem. By Mrs.
+    A. H. Leonowens. 12mo. pp. viii.‐277.
+
+    From ROBERTS BROS., Boston: What Katy Did. By Susan
+    Coolidge.—Thorvaldsen: His Life and Works. By Eugene Plon. 12mo.
+    pp. xvi.‐320.—The World Priest. By Leopold Schefer. 12mo. pp.
+    xv.‐371.
+
+    From THE AUTHOR: Sermon at the Month’s Mind of the Most Rev. M. J.
+    Spalding, D.D., Preached at the Church of the American College
+    (Rome). By the V. Rev. Dr. Chatard, Rector. Paper, 8vo. pp. 30.
+
+    From E. H. BUTLER & CO., Philadelphia: The Etymological Reader. By
+    Epes Sargent and Amasa May.
+
+    From S. D. KIERNAN, Clerk, Department of Public Instruction:
+    Report of the Board of Public Instruction of the City and County
+    of New York, for the year ending Dec. 31, 1871; with Addenda to
+    May, 1872.—Manual of the Department of Public Instruction, 1871‐2.
+    18mo, pp. 262.
+
+    From HOLT & WILLIAMS, New York: Sermons by the Rev. H. R. Hawes,
+    M.A. 12mo, pp. xiv. 347.
+
+    From AMERICAN BAPTIST SOCIETY, Philadelphia: The Baptist Short
+    Method, with Inquirers and Opponents. By Rev. C. T. Hiscox, D.D.
+    18mo, pp. 216.
+
+    From HURD & HOUGHTON, New York: The City of God and the Church
+    Makers. By R. Abbey. 12mo, pp. xx. 315.
+
+    From BURNS, OATES & CO., London (New York: Sold by The Catholic
+    Publication Society): The Life of Monseigneur Berneux, Bishop of
+    Capse. Vicar‐Apostolic of Corea. By M. l’Abbé Pichon. Translated
+    from the French, with a Preface by Lady Herbert.
+
+    From JOHN HODGES, London: (New York: Sold by The Catholic
+    Publication Society): The Lives of the Saints. By Rev. S. Baring‐
+    Gould, M.A. March.
+
+    From J. R. OSGOOD & CO., Boston: His Level Best, and Other
+    Stories. By Edward E. Hale.
+
+
+
+
+
+THE CATHOLIC WORLD. VOL. XVI., NO. 96.—MARCH, 1873.
+
+
+
+
+The Relation Of The Rights Of Conscience To The Authority Of The State
+Under The Laws Of Our Republic.
+
+
+(A LECTURE BEFORE A CATHOLIC SOCIETY OF S. PATRICK’S CHURCH, NEW HAVEN,
+CONN., OCT. 20, 1872.)
+
+REVEREND GENTLEMEN AND MY FRIENDS: Before I speak particularly of the
+relation of the rights of conscience to the laws existing in our republic,
+I consider it necessary to make a few preliminary remarks and to lay down
+a few principles regarding the nature of law and government in general,
+and the relation which they hold to religion. I shall best illustrate the
+difficulties which envelop this subject, and also give a clue to the way
+by which it may be extricated, by making a supposition.
+
+Let us suppose that a large number of men come together for the purpose of
+founding a new state with all its institutions of civil society and
+government. Some of these are Christians, among whom are Quakers; others
+are Mohammedans, Hindoos, Thugs, idolaters practising human sacrifices,
+and communists. It is necessary that they should agree and concur with
+each other in regard to the rights which respect life, liberty, property,
+the pursuit of happiness in general and particular, and the means of
+protecting all these rights, otherwise no society or government is
+possible. But this cannot be done by any general consent among these
+different parties. The Christian holds the sacredness of life and
+property, and the force of the law of monogamy. The Mohammedan rejects
+this last, and maintains the right to a plurality of wives. The Hindoo
+regards it as a sacred right and duty of a widow to offer herself on the
+funeral pile of her husband, that her spirit may rejoin his spirit in
+another world. The Thug considers it a most holy and meritorious act to
+murder as many persons as possible in honor of the cruel goddess whom he
+worships; while the idolater looks on the sacrifice of children or
+captives as the means of placating his offended deities and procuring
+success in war. The Quaker will not allow of any bloodshed whatever,
+either for avenging crime or repelling aggression. And the communist would
+abolish all rights of property, reconstruct society on a wholly different
+plan from that which has heretofore existed, and banish all religion as
+noxious to the well‐being of man.
+
+It is evident, therefore, that society cannot be constituted without
+religion, and that society constituted with religion, and on the basis of
+religious ideas, requires some agreement in these religious ideas, and the
+incorporation of some fixed and definite religious principles into its
+very structure and conformation.
+
+If we consult history, we shall find that no state or perfect society has
+ever been established on the atheistic principle. Every one that has ever
+existed has had a religious basis, and all political and social
+constitutions have proceeded from religious ideas and been founded upon
+them. The civilization of Christendom in general has received its specific
+form from the influence of the Christian religion moulding and modifying
+in the Eastern world its previous and ancient laws, and in the West to a
+great extent creating a new order out of a pre‐existing state of imperfect
+civilization or semi‐barbarism. To this Christendom we belong, and the
+laws of our republic are a product of this Christian civilization. This
+cannot be denied, considered as a mere historical fact respecting our
+origin; for we are the offspring of Christian Europe, and in the beginning
+distinctly professed to be a Christian people. But it may be said that we
+have changed, have undergone a political regeneration as a nation, and in
+the process of transformation have thrown out all religion from our
+organic constitution as a republic. By our organic constitution and the
+laws of our republic I intend not merely the federal constitution and laws
+which bind together the United States, but also the laws and constitutions
+of the states, the _tout ensemble_ of our common and statute laws of every
+kind, which form the regulating code of our whole society as one political
+people. And in regard to this organic law, I affirm that we do not form an
+exception among human societies to the universal rule I have above laid
+down, that the state in political society is based on religious ideas.
+
+In support of this proposition, I cite the opinion of a most competent and
+impartial judge, Prof. Leo, of Halle, and borrow from him a definition of
+that which constitutes our state religion. This great historian, in the
+introductory portion of his _Universal History_, where he is discussing
+the universal principles which underlie all political constitutions,
+analyzes in a masterly way the elements of our own system of government;
+and he points out that which is the religious element, namely, the rule or
+law of morals, derived from the common law of Christendom, or a certain
+standard of moral obligation, conformity to which is enforced by the state
+with all its coercive power. All churches or voluntary associations which
+include this moral code or religion of the state within their own specific
+religious law possess complete equality and liberty before the civil law.
+With their doctrines, rites, regulations, and practices the state does not
+interfere, and gives them protection from any infringement upon their
+rights on the part of any private members of the community. But let them,
+on pretext of doctrine, of ecclesiastical law, of liberty of conscience,
+or even of any divine revelation, violate by any overt acts the rule of
+moral obligation recognized by the state, they come into direct collision
+with her authority, and must suffer the consequences. So far, therefore,
+as concerns that portion of Christian law, namely, the moral precepts of
+the Christian religion, which are incorporated into our civil law, all
+churches are in vital union with the state. Even Jews, because they hold,
+with Christians, the decalogue; and societies based on purely natural
+religion, because they hold the law of nature, are in the same vital
+union, so far, with the state. And beyond this, within the limits which
+this law sanctions or permits, all these churches or societies are in
+union with the state, as lawful, voluntary associations over which her
+protection is extended. But let a Mohammedan community be formed among
+citizens or resident foreigners, and attempt the introduction of polygamy,
+our laws require the civil magistrate to interfere and suppress by force
+this exercise of the privileges granted by their prophet. Let a community
+of Hindoos, Thugs, or idolaters establish itself within our bounds, and
+commence any of the murderous practices of those false religions, and the
+gibbet or the sword would be called on to execute vengeance upon them. We
+have in our borders the sect of Mormons, whose doctrines and practices are
+contrary to our fundamental laws and subversive of them. Obviously, we
+cannot, consistently with our safety, our well‐being, or our essential
+principles of political and social order, tolerate the enormities of
+Mormonism, much less permit the formation of a Mormon state. The right to
+life, liberty, property, and the pursuit of happiness, must be exercised
+in conformity to certain laws, which are to the state as her axioms or
+first principles, and are held as inviolable. And the exercise of this
+right, in this due and legitimate manner, must not be hindered by force
+and violence under any pretext. Therefore no pretence of conscience or
+religion can avail to cover any violation of law by an individual or a
+society, or any such infringement on the rights of others as has been just
+alluded to. All this presupposes that the state recognizes and bases its
+laws upon certain fixed ideas concerning the rights which God has really
+granted to men, and the obligations which he has imposed upon them. But
+this has also been distinctly and expressly declared by a body of men,
+representing the whole political people of the nascent republic which was
+afterwards developed into the United States of North America. The
+declaration was made in the very act which constituted the United Colonies
+free and independent states, and which was published to the world on the
+fourth day of July, 1776. In the first sentence of this Declaration of
+Independence, the Congress affirms that the people of the United States
+have judged it necessary “to assume among the powers of the earth the
+separate and equal station to which THE LAWS OF NATURE AND OF NATURE’S GOD
+entitle them.” This august body then proceeds to lay down the foundation
+and basis of the entire argument of the document, as follows: “We hold
+these truths to be self‐evident, that all men are _created equal_; that
+they are _endowed by their Creator_ with certain inalienable _rights_;
+that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness; that to
+secure these rights governments are instituted among men.” It then
+proceeds to argue that those governments which fail to fulfil this end,
+and pursue a contrary end by invading and destroying these rights, forfeit
+their powers; and makes an application of this principle to the _casus
+belli_ between the colonies and the British crown.
+
+In this most momentous crisis, amid the very birth‐pangs of our infant
+republic, the people of the United States solemnly declared that the
+origin of all right, all law, all political organization, all government,
+and specifically of those which constitute the United States a separate
+political people, is to be found in the _lex æterna_, the law of God; that
+is to say, it is in religion. For what is religion? According to Cicero’s
+definition, it is a bond which binds men to God and to each other. This is
+the very meaning of the word, which comes from _ligare_, to bind, whence
+we have the terms ligament, ligature, and obligation. Human right is,
+therefore, something conferred by God. The right to govern must come from
+God, for we are created equal, and therefore without any natural right of
+one over another to give him law. The rights of the governed come from
+God, and are therefore inviolable; but liberty is the unhindered
+possession and exercise of the rights conferred by God, under the
+protection of lawful government; and liberty of conscience is freedom to
+obey the law of the Creator, and to enjoy the blessings which he has
+imparted to the creature by that law. These rights and liberties belong to
+each individual man as a grant from the Creator, which he can maintain in
+the face of any government, be it that of a monarch, of an aristocracy, or
+of a majority of the people. If a monarch, or one who executes by
+delegated power the sovereignty of a majority, invades the right of an
+individual, he violates a law. This law can be no other than that of the
+Sovereign Lord of the universe. There is, therefore, a higher law than
+human law, a higher sovereignty than human sovereignty, to which both
+governments and the governed are subject and amenable, and which are
+acknowledged as supreme by this American Republic of which we are
+citizens. And as another proof of this recognition, I may cite the law of
+oaths, or the solemn appeal to Almighty God as the Supreme Judge, by which
+a religious sanction is given to judicial testimony and the engagements of
+public officers.
+
+There is, therefore, in our republic a religion of the state, but one
+embodied in civil and political society only, which leaves to citizens
+perfect freedom to organize churches and act out what they profess to be
+the dictates of their individual consciences, provided they do not violate
+the laws which constitute the religion of the state.
+
+Under this law, the Catholic Church possesses in essential matters
+theoretical liberty and equality of rights with the various religious
+bodies existing in the country, with some trivial exceptions to be found
+in the laws of some of the states. To a great extent, this theoretical
+liberty is also a practical liberty, really possessed and enjoyed, and
+only occasionally invaded. This is a remark which is quite specially
+verified in the instance of your own state of Connecticut.
+
+This has not always been the case either here or in other portions of our
+country. Catholics have not always enjoyed freedom of conscience and
+liberty of religion. If we go back to the early history of the colonies
+which became afterwards the United States, we shall find that their
+founders did not intend to grant that liberty which now exists. In some of
+these colonies, the Church of England, in others the Church of the
+Puritans, and in those of Spain and France, which were admitted at a later
+period, the Catholic Church was the established religion of the state. In
+all the English colonies the Catholic religion was proscribed and
+persecuted. The Puritan fathers of New England intended to establish a
+theocracy. There was a strict union of church and state under their old
+colonial governments. Only professed members and communicants of the
+church could vote, and the legislatures regulated the affairs of parishes,
+and decided doctrinal questions. Our ancestors therefore had a Christian
+ideal of the state before their minds which they attempted to make an
+actual reality, and which they dreamed should become the kingdom of Christ
+our Lord upon the earth which the prophets and apostles foretold. The
+attempt failed from causes which lay within the bosom of the community
+itself, and not because of any external force; and the same community
+which had by tacit agreement or positive statutes enacted the original law
+combining a specific form of religion with the state, repealed the same by
+its own free will. In the Puritan state, the first change came about by
+the multiplication of baptized persons who never became communicants. The
+number of citizens who were thus deprived of the highest rights of
+citizenship was felt to be a grave anomaly and inconvenience in a
+democratic state, and caused the adoption of the half‐way covenant. By
+this arrangement, those baptized persons who publicly acknowledged their
+baptism were considered as quasi‐members of the church, entitled to all
+political rights. When, in the course of time, the number of unbaptized
+persons increased, and other sects of Protestantism began to flourish, new
+changes were brought about by which in the end the connection between the
+state and the Puritan Church was dissolved. Similar causes produced
+similar effects in other parts of the country, and, so far as the federal
+union was concerned, there was obviously from the first an utter
+impossibility of making any specific form of Christianity the religion of
+the entire republic. Thus, by the very law which the necessity of the case
+imposed upon the separate states and the entire federal republic, that
+liberty of religion became established under which the Catholic Church
+could come in upon a footing of perfect equality with the other religious
+denominations. Catholics have not come into New England and Connecticut
+either to demand religious liberty as a right or to beg toleration as a
+favor. We have not obtained our rights or privileges by any agitation or
+revolution stirred up by ourselves in our own interest. The work was done
+before there was a number of Catholics worth estimating either in
+Connecticut or New England. It was done by the old manor‐born citizens for
+their own advantage and the welfare of the state.
+
+So also, in regard to the political privileges conceded to foreign‐born
+immigrants. These are, in their nature, distinct and separate from the
+rights of conscience conceded to Catholics. Yet they have an actual
+connection, arising from the fact that so very large a proportion of our
+Catholic citizens are of foreign birth, and so large a proportion of our
+adopted citizens are of the Catholic religion; and therefore, in the
+public mind, these two matters are very much blended together, and even
+confused with each other. It is, therefore, quite fitting that I should
+speak of the two things in relation with each other. And I remark on this
+point that the privileges possessed by the Catholics of this state who are
+of foreign birth, by which they are made equal to the native‐born citizens
+in regard to both religious and political rights, have not been extorted
+by themselves, but freely conceded for the good of the state and of all
+citizens generally. The original inhabitants had the power to exclude the
+Catholic religion from all toleration. They had the power and the right to
+exclude all foreigners from the privileges of native‐born citizens, or to
+make the conditions of being naturalized more stringent than they now are.
+They took another course, having in view their own good and the well‐being
+of the state, and Catholics as well as foreigners have profited by it.
+Catholics have profited by the religious liberty conceded to citizens,
+which is something essentially distinct from the privileges conceded to
+residents of foreign origin. And in point of fact, although the extent and
+prosperity of the church in Connecticut have proceeded principally and in
+very great measure from the immigration of Irish Catholics into the state,
+yet its rights, and liberty, and equality do not depend on anything
+necessarily and essentially but the religious liberty granted to citizens,
+and which is the birthright of Catholics as well as Protestants who are
+born on the soil of the republic.
+
+It would be easy to show, in respect to our country at large, that the
+first beginnings of the Catholic Church have an intertwined radical grasp
+with the first fibres of national life in our own soil; and that there is
+a truly glorious Catholic chapter in the history of the United States. We
+can find something of this even in the history of this state. The first
+Mass celebrated in Connecticut was said in an open field within the bounds
+of Wethersfield, by the chaplain of the French troops who came here to aid
+our fathers in fighting the battle for independence. The first Catholic
+sermon in English was preached by the Rev. Dr. Matignon, of Boston, in the
+Centre Congregational Church of Hartford, at the invitation of the Rev.
+Dr. Strong, the pastor of the church. The first Catholic church was formed
+at Hartford in 1827, by Mr. Taylor, a respectable citizen of that town,
+who was a convert, and who organized the few Irish, French, and German
+Catholic residents in the place into a congregation, which assembled on
+Sunday for worship. In 1830, Bishop Fenwick, of Boston, a native of
+Maryland, purchased and blessed a small frame church, over which he placed
+F. Fitton, a native of Boston, who was the pastor of the entire state, and
+who is still actively engaged in the duties of the priesthood at Boston.
+During the first five years of his ministry at Hartford, F. Fitton
+received eighty adult converts, who, with their families, made a
+considerable portion of his little flock, since, in 1835, there were only
+730 Catholics in the whole state. The first bishop of the diocese of
+Hartford was a native of New England. The present distinguished prelate
+who rules the church in Connecticut is a native of Pennsylvania; and of
+the 150,000 Catholics under his jurisdiction nearly one‐half must be
+natives of the state or of the United States. We have, then, some 67,000
+native‐born Catholics in this state, most of whom are native‐born
+Yankees.(230) If you wish to see a fair sample of these, you have only to
+visit St. Patrick’s Church at nine o’clock of a Sunday morning, where you
+will see the church filled with them, and to go into the school‐house
+behind the church any day in the week, where you will find 1,100 of these
+young Catholic Yankees busily conning their lessons, and learning to love
+God and their native Columbia. All these have their liberty of conscience
+and their other rights as citizens secured to them by their birthright,
+and therefore, on this ground alone, the Catholic Church is equal to the
+Protestant churches before the law.
+
+And as regards foreign‐born citizens, the state having conceded to them
+equal rights to those of native‐born citizens, their conscience or
+religion is included among these rights. The original concession was a
+privilege, but, having been once conceded, it has become a right. And it
+was conceded, as I have said, for the good of the state which conceded it,
+and in view of a compensation or equivalent which the party of the grantor
+expected to receive. You did not intrude yourselves upon the soil of the
+state, or come uninvited to beg food and shelter. You were invited, and
+that not from motives of pure philanthropy. Doubtless many had a kind and
+philanthropic feeling in the matter, but the prime and urgent motive was
+that you were needed and wanted for your labor. You were told that your
+services were wanted for the upbuilding of the material prosperity of the
+state, and, as an inducement to come, you were offered citizenship, and
+with that, freedom to bring your religion with you and enjoy it. This was
+a favor to you without question; but not a purely gratuitous one. It was
+something advanced to you, but for which you were expected to make a
+future compensation. And you have well purchased your rights, not only by
+what you have done in the peaceful arts of industry, but by fighting for
+your adopted country and shedding your blood for its integrity and the
+consolidation of its power. You have fought for the state, and for the
+United States, and, therefore, the compact has been sealed and made
+inviolable by your blood.
+
+Now, what is the point I have been coming to and have at length reached?
+It is this: that you possess the full freedom and equality of your
+Catholic religion, not by toleration, but as an absolute right, inhering
+in your character as citizens whether by birth or adoption. Catholics are
+legally domiciled here by virtue of our laws, which recognize, maintain,
+and protect their religious rights as standing on an equal footing with
+those of Congregationalists or Episcopalians. No doubt, we should cherish
+a kind feeling toward those who have granted these most precious and
+valuable rights, and respect their similar rights. But we must not permit
+ourselves to be placed in any position of inferiority to other classes of
+citizens. We must insist upon the full recognition of our equality in the
+state, and maintain with a manly bearing all our rights of conscience to
+their fullest extent, claiming and demanding from our fellow‐citizens a
+complete respect and observance of these rights, and from the state that
+protection in their exercise which it is bound to give.
+
+The Declaration of Independence avows as an article of the national creed
+that the right of life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness has been
+conferred by the Creator, and is inalienable, and that government is
+instituted for the purpose of securing to us the possession and exercise
+of this right. The right to liberty includes freedom to keep the
+commandments of God, to observe his law, to make use of all the means
+which he has granted to us for obtaining grace, acquiring virtue, and
+fulfilling the end of our creation. The right to happiness includes the
+undisturbed enjoyment of all the privileges of our religion, which alone
+can make us truly happy in this world, and enable us to obtain eternal
+happiness. The right to liberty and happiness gives freedom, to those who
+choose to do so, to devote themselves to the sacred duties of the altar
+and the cloister. It gives freedom to practise all the rites and
+ceremonies of religious worship, to dedicate our wealth to the service of
+God and our fellow‐men, to constitute and regulate our churches according
+to our own canonical law, to establish and hold possession of colleges,
+seminaries, convents, and charitable institutions, to educate our
+children, to profess and practise the Catholic religion wholly and
+entirely. It is the end of government to secure these rights, so that, if
+it fails to do so by extending an efficacious protection to their free and
+peaceable exercise, it is negligent of its duty; and if it impairs or
+violates them by unjust and tyrannical legislation, it commits a positive
+act of wrong and usurpation. The government, the sovereign power in the
+state from which the government holds its authority, are amenable to the
+eternal law, as well as the individual citizen; and they may violate it by
+neglecting to secure and protect, or by infringing upon, the rights of
+conscience conferred by the Creator. Wherefore it is necessary to keep a
+watchful guard over these rights, to proclaim and defend them loudly when
+they are assailed or in danger of being impaired, and by all lawful means
+to hinder any attempt to interfere with their exercise by unjust
+legislation or a tyrannical exercise of authority by the governing power
+and its official agents. It is a universal and constant tendency of the
+sovereign power in the state to usurp unjust authority and to invade the
+rights of its subjects. The liberty of the individual man and of the class
+which is governed is always in danger, and, therefore, eternal vigilance
+is the price of liberty. This is true where the people retains its
+sovereignty, as well as where the sovereignty has been entrusted to a
+monarch or an aristocracy. It is a great mistake to suppose that a popular
+form of government and republican institutions are a perfect and adequate
+guarantee of liberty in general or of liberty of conscience in particular.
+The political majority or ascendant party can tyrannize over the minority
+or weaker party and over private citizens. Magistrates elected by a
+popular vote can misuse their power to oppress those whom they ought to
+protect. Legislatures chosen by the people can pass the most unjust and
+despotic laws. The Athenian democracy banished Aristides the Just, and
+poisoned Socrates, the wisest man of pagan antiquity, the father and
+founder of philosophy. In our own day we have seen the most perfidious
+violation of guaranteed rights, and the most tyrannical oppression of the
+religious freedom of Catholics, perpetrated by the Swiss Republic.
+Catholics are always liable to oppression where they are the weaker party,
+and have never any sufficient guarantee for the acquisition and
+preservation of their full religious liberty, except in their own numbers
+and strength, made available by their own energetic activity in their own
+cause. According to the principles and spirit of our laws and political
+institutions, the Catholic Church possesses in the United States a greater
+degree of the liberty which belongs to her by divine right than in most
+other countries. And in practice this liberty has been to a great extent
+secured to her by the justice of the people at large, and the fidelity of
+those to whom the administration of law has been entrusted. We may say of
+Connecticut especially that, considering the old and deeply rooted
+prejudice of her native inhabitants against the Catholic religion, it is
+remarkable with what comity they have received and made place for the new
+and mercurial race who have come in to replenish their staid old towns and
+quiet villages with fresh life, and with what composure they have beheld
+the multiplication of the crosses which gleam in the sunlight, on their
+hilltops and in their valleys, over the churches and convents of that
+which to them was a new and strange religion. Nevertheless, we cannot and
+ought not to be content with anything short of that full and complete
+liberty and equality which of right belong to us, and which do not in the
+least degree prejudice the same rights in those who profess a different
+religion. There are some things in regard to which it is our duty as well
+as our right to demand a greater measure of justice than that which has
+hitherto been yielded, and to exert ourselves to prevent a still further
+diminution of our rights as Catholic citizens.
+
+One of these is the right of those unfortunate persons who are inmates of
+prisons, houses of reformation, and similar institutions to enjoy all the
+privileges and fulfil all the duties of their religion, if they are
+members of the Catholic Church. Closely connected with this is the right
+of the Catholic clergy to have access to all the members of their flock,
+and to exercise the functions of their sacred ministry wherever their duty
+calls them, unhindered, and, if necessary, fully protected by the law and
+all official persons.
+
+Another is the complete and untrammelled freedom of Catholic education in
+all its departments. The state has no right either to prescribe and
+enforce religious instruction beyond those first principles of morality
+and civic obligation which are the foundations of our political order, or
+to interfere with the religious instruction which the Catholic conscience
+demands for those who are in a state of pupilage. Far less has it the
+right to prescribe an irreligious and atheistical system of instruction. I
+cannot enlarge upon this most important topic in this place. I will here
+simply recall what I have said of the possibility and danger of usurpation
+over the rights of conscience even in popular governments, and point out a
+direction from which we ourselves are threatened by this very danger. I
+refer to a project entertained by some persons in high positions of
+establishing under the authority of the federal government a national and
+compulsory system of education, thus depriving not only Catholics, but
+Protestants and Jews also, of their essential right as citizens to give
+their children a religious education. I do not attribute this policy to
+the party of the administration as a party, but it is most undoubtedly the
+policy of a considerable and very active section of what is called the
+Republican party, and is part and parcel of a scheme for modifying most
+essentially the relations between the federal and the state governments,
+for extending the authority of the governing power and restricting the
+private liberty of citizens. The men who are possessed by these ideas are
+in sympathy with that party in Europe self‐styled the progressive party.
+The idea which they have of liberty is their own freedom to drive the
+people on the path which they themselves have surveyed and marked out as
+the straight road to happiness and well‐being, and this compulsory march
+they dignify by the name of Progress. In this country, they are avowedly
+not content with existing institutions and laws, but are restless to try
+their improving hand upon them. They desire to secure uniformity according
+to their own ideal standard, by consolidation, concentration, unification
+of the legislative and executive powers in the federal government, and the
+reduction of the states into the condition of subordinate, dependent
+provinces in a republican empire. Education by the state and for the
+state, and in accordance with so‐called progressive ideas, is an essential
+part of this Prussianizing plan—an education wholly secular, from which
+instruction in positive, revealed dogmas and a positive religious
+discipline are wholly excluded, on the plea that all these are sectarian;
+and one, of course, which is really anti‐Christian and godless—an
+education like that of the University of Paris, which made a whole army of
+infidels among the lettered class in France. It is on this ground of
+education that the tyrannical and infidel power of the state is waging a
+battle with the point of the lance against the church and the Catholic
+religion in Europe. In England, also, as I know from those who have heard
+it from the lips of the leaders of this party, it is the fixed purpose of
+these leaders to work for the establishment of this infidel system by the
+coercive power of the state. The necessary sequel of all this is the
+_commune_; and, if such a system should prevail here, we have in prospect
+the confiscation of ecclesiastical property, the destruction of those
+institutions of learning which will not conform to the ideal of the state,
+the overthrow of the most essential rights of conscience, and finally the
+proscription of religion, followed by the war of the masses upon the
+rights of property and upon the order of civil society itself.
+
+We want none of these improvements of Boston _doctrinaires_, and no
+meddling of political charlatans with our constitution. Our private rights
+we hold from the Creator, and not from any social compact or grant of
+government. State rights, the strongest safeguard we have against
+usurpations upon our liberty, we hold from the fundamental law which first
+constituted us a political people—the law of unity in multiplicity, which
+is our strength, and the geometrical principle, of our harmonious and
+symmetrical structure. There was a time when our centralizing principle
+was in danger; when, so to speak, the centrifugal force threatened to
+become too strong, and to make a rupture of our system. Now it is the
+opposite danger we have to fear—the increase of the centripetal force. As
+we were in danger of flying away from our sun and becoming separated,
+wandering political orbs, so we are now in danger of running into our sun,
+and thus losing our proper orbits, becoming absorbed into the central
+mass, and thereby suffering the extinction of the life of liberty in the
+individuals who form our population. Therefore, as the exorbitant demands
+of state rights have been repressed, it should now be our study to prevent
+the encroachment of federal power upon the just domain of these state
+rights, of state power over municipal freedom, and of all these powers
+upon the personal and private liberty of the citizen. It is for the
+interest of all to do this, but my special purpose has been to show why
+Catholics in particular are bound to do it, in order to preserve that
+liberty which God has given to them, and their rights of conscience, among
+which this right of education is one of the most precious and the most
+imperilled.
+
+This leads us to another point. All religious societies being equal before
+the law, and entitled to an equal protection, so long as they do not
+violate those fundamental principles of morality which constitute the
+religion of the state, Catholic institutions have an equal claim to a
+share in the distribution of the public money with those which are not
+Catholic. In this state, large sums have been granted to institutions
+which are under the control of particular denominations; for instance, to
+Yale College. The state is bound to be impartial, and whatever it
+determines to do in support of education or for the nurture and relief of
+the helpless and destitute, and the reformation of the depraved, it is
+bound to carry out on this impartial principle. Therefore grants to useful
+institutions ought never to be opposed or withheld on the ground that the
+Catholic clergy have the control over them, and that within their walls
+the Catholic religion is taught and practised. Nor has the state any right
+to prefer, much less to enforce, what is falsely called a non‐sectarian
+system of religious and moral instruction. This is one of the most patent
+fallacies by which the common mind in our time and country is duped and
+deluded. If there is one only true church, all other so‐called churches
+are sectarian, or sections cut off from the church. The true church cannot
+be a sect or have anything sectarian about it. But the state is
+incompetent to judge or decide that the Catholic Church is a sect in this
+sense; and, therefore, incapable of determining that the public money
+which is granted to a Catholic institution is devoted to sectarian
+purposes. The state is equally incompetent to decide that there is no one
+true church, and that, therefore, all denominations are sections of the
+true church, or sects considered in the sense of parts included in a
+whole. But if it were competent to decide this point in the sense
+indicated, the only just conclusion would be that all should be
+impartially treated and protected. The state is also incompetent to decide
+that a particular party of men, having a system differing from that of any
+one sect, and professing to retain the common elements of all, is not
+itself a sect, and that its system is non‐sectarian. It is, in fact, only
+another sect. Regular association, government, and special rites are not
+essential to the nature of a sect. There were the sects of Pharisees,
+Sadducees, and Herodians among the Jews. There are philosophical sects. A
+sect is a party of men holding certain particular opinions. Those men who
+profess to hold what they call the essential parts of religion and
+morality, and to teach the same without any sectarian doctrines, simply
+mean that they do not hold the tenets of any of the Protestant sects
+around them, by which they differ from each other. But they belong to the
+genus Protestant nevertheless, and have their own specific _differentia_.
+They cannot discriminate the essential from the non‐essential parts of
+Christianity without a criterion, and the criterion which they adopt and
+apply makes their specific doctrine, which constitutes them a distinct, if
+not a separate, sect. They assume that the specific doctrines and laws of
+the Catholic Church are not essential. But in this they deny a fundamental
+Catholic doctrine: they place themselves in opposition to Catholics in
+respect to the essentials of faith and practice, and thus they are,
+relatively to us, a sect. The state cannot decide this question, and
+cannot, without injustice, prefer one party to the other. It is,
+therefore, a violation of Catholic rights to compel Catholics to listen to
+the teaching which calls itself non‐sectarian, or in any way to adopt and
+sanction it as a system exclusively entitled to the support and protection
+of the state.
+
+The truth is that the state has nothing to do directly with religious
+instruction. Formerly, in this state of Connecticut, it had to do with it,
+because the Puritan form of Protestantism was the established religion of
+the state, and made part of the law. But now the state has only to protect
+the religious corporations and societies which have legal existence in the
+enjoyment of their vested rights. Grants of money and other legal
+provisions must be made in view of the utility to society and the state
+which lies in the nature of the object which any institution aims at
+accomplishing. Education, the care of the orphaned, the poor, the sick,
+and other destitute persons, and the instruction of all classes in moral
+and civic virtues and the fear of that Creator who is acknowledged in our
+Declaration of Independence as the Author of our natural rights, are
+useful to the state and society, and even necessary to their continuance
+and well‐being. Therefore the state may exercise a supervision within
+certain limits over these things, and grant subsidies for the purpose of
+sustaining them. But this must be done in such a way that no violence is
+committed upon the rights or the liberty of conscience guaranteed by law.
+Religion must be left free, and not interfered with by the state. But non‐
+interference is something quite incompatible with exclusion. The state
+cannot confiscate the property which it has once granted to Yale College
+because the clergy of one particular denomination control the religious
+instruction of the college. Nor can it justly refuse to treat Catholic
+institutions of education with a favor equal to that which it shows to
+others, because the Bishop of Hartford will have control of their
+religious teaching.
+
+It is for the interest and well‐being of the state and of all classes of
+its citizens that the Catholic Church should fully exercise all its
+rights, and enjoy the most perfect freedom of growth and development. The
+Catholic Church is fully and unchangeably committed to those essential
+principles of morality on which our laws are founded. By the very
+principle of the Catholic religion, those who profess it can never abandon
+or change these principles, and they thus receive the strongest guarantee
+of their perpetuity in the number and the moral power of those citizens
+who profess this religion. By our religion we must hold and profess that
+human rights are conferred by the Creator, that they are inviolable, and
+that civil society has been established by Almighty God, with its
+institutions of government, in order that these rights may be secured. We
+must profess that peoples and governments are accountable to God for the
+just administration of the trust committed to them, and responsible to a
+higher law than mere human laws, the eternal law itself, which is written
+on the conscience and clearly promulgated by a divine revelation. We must
+profess the sanctity of life, of marriage, of the rights of property, of
+oaths, contracts, treaties, and civic obligations, and the duty of
+allegiance and obedience to the laws and the lawful authorities in the
+state. All that I have shown to be the religion of the state, which is
+indeed nothing more than a portion of the universal common law of
+Christendom, is involved in the religion of Catholics and taught by it
+with an authority which they acknowledge as unerring and supreme. Here is,
+therefore, a principle of stability to the state, and to the rights of all
+classes of citizens, which is involved in the education and popular
+instruction which is given by the Catholic clergy. Moreover, as the
+pastors of 150,000 of the inhabitants of the state, and wielding a moral
+influence over them far superior to that of any other body of clergy, it
+is for the interest and advantage of their fellow‐citizens that their
+education, training in their special functions, and other qualifications
+and advantages for exercising their civilizing power upon such a large and
+increasing mass of the population, should be elevated to the highest
+possible grade. Therefore the schools, academies, seminaries, and
+religious houses in which the clergy are trained are deserving of
+encouragement as sources of intellectual, moral, and social benefit and
+improvement to society at large, which accrue to the benefit of the state.
+
+The same is true of institutions of religious women, who are a kind of
+female clergy in a wider sense of the word, of schools of all kinds, of
+orphanages and charitable asylums. In the care of the poor and the sick
+especially, the Catholic Church can do a work which cannot be done so well
+by any other society, and thus relieve the state of a burden as well as
+heal a sore on the body politic which is frequently dangerous as well as
+distressing. Besides these more necessary services to humanity, the
+Catholic Church contributes to the decoration and embellishment of life,
+to the refinement of taste, and to the increase of innocent and elevating
+enjoyment. It ornaments towns and villages with specimens of fine
+architecture, multiplies statues and paintings, cultivates sacred music,
+and by its multifarious ceremonies acts most powerfully not only on the
+souls of men to raise their minds to an unseen world, but, in their human
+sentiments and manners, to give grace and refinement as well as enjoyment
+to a life rendered too dull and prosaic by the everlasting drudgery of an
+industrious and material existence.
+
+All this would not weigh a feather with the severe Puritan ancients who
+founded this commonwealth. The Catholic religion is a religion of error,
+they would have said; error is fatal to the soul, and cannot be tolerated
+in a state where laws are framed according to the laws of God. But times
+are changed, and both laws and the minds of the descendants of the
+Puritans are changed with them. Even a great light among the descendants
+of the Scottish Presbyterians, the Rev. Dr. Hodge, has declared that the
+Catholic religion teaches the essentials of Christianity, exercises a
+wholesome moral influence, and cannot be refused the same countenance and
+aid by the state which is given to the Protestant religion, without the
+usurpation of an authority to determine what is religious error. Although
+the _New York Observer_ has raised an outcry against this candid statement
+of a learned and honest man, and has vehemently denounced the Catholic
+religion as worse than infidelity, I am persuaded that Yale College will
+not be satisfied to take a more illiberal position than Princeton, and
+that the general sense of the Protestant people of Connecticut will accord
+with that of Dr. Hodge, and reject the contrary extreme of the _Observer_.
+The religious people of Connecticut cannot fail to see that they have a
+common cause with us against atheism and progressive radicalism, and that
+we are a bulwark against a devastating flood which would sweep away their
+rights with ours if it once broke over the surface of our society. Our
+rights stand upon a common basis. They depend from a common chain, which
+is fastened by the same ring. They have nothing to fear from any violation
+of their liberty or usurpation of their rights on our part, even should we
+obtain power enough to be able to attempt such an enterprise. We always
+respect vested rights and established laws, when these are not contrary to
+the law of God. The order which is now established is the only one that is
+good for a state in which the inhabitants are divided in religion, and it
+enables these divided religious communities to live together in political
+harmony and social peace. We will not disturb this harmony, and we
+denounce those who attempt to stir up the passions of the people to
+destroy it as the enemies of the state as well as impious transgressors of
+the law of God. The rights of conscience and the liberty of religion which
+we possess under our laws are invaluable and precious to all of us. And
+there is indeed a common bond between the descendants of the Puritan
+founders of this commonwealth and the descendants of the persecuted
+Catholics of Ireland who have settled on this soil, of which perhaps you
+have not thought sufficiently. It is the bond which has been made by a
+conflict which the fathers of both these lines of descendants have
+maintained against a common enemy. That enemy was the despotic tyranny of
+the successors of Henry VIII. and their ministers. Our ancestors drew the
+sword against an invasion of rights which, they avowed, had been conferred
+upon them by their Creator, and the issue of the war was the establishment
+of this republic, in which the rights of conscience are declared to be
+sacred. The ancestors of the “exiles of Erin” who have found a new home in
+this republic fought, both with the sword and with the patient resistance
+of martyrdom, against the same despotic violence which invaded all their
+rights both civic and religious. It is fitting, therefore, that their
+descendants should dwell together in the land rescued by the blood of
+heroes from tyranny, and that here should flourish the religion rescued
+from the same tyranny by the blood of martyrs.
+
+I conclude with the eloquent apostrophe of the Bishop of Orleans to the
+Belgians, which came from his mouth like the electric flash, amid thunders
+of applause, at the Congress of Malines in 1867, where I had the privilege
+of being present. “_Vous avez une patrie, sachez la garder!_”—“You have a
+country, _know how to keep it_!”
+
+When we look abroad and see the dark, threatening clouds overhanging older
+nations, threatening new tempests to follow those which have lately burst
+upon them, and then look at home on the peace and liberty we enjoy; our
+church and religion free, priests, bishops, and the Holy Father from his
+prison in the Vatican, exercising their lawful jurisdiction without
+hindrance, we can esteem at their proper worth the blessings we enjoy. We
+learn how to value order, good government, and civilization founded on
+religious ideas, as the most precious of all earthly possessions after the
+faith and the means of eternal salvation. These advantages we possess in
+the laws and institutions which are summed up in the one word _our
+country_—our native land, or the land of our refuge and our children’s
+nativity. Let us all, therefore, prize, cherish, guard, and loyally serve
+it during life; prepared and resolved, if necessary, to give our blood and
+our lives in its defence, in emulation of the patriotic bravery of our
+noble brothers and ancestors from whom we have received this fair
+inheritance.
+
+
+
+
+The Widow Of Nain.
+
+
+“The only son of his mother, and she was a widow.”
+
+
+    I.
+
+    The dust on their sandals lay heavy and white,
+    Their garments were damp with the tears of the night,
+    Their hot feet aweary, and throbbing with pain,
+    As they entered the gates of the city of Nain.
+
+    II.
+
+    But lo! on the pathway a sorrowing throng
+    Pressed, mournfully chanting the funeral song,
+    And like a sad monotone, ceaseless and slow,
+    The voice of a woman came laden with woe.
+
+    III.
+
+    What need, stricken mothers, to tell how she wept?
+    Ye read by the vigils that sorrow hath kept,
+    Ye know, by the travail of anguish and pain,
+    The desolate grief of the widow of Nain.
+
+    IV.
+
+    As he who was first of the wayfaring men
+    Advanced, the mute burden was lowered, and then
+    As he touched the white grave‐cloths that covered the bier
+    The bearers shrank back, but the mother drew near.
+
+    V.
+
+    Her snow‐sprinkled tresses had loosened their strands,
+    Great tears fell unchecked on the tightly clasped hands;
+    But hushed the wild sobbing, and stifled her cries,
+    As Jesus of Nazareth lifted his eyes.
+
+    VI.
+
+    Eyes wet with compassion as slowly they fell—
+    Eyes potent to soften grief’s tremulous swell,
+    As, sweetly and tenderly, “Weep not,” he said,
+    And turned to the passionless face of the dead.
+
+    VII.
+
+    White, white gleamed his forehead, loose rippled the hair,
+    Bronze‐tinted, o’er temples transparently fair;
+    And a glory stole up from the earth to the skies,
+    As he called to the voiceless one, “Young man, arise!”
+
+    VIII.
+
+    The hard, rigid outlines grew fervid with breath,
+    The dull eyes unclosed from the midnight of death;
+    Weep, weep, happy mother, and fall at his feet:
+    Life’s pale, blighted promise grown hopeful and sweet.
+
+    IX.
+
+    The morning had passed, and the midday heats burned:
+    Once more to the pathway the wayfarers turned.
+    The conqueror of kings had been conquered again:
+    There was joy in the house of the widow of Nain.
+
+
+
+
+Fleurange.
+
+
+By Mrs. Craven, Author Of “A Sister’s Story.”
+
+Translated From The French, With Permission.
+
+
+
+Part IV. The Immolation.
+
+
+LIX.
+
+
+Several hours had passed since Fleurange’s return. Anxiety, horror,
+sadness, and emotion, which by turns filled her heart during the affecting
+scene we have just described, now gave place to a feeling in which a
+sweet, profound sense of gratitude predominated.
+
+Ah! no one could comprehend, without the experience faith alone gives, the
+mysterious joy that penetrates the heart when the salvation of a soul
+seems assured; when, in a tangible manner, as it were, the abyss of divine
+mercy which ever surrounds us, opens and allows us to sound its depths;
+when, in answer to our tears, we almost behold the heavens open; when, in
+return for _pardon implored_, we are made to comprehend the ineffable
+signification of two other words, sweet as mercy and boundless as
+infinitude—_pardon obtained_.
+
+Fleurange therefore felt, if not happy—for the impressions of the day had
+been too solemn not to have left a veil of sadness on her soul—at least
+calm and serene. The sight of that death‐bed had put to flight some of the
+dreams she so often abandoned herself to now without scruple—dreams of
+passionate joy at her approaching sacrifice, mingled with the perspective
+of a brighter future, in which her happiness with George would be
+increased and consecrated by the sufferings they first shared together—the
+cherished theme on which lingered her imagination, her heart, and even her
+soul, which had faith in the efficacy of sacrifice, and instinctively made
+it the basis of its hopes. Everything, even this, was forgotten for the
+moment. It was as if a graver, purer, holier strain had put to flight the
+mingled harmony in which heaven and earth seemed almost confounded.
+Hitherto, the idea of immolating herself with and for another had seemed
+noble; but at this quiet hour, after a day of so much agitation, a
+sublimer thought sprang up in her soul in spite of herself; it was that of
+a sacrifice unknown to the person for whom one immolates one’s self!
+
+Was not the greatest of sacrifices—the sacrifice which is our example—of
+such a nature? Was it not made for those who were unaware of it? And has
+not this very ignorance been regarded by the eternal goodness as a plea
+for disarming eternal justice?
+
+Fleurange did not attempt to thus define her confused thoughts; she
+allowed them to float in her mind without welcoming or rejecting them. She
+was in that frame of mind which unconsciously enfolds a latent disposition
+in the depths of the soul, that suddenly develops into efforts and
+sacrifices which seem impossible an hour before they have to be made.
+
+She was alone in one corner of a large, white marble fireplace in which
+blazed a good fire. She preferred this salon to the others, which were
+heated invisibly, though it was the smallest in the house, and it was the
+one she habitually occupied. Clement, after accompanying her home, had
+returned to the sad place they visited together to obtain, if not an
+honorable, at least a separate burial of his unfortunate cousin’s remains.
+Mademoiselle Josephine, at her usual hour, had gone to her fine chamber,
+which she now occupied with less uneasiness than the first night, and had
+been for an hour in the capacious bed, where she had learned to sleep as
+comfortably as under the muslin curtains which generally guarded her
+slumbers.
+
+It was nearly ten o’clock, and Fleurange in her turn was about to retire,
+when the noise of a carriage was heard, the bell rang, and a few minutes
+after a card was brought her. She looked at it: “The Countess Vera de
+Liningen”—and beneath, written with a pencil: “Will Mademoiselle Fleurange
+d’Yves have the kindness to see me a moment?”
+
+“Vera!—the Countess Vera!—”
+
+Fleurange repeated the name twice. It was the first time she had thought
+of it since she left Florence. She remembered hearing it once in a
+conversation between the Princess Catherine and the marquis, the first
+time she ever saw the latter. From that time, Vera’s name had never been
+mentioned before her. The marquis instinctively avoided it in talking with
+her the day before, as he did that of Gabrielle in conversing with Vera,
+and no one mentioned it at the palace. Fleurange’s surprise was therefore
+inexpressible. She remained with her eyes fixed on the card, till the
+valet de chambre took the liberty of reminding her the Countess Vera was
+waiting in her carriage for an answer.
+
+“Certainly. Ask her to come up.” Then she waited, with a mixture of
+curiosity and embarrassment, for the entrance of the visitor, without
+knowing exactly why. She was almost breathless from agitation; but when
+the door opened, and she saw the beautiful maid of honor, she felt
+partially relieved.
+
+“Ah! it is you, mademoiselle,” she exclaimed joyfully. “Pardon me for not
+having divined it immediately, but I did not know this morning the name of
+her who received me so kindly.”
+
+It now occurred to Fleurange that the maid of honor had been sent by the
+empress sooner than she expected with the favorable reply promised, but
+the visitor’s pale face and silence struck her and checked the words on
+her lips.
+
+“You were unaware of my name this morning, but did you never hear it
+before?”
+
+Fleurange blushed. “Never would be incorrect,” replied she.—And she
+stopped.
+
+“No matter,” continued Vera. “I do not care to know when or how you heard
+it. I can imagine they did not say much to you about me. But allow me to
+ask you in my turn if you have not another name besides that under which I
+had the honor of presenting you to her majesty!”
+
+“My name is Fleurange,” replied the young girl simply, “but it is not the
+one I habitually bear.”
+
+“And your other name?” asked Vera, with a trembling voice.
+
+Fleurange was astonished at the manner in which this question was asked,
+and still more so at the effect of her reply, which produced a frightful
+change in the listener’s face.
+
+“Gabrielle!” repeated she. “I guessed rightly, then.”
+
+An embarrassing silence followed this exclamation. Fleurange did not know
+what to say. She awaited an explanation of the scene which appeared more
+and more strange. But while she was looking at Vera with increased
+surprise during this long silence, a sudden apprehension seized her, and a
+faint glimpse of the truth flashed across her mind. Nothing could have
+been more vague than the remembrance of the name mentioned before her but
+once, but that time it was in a conversation respecting George, and she
+bethought herself that she understood it to be a question of a marriage
+the princess desired for her son. Was it with reluctance Vera had now
+brought the permission for another to accompany him? Such was the question
+Fleurange asked herself. Approaching Vera, therefore, she said to her
+softly:
+
+“If you have come with a message, how can I thank you sufficiently,
+mademoiselle, for taking the trouble of bringing it yourself!”
+
+Vera hastily withdrew her hand, and retreated several steps; then, as if
+suffering from an emotion she could not overcome, she fell into an arm‐
+chair beside the table, and for some moments remained pale and breathless,
+with a gloomy, forbidding air, wiping away from time to time with an
+abrupt gesture the tears which, in spite of all her efforts, escaped from
+her eyes.
+
+Fleurange, motionless with surprise, looked at her with mingled interest
+and astonishment, but, the frank decision of her character prevailing over
+her timidity, she came at once to the point.
+
+“Countess Vera,” said she, “if I have not guessed the motive that brings
+you here, tell me the real one; there is something in all this which I do
+not understand. Be frank; I will be likewise. Let us not remain thus
+towards one another. Above all, do not look at me as if we were not only
+strangers, but enemies.”
+
+At this word, Vera raised her head. “Enemies!” she said. “Well, yes, at
+present we are.”
+
+What did she mean? Fleurange crossed her arms, and looked at her
+attentively, trying to guess the meaning of her enigmatical words, and the
+still more obscure enigma of her face, which expressed by turns the most
+contradictory sentiments; the enigma of her eyes, which sometimes gazed at
+her with hatred, and then with sweetness and a humble, beseeching look. At
+length Vera seemed decided to continue. “You are right,” she said; “I must
+put an end to your suspense, and explain my strange conduct; but I need
+courage to do this. To come here as I have, to appeal to you as I am going
+to do, I must—I must, without knowing why—”
+
+“Well,” said Fleurange with a faint smile, “continue. You must what?”
+
+Vera went on in a low tone, as if affected: “I must have had a secret
+instinct that you were kind and generous.”
+
+This result of so much hesitation did not throw any light on the subject,
+but only made it more obscure.
+
+“There has been preamble enough,” said Fleurange, with a calm accent of
+firmness. “Speak clearly now, Countess Vera, tell me everything without
+reservation. You may believe nothing to fear. Though your words do me an
+injury I can neither foresee nor comprehend, speak, I insist upon it.
+Hesitate no longer.”
+
+“Well, here,” said Vera, suddenly throwing on the table a paper till now
+concealed.
+
+Fleurange took it, looked at it, and blushed at first, then turned pale.
+“My petition!” she said. “You have brought it back? It has been refused,
+then?”
+
+“No; it was not sent.”
+
+“You mean that the empress, after showing me so much kindness, changed her
+mind and refused to present it?”
+
+“No; on the contrary, she ordered me to forward your petition, and to add
+her recommendation.”
+
+“Well?”
+
+“I disobeyed her orders.”
+
+“I await the explanation you doubtless intend giving me. Go on without any
+interruption; I am listening.”
+
+“Well, first, did you know that George de Walden was the husband promised
+me—to whom my father destined me from infancy?”
+
+“Who was promised you!—from infancy! No, I did not know that. No matter;
+go on.”
+
+“No matter, indeed; that is not the point, though it is proper to inform
+you of it. Neither is it a question of his misfortune, or his frightful
+sentence, or that terrible Siberia where you wished to accompany him and
+participate in a lot the severities of which you could neither alleviate
+nor perhaps endure. This is the point: to preserve him from that destiny,
+to save him, to enable him to regain life, honor, and liberty—in a word,
+all he has lost. His property, name, and rank can all be restored to him.
+It is this I have come to tell you and ask you to second.”
+
+“All can be restored to him?” repeated Fleurange, in a strange voice. “By
+what means?—what authority?”
+
+“The emperor’s. I have appealed to his clemency, and my prayers have
+prevailed, but on two conditions, one of which is imposed on George, and
+the other depends on me. To these two conditions, there is a third which
+depends on you—you alone!”
+
+Fleurange’s large eyes fastened on Vera with an expression of profound
+astonishment and anguish.
+
+“Finish, I conjure you, if you are not mad in speaking to me so, or I in
+listening to you—if we are not both deprived of our reason!”
+
+Vera clasped her hands, and passionately exclaimed: “Oh! I beg you to have
+pity on him!” She stopped, choked with emotion.
+
+Fleurange continued to gaze at her with the same expression, and, without
+speaking, made a sign for her to continue. She seemed to concentrate her
+attention in order to comprehend the words addressed her.
+
+“I am waiting,” she said at last. “I am listening attentively and calmly;
+speak to me in the same manner.”
+
+Vera resumed in a calmer tone: “Well, this morning just as I had finished
+reading your petition and learned for the first time who the exile was you
+wished to accompany—at that very moment the emperor arrived at the palace
+and sent for me.”
+
+“The emperor!” said Fleurange, with surprise.
+
+“Yes, and can you imagine what he wished to say to me? You could not, and
+I am not surprised, for you are not aware how earnestly I had solicited
+George’s pardon, and, to this end, how zealously I had sought out every
+circumstance calculated to conciliate his sovereign. Well, what the
+emperor wished to inform me was that this pardon would be granted me—_me_,
+do you understand?—but on two conditions.”
+
+“His pardon!” exclaimed Fleurange. “Go on, I am listening.—”
+
+“The first, that he should pass four years on his estates in Livonia
+without leaving them.—” Vera stopped.
+
+“I hear; and next?” said Fleurange, raising her eyes.
+
+“Next,” said Vera slowly and anxiously, “that the will of my father and
+his should be fulfilled before his departure.”
+
+Fleurange shuddered. An icy chill struck to her heart, and her head swam
+as if with dizziness. But she remained perfectly motionless.
+
+“His pardon is at this price?” said she in a low voice.
+
+“Yes; the emperor has taken an interest in me from my childhood; he loved
+my father, and it has pleased him to make this act of clemency depend on
+the accomplishment of my father’s wish.”
+
+There was a long silence. Vera herself trembled at seeing Fleurange’s pale
+lips, and colorless cheeks, and her eyes looking straightforward, lost in
+space.
+
+“And he?”—she said at last. “He accepts his pardon on this
+condition—without hesitation?”
+
+“Without hesitation!” repeated Vera, blushing with new emotion. “That is
+what I cannot say. It is this doubt that humiliates and alarms me, for the
+emperor would regard the least hesitation as fresh ingratitude, and
+perhaps would annul his pardon.”
+
+“But why should he hesitate?” said Fleurange, in an almost inaudible tone.
+
+“Fleurange,” said Vera, in that passionate tone she had used two or three
+times during this interview, “let us rend each other’s hearts, if need be,
+but let us go on to the end. Have you had permission to see George since
+you came?”
+
+“No.”
+
+“But he expects you; he knows you have arrived, and the devotedness that
+has brought you here?”
+
+“No, he is still ignorant of all this; he was to be informed of it to‐
+morrow.”
+
+A flash of joy lit up Vera’s black eyes. “Then it depends on you whether
+he hesitates or not—whether he is saved.—Yes, Fleurange, let him remain
+ignorant of your arrival, let him not see you again—let him never behold
+you again,” she continued, looking at her with a jealous terror she could
+not conceal, “and his life will again become brilliant and happy—as it
+was—as it always should be—and the remembrance of the last few months will
+disappear like a dream!”
+
+“Like a dream!” repeated Fleurange mechanically, passing her hand over her
+brow.
+
+“I have told you everything now,” said Vera. “I have done you an injury I
+can understand better than any one else. But,” she continued, with an
+accent that resounded in the depths of the listener’s soul, “I wished to
+save George, I wished to win him back to me! And I thought, I know not
+why, for I am generally distrustful—yes, I thought I could induce you to
+aid me against yourself!”
+
+Fleurange, with her hands clasped on her knees, and her eyes gazing before
+her with a fixed expression, seemed for some moments insensible to
+everything. She was listening, however—she was listening to that clear,
+distinct voice which resounded in her soul in a tone so pure—a voice she
+had never failed to recognize and obey.
+
+If George were free, if he recovered his name, rank, and former position,
+would she not still be in the same position as before? In that case, could
+she treacherously usurp the consent obtained from his mother, and that to
+the detriment of the one before her—the wife chosen from his infancy?
+Would it not be treachery to him to present herself before him at the
+moment of recovering his liberty, and thereby endanger its loss with the
+momentary favor that conferred it?
+
+She placed her icy hand on Vera’s, and turned towards her with a sweet
+expression of resolution. “That is enough,” she said, in a calm tone. “You
+have done right. Be easy, I understand it all.”
+
+Vera, astonished at her expression and accent, looked at her with
+surprise.
+
+“Do not be afraid,” continued Fleurange, in the same tone. “Act as if I
+were far away—as if I had never come.” And, taking the petition lying on
+the table, she tore it in pieces, and threw it into the fire! There was a
+momentary blaze, which died away, and she looked at the ashes as they
+flew.
+
+Vera, with an irresistible impulse, pressed her lips to the hand she
+seized, then remained mute and confounded. She had come determined to
+prevail over her rival, to convince her, to use every means of contending
+if she failed in her first efforts, but her victory suddenly assumed an
+aspect she had not anticipated. It had certainly been an easy one, and yet
+Vera felt it had left a bleeding wound. She experienced for a moment more
+uneasiness than joy, and her attitude expressed no more of triumph than
+that of Fleurange of defeat. While one remained with her head and eyes
+cast down, the other had risen. A passing emotion colored Fleurange’s
+cheek, the struggle of the sacrifice gave animation and an unusual
+brilliancy to her face.
+
+“I think,” said she, “you have nothing more to say to me.”
+
+“No—for what I would like to say I cannot, dare not.”
+
+Vera rose and turned towards the door. A thought occurred to her. She
+approached Fleurange. “Excuse my forgetfulness,” said she; “here is the
+bracelet you lost this morning. I was commissioned to restore it to you.”
+
+At the sight of the talisman, Fleurange started; her momentary color faded
+away, she became deadly pale, and, as she looked at it silently, some
+tears, the only ones she shed during the interview, ran down her cheeks.
+But it was only for an instant. Before Vera realized what she was doing,
+Fleurange clasped the bracelet around her rival’s arm.
+
+“This talisman was a present from the Princess Catherine to her son’s
+betrothed. She said it would bring her good luck. It no longer belongs to
+me. I return it to you; it is yours.”
+
+Fleurange held out her hand. “We shall never see each other again,” she
+continued; “let us not bear away any bitter remembrance of each other.”
+
+Vera took her hand without looking at her. She had never felt touched and
+humiliated to such a degree; gratitude itself was wounding to her pride.
+But Fleurange’s sweet, grave voice was now irresistible, and spoke to her
+heart in spite of herself. She hesitated between these two feelings.
+Fleurange resumed: “You are right. It is not my place to wait for you at
+this time—you have nothing more to forgive me for, I believe, and I
+forgive you everything.”
+
+And as Vera still remained motionless with her head bent down, Fleurange
+leaned forward and embraced her.
+
+
+LX.
+
+
+The Marquis Adelardi often declared he had witnessed so many extraordinary
+and unexpected events that he was seldom surprised at anything that
+happened. But the day that now dawned brought a surprise of the liveliest
+kind, and even a second one in the course of a few hours. He rose late,
+according to his custom, and was breakfasting beside the fire when a note
+was brought him which put a premature end to the repast just begun. After
+reading it, he fell into deep thought, then rose and strode around his
+room. Finally he went to the window, and read the following note a second
+time.
+
+“MY KIND FRIEND: I have changed my mind. I earnestly beg you when you see
+Count George not to mention my name, and, above all, to take the greatest
+precaution to keep him for ever ignorant of the plans I formed and the
+journey I have made. This will be easy, for no one knows I am here, and
+tomorrow, before night, I shall have left St. Petersburg. Everything will
+be explained to you, but I only write now what is most essential for you
+to know without any delay.”
+
+In vain he read and re‐read. Such were the words, signed _Fleurange_,
+which he held in his hands. For once the marquis was completely at a loss.
+Nothing—absolutely nothing—could account for this sudden change. The
+success of her petition presented the empress the day before was certain.
+He recalled every detail of his recent interview with her, during which,
+having nothing more to conceal, she naïvely revealed all the depth and
+sincerity of her sentiments towards George. He had long been aware of her
+firmness and courage, and the idea of her drawing back at the last moment
+in view of the trial never occurred to him. There was, then, an
+impenetrable mystery, and he impatiently awaited the hour he could go for
+the promised explanation. But he must first keep his engagement with
+George. Poor George! he inspired him now with fresh pity, though he had
+doubted, the evening before, if he was worthy of the consolation in store
+for him. It seemed now as if he could not live without it, and that a new
+and more frightful sentence had been pronounced against him. The marquis
+was about to start for the fortress to fulfil more sadly than ever the
+painful duty of his powerless friendship, when another letter was brought
+him. The mere sight of this second missive made him start, and he examined
+with extreme astonishment the address and the very envelope that bore it,
+the impression on the seal, and the slight perfume it gave out. All this
+was a source of surprise, and, for once, it was not unreasonable, as it
+generally is, to dwell on these exterior signs before solving the mystery
+by opening the letter. The reader may judge, after learning that the
+Marquis Adelardi recognized his friend’s writing in the address. Since
+George’s imprisonment, he had neither had permission to write, nor the
+means. In the second place, the paper, the arms on the seal, the
+perfume—all these things belonged to a different condition, for certainly
+none of these elegances had been allowed him in prison. The mere exterior
+of the letter, therefore, had something inexplicable, and, when he opened
+it to solve the enigma, he read as follows:
+
+“MY VERY DEAR FRIEND: Perhaps the very sight of this letter has given you
+a suspicion of its contents. If not, know that I am free, or, at least, I
+shall be so to‐morrow! Meanwhile, I have left the frightful cell where you
+found me yesterday, and now, thanks to the governor of the fortress, am
+established in his own apartment and surrounded once more by all the
+delightful accessories of civilized life of which I thought myself for
+ever deprived—accessories which are only a dawn of the delightful day
+before me. Yes, Adelardi, free! by the favor of the emperor, against whom
+I eagerly pledge myself never to enter into a conspiracy as long as I
+live. Free on two conditions: one to live at my home in Livonia four
+years; the other—guess what it is! It is not more severe than the first:
+it is to return to my first love—to her to whom I owe my pardon. In a
+word, to end where I began, by marrying Vera de Liningen! What do you say
+to that? Is not this a _dénoûment_ worthy of a romance? You predicted it
+once, do you remember it? ‘You will renounce this folly which tempts you,
+and keep the promise you made.’ I was far from believing it then, and
+perhaps it is well even now that that beautiful siren is seven hundred
+leagues off, for I know not what would be the result were I subjected to
+the fascination of those eyes which turned my head, whereas I am now
+wholly absorbed in the happiness that awaits me. Vera still loves me. She
+is also beautiful in her way, and, above all, possesses a charm which
+makes me forget all others. She has the beautiful eyes of liberty which I
+owe her. Therefore I am not tempted to refuse the hand she is ready to
+accept, or even my heart, though somewhat _blasé_, but now filled with
+gratitude strong enough to sufficiently resemble the love she has a right
+to expect.
+
+“_Au revoir_, Adelardi! Come when you please; I am no longer a prisoner,
+though I have pledged myself not to leave here till I go to the empress’
+chapel to meet her who is to accompany me into the mitigated exile to
+which _we_ are condemned.”
+
+It would be difficult to describe the strange effect of this letter,
+coming so soon after the other, upon the person to whom they were both
+addressed. It would be impossible to say whether he was glad or sorry,
+indignant or affected, relieved or overwhelmed, by such sudden news; and,
+though only imperfectly enlightened respecting some of the circumstances
+he wished to know, he felt that somehow Fleurange had been informed of
+George’s pardon before himself, and the conditions attached to it. This
+was the evident meaning of her note, which now seemed to the marquis so
+generous, so touching, and even so sublime, that his whole interest
+centred, with a kind of passion, in this charming, noble girl. Her letter,
+which lay beside George’s before him, displayed the greatest contrast
+imaginable to the cold, selfish levity of the latter. At all events, he
+had no reason now to be anxious about him on whom everything seemed to
+smile, but rather about her who was immolating herself to‐day as much as
+yesterday—unsuspected by the object—and with a devotedness a thousand
+times more disinterested and more generous than before.
+
+At that moment the door opened, and the marquis uttered an exclamation of
+joy and welcome at hearing Clement announced. He was just thinking of him,
+and wishing he could see him at once. As soon as he looked at him he
+perceived he was unaware of what had occurred. Clement returned home at a
+late hour the night before, and had not seen Fleurange since their return
+from the hospital. He now came from the burial of his unfortunate cousin
+in a distant, obscure spot, to beg the marquis to use his influence to
+obtain permission to place a simple stone cross on his forlorn grave. But
+he could not find any opportunity of introducing the subject, the marquis
+was so eager to enter on that which absorbed him. He informed Clement of
+George’s pardon and the conditions on which it was granted; but in his
+eagerness he did not at first perceive the effect of the news on his
+listener. The latter remained motionless, and for moments his excessive
+surprise prevented him from replying. The aspect of everything was so
+changed by the intelligence that his mind refused to take it in. He looked
+at the marquis with so singular an expression that he was struck by it,
+and clearly saw he had unguardedly touched a deeper and more vital point
+than he supposed.
+
+“Pardon me, Dornthal, I have excited you more than I wished or expected.”
+
+“Yes,” said Clement, in a strange voice, “I acknowledge it; but does she
+know what you have just informed me of?”
+
+The marquis in reply gave him Fleurange’s note. He read it with a still
+more lively emotion than he had just experienced; but he succeeded better
+in controlling it.
+
+“Poor Gabrielle! This is evidently a generous, spontaneous impulse, worthy
+of her. But,” continued he, in quite a different accent, in which trembled
+an indignation he repressed with difficulty, “I cannot comprehend how
+this—how Count George can unhesitatingly consent to the conditions
+_proposed_, for really I can never believe them rigorously _imposed_ by
+the emperor, still less that they could be accepted if he appreciates as
+he ought the sentiments which I should suppose would prevent him from
+accepting them.”
+
+The marquis hesitated a moment, and then said: “Here, Dornthal, time
+presses; it is better you should know everything without delay.” And he
+gave him George’s letter.
+
+As Clement read it, contempt and anger were so clearly displayed in his
+face that the marquis was confounded at the flash of indignation with
+which he crushed the letter and threw it on the table. “That is exactly
+what I should have expected from the man you told me of yesterday. Poor
+Gabrielle!” he continued, in a voice trembling with emotion and
+tenderness, “it is thus that the precious treasures of thy heart have been
+lavished and wasted!”
+
+He leaned on the table, and hid his face in his hands. For some instants
+there was a silence neither sought to break. At length Clement returned to
+himself. “Once more pardon me, M. le Marquis. I really do not know what
+you will think of me after the weakness I have shown before you. But no
+matter, it is not a question of myself, but of her. There is one point I
+recommend to you which there is no need of insisting upon: she must remain
+ignorant of the contents of this letter. She must never know—_never_, do
+you understand?—what kind of a love she thought worthy of hers.”
+
+The marquis looked at him with astonishment. “And it is you, Dornthal, who
+are so anxious as to your cousin’s remembrance of Count George!”
+
+This total absence of vulgar triumph and selfish hope added another
+notable surprise to those of the morning. Clement neither noticed
+Adelardi’s tone nor the kind, affectionate expression of regard which
+accompanied the words he had just uttered.
+
+“I wish her to suffer as little as possible,” said he briefly; “that is my
+only aim and thought.”
+
+He rose to go out. The marquis pressed his hand with a cordiality he
+rarely manifested, and after Clement’s departure he remained a long time
+thoughtful. Perhaps at that moment he was thinking how much more
+satisfaction there was in meeting and studying such a noble heart than
+most of those whose acquaintance he had hitherto sought and cultivated
+with so much eagerness.
+
+
+LXI.
+
+
+At Clement’s return, he learned that his cousin had asked for him several
+times. He immediately went up to the room she occupied. His emotion at
+seeing her again, though less sudden than that he had just experienced,
+was deeper than he anticipated, for he was unprepared for the change
+wrought within so short a time. She was, however, as calm and resolute as
+the night before, though she had passed through what might be called the
+agony of sacrifice—that hour of inexpressible suffering, not when the
+sacrifice of one’s self is decided upon, not even that in which it is
+consummated, but the intermediate hour in which repugnance still struggles
+against the will. It was this hour endured by our common Master in the
+order of his sufferings after he took upon himself our likeness.
+
+Fleurange had only taken a short hour of repose before day. The remainder
+of the night she passed wholly in conflict with suffering. She then
+allowed the repressed sobs that filled her breast during her interview
+with Vera to burst forth without restraint as soon as she was alone for
+the night; she gave herself up to the poor solace of tasting at leisure
+the bitterness of sacrifice, repelling every consoling thought—almost
+allowing the waves of despair to gather round her, and, if not to break
+over her, at least to threaten her.
+
+The chamber she occupied was more spacious and sumptuous than Mademoiselle
+Josephine’s, being that of the Princess Catherine herself. It was lighted
+only by a lamp which burned before the holy images enshrined in gold and
+silver in one corner, according to the Russian custom. Fleurange threw
+herself on a couch, and there, with her head buried in the cushions, her
+long hair dishevelled, and her hands clasped to her face inundated with
+tears, she gave vent to her grief for a long time without any attempt to
+moderate it.
+
+Once before in her life she had abandoned herself to a similar transport
+of grief, though certainly with much less reason. It was when she left
+Paris two years before, and it seemed as if she was alone in the world,
+and all the joys of life had come to an end. Those who have not forgotten
+the beginning of this story may remember that on that occasion the sight
+of a star suddenly appearing in the clear sky brought her a message of
+peace. God knows, when it pleaseth him, how to give a voice to everything
+in nature, and to speak to his creatures by the work of his hands, and
+even of theirs. An impression of such a nature now infused the first ray
+of calmness into the tempest that completely overwhelmed her soul.
+Suddenly raising her head from the attitude in which she had so long
+remained, her eyes naturally turned towards the light diffused by the lamp
+before the images in the corner of the chamber, the richest of which
+sparkled in its ray. In these Greek paintings, as we are aware, the heads
+alone on the canvas stand out from the gold and precious stones that
+surround them. That which now attracted Fleurange’s attention was the
+image of Christ—that sacred face of the well‐known type common to all the
+representations of Byzantine art. That long, grave face, those mild eyes,
+with their calmness and depth, have a thrilling, mysterious effect which
+surpasses a thousand times every reproduction of human beauty. This
+impression, which a pious love of art enables every one to comprehend, was
+associated with a tender remembrance of Fleurange’s childhood. She had
+often prayed before a face of similar aspect in the chapel of Santa Maria
+al Prato. She now looked steadfastly into those divine eyes gazing at her,
+and it seemed as if that sweet penetrating look pierced to the depths of
+her soul, and infused a sudden, marvellous, inexpressible consolation.
+Changing gradually her previous attitude, she remained for some time
+seated with clasped hands, transfixed. At last, her eyes still fastened on
+the holy face, she fell on her knees, bent down her head, and remained a
+long time buried in profound recollection. Her immoderate grief seemed to
+diminish and change its character. Her tears, without ceasing to flow,
+lost their bitterness and changed their object; for in the mildness of
+that majestic look she read a reproach which she comprehended!—
+
+“O my Saviour and my God! pardon me!” exclaimed she, with fervor, bending
+down till her forehead touched the floor.
+
+Pardon!—Yes, in spite of her purity, her piety, and the uprightness of her
+soul, it was a word Fleurange was likewise obliged to utter. In it she
+felt lay solace and peace for her heart. She perceived it now for the
+first time. A new light began to rise in her soul, like the faint flush of
+aurora which precedes day, and her grief seemed a punishment merited for
+forgetfulness, her tears an expiation. These thoughts were still confused;
+but their influence was already beneficent, and she soon felt really
+springing up within her the courage and fortitude which she outwardly
+manifested during her interview with Vera. She had always been capable of
+action in spite of suffering, and she now sought it, realizing its
+benefit. The night was far advanced, but she did not feel the need of
+repose, and before seeking it she would give her heart and mind, even more
+fatigued than her body, the relief they needed. Under the impression of
+all the incidents and varied emotions of the day, she wrote the Madre
+Maddalena a letter which was the faithful transcript of all she had passed
+through. The joy of the morning, the sacrifice of the evening, her despair
+scarcely subsided, nothing was concealed or suppressed, not even a fresh
+ardent aspiration towards the cloister which she thought could no longer
+be shut against her, and which now seemed the only refuge of her broken
+heart.
+
+There is a certain art in reading the hearts of others; but it is as great
+a one to be able to read one’s own, and this art Fleurange possessed in
+the highest degree when in the presence of that great soul which afar off
+as well as near watched over hers. This outpouring soothed her. She
+afterwards slept awhile, and, on awaking, courageously despatched the
+letter which we have just seen the Marquis Adelardi read and communicate
+to Clement.
+
+But such a night leaves its traces. Fleurange’s swollen eyes, her
+contracted features, her pale, trembling lips, and her sad expression
+indicated suffering which was an insupportable torture to Clement. He
+would have spared her this at the expense of his life, as it is allowable
+to say he had proved. But now that the arduous duty of earnestly desiring
+her happiness through the affection of another was no longer required of
+him, the impetuous cry of his own heart became almost irresistible in its
+power, and Clement never manifested more self‐control than this morning in
+subduing the impulse which prompted him a thousand times to throw himself
+at his cousin’s feet, and passionately tell her she loved and regretted an
+ungrateful man, and that she herself was even more ungrateful than he! But
+instead of that, he silently pressed her hand. Fleurange saw he was aware
+of everything, and it was a relief to have nothing to tell. In a few words
+they made arrangements for their departure, and Clement promised her to
+start within twenty‐four hours.
+
+Meanwhile, Mademoiselle Josephine appeared, and Clement, too preoccupied
+to use any circumlocution, simply announced the change in his cousin’s
+intentions, without giving her any explanation. But when, in the height of
+her joy, mademoiselle exclaimed, “She is going back with us!—O mon Dieu!
+what happiness!” Clement frowned and pressed her hand in so expressive a
+manner that the poor demoiselle stopped short and, according to her
+custom, buried her joy in utter silence, saying to herself that the day
+would perhaps come when she would understand all these inexplicable
+things, and, among others, why, when she wept at Gabrielle’s leaving them,
+it was necessary to conceal her sorrow; and now she was to remain, it was
+not permitted to manifest her joy.
+
+“All this is very singular—I always seem to take aim at the wrong moment.
+And yet, Clement allow me to say that I suspect that, as to this Monsieur
+le Comte, it was I—and I alone—who was right.”
+
+This last reflection did not escape her, it is reasonable to suppose, till
+later, at one of those seasons of special unburdening her mind to Clement
+which she sought now and then, and we should add that the smile in return
+amply repaid her for the frown we have just noted.
+
+The evening passed away almost in silence. The Marquis Adelardi spent it
+with them. The frightful alteration in Fleurange’s features did not allow
+him to mistake the extent of her sufferings; and her calm, simple manner
+redoubled the enthusiasm she had always inspired him with—an enthusiasm
+which gradually ripened into solid friendship, and ultimately wrought a
+durable, beneficent effect on his life.
+
+Before Clement and his cousin separated for the night, they spoke of
+Felix’s sad burial, and its lack of any religious ceremony. The marquis
+had promised to obtain the last favor Clement asked—that a cross should
+mark the spot where he reposed. The following morning Mass was to be
+celebrated for him in the Catholic church.
+
+“We will attend this Mass together,” said Fleurange.
+
+“Yes, Gabrielle, that was my expectation.”
+
+The next morning, at an early hour, Fleurange and her cousin were
+prostrate at the foot of the altar in the large Catholic church on the
+Nevskoi Prospekt. After all the sorrow that had overwhelmed the young
+girl’s soul since the night before, this was an hour of sad consolation
+and repose. Her long journey, after all, in spite of the bitter deception,
+in spite of the grief and sacrifice at the end, had not been made in vain.
+He whose last hours she had consoled, and for whom they were now praying,
+had carried away with him the blessed influence of her presence into those
+regions to which repentance opens the door! Repentance! the salvation of
+the soul that feels it, the benediction of the soul that seconds it, the
+mysterious joy of the angels that inspire it and rejoice over it as one of
+the delights of their eternal beatitude!
+
+They left the church, and slowly descended the long avenue bordered by
+trees called the Nevskoi Prospekt. They found their way impeded by a
+numerous crowd in front of the gate of the Anitschkoff Palace, which they
+had to pass. Fleurange, lost in thought, was walking slowly along without
+looking around, and Clement also was absorbed in his own reflections, when
+they were both startled as if by an electric shock.
+
+“The newly married pair are coming out,” said a voice.
+
+“Married!—condemned, you mean,” replied another, laughing. “You know they
+are both going into exile.”
+
+They heard no more. Clement’s sudden effort to lead Fleurange away was
+powerless. She resisted it, and, leaving his arm without his being able to
+prevent it, she swiftly made her way to the front, and leaned against a
+tree. She saw the _grille_ open—the carriage appeared; it drew near; at
+last she saw him! Yes; she saw Count George’s noble features, his smiling
+face, his radiant look, and she caught a glimpse of the black eyes and
+golden locks of the bride. Then it seemed to grow dark around her, and
+everything vanished from her thoughts as well as from her sight!
+
+
+Epilogue.
+
+
+—“No, my Fior Angela, I once more say no, as when you made the same
+request at Santa Maria that lovely evening in May while we were gazing at
+the setting sun over the cloisters. What has been changed? And why should
+God call you now to this retreat if he did not call you then?—Because you
+suffer still more? But, my poor child, you were suffering then. Life, you
+said, seemed ‘empty and cheerless, unsatisfactory and imperfect.’ And,
+indeed, you were not wrong. That is its real aspect when we compare it
+with the true life that awaits us. From that point of view nothing truly
+can give it the least attraction; but with this kind of disgust there is
+no sadness mingled. We are not sad when an object seems poor and valueless
+compared with another object wonderful and divine of which we are sure. As
+I have already told you, this is the disgust of the world whence springs
+the irresistible call to the cloister; but, as I likewise said, this
+divine voice, when it speaks to the soul, resounds alone, to the exclusion
+of all earthly voices. A flame is kindled that absorbs and extinguishes
+all others, even those earthly lights that are attractive and pure. That
+divine call has not been made to you. The earthly happiness you dreamed of
+has failed you, that is all. And this disappointment for the second time
+has inspired you with the same wish as before; but, as on that occasion, I
+believe if God claimed your life he would not have permitted such a heart
+as that of my Fleurange to be divided for a day!
+
+“This time, it is true, everything is at an end, and without remedy. You
+are irrevocably separated from him to whom you gave your heart—allow me to
+say now, to whom you gave it unreasonably!—You shudder, my poor child, you
+find me cruel, and all the false brilliancy which fascinated you, now
+lights up anew the image still present and still dear to your imagination;
+nevertheless, I will go on.
+
+“There is an earthly love which, if it lengthens the road that leads to
+God, does not, however, turn one from it—which, by the very virtues it
+requires, the sacrifices it imposes, and the sufferings that spring from
+it, often seconds the noblest impulses of the soul.
+
+“Do you not feel now, Fleurange, that the foundation of such a love was
+wanting to yours? I perceived it at Santa Maria as soon as I heard your
+story to the end, and looked into the most secret recesses of your heart.
+I then understood why God had placed obstacles in your way, and imposed a
+sacrifice on you. Your sufferings appeared to me the expiation of an
+idolatry you did not realize the extent of.
+
+“If you had shown any doubt or hesitation as to the course to be pursued,
+if you had been weakly desirous of sparing yourself and escaping the
+sacrifice imposed, perhaps I should at that time have expressed myself
+more severely. But you acted with firmness and uprightness, and I deferred
+revealing to you the secret malady of your heart till, with time, peace
+should be restored to you. Till then, what you suffered seemed to me a
+sufficient punishment.
+
+“But it was not to be so. The temptation was to be renewed, and under a
+form impossible for my poor child to resist. She yielded to the generous,
+passionate impulse of her heart, and found in the very excess of her
+devotedness a means of satisfying her conscience which she confusedly felt
+the need of. But something more was essential: she must suffer still
+more—more than before. In short, the idol must be shattered, and this
+destruction seemed to involve the very breaking of her own heart!—
+
+“But it is not so, Fleurange. Across the distance that separates us I
+would make my voice heard, and wish it possessed a divine power when I say
+to you: ‘Rise up and walk.’ Yes; resume your course through the life God
+gives you, and courageously bless him for having snatched you from the
+snare of a love not founded on him, which must have proved hollow sooner
+or later. Then look around, see whom you can console and aid; see also
+whom you can love; especially notice who loves you, and banish from your
+heart the thought, equivalent to blasphemy, which you express in saying,
+‘My life is stripped of all that made it desirable!’—
+
+“Some day, my Fior Angela, you will again recall these bitter, ungrateful
+words, and will, I assure you, see their falsity. If God did not create
+you to love him to the exclusion of those lawful affections which reflect
+a ray of his love, you were still less created to find rest in a love
+deprived of that light—a love whose sudden rending and keen anguish
+preserved you from proving its perishable nature and spared you the pain
+of irreparable deception!
+
+“Once more, Fleurange, prostrate yourself before God, and give thanks:
+then rise up and act. No lingering pity over yourself, no dwelling
+regretfully on your deceived hopes and the pain you have suffered.
+Courage! Your heart has been weak, it yielded to fascination; but your
+volition as yet has never ceased to be strong. However rough the path of
+duty, it was enough for you to see it in order to walk in it without
+faltering. Courage, I say! You will live. You will do better than live—you
+will recover from all this, and recall the time that seemed so dark as
+that which preceded the real day that is to illumine your life.
+
+“At first this letter will add to your sadness. You will feel yourself
+deprived of everything, even of the consolation you expected of me; but do
+not yield to the temptation of burning this letter after reading it. Keep
+it to read over again, and be sure that sooner or later the day will come
+when a sweet promise of happiness will respond at the bottom of your heart
+at reading it. You will then comprehend what were the prayers of your
+Madre Maddalena for you, dear Fleurange, for they will on that day have
+been heard!—”
+
+This reply to the letter Fleurange wrote during the night of agitation
+which followed her interview with Vera we lay before our readers at its
+arrival at Rosenheim after her return from her sad journey; but one summer
+evening, two years after, the young girl, seated on a bench overlooking
+the river, read it over the second time. She was in her old seat, but her
+appearance was somewhat changed. A severe illness, resulting from the
+emotion and fatigue endured two years before, endangered her life, and to
+her convalescence had succeeded a malady slower, deeper, and more
+difficult to heal, against which all remedies, though energetically
+seconded by a resolute will, long remained ineffectual.
+
+During this period of weakness Fleurange had never known before, life
+assumed a new and formidable aspect. For a long time she was unable to
+struggle actively against the double languor of illness and depression;
+she had to endure inaction without making it an additional torture to
+herself and others; in short, she was obliged to be constantly and
+silently on her guard against herself. She succeeded, however, accepting
+with grateful docility all the care that surrounded her. She did not repel
+her friends from her crushed heart, but, on the contrary, endeavored to
+convince them that their affection was sufficient, and that, once more
+with them, nothing was wanting. By degrees, it required no effort to say
+this. As the sun in spring‐time melts away the snow, then warms the earth
+and covers it with flowers, so, under the influence of their beneficent
+tenderness, everything began to revive in her heart and soul. Was it not
+delightful, as she lay half asleep on her _chaise longue_ for long hours,
+to hear around her, like the warblings of birds, Frida’s caressing voice
+mingled with the tones of her cousin’s little children whom she loved to
+hold in her arms and caress when they awoke her? Was it not a consolation
+to rest her weary head on a bosom almost maternal? Was it not salutary to
+converse with her Uncle Ludwig when he wheeled his chair near the young
+invalid, and spoke of so many things worthy of her attention without ever
+turning it away from the highest of all? And Hilda? And Clara? And Julian
+and Hansfelt? Did they not all come with their constant affectionate
+interest, each one bringing, as it were, a flower to add its perfume to
+the air she breathed? Finally, was it nothing when she opened her eyes to
+meet the kind glance of her old friend who, after fearing to lose her, was
+never weary of gazing at her now she was again restored to life?
+
+And what shall we say of him whom we have not yet named—him whose
+solicitude for her was not apparently greater than that of his parents and
+sisters, but who, during her long convalescence, ended by taking a place
+beside her which no one thought of disputing? Clement’s character has been
+badly delineated if, after the unexpected occurrence that restored freedom
+to his hopes, it is supposed he was prompt to admit them, and especially
+to express them. Nevertheless, since it was no longer an absolute duty to
+maintain a strong, constant control over himself; since the fear of
+betraying himself no longer obliged him to a restraint with his cousin
+which had extended to every subject, and ended by frequently obliging him
+to partially conceal from her the superiority of his mind and the rare
+nature of his intelligence, a change was wrought in him which he did not
+realize himself, and now gave to his physiognomy, the tone of his voice,
+and his whole person a wholly different character than before in the eyes
+of her to whom he thus appeared for the first time. She noticed it with
+surprise, and, when he stopped reading to express the thoughts that sprang
+spontaneously from his heart when moved, or his mind unimpeded in its
+flight, and touched on a thousand subjects hitherto deemed forbidden, she
+became thoughtful, and, in spite of herself, compared his eloquence of
+soul, whose source was so profound, and whose flight was sometimes so
+elevated, with the eloquence of another which once dazzled her, the only
+charm of which sprang from his carefully cultivated mind, and his mind
+alone. Every day she impatiently awaited this hour for reading or
+conversation. She already appreciated her cousin’s devotedness, the
+incomparable kindness of his heart, his trustworthiness, his energy, and
+his courage. She had given him credit for all these qualities before, and
+yet, all at once, it seemed as if she had never known him. She even asked
+herself one day if she had ever looked at him, so completely did the
+expression of his countenance—which beamed with what is most divine here
+on earth—a double nobleness of mind and soul—so fully did his look and
+smile atone for the imperfections already alluded to in Clement’s
+features, but which time had greatly modified to his advantage. She soon
+felt that, though she had always cherished a strong regard for her cousin,
+she had been unjust to him and never appreciated his real worth.
+
+But the day, the hour, the moment when she discovered she had been not
+only unjust, but ungrateful, and even cruel, we cannot state, and perhaps
+she did not know herself. Was it the day when, after reading in a
+tremulous tone a passage that expressed what he dared not utter, he
+suddenly raised his eyes and looked at her as he had never done before?
+Was it on another occasion, when, playing one tune after another on his
+violin, he ended with that song without words which Hansfelt called
+_Hidden Love_, and suddenly stopped, incapable of continuing? Or was it
+when, towards the end of the second spring after their return, she had
+fully recovered, and he saw her for the first time in the open air
+standing near a rose‐bush with her hands full of flowers? Was it when he
+knelt to pick up one that had fallen at her feet, and remained in that
+position till she extended her hand and blushingly bade him rise? No
+matter. That day came, and not long before the one when we find her seated
+on the bench by the river‐side, attentively reading over the letter Madre
+Maddalena had written her two years before.
+
+The young girl, as we have said, had changed somewhat since we last saw
+her. Her long illness had left some traces, but those traces which are an
+additional charm in youth, betokening the complete return of brilliant
+health. Fleurange’s form was more slender and supple; her complexion more
+transparent; her long hair, cut off during her illness, and now growing
+out again, encircled her youthful face with thick, silky curls—all this
+gave her something of the grace of childhood, and when she stood beside
+her cousin, whose tall stature and manly, energetic expression added the
+appearance of several years to his real age, it would never have been
+supposed she was not the younger of the two.
+
+Motionless and absorbed, from time to time as she read her face colored
+and expressed a variety of emotions. But when she came to her own words:
+“My life is now stripped of all that made it desirable,” and what follows,
+“Some day, my Fior Angela, you will recall these bitter, ungrateful words,
+and will, I assure you, see their falsity,” she stopped short, and,
+raising her eyes full of tears to heaven, she said:
+
+“Yes, Madre mia, you were right!” She covered her face with her hands, and
+remained a long time absorbed and overpowered by a flood of thoughts. In
+the depths of her memory, there were vague recollections of the past
+traced as if by lightning; and some almost forgotten scenes now rose
+before her like a confused dream.
+
+That violent outburst of grief; the sobs he could not repress when he
+learned she was determined to go to George; and, later on, the words
+murmured on the ice when he thought the last hour of his life had come,
+scarcely heard at the time, and then speedily forgotten, came back to‐day
+like invisible writing brought out by the application of heat. The
+sentiments she had discovered only within a few days perhaps had long been
+experienced by Clement, if not always—and, if so, oh! then, how great had
+been his love and constancy, and what sufferings had he not endured for
+her sake! Alas! what had she not inflicted on that noble, faithful soul!
+
+“Oh!” cried she aloud, “was there ever a person more blind, more
+ungrateful, more cruel than I?”
+
+She stopped, started, and raised her head; she thought she heard her
+cousin’s step. She was not mistaken. He sought her in her favorite seat,
+and now stood before her in the same place where, three years before, she
+unwittingly caused him so much suffering as he looked at her. It was the
+same place, and the same season, and also the same hour. Daylight was
+fading away, and now, as then, the rising moon cast a silver ray over the
+charming face which he was again seeking to read. But this time his
+questioning look was comprehended, and the silent response of her
+beautiful eyes, as expressive as words, imparted to the heart that
+understood it one of those human joys reserved here below for those alone
+who are capable of a pure, constant, peculiar love—a love only worthy of
+being named after that for God.
+
+We might now end this story, and lay down our pen, without attempting to
+describe the joy of the family when, as night came on, they saw the two
+absent ones return, and each one divined from their looks the nature of
+the conversation which tonight had detained them so long on the banks of
+the river. But towards the end of an evening so happy, Mademoiselle
+Josephine unintentionally made an exclamation it may not be useless to
+add:
+
+“See! see!” she cried, in the exultation of her happiness, mingled with
+secret pride at her penetration, “how right I was in thinking Count
+George!—” She stopped confounded, suddenly recalling all past precautions,
+and fearing she had been imprudent in neglecting them.
+
+But Fleurange unhesitatingly exclaimed: “Go on, dear mademoiselle, go on
+without any fear, and boldly pronounce a name I now neither shrink from
+nor seek to hear.” And, as she spoke, the remembrance of his past tortures
+crossed Clement’s memory, giving him a keener sense of his present
+happiness. She asked him, in a calm tone, “Is he still in exile, or has he
+been pardoned?”
+
+Clement replied with a smile: “No, he has not been pardoned; he is still
+undergoing his sentence to the full extent.” After a moment’s silence, he
+added: “I had a letter from Adelardi this very morning which speaks of
+him.—Would you like to read it?”
+
+At an affirmative nod from her, he took out his pocket‐book to find the
+letter. As he opened it, a little sprig of myrtle fell out. Fleurange
+immediately recognized it. “What! you still keep that?” said she,
+blushing.
+
+Clement made no reply. He looked at it with emotion; it was a part of a
+carefully hoarded treasure, and for a long time the only joy of his hidden
+love! “Never, no never!” murmured he. “That was my reply that evening,
+Gabrielle, when you promised me a beautiful bride. Do you remember it?”
+
+“Yes, for I had said the same words an hour before, and the coincidence
+struck me.”
+
+“What can we think of it, now you are really the _fiancée_ I dreamed of as
+impossible?”
+
+“That our presentiments are often illusory—and our sentiments also,
+Clement,” added she, turning towards him her eyes veiled with tears which
+seemed to implore his pardon.
+
+We will not say what Clement’s reply was; only, that it made them both
+completely forget Adelardi’s letter. We will, however, lay it before our
+readers, who may be less indifferent to its contents than he to whom it
+was addressed was for the moment. It was dated at Florence. The marquis,
+whose visits at Rosenheim had become annual, announced his speedy arrival,
+after which he continued:
+
+“The poor Princess Catherine, after whom you inquire, has had a return of
+her malady, so many times cured, and it is now increased by
+dissatisfaction and annoyance more than by age. No one succeeds in taking
+care of her so well as she whom she still remembers. Each new attack
+renews her regrets, which have found no compensation in the gratification
+of her wishes. I have often remarked, however, that there is nothing like
+the realization of a desire to efface the remembrance of the ardor with
+which it was sought, and even the transport that hailed its fulfilment. It
+is certain the princess’ actual relations with her son are by no means
+satisfactory; they are affected by the ill‐humor of both parties. George’s
+exile would seem enviable to many; for the place he inhabits has
+everything to make it delightful excepting the liberty of leaving it, and
+this mars the whole. He can enjoy nothing, he says, because everything is
+forced upon him. There is reason, therefore, to fear the future he is
+preparing for himself and his wife is very ominous.
+
+“The Countess Vera is a beautiful, noble woman, capable of self‐sacrifice
+to a certain point, but haughty, high‐tempered, and jealous to the last
+degree. She thought the sacrifice she made in marrying George in the
+position he was then in, would secure his unsteady heart, and bind him
+faithfully to her through gratitude. She saw only too soon it was not so,
+and that the comparative liberty he had regained was soon regarded as a
+weary bondage. Thence resulted scenes which more than once have disturbed
+the life whose monotony they are not allowed to break. Will you credit it?
+In one of them, Vera, in the height of her irritation and jealousy,
+betrayed the secret hitherto so well guarded, and declared in her anger
+that _she regretted not having left him to the fate another was so ready
+to share with him_. She afterwards had reason to regret her imprudence,
+for George exacted a complete revelation, and the remembrance thus
+suddenly revived and clad with the double charm of the past and the
+unattainable caused him in his turn to overwhelm her with the most bitter
+reproaches. I am not sure but he had the cruelty to tell her he should a
+thousand times have preferred the fate she saved him from to that he now
+had to endure with her!—There can only be one opinion as to this mirage of
+his imagination; but, after all this, you will not be surprised to hear
+that they both long with equal ardor for their liberty, which they must
+wait for two years longer. According to appearances, it will be as
+dangerous for one as for the other. The princess has realized and
+predicted this since her visit to Livonia last summer, where I accompanied
+her.
+
+“During her stay, George did not spare her any reproaches, and they were
+the more keenly felt because she had for a long time seen that the result
+of her wishes had been a sacrifice of her own comfort and happiness
+through her opposition to what had at once deprived her of her son and the
+only companion that had ever satisfied her. And when she is dissatisfied,
+she must always vent her anger on some one besides herself. Whom do you
+think she reproached the other day before me for all her troubles?
+Gabrielle!—who, she said, did not know how to avail herself of her
+ascendency three years ago as she should, and to retain it!
+
+“Since she has seen that I by no means sympathize in her regrets—which
+will not be shared by you either, I suppose, nor, I like to think, by her
+who inspires them—she is offended with me in my turn, and declares in a
+melancholy tone that all friends are unfeeling and all children
+ungrateful!—”
+
+Clement’s reply to this letter hastened the marquis’ arrival. He had seen
+his young friend’s hopes spring up and develop, and would not for the
+world have been absent from Rosenheim on the day of their realization.
+William and Bertha, the discreet confidant who knew how to console Clement
+in his sufferings without questioning him, were the only friends, besides
+the marquis, who were admitted that day into this happy family. The
+wedding was as gay as Clara’s, but the newly married pair were graver and
+more thoughtful. They had both passed through severe trials, which now
+gave a certain completeness to their happiness, often wanting here below
+in the most joyful of festivals.
+
+And they also, in their turn, set off for Italy, and it may be imagined
+that, among the places they visited together, the first to which their
+hearts led them was that where awaited the Madre Maddalena’s welcome and
+blessing. At their return, Mademoiselle Josephine’s house, improved and
+embellished, became their home, on the condition imposed by their old
+friend that she should dwell under their roof the remainder of her days.
+
+Was their destiny a happy one? We can safely reply in the affirmative. Was
+it exempt from pains, sufferings, and sacrifices? We can deny that still
+more positively. But it was, however, enviable; for of all earthly
+happiness, they possessed what was most desirable, without ever forgetting
+that “life can never be perfectly happy because it is not heaven, nor
+wholly unhappy because it is the way thither.”(231)
+
+
+
+
+American Catholics And Partisan Newspapers.
+
+
+To Catholics, as such, the political discussions of a Presidential
+campaign have no special significance. Thus far no issues between the two
+chief parties have particularly affected us. Both have generally been
+careful not to offend us; and although in local elections questions
+touching our schools and charities have sometimes become prominent, in the
+larger contest our votes have been fairly divided between the Republican
+and the Democratic candidates. If there ever unfortunately arise a
+distinctively Catholic party in American politics, it will not be because
+Catholics are unwilling to co‐operate freely with their Protestant fellow‐
+citizens in secular affairs, but because we have been thrown upon the
+defensive by some combination directly and designedly hostile to our
+religious interests. None know better than we do that there is no excuse
+in this country for uniting religious with political issues. Our
+constitution gives equal liberty and protection to all, and we should be
+sorry to have it otherwise, for we know that the church makes all the more
+rapid progress in the United States by reason of her absolute
+independence. Asking nothing of the state but fair play, she gives no
+excuse to her enemies for making any discrimination against her children.
+Her position has been generally understood and approved; and although
+there are fiery bigots at all times who rave about the dangerous designs
+of the papists, and affect to dread a crusade with torch and sword as soon
+as we get to be a little stronger, the good sense of the American people
+has usually treated these sectaries with the indifference they deserve.
+
+We have intimated, however, in former numbers of THE CATHOLIC WORLD, that
+the chronic anti‐Catholic agitation might assume a new character which
+would require on our part a new attitude of resistance. A few years ago,
+when the settlement of the issues of the war first seemed to menace the
+dissolution of the Republican party, the most active leaders of that party
+began to cast about for a “new departure,” and one of their favorite plans
+for keeping the organization alive was the scheme of compulsory education
+by the general government. Of this project the Hon. Henry Wilson was a
+prominent advocate. It has not yet been formally brought into politics,
+for the party has been able to get along without it; but it has not been
+abandoned, and we need not be surprised if it be strongly pushed within
+the next few years. Now, Catholics look upon the question of religious
+education as one of paramount importance. They will not surrender the
+teaching of their children into the hands of Protestants and infidels;
+they will not consent, so far as _their_ young people are concerned, to
+the separation of religious and secular instruction. Any party which seeks
+directly or indirectly to limit the usefulness or hamper the operations of
+Catholic schools, must prepare to encounter in Catholics a united and
+determined resistance.
+
+Thus far no such conflict has arisen. We may hope that it never will
+arise. And yet, during the canvass that has recently closed, two of the
+leading organs of Republican opinion have opened a bitter and apparently
+concerted warfare upon the Catholics of the United States which we cannot
+help regarding as highly significant. In the midst of a Presidential
+campaign, political organs never make such attacks except for political
+reasons. The papers to which we refer are in close relations with the
+party leaders. _The New York Times_ became for a time, when _The Tribune_
+abandoned orthodoxy, the principal Republican newspaper of the principal
+state in the Union. It is known to have reflected with tolerable accuracy
+the sentiments of the Republican managers in New York, and it has always
+said what it assumed to be acceptable at the White House. For a long time
+it has been notoriously unfriendly to Catholics. It has amused itself, in
+its heavy, witless way, laughing at what they hold sacred and abusing all
+that they respect. Until a few months ago, its offensive utterances seemed
+to be merely the occasional vulgarities of a bigotry that, did not know
+enough to hold its tongue. But when Mr. Francis Kernan was nominated for
+Governor of the State of New York, its assaults became more methodical,
+more vehement, and apparently more malicious. Mr. Kernan is a Catholic; so
+_The Times_ instantly denounced him as “a bigot.” An utterly untrue
+pretence was made that Democrats were asking Irishmen to vote for him on
+account of his religion, and thus the point was insinuated rather than
+openly pressed that on account of his religion Protestants ought to vote
+against him. For the first time, to our knowledge, since Know‐Nothing
+days, the question of religious belief was dragged into the dirty arena of
+politics. Happily, the Catholics as a body kept their temper and their
+judgment during these infamous proceedings. They refused to be drawn into
+the discussion which _The Times_ wanted to provoke, and even when that
+paper surpassed all its former disreputable acts by reproducing in its
+columns a forged handbill, showing the name of Francis Kernan surrounding
+a huge black cross, and told the public that such were the devices by
+which the Democratic candidate sought to inflame the fanatical zeal of his
+followers, the Catholics contented themselves with one word of indignant
+denial. It would have been a rash display of political courage to which we
+do not believe _The Times_ capable of rising, if an open attack had been
+made upon the Catholic faith or Catholic morals. _The Times_ was even
+frightened at its own frankness in scolding at Mr. Kernan for a bigot. It
+professed to be shocked at the introduction of religious affairs into the
+discussions of the campaign, and carried on a cowardly anti‐Catholic
+warfare under cover of repelling purely imaginary assaults. Of course this
+subterfuge was well understood by all parties. The Catholics knew that
+they had done nothing to draw this fire; the Protestants also knew it, and
+a great many of them were indignant at the transaction. Was _The Times_
+itself deceived? That is a question which perhaps we should not attempt to
+answer. In its wild bigotry, it is capable of believing almost any
+preposterous falsehood against us; but it is equally capable of inventing
+one. Some familiarity with the course of political controversies in the
+United States has convinced us that in a fight _The Times_ sticks at
+nothing. It would rather stab an enemy in the back than kill him in open
+battle. It never gives fair‐play; it never makes amends for a wrong‐doing;
+it never withdraws a calumny. Everybody who has had a controversy with it
+will bear witness that it is not in the habit of telling the truth about
+its adversaries. That it is in the habit of consciously, or, to speak more
+correctly, deliberately, lying we do not go so far as to say. But there is
+a kind of falsehood very common with people of strong prejudices to which
+_The Times_ is greatly addicted. It bears about the same relation to truth
+that hyperbole bears to historical statement. Let us suppose that _The
+Times_ really imagines the Catholic Church to be a dangerous and immoral
+organization, and its bishops and supporters in this country to be engaged
+in an enterprise which ought to be resisted; with this conviction of the
+general wickedness of Catholic principles, it imagines itself justified in
+charging upon individual Catholics a variety of specific crimes for which
+it has no evidence whatever. Catholics are none too good to commit murder,
+we can imagine it saying; therefore let us accuse Francis Kernan of
+killing his grandmother. The Pope is an impostor; therefore it cannot be
+wrong to call Archbishop McCloskey a thief. Indeed, men who would blush to
+tell an untruth in private intercourse with their fellow‐men have no
+hesitation in publishing slanderous accusations which they suppose may
+“help their party”; and, if we should say that their conduct in doing so
+was to the last degree infamous, they would affect to be shocked by our
+strong language. The editor of _The Times_ would think twice before he
+went into a club parlor, and publicly accused some prominent citizen of a
+criminal action, unless he had the strongest possible proof of the
+commission of the offence. But he makes such accusations every day in his
+newspaper, without knowing, and we presume without caring, whether they
+are true or not. Anybody whom he dislikes he regards as an outlaw. Anybody
+who comes in his way is a fit subject for the penitentiary. We saw a
+striking illustration of his entire insensibility to the demands of truth
+and honor in his behavior towards a rival newspaper a few weeks ago. At
+the close of the year, _The Times_ made great efforts to secure the old
+subscribers of _The Tribune_, who were supposed to be dissatisfied with
+that paper’s recent declaration of political independence, and the means
+which it took to secure them was one which in any other business would
+have resulted in a suit for slander and a verdict in very heavy damages.
+_The Times_ first circulated a report that _The Tribune_ had sold itself
+to one of the most disreputable stock‐gamblers in Wall Street, and then
+assured the public that the circulation of its competitor had fallen away
+more than half, and was rapidly going down to nothing at all. Both these
+stories were well known to be entirely untrue, and, if the editor of _The
+Times_ was not conscious of their falsity when he penned them, he might
+easily have learned the truth by a moment’s inquiry. But he did not want
+the truth. He wanted to say something damaging, and these were the most
+damaging things he could think of.
+
+How much he succeeded in damaging Mr. Kernan by his campaign slanders
+against Catholics, we can guess from the figures of the election. Mr.
+Kernan received about 5,000 more votes for Governor than Mr. Greeley
+received in this State for President; but he received 5,000 fewer than the
+candidate for Lieutenant‐Governor on the same ticket. This loss is
+probably attributable directly to the anti‐Catholic feeling, for Mr.
+Kernan is a gentleman to whom no personal objection could possibly be made
+except on religious grounds. No doubt an equally large number of voters
+were repelled, by the bigotry _The Times_ fostered, from supporting the
+Democratic and Liberal ticket at all; so that we shall not pass the bounds
+of probability if we estimate the fruit of prejudice and falsehood in this
+case as equivalent to ten thousand votes.
+
+Catholics are used to injustice, and they are not quick to resent it. In
+America, the church has prospered under every sort of obstacle and
+discouragement short of the direct hostility of the government, and it is
+not likely that her course will be stayed by _The New York Times_. But it
+is well for us to look at the situation carefully, and judge who are our
+friends. If any political party is to make bigotry part of its stock in
+trade, we cannot help taking notice of such a declaration of hostilities,
+and we shall govern ourselves accordingly.
+
+We have said that _The Times_ and _Harper’s Weekly_ appear in this matter
+to have acted in concert. Perhaps it is unfair to hold the party managers
+fully responsible for the utterances of these two violent newspapers; but
+we cannot forget that both journals are in close communion with the
+Republican administration, and that both have been governed during the
+campaign by the judgment of the Republican leaders. The editor of _The
+Times_ enjoys the most intimate association with the federal organization
+popularly known as the “Custom‐house faction” in New York City; the editor
+of _Harper’s Weekly_ is the personal friend of the President, and speaks
+the mind of the President’s chief advisers in Washington. If, then, these
+two papers have made a systematic assault upon the Catholic Church in the
+midst of a sharp political controversy, and have taken pains to give their
+furious Protestantism a direct political bearing, the party for which they
+speak must be prepared to face the responsibility. It should be observed,
+however, in justice to the sensible and unprejudiced members of the party,
+that _Harper’s Weekly_, though it may have been encouraged in its
+bitterness by partisan considerations, did not draw from such motives its
+first anti‐Catholic inspiration. It has always been our enemy. A spirit,
+of commercial fanaticism, the hatred of a religion which it will pay to
+abuse, has distinguished the firm of the Harpers ever since the public has
+known anything about them. The political campaign of 1872 made no
+difference in the tone of their paper; it merely gave force, and
+concentration, and regularity to the attacks which had previously been
+spasmodic.
+
+How coarsely it attempted to turn to political account the religious
+bigotry upon which it had always traded may be seen in an article entitled
+“Our Foreign Church,” published in _Harper’s Weekly_ of the 14th of
+September last. The writer starts with the assumption that all religious
+denominations in this country, except “the Romish Church,” patriotically
+renounced the authority of their European rulers when the American
+republic was founded. The Methodists “rejected the control in political
+and ecclesiastical matters of their founders”; the Presbyterians
+repudiated the General Assembly of Scotland; Episcopalians revolted from
+the Archbishop of Canterbury; the Jews “threw themselves boldly into the
+tide of American progress”; while the Catholic Church alone stood aloof,
+and “refused to separate itself from its European masters,” and conform
+its organization to the Declaration of Independence and the constitution
+of the United States. Ridiculous as this complaint sounds, it is no
+burlesque, but a faithful synopsis of the nonsense which Mr. Eugene
+Lawrence is permitted to print in _Harper’s Weekly_. A church of divine
+origin, according to this preposterous person, is to change its divine
+laws to conform to the requirements of temporary human institutions; and
+the political theories of Thomas Jefferson are to govern the ordinances of
+Jesus Christ. It is the glory of the true church that she is above all
+secular constitutions. She has seen the rise and fall of countless
+dynasties and states; she will survive the ruin, if every form of
+government now known upon earth shall be eventually overthrown. Empires,
+kingdoms, republics, are all alike to her. She was founded for all ages
+and all climes; she was not created, as Mr. Eugene Lawrence seems to think
+she ought to have been, for the exclusive benefit of the United States of
+America. This is a great country; but we presume that our constitution,
+amendments and all, occupies but an insignificant place in the divine
+order of the universe.
+
+Obeying its heaven‐appointed head, who did not see fit to choose either
+Europe or America for the place of his human birth, the Roman Catholic
+Church in America, according to _Harper’s Weekly_, is a foreign body, and,
+therefore, dangerous (as all foreigners are) to the peace of society. “It
+is loud in its denunciations of American civilization;” it “furnishes
+three‐fourths of the criminals and the paupers who prey upon the
+Protestant community”; it never intermits its “attacks upon the principles
+of freedom”; and “its great mass of ignorant voters have been the chief
+source of our political ills.” Moreover, “the unpatriotic conduct of the
+Romish population in our chief cities during the rebellion is well known.
+They formed a constant menace and terror to the loyal citizens; they
+thronged the ‘peace meetings’; they strove to divide the Union; and when
+the war was over they placed in office their corrupt leaders, and
+plundered the impoverished community.” We are almost ashamed to copy, even
+for the purpose of denouncing it, this insult to the memory of our dead
+Catholic soldiers. There is not a man in the United States who does not
+know of the noble share of these outraged “Romish” troops in the terrible
+struggles of the civil war; not a man who is ignorant of the splendid
+record of the Irish regiments under the Union flag on every hard‐fought
+field from the first Bull Run to the last conflict before Richmond. “The
+Romish population of our chief cities” furnished the bone and sinew of
+more than one gallant army during those four sad years. They gave up their
+lives for the country of their birth or their adoption with a heroism that
+stirs every sensitive heart. Their priests followed the army on the march
+and into the fight. Their Sisters of Charity nursed the wounded and the
+sick. The greatest of their prelates, aided by another bishop who is still
+living, spent the last remains of his strength in defending the cause of
+the Union in hostile foreign capitals. Nothing, in fine, could be more
+magnificent than the patriotism with which the adherents of this “foreign
+church” sacrificed life and fortune for their country during its hour of
+need; and we have no language to define the infamy of endeavoring to make
+capital for Gen. Grant by maligning the devoted men whom he led to death
+at Shiloh and in the wilderness, and whose bravery, we are sure, he would
+be the last man to depreciate.
+
+And now, continues the writer in the _Weekly_, as the Presidential
+election approaches, “our foreign church has assumed more openly than ever
+before the form of a political faction.” “Romish priests” and “Romish
+bishops” have taken the field as the partisans of Mr. Greeley, “the
+candidate of disunion _and of religious bigotry_”!—the italics are
+ours—and the church is engaged in an attempt “to place the fallen
+slaveholders once more in power.” For these statements we deliberately
+declare that there is no justification whatever. Mr. Eugene Lawrence
+invented them out of his own bigotry and malice; and when he had the folly
+and insolence to threaten us, as he did at the close of his article, with
+“the vengeance of the people,” he added to his untruthfulness a degree of
+hypocrisy which we have rarely seen equalled even in the publications of
+the house of Harper & Brothers. We say hypocrisy; but perhaps that is
+unfair. Mr. Lawrence may be silly enough to tremble at the bogies of his
+own devising. He may imagine that the rest of the world is as much afraid
+of the Pope as he is. He may fancy that the whole party of which he is
+such a hard‐working member is burning with desire to take the Jesuits by
+the throat and hang them on the nearest lamp‐post. If he did not suppose
+that a profitable market could be found for his sensational wares, he
+probably would not be at the trouble of the manufacture. If the “vengeance
+of the people” do not menace the Jesuits, it will certainly not be the
+fault of Mr. Lawrence. In the issue of the _Weekly_ for Oct. 12, he had a
+furious narrative of “The Jesuit Crusade against Germany,” the points of
+which are substantially these: The Jesuits, with the aid of the
+Inquisition (of which they are the directors) and of a hired band of
+convicts and brigands, obtained the absolute mastery of the city of Rome
+and the papal government. The wretched people “cowered before their Jesuit
+rulers,” and within the crumbling walls of the guilty capital “priests and
+cardinals perpetrated their enormities unchecked and unseen.” They then,
+by means of their “lawless police,” overpowered the Œcumenical Council,
+and forced it, “by intimidation and bribes,” to accept the doctrine of
+infallibility, to curse liberty and education, and to set on foot a bloody
+crusade against political and intellectual freedom. This was in accordance
+with the Jesuits’ time‐honored policy. “The fierce and fanatical Loyola”
+used to burn heretics in Spain and Italy, and taught his followers that no
+mercy should be shown to such offenders. It was the Jesuits who set on
+foot the persecutions under Charles V. and Philip II., and “excited the
+unparalleled horrors of the Thirty Years’ War.” In 1870, they were getting
+ready for a new religious war. Napoleon III. was their chief backer. In
+fact, the attack upon Germany in 1870 was the result of a conspiracy
+between Rome and Paris, concluded at the council, and the purpose of the
+war was nothing less than the establishment of the Jesuit Order on the
+ruins of prostrate Germany! For this scheme _the Irish Catholics of
+Dublin, London, and New York __“__furnished men, sympathy, and possibly
+money.__”_ And now that the conspiracy has failed, and that the papists of
+France have been beaten (in spite of all the sinews of war so lavishly
+furnished by the Irish laborers and servant‐girls of New York), the
+Jesuits are getting, up another European convulsion. “The Romish Church,
+organized into a vast political faction, is stirring up war in Europe,
+calls upon France to lead another religious crusade, and promises the aid
+of all the chivalry of Catholicism in avenging the fall of Napoleon upon
+the German Empire.” It purposes to involve all the great states of Europe
+in a common ruin, “and erect the Romish See upon the wrecks of the
+temporal empires.” The pilgrimage of Lourdes is a part of this scheme. The
+Catholic Union is another. The International Society of Workingmen (of
+which the Jesuits are the secret instigators!) is another. Mr. Lawrence
+exhibits the venerable fathers in the unfamiliar garb of communists, and
+substitutes the red cap for the beretta with all the effrontery and
+_nonchalance_ in the world. The Order which in one column is the detested
+safeguard of absolutism becomes in the next the raving propagandist of
+social anarchy, revolution, and universal democracy. Can any rational
+person after this condescend to dispute with Mr. Lawrence?
+
+As in the other cases to which we have referred, there was a political
+moral to this story also. If we would avert this horrible era of blood and
+fire, said _Harper’s Weekly_, we must vote for General Grant, and stand up
+for the straight Republican ticket. Grant is the firm ally of Germany
+against Jesuitism. Grant is the champion of public schools against
+religious education. Grant is the enemy of all manner of Romish fraud and
+violence. Greeley is the friend of priests and persecutors, the foe of the
+Bible and education, the accomplice of that infamous “Jesuit faction”
+which “would rejoice to tear the vitals of American freedom, and rend the
+breast that has offered it a shelter”; and if he should be elected the
+“Jesuit Society” would celebrate the victory “like a new S. Bartholomew,
+with bells, cannon, processions, prayers at the Vatican,” and hasten “the
+rising of the Catholic chivalry ... in their sanguinary schemes against
+the peace and independence of Germany.” Such was the wicked nonsense with
+which _Harper’s Weekly_ in the autumn of 1872 attempted to make political
+capital out of the ignorance and bigotry of its readers.
+
+But this was not the worst. The Jesuits were not only conspirators against
+political and mental freedom, they were the principal enemies of the freed
+people of the South. Their society (_risum teneatis, amici_) had “allied
+itself with the Ku‐klux of Georgia and Mississippi”! And so infatuated was
+the _Weekly_ with the monstrous folly of this tale that week after week it
+returned to the same slander. On Oct. 26 it printed a portrait of the Most
+Reverend Father‐General, accompanied with one of the most outrageous pages
+of falsehood and defamation ever put into type. “In our country,” says the
+author of the article, “the Jesuit faction has allied itself with the Ku‐
+klux.” “The Jesuit Society assumes the guise of liberalism, and cheers on
+the rebel and Ku‐klux in their plots against the Union.” “In America the
+Jesuits link themselves with the Ku‐klux.” They do this because they hate
+the republic. They denounce, “with maledictions and threatenings, the
+course of modern civilization.”
+
+
+    “The world is in danger from the mad schemes of the triumphant
+    society; it is rousing France to a new crusade with omens and
+    pilgrimages; it threatens the German Empire with a war more
+    disastrous and destructive than Europe has ever seen. It summons
+    its adherents to the polls in Italy; it guides the elections of
+    Ireland, terrifies Spain, and even disturbs the repose of London;
+    and in our own country, so recently torn by civil war, the papal
+    crusaders, linked by the tie of perfect obedience, stand ready to
+    profit by our misfortunes, and to stimulate our internal
+    dissensions; to crush those institutions that have ever reproached
+    their own despotism, and destroy that freedom which is the chief
+    obstacle to their perpetual sway.”
+
+
+The picture which the _Weekly_ draws of these dangerous brethren is
+horrible enough to throw a child into fits:
+
+
+    “A dreadful mystery still hangs over them. Their proceedings are
+    secret, their purposes unknown. At the command of an absolute
+    master, they wander swiftly among the throngs of their fellow‐men,
+    eager only to obey his voice. Obedience is to the Jesuit the first
+    principle of his faith, instilled into his mind in youth,
+    perfected by the labors of his later years; he hears in the
+    slightest intimations of his chief at Rome the voice of his God,
+    the commands from heaven; and in the long catalogue of fearful
+    deeds which history ascribes to the disciples of Loyola, the first
+    impulse to crime must always have come from the absolute head of
+    the Order, and its single aim has always been to advance the power
+    of the Romish Church. Scarcely had its founder gained the favor of
+    the Pope, and fixed his seat at Rome, when he revived the
+    Inquisition. Italy trembled before the spectacle of ceaseless
+    _autos‐da‐fe_; the tortures and the cries of dying heretics, the
+    ruin of countless families, the flight of terrified and hopeless
+    throngs from their native land to the friendly shelter of Germany
+    and Switzerland, were the earliest fruits of the relentless
+    teachings of Loyola. The Jesuits led the armies of the persecutors
+    into the beautiful Vaudois valleys, and the worst atrocities of
+    that mournful example of human wickedness are due to their brutal
+    fanaticism. Soon they spread from Italy through all the kingdoms
+    of Europe; everywhere they brought with them their fierce and
+    cruel hatred of religious freedom, their cunning, their moral
+    degradation, their bold and desperate policy. They ruled in
+    courts; they terrified the people into submission; they were the
+    most active politicians of their time; their wealth was enormous;
+    their schools and colleges spread from Paris to Japan; and for
+    three centuries the name of the Jesuits, covered with the infamy
+    of the massacres of the Vaudois, the Huguenots, the Hollanders,
+    and the Germans, surrounded by its terrible mystery, the symbol of
+    a dark and dreadful association, has filled mankind with horror
+    and affright.”
+
+
+The practical conclusion to be drawn from all this rhetoric was that
+everybody, and especially every German, ought to vote for Gen. Grant and
+the straight Republican anti‐Jesuit ticket. It was the Jesuits who
+“nominated Mr. Greeley, a person known to be in friendly connection with
+the Romish leaders and closely linked to the Papal Church.” The Jesuits
+“cover Grant with monstrous calumnies, and celebrate the erratic Greeley.”
+“Let every German beware lest he lend aid to the enemies of his country.
+Let him shrink from the support of any candidate who is maintained by the
+influence of the Jesuits.” “We trust every sincere Protestant ... will
+labor ceaselessly to defeat the schemes of the Jesuits, and drive their
+candidate back to a merited obscurity.” And in the same number we find the
+following wicked paragraph:
+
+
+    “A Jesuit, the Rev. Mr. Renaud, was appointed some time ago by
+    Archbishop McCloskey to superintend the Romish interest in our
+    city charities. The result was at once apparent. The Jesuits
+    excited a revolt in the House of Refuge. One of the keepers was
+    murdered. One of the convicts was sent to the State prison. The
+    rebellion was subdued; but the Jesuits still defend the murderer,
+    and assail with calumnies the House of Refuge, one of the most
+    valuable and successful of our city institutions. This is a
+    curious confirmation of that dangerous character of the Jesuit
+    Society which is painted upon a larger scale in our article in the
+    present number on ‘The Jesuits.’ ”
+
+
+The next slander of the _Weekly_ was to identify Tweed with the Jesuits.
+“When the Romish priests,” says this astonishing journal (Nov. 2, 1872),
+“at the command of their foreign master, began their assaults upon the
+public schools, they found a ready ally in the Tammany Society.... Tammany
+became the representative of a foreign influence and a foreign church. It
+was European rather than American. It teemed with the coarse prejudices,
+the dull ignorance, the intense moral blindness that to American sentiment
+are so repulsive, with that mental and moral feebleness that belongs to
+populations racked by the despot and oppressed by the priest.” An infamous
+compact was now struck between Tammany and the Papal Church. The
+“Romanists” supported the political leaders in riotous license, gross
+vices, and indecent corruption; while an enormous debt was laid upon the
+city “to satisfy the demands of the Romish priests.” Thus Tammany, by the
+aid of its foreign allies, became despotic master of New York.
+
+
+    “Covered with the ineffaceable stains of treason and of public
+    robbery, its members attempted to rule by force, and in the spring
+    of 1871 New York lay at the mercy of rebels, peculators, and
+    foreign priests. The press was threatened, whenever it complained,
+    with violence, lawsuits, and the frowns of infamous courts. The
+    Common Council was imported from Ireland, and foreign assassins
+    threatened the lives of those ardent citizens who planned reform.”
+
+
+The overthrow of the Tweed and Connolly Ring was a stunning defeat for the
+Pope and his agents. The nomination of Greeley and Kernan (the one openly,
+the other secretly; a slave of the Jesuits and the Inquisition) was a
+desperate attempt of the Jesuits to recover what they had lost. And then
+followed the usual homily, “Vote for Grant,” etc.
+
+In this bitter political campaign against the church the writers for
+_Harper’s Weekly_ were zealously assisted by their artist, Mr. Thomas
+Nast. This individual has done more to degrade his profession than any
+other draughtsman we know of, except, perhaps, the makers of lascivious
+pictures for some of the flash newspapers. He has made a practice of
+ridiculing the religious belief of hundreds of thousands of honest people
+who came to America, as he did, from a foreign land, because America
+offers to all immigrants the fullest measure of political equality and
+religious freedom. It has been his pleasure to depict the priest
+invariably as a sleek, sensual, brutal, and repulsive rogue; the bishop as
+a grim, overbearing, and cunning despot, or now and then as a crocodile
+crawling with open jaws towards a group of children. In the _Weekly_ of
+Oct. 12, he represents Brother Jonathan attempting to sever the tie which
+binds an American bishop to the Pope, holding out, as he does so, a
+naturalization paper inscribed “This ends the foreign allegiance.” The
+Pope has his arms full of papers: “Orders to all state officials that are
+Roman Catholics”; “Down with the American public schools”; “The promised
+land, U. S.,” etc.; and the bishop carries similar documents: “Orders from
+the Pope of Rome to the Catholics in America”; “Vote for Horace Greeley”;
+“Vote for Kernan; he is a Roman Catholic, and will obey the orders of the
+church.” Another picture, entitled “Swinging around the circle,” was
+intended to represent all the disreputable supporters of Mr. Greeley in
+company. “Free love and Catholicism” were side by side, in the persons of
+Theodore Tilton and a priest, and “Mass and S. C.” figured as a
+conventional Irishman with one of the Ku‐klux. Mr. Kernan was drawn (Nov.
+2) kneeling, in an abject attitude, at the feet of the Pope (“Our Foreign
+Ruler”), and swearing, “I will do your bidding, as you are infallible”; in
+the background stood a priest loaded with papal orders against the public
+schools; and on the wall was a copy of the forged handbill, with the
+legend, “For governor, Francis Kernan,” surrounding a black cross. In a
+picture of the “Pirates under False Colors,” a priest with a cross held
+aloft in one hand, and a tomahawk half hidden in the other, is a
+conspicuous figure in a gang of ruffians. In another cartoon a vulgar‐
+looking priest is seen sprinkling the ruins of Tammany Hall with holy‐
+water.
+
+Now, we know very well that from one point of view the introduction of
+these calumnies into politics was fraudulent. Mr. Greeley certainly had no
+leaning towards the Catholic Church and no affiliations with Catholic
+leaders, and Gen. Grant, we venture to affirm, is insensible to the
+bigotry which his unworthy followers brought up as a reason for his re‐
+election. We have nothing to ask of any President, and we give our votes
+according to our individual preferences. But while we do not purpose
+acting as a religious body in any political movement, we do not purpose
+either to be set aside by any political party as an outlawed and degraded
+people, upon whom venal pamphleteers and ignorant politicians may trample
+at pleasure. If party organs take pains to attack us, and pour out, day
+after day, and week after week, their filthy libels upon us, the party
+which sanctions such a warfare and tries to reap the fruits of it shall
+bear the responsibility. The Catholics of the United States are too
+numerous, too intelligent, and too public‐spirited to be treated with
+contempt by any faction, whether that faction call itself Liberal, or
+Republican, or Democratic. We prefer, as we have often said before, to let
+the politicians alone, and go our various ways in quiet, some after one
+leader, some after another. But it may as well be understood that, if any
+of these parties invite an irrepressible conflict with us, they will find
+out, we trust, that we are not disposed to flinch from the defence of our
+rights, which are identical with the rights of all other American
+citizens.
+
+
+
+
+Brussels.
+
+
+    “There was a sound of revelry by night,
+    And Belgium’s capital had gather’d then
+    Her beauty and her chivalry, and bright
+    The lamps shone o’er fair women and brave men.
+    A thousand hearts beat happily; and when
+    Music arose with its voluptuous swell,
+    Soft eyes look’d love to eyes which spoke again,
+    And all went merry as a marriage bell;
+    But hush! hark! a deep sound strikes like a rising knell!”
+
+    _Childe Harold._
+
+
+The roar of cannon that ushered in the day of Waterloo—the deadly
+Waterloo, big with the fate of empires—the fatal Waterloo, that sealed the
+doom of the mighty conqueror, that hurled him on the prison‐island in the
+far‐distant ocean, where expiation could be the only consolation of the
+proud, haughty heart that knew no law but the iron will, which,
+irresistible to all else, was shivered on the Rock of Peter—was not the
+first, and may not be the last, sound of fearful strife there heard, as
+Belgium has ever been the chosen battlefield of Europe.
+
+And so well is the fact recognized, that the sole condition on which she
+now exists as an independent state, is that of perfect neutrality. No
+matter what may be her sympathies, what may be her interests, she cannot
+take the sword: she can only defend her frontier, and prevent the entrance
+of either friend or foe. This it is that gives her importance; her central
+position, which makes her the key of the Continent, causes England to
+watch over her with tender interest, gives the mistress of the seas a
+_pied‐à‐terre_ in case of a general war—a contingency which may arise at
+any moment.
+
+The late King Leopold I., the Nestor of the European sovereigns, held an
+exceptional position; the head of one of the smallest states, he had
+perhaps the largest personal influence. His sagacity and experience made
+his advice sought and respected by all. When, in the revolution of 1848,
+thrones were tumbling down, and kings flying in every direction, of course
+Brussels had to follow the prevailing fashion, and, without knowing
+exactly what was wanted, the Bruxellois assembled around the palace; but
+before they could state their grievances, Leopold appeared upon the
+balcony, told them there was no necessity of any demonstration; he had
+come to Brussels at their invitation, and was ready to leave, if his
+departure would make them happier. Whereupon they reconsidered the
+question, and concluded to let well enough alone.
+
+After the separation of Holland and Belgium, Brussels increased rapidly,
+and is now one of the pleasantest capitals in Europe. The new part of the
+city, the Quartier Leopold, is a beautiful faubourg, and the boulevards
+that encircle the city with a belt of green verdure, furnish a delightful
+promenade. The park, a portion of the forest of Soignes, is charming; the
+great trees meet in arches, and shade the crowds of ladies and children,
+who live in the open air on fine days. On Sundays, the military bands play
+from 2 to 3 P.M.; and every summer evening, from the 1st of June to the
+1st of September, the orchestra of the Grand Opera gives concerts in the
+kiosk of the _Quinconce_, the flower‐garden of the park.
+
+Life in Brussels is very pleasant, easy, and independent; all the
+appliances of modern civilization are within reach, botanical and
+zoological gardens, picture galleries, theatres; the opera is a permanent
+fact, at a reasonable rate; the orchestra led by Hanssens (recently
+departed for another world) was admirable; numbered among the violinists
+De Beriot, blind, but playing always with rare skill, and the other
+artists were of equal merit. Of late years Brussels has become a _foyer_
+for discontented spirits—
+
+
+    “Black spirits and white,
+    Red spirits and gray.
+    Mingle, mingle, mingle,
+    You that mingle may.”
+
+
+And mingle they do without fear of _mouchards_, and air their opinions, no
+matter how wild and dangerous. If they go a little too far, the government
+or persons attacked interchange a few diplomatic notes with the Belgian
+authorities, and then the police politely request them either to be silent
+or try another dwelling‐place. Prim was for a long time resident, but one
+fine morning was advised to take his departure, as his intrigues were
+becoming too open and dangerous, but had been kept secret long enough to
+lay the mine that exploded and blew the Queen of Spain into France; and
+Henri Rochefort, driven from France, issued his _Lanterne_, which threw
+light on many facts then thought to be false, but which events proved to
+have been only too true.
+
+Brussels is a paradise for women of taste; for where else can be found
+such laces and fairy webs, such garnitures of _point de Bruxelles_, of
+Valenciennes, of Malines, of Duchesse? A morning stroll down the Montagne
+de la Cour and the Madeleine is a feast for the eye, for lace‐making is
+one of the fine arts; the large houses employ three or four first‐class
+artists to draw the designs, and, as the competition is great, the efforts
+to surpass are immense. In making up a bride’s trousseau, it is etiquette
+for the mother of the bride to give the white laces, the happy bridegroom
+the black; and the prices where the parties are wealthy run up to an
+enormous amount.
+
+The gold embroideries are equally beautiful; in one _fabrique_ we saw a
+set of vestments just finished for the Cathedral of Tournai; they were for
+Lent, and were violet, with the instruments of the Passion exquisitely
+done in raised embroidery. The effect was admirable; on the back of the
+chasuble was the cross with the spear and the sponge, and so perfect was
+the sponge it seemed as though it could be grasped. The column was on the
+front of the vestment. It was a complete set for priest, deacon, and sub‐
+deacon, with five copes, so that the artist had full opportunity for the
+display of his talent. The same house had recently sent off the dresses
+for the Empress of Austria and the ladies of her court, to be worn when
+they walked in the procession on the Feast of Corpus Christi. Specimens of
+the embroidery, which was of silver on white satin, were shown us, and,
+judging by what we saw, the effect of the whole must have been charming.
+
+The Musée Ancien is devoted to the artists of the past. Hubert and Jean
+Van Eyck, whose discovery of the use of oil in mixing colors
+revolutionized art, are represented by the “Adam and Eve” and the
+“Adoration of the Magi.” Holbein’s portrait of Sir Thomas More is worthy
+of the subject and the artist. Crayer’s Saints and Martyrdoms abound; one,
+the “Apparition of Our Lord to S. Julien,” illustrates the beautiful
+legend of S. Julien and his wife, S. Basilisse, who founded a hospital,
+where they received and tended the sick poor. One winter night, hearing
+sighs and groans at the door, S. Julien went out, and found a man nearly
+frozen to death. He carried him in, warmed him before the fire, restored
+him to consciousness, and then laid him in his own bed. The next morning
+the holy couple went in to see their guest. The bed was empty, and, as
+they approached it, Jesus, for it was he who had taken the form of the
+poor sick man to try their charity, appeared to them, and said, “Julien, I
+am your Lord and Saviour, who announces to you that ere long you and your
+wife will repose in God.”
+
+The “Martyrdom of S. Peter,” by Van Dyck, is terrible. The saint is
+fastened to the cross, and three men are placing it in the ground. One,
+kneeling, is endeavoring to push the end of the cross into the hole
+prepared to receive it, another supports the cross on his shoulders, the
+third steadies it. Meanwhile, all the blood in S. Peter’s body seems to
+have descended into his head and face, which is brick‐dust color, and
+looks as though it would burst. Altogether it is a fearful picture, so
+lifelike that one waits to hear the thump the cross will give when finally
+placed. Such pictures make us appreciate our feather‐bed Christianity, the
+comfortable way we try to gain heaven and at the same time keep up an
+agreeable acquaintance with the world, and perhaps its friend, the devil.
+
+The finest Rubens in this Musée is “Christ ascending Calvary.” It is when
+he is met by S. Veronica and some other women, who are magnificently
+dressed, thus making the contrast greater between them and the exhausted,
+blood‐stained figure of Our Lord, who is sinking beneath the weight of the
+cross, and the agonized face of his blessed Mother, who, supported by S.
+John, is advancing with outstretched hands to the assistance of her
+beloved One.
+
+The flower‐pieces by Seghers, the famous Jesuit painter, are exquisite;
+interiors by Cuyp and Teniers, displaying their delicate care and finish,
+are numerous; pictures by Rembrandt, with all his wonderful effects of
+light and shade; some charming faces by Velasquez—two lovely little girls
+hand‐in‐hand, who look as if they would step out of the frame and speak;
+two splendid half‐lengths of Albert and Isabella, by Rubens, whose
+portraits are always admirable; and some very good specimens of the
+Italian school, among which are a Madonna of Sassoferrato, and a portrait
+of a young woman, by Guercina, which is very beautiful.
+
+The Musée Moderne is a collection of the modern Belgian school, which
+deservedly ranks among the first. “Hagar in the Desert,” by Navez, is as
+touchingly beautiful as any of the masterpieces of the great past; Leys,
+Wiertz, Gallait, Portaels, whose “Fuite en Egypte” is found everywhere,
+are men whose genius is recognized by all Europe; Van Schendel has
+produced effects of light as remarkable as Rembrandt; Willems and Stevens
+in finish rival Cuyp and Teniers; and Verboekhoven’s cattle‐pieces are
+unsurpassed. Art is encouraged and fostered by the government; every year
+there is a grand competition for the “Prix de Rome”; a committee is
+appointed by the crown to decide upon the merit of the pictures, and the
+successful one receives the Prix de Rome, which is four thousand francs, a
+sum sufficient to maintain a student in Rome, in artist style, three
+years, while he continues his studies.
+
+Brussels is comparatively modern; it was a mere village when Malines,
+Louvain, and other towns had acquired importance. In 1005, it passed by
+marriage into the possession of the Comtes de Louvain, under whom it
+rapidly increased; in 1040, it was surrounded by massive walls, of which
+some portions still remain in the garden of the Curé of S. Gudule. In
+1106, Comte Godfrey le Barbu acquired the title of Duc de Brabant, but
+Louvain continued the most important town in the duchy, and preserved the
+title of capital until the time of Albert and Isabella, who preferred
+Brussels on account of its healthful climate and the vicinity of the well‐
+stocked forest of Soignies.
+
+The Grande Place of Brussels is unique; any change is forbidden by law; as
+it has been for generations, so it must remain; and when one descends
+suddenly from the park and boulevards, brilliant and gay with all the
+sparkle of modern life, into the Grande Place, it is like another world.
+The Hôtel de Ville is on one side; opposite is the Maison du Roi, adorned
+with a statue of the Blessed Virgin, beneath which is the legend, _A
+Feste, Fame et Bello, libera nos, Maria Pacis_, placed there in 1625 by
+Isabella in gratitude to our Lady of Peace, for having delivered the city
+from plague, famine, and war. In the place immediately below, is the noble
+monument erected in reparation to the memory of the unfortunate Comtes
+d’Egmont and de Hornes, on the spot on which, as the inscription runs,
+“they were unjustly executed by the decree of the cruel Duc d’Albe.”
+
+It was unjust and cruel, but still we cannot judge the past by the
+present. Then, principles were positive facts, not vagaries expected to
+give way at any moment to expediency, but realities plain and palpable,
+upon which depended not only this perishable present, but the never‐ending
+future, with its eternity of weal or woe. As men were expected to live up
+to their principles, so were they expected to die for them. It is a high
+standard by which to live, but it is the safest. We fancy nowadays that
+the cruelty then dealt out for thoughts and opinions was abominable, but
+we forget that those ideas, those thoughts, produced the frightful effects
+of the ravages of the Gueux, of the orgies of John of Leyden; that from
+religious they degenerated into social excesses of the lowest
+kind—excesses which, if prolonged, would have reduced Christian Europe to
+Vandal barbarism.
+
+And so the brave, unfortunate Comte d’Egmont, the hero, whose valor
+contributed so signally to the brilliant victory of Philip II. at St.
+Quentin, lost his life for having tampered with the political sectaries,
+or rather by being led into the snare by the Prince of Orange; when too
+late, he saw his error, which was only political; his faith he ever kept
+pure and untarnished. The Prince of Orange, on the eve of leaving Brussels
+to join the enemy in Germany, urged him to go, but Egmont refused; the
+prince told him if he remained he would be lost; that he was a fool to run
+the risk. Friends until then, they parted in anger. Egmont spurned him,
+and said, “Adieu, prince sans terre”; the prince replied, “Adieu, comte
+sans tête”—words which were too fatally verified soon after. The Maison du
+Roi is now occupied by the Cercle Artistique et Littéraire, and it was in
+a small room in the second story that Comte d’Egmont passed the night
+preceding his death, and wrote those touching farewell letters to his wife
+and the King of Spain which reveal the nobleness of his character. The
+famous picture by Gallait, “La tête d’un supplicié,” is a portrait of
+Egmont. We have seen the original in the _atelier_ of Gallait, and he
+assured us it was an accurate resemblance. _Requiescat in pace._
+
+The Hôtel de Ville on the Grande Place is the finest of the municipal
+palaces found in almost every city of Belgium. It is built round a
+quadrangle, and the oldest part is the wing to the east of the tower,
+commenced in 1402, at the angles of which are elegant turrets; the façade
+consists of a gallery of open arches, surmounted by the Grande Brétèque, a
+balcony from whence proclamations were made; above this are two rows of
+windows, and an enormous battlemented roof, pierced with thirty‐seven
+dormer windows.
+
+The tower is 330 feet high; the lower half, from the basement to the
+summit of the roof, is square; the upper part, built in 1444, is
+octagonal, surmounted by a magnificent spire of open‐work, remarkable for
+its lightness and delicacy; on its apex is fixed a table of stone, twelve
+feet in circumference, and on this stone a globe of copper, supporting a
+colossal figure of S. Michael trampling on the devil, thirteen feet high,
+made of a number of thin plates of copper‐gilt, in 1454, which serves as a
+weathercock, and turns with the least breath of wind. There is a shocking
+tradition, currently reported, but not positively confirmed, that the
+architect of the beautiful tower hung himself on its completion, because
+he had not placed it exactly in the centre of the façade; which certainly
+did not remedy the evil, as putting himself out of the world did not put
+the tower in the right place.
+
+The first story of the Hôtel de Ville contains a gallery in which are
+magnificent full‐length portraits of Philippe le Beau, Charles V., Philip
+II., Albert and Isabella, and other dignitaries; the council‐room,
+audience‐chamber, and all the other apartments are splendidly ornamented,
+the walls hung with Gobelin tapestry, representing scenes in the life of
+Clovis and Clotilda. The ceiling of the council‐chamber is a masterpiece
+of Janssens, in which the most extraordinary effects of light and shade
+are produced; it represents an assembly of the gods, and their majesties
+vary in their positions as they are seen from different points.
+
+The remainder of the Grande Place is lined with venerable old houses,
+terminating in fantastic gables, most of which were originally the halls
+of various guilds and corporations; their façades pierced with numerous
+odd little windows and covered with quaint designs, bas‐reliefs,
+pilasters, balustrades, and inscriptions; some of the houses are gilded,
+which adds to the picturesque appearance of the place, and on the summit
+of the Brewers’ Guild is a fine equestrian statue of Prince Charles of
+Lorraine—the good prince, as he is still affectionately called. In
+mediæval times, the Grande Place was the ordinary scene of tournaments and
+executions; here the Knights of the Golden Fleece held their brilliant
+_réunions_, and Philip l’Asseuré and Charles V. gave splendid fêtes, which
+in the reign of Philip II. were succeeded by very different scenes, under
+the stern rule of the Duc d’Albe.
+
+Just behind the Hôtel de Ville, at the corner of the Rue du Chêne and the
+Rue de l’Etuve, is the beloved little statue of the “Premier Bourgeois de
+Bruxelles.” The present bronze statue, after a model by Duquesnoy, was
+made in 1619, and this replaced an old stone statue which is said to have
+existed in the IXth century. Its origin is not known, but the favorite
+tradition is that it represents a youthful Duc de Brabant, whose father
+dying left him an infant of three years under the regency of his mother,
+the Duchesse Lutgarde. The neighboring Comte de Malines coveted the fair
+inheritance, declared war against the boy‐duc, and approached Brussels,
+determined to take it by force of arms. The Brabançons flew to defend the
+rightful heir, and, when the decisive day arrived, they besought the
+duchesse to let them carry the little fellow in his cradle, and suspend it
+from a great oak‐tree that overlooked the battle‐field. The duchesse in
+tears consented, accompanied them to the field of Ransbeek, and remained
+by the tree, from the highest branch of which the cradle was suspended.
+
+The battle raged with fury; three times the Brabançons were driven back to
+the tree, but the sight of the brave little boy, who looked on with
+intense interest, never exhibiting fear or impatience, spurred them on to
+fresh efforts; at last the day was won, and the cradle carried back in
+triumph to Brussels, the duchesse radiant with joy. To commemorate the
+event, the oak‐tree was transplanted to Brussels, placed at the corner of
+a street, since then called Rue du Chêne, and the statue erected at its
+side; in the course of time, the tree has disappeared, but the statue
+remains, the object of undying love and interest. To steal it is
+considered an impossibility; in 1585, he was seized and carried off to
+Antwerp, but was speedily recaptured and brought home in triumph by a
+small party of Bruxellois; again he was taken away in a baggage‐wagon by
+the English troops after the battle of Fontenoy, and, on being recovered,
+was allowed for a short time to delight by his presence the inhabitants of
+Grammont, until he was reclaimed by the Bruxellois. In 1747, he was stolen
+by some soldiers of Louis XV., and again a few years later by two English
+soldiers, who, however, found him too heavy to carry away; the last time
+he was disturbed was in 1817, but the same good fortune attended him, and
+he was again recovered, to the great joy of the Bruxellois, who look upon
+him as the good genius of the city, and consider his loss a public
+calamity.
+
+In the XVIth century, Louvain and Brussels gave him two splendid dresses
+for fête‐days; Charles V. presented him with a complete suit, and settled
+a pension on him. In 1698, the Elector of Bavaria not only gave him a
+uniform, but invested him with a military order, and appointed a valet‐de‐
+chambre to wait on him. Peter the Great visited him, and added to his
+pension. In 1747, Louis XV. made him a knight, and solemnly decorated him
+with the Order of S. Louis, at the same time presenting him with a suit of
+gold‐laced uniform, a _chapeau‐bros_, and a sword; and in 1780 he was the
+first who wore the national cockade of Brabant, hence his present title,
+“Le Premier Bourgeois de Bruxelles.”
+
+On national fêtes, and during the _Kermesse_ in July, he is always dressed
+in the uniform of the Garde Civique, which he has worn since 1830, his
+numerous orders displayed on his infant breast. In addition to these
+gifts, several persons have made him presents, while some have actually
+remembered him in their wills. He thus possesses a positive revenue which
+is regularly paid, a treasurer who is responsible for his disbursements, a
+lawyer, and a valet‐de‐chambre; and let any stranger beware of ever
+speaking disrespectfully or slightingly to any Bruxellois of the “Premier
+Bourgeois de Bruxelles”!
+
+Brussels abounds in charitable institutions and convents of every order;
+some are peculiar to the place. There is but one house in the world of the
+“Dames de Berlaimont”—an order of canonesses who follow the rule of S.
+Augustine—and it was founded by the Comtesse de Berlaimont, whose husband
+was one of the great officers of the court of Charles V. It is eminently
+aristocratic in its design. Any number of quarterings was required for the
+fair candidates in the palmy days of the old régime, but ideas have been
+modified by the wheel of the revolution, and now, if the head and heart
+are right, whether the blood is more or less blue is not strictly
+considered. The convent is splendid, the canonesses charming, and the
+education received by the young ladies under their charge leaves nothing
+to be desired.
+
+Convents of Poor Clares are now few and far between; one is still found in
+Brussels. The rule is very strict—the strictest, we believe, for women in
+the world, not even excepting those of the Trappistines and Carmelites. It
+is forbidden to see strangers, but the superioress graciously relented in
+our favor, drew aside the heavy serge curtain behind double iron grilles
+armed with spikes, and told us we could look at her, but not speak. This
+announcement was made before the curtain was drawn. We kept profound
+silence, and for a few moments contemplated the figure, that stood
+motionless and speechless. What could have carried her there, from family,
+from home with all its charms? At the moment of solemn choice, the world
+enters but little into the thoughts: it is the strong ties that God and
+nature have implanted in the human heart that are the hardest to unloose.
+
+She had left all for the rigid rule, for the self‐denying life, of a Poor
+Clare; the happy unbroken sleep of youth for the broken night of prayer
+and meditation; and, when sleeping, not even to lie down, but to sit half‐
+upright; to go barefooted, never to touch meat, never to speak—only
+imagine it, a woman, and never to speak!—never to her fellow‐beings—ever
+to God. It was for him she had left home and friends, to find her eternal
+home and the never‐failing Friend; to be thirteen hours a day in prayer
+and adoration before the Blessed Sacrament, to expiate by her life the
+sins of the world around her. It is a wonderful life, a supernatural life;
+but, when truly desired, supernatural grace is given to lead it
+courageously to the grave.
+
+The oldest church in Brussels is Notre Dame de la Chapelle, in the Rue
+Haute, which derives its name from having been at first a simple oratory
+in which the great S. Boniface, the apostle of Germany, had said Mass. The
+style is Gothic, and recently the choir, which is very fine, has been
+restored; it had been disfigured by an atrocious high altar in the style
+of the Renaissance; but in this reign of good taste it was decided to
+remove it, and in making the changes it was found there was a false wall,
+which, on being destroyed, disclosed the beautiful circle of the apse,
+which is remarkable for having the presbyterium and the credence‐table cut
+in the wall, something that has only been found in two other churches—one
+in France, another in Germany.
+
+Notre Dame des Victoires—or Notre Dame du Sablon, as it is more generally
+called from its situation on the Place du Petit Sablon—is in the form of a
+Latin cross, with a polygonal apse to the choir. The Place du Petit Sablon
+during several centuries was the favorite residence of the aristocracy,
+and is yet surrounded by the Hôtel de Merode, and the palace of the Duc
+d’Aremberg, which was formerly occupied by Comte d’Egmont. Consequently in
+this church the monuments are very fine, especially the mortuary chapel of
+the Princes of Tour and Taxis, in which is an exquisite statue of S.
+Ursula, by Duquesnoy, and the tombs of the De Hornes, d’Egmonts, and De
+Chimay.
+
+The beautiful collegiate church of SS. Michel and Gudule is built on a
+height formerly called Mont St. Michel, and its great towers dominate the
+city, and can be seen from every point. Its plan is cruciform. The choir
+is entirely surrounded by chapels, from which it is separated by double
+rows of columns; on one side is the Chapel du Saint‐Sacrement de Miracle,
+on the other the Chapel of the Blessed Virgin, behind that of S. Mary
+Magdalen. It is a magnificent church, one of the richest in Belgium, and
+the vestments and appointments are superb. The laces are a treasure in
+themselves—laces which now cannot be bought, are used in the sanctuary,
+and the vestments and antependiums are of corresponding magnificence. One
+antependium, which is the Lamb surrounded by the symbols of the four
+evangelists, is considered the finest piece of embroidery in Belgium.
+
+But the glory of S. Gudule is not the gold, and silver, and lace, but the
+Très‐Saint‐Sacrement de Miracle, which is there preserved, and which is
+the object of the profoundest love and veneration. For it did Charles V.
+build the exquisite chapel whose four splendid windows were presents from
+his sisters, the Queens of Portugal and Hungary, his brother Ferdinand,
+King of the Romans, and Francis I. of France. Sovereigns, princes, nobles,
+and people for five hundred years have adored the sacred Body of our Lord,
+so cruelly profaned and outraged by the Jews, on Good Friday of 1370, who
+on that day, the day of Redemption, assembled in their synagogue, and
+stabbed the consecrated hosts stolen from S. Catherine’s, and, when they
+stabbed them, the blood which had flowed for them on Calvary, flowed again
+beneath their sacrilegious hands.
+
+Day and night reparation is offered; the synagogue is now a _chapelle
+expiatoire_, attached to which is a community for perpetual adoration, and
+the Confrérie du Très‐Saint‐Sacrement de Miracle, established in S.
+Gudule, embraces thousands. The Duc d’Aremberg gave the monstrance, which
+is a cross of diamonds, surmounted by a triple crown of diamonds, from
+which hangs a little ship of the same precious stones, presented by the
+captain and crew of a vessel, in gratitude for delivery from shipwreck.
+Marie Antoinette sent her wedding necklace of diamonds to be suspended
+around it, and the lamps around the sanctuary are kept burning by the
+children of the family d’Aremberg.
+
+The great ornament of the nave is the pulpit, elaborately and exquisitely
+carved in oak by Verbruggen in 1699, originally in the church of the
+Jesuits, in Louvain, and, on the suppression of the Order, given to S.
+Gudule by Maria Theresa, in 1776. The lower part represents the expulsion
+of Adam and Eve from Paradise by the angel of the Lord, armed with a
+flaming sword. On the left is seen Death gliding around with his dart. The
+pulpit itself, in the hollow of the globe, is supported by the tree of
+knowledge, crawling up which is the serpent, while on the extreme summit
+stands the Blessed Virgin holding her divine Son, whom she is assisting to
+bruise the serpent’s head with a large cross. On either side the railing
+of the steps is formed by a hedge in which numerous birds are enjoying
+themselves; on the side of Adam are the eagle, the jay, and a monkey;
+while in the vicinity of Eve are the peacock, the ape, and the parrot.
+
+And why these birds are there is the result of a little domestic
+disagreement between the artist Henri Verbruggen and his wife Martha Van
+Meeren, whom he married, hoping to find a tenth muse, but who only proved
+a prosaic everyday somebody, who fretted herself to death because Henri
+loved pleasure even more than art, and, while amusing himself with his
+friends, forgot there was no money in the house, nothing in the larder,
+nothing wherewith to dress Mme. and Mlle. Verbruggen. Poor Martha, who
+loved order, and would have been the treasure of some honest burgher, only
+provoked and irritated Henri by her occasional plain statement of facts.
+Affairs were in this sad condition when the Jesuits of Louvain, knowing
+the splendid talent of Verbruggen, ordered a pulpit for their church. The
+artist was enchanted. Here was a field for his genius; he immediately
+conceived an admirable work, which should contain, as in a book, the whole
+history of the Christian religion.
+
+Said he, “I will make a globe, which will represent the earth, under which
+I will place Adam and Eve, the moment after their fatal disobedience,
+which entailed on us such misery. This globe will be the pulpit, the
+canopy of heaven will cover it, the tree of knowledge will overshadow it,
+around which will creep the serpent, and above, Mary, crowned with stars,
+the moon at her feet, her infant Son before her, will bruise the serpent’s
+head with the cross. By the side of the man I will place the cherubim with
+the flaming sword; near the woman, young and beautiful, hideous death—that
+will be a contrast!”
+
+The artist commenced his work with ardor. The wood grew animated beneath
+his fingers. But pleasure for ever distracted him; the more people
+admired, the more he amused himself. Martha was miserable; she could see
+no hope of order and plenty. Irritated by the complaints of his wife,
+Verbruggen determined to revenge himself in his _chef‐d’œuvre_, and so
+perpetuate his vengeance. He was making the stairs of the pulpit. In his
+angry malice, Verbruggen thought he would punish Martha by placing
+satirical emblems to characterize women. On the staircase, by the side of
+Eve, who has just sinned, and who still holds the apple, he placed, as
+symbols, a peacock for pride, a squirrel for destructiveness, a cock for
+noise, an ape for malice—four defects of which poor Martha was totally
+innocent.
+
+Man he made with pleasure. On his side he placed, first, an eagle, to
+typify genius—but just then Martha bade adieu to the world and her
+troubles, and Verbruggen was a happy widower. Too late, the sculptor
+understood his loss; the gentle, patient wife was gone, and now he only
+remembered her good qualities; his courage and energy forsook him; he
+could not work. Months rolled on; his friends pitied him, and tried to
+rouse him from his deep despondency.
+
+“You weep for Martha,” said they; “there are others as good; you are only
+thirty‐six—marry Cecile Byns. She is joyous and lively like you. She will
+be a mother to your daughter, a charming companion for you.”
+
+Verbruggen listened to the good advice; he asked the hand of Cecile Byns,
+who was one of those women that rule while laughing, that carry the point
+while appearing to submit. Cecile knew her power over Verbruggen, and made
+him obey.
+
+“I love you,” said she, “but I will not marry you until the work which
+will make me proud of the name of Verbruggen is finished.”
+
+“Only say the word,” replied Henri, “and I will complete it.”
+
+Accompanied by her mother, she visited his _atelier_. She asked the
+explanation of the emblems he had placed on the side of Eve. The sculptor
+blushed.
+
+“When I made what astonishes you,” he stammered, “I did not know Cecile
+Byns.”
+
+“Very well,” replied the young lady; “but after the symbols of our
+defects, which perhaps we have not, how do you intend to designate your
+own noble sex?”
+
+“I had just commenced,” he answered, blushing redder than before. “You
+already see the eagle, perhaps it typifies vanity.”
+
+“Not at all,” interrupted Cecile. “The eagle is a bird of prey, an emblem
+of brutal tyranny. What do you intend adding?”
+
+Verbruggen was silent. Cecile continued: “To be just to men, as you
+fancied you were towards us, you will place near the eagle a fox, a symbol
+of vain gossip; a monkey eating grapes, for drunkenness; a jay, for
+foolish pride. You must avow, my dear Verbruggen, these defects belong to
+men as much as the faults you have given to us, and which adorn the other
+staircase. And now, when this great work is completed, I will accompany
+you to the altar.”
+
+The sculptor did not reply. He obeyed, fulfilled faithfully the orders
+given, and received for reward the hand of Cecile Byns; since which happy
+event he was never known to offer any further insult to the devout female
+sex.
+
+And so the pulpit was finished and placed in the church of the Jesuits in
+Louvain, where it was the object of universal admiration, as it still
+continues to be in beautiful S. Gudule the pride and joy of Brussels.
+
+
+
+
+Sayings Of S. John Climacus.
+
+
+It is better to displease our relatives than displease God.
+
+Obedience is simply going about anything without any judgment of our own.
+
+Let your conscience be the mirror in which you behold the nature of your
+obedience.
+
+A new wound is easily closed and healed; but the old wounds of the soul
+are cured, if ever, with great difficulty.
+
+He is truly virtuous who expects his death every day; but he is a saint
+who desires it every hour.
+
+
+
+
+Marriage In The Nineteenth Century.
+
+
+    “Heaven and earth shall pass, but my words shall not pass.”—Matt.
+    xxiv. 35.
+
+
+It is only truth that is immutable in this world, and only truth’s
+representative that dare speak to‐day the same language it spoke eighteen,
+twelve, or three centuries ago.
+
+Truth cannot progress, for it partakes of the nature of God’s perfection;
+it is not an ideal of our own evolving, susceptible of improvement as our
+knowledge grows wider, but a type towards which we are, on the contrary,
+making slow stages of assimilation. Of all individual parts of truth,
+hardly one of which remains in our day unassailed, none is so fiercely
+attacked as the truth about marriage. And yet, as we have shown in a
+previous paper,(232) almost every argument against it has repeatedly been
+put forward by barbarians and Romans, Byzantine emperors and feudal
+chiefs, and borne out by all the imposing display of military force, legal
+servility, and even ecclesiastical truculence. One might almost say of the
+agitation against marriage in our day, “What has been will be, and what
+will be has been.” If it is no longer in the individual passions of kings
+and nobles that the conflict centres, it is still a “sovereign” who plays
+the part of Philip Augustus or Henry VIII.—the “sovereign people.” Instead
+of one mighty colossus, it is a legion of personally obscure individuals
+which the church finds opposed to her; but the principle is the same, the
+issue is identical. What councils and embassies did formerly is now done
+oftener and in privacy; new agencies have widened the possibilities of
+communication, of discussion, and of adjustment, and causes are more
+rapidly multiplied, as well as more speedily settled. The press has lent
+its power to the altar, and redeemed, in part, its too well‐earned
+reputation as a pander and a tempter; and besides these new helps, we
+have, as of old, all those oft‐tried resources of personal eloquence,
+canonical censures, and grievous penances.
+
+Still the question is exactly the same in the nineteenth as it was in all
+preceding centuries: Shall passion or reason rule mankind? Shall the most
+sacred of all rights of property be protected and maintained, or shall
+communism be allowed gradually to extirpate the human race?
+
+The historian Rohrbacher, whom we have often quoted in the paper referred
+to above, specially insists upon the confusion which the legalized
+disruption or total disregard of the marriage vow would introduce into
+society, and supports his opinion by that of De Maistre. He also adduces
+the argument that, since the creation of man in the earthly Paradise was a
+perfect and complete act, and only one woman was there joined to one man,
+therefore the union of one man and one woman was distinctly God’s type of
+what he meant all future unions to be. We might speak of many Scripture
+proofs of the original institution of marriage being a state of perpetual
+monogamy until death, but such proofs would involve too lengthy a sketch
+of _one_ portion of the subject, and this aspect has been so often
+discussed that we turn with a feeling of relief to any less hackneyed view
+of the question.
+
+Speaking broadly, we may say that the Hebrews were the first, as they were
+for a long time the only, people whose laws protected both the honor and
+the property of women. Because they did so, they were also most stringent
+as regards the tie of marriage. Again, with them ancestry and descent were
+of paramount importance, and every family jealously guarded its record and
+registers; this also implied a strict protection of marriage, and, in
+fact, would have been impossible without it. Even when dispensations were
+allowed the Jews “because of the hardness of their hearts,” the son of the
+first wife was not to be put aside for the son of the second, if the
+latter were more pleasing to her husband than the former, and this because
+the sacred rights acquired at her betrothal were absolutely
+inalienable.(233) In the marriages mentioned in the Old Testament, the
+consent of the woman is always formally asked,(234) and she is considered
+competent to inherit property and transfer it to her husband.(235)
+
+Among other nations of antiquity, the more truth was obscured in their
+religious forms, the more degraded became their ideal of marriage. This is
+patent even among such civilized nations as the Greeks and Romans; the
+whole of mythology is a deification of the passion of lust, and a
+caricature on marriage. Still, where greater genius abounds, there also we
+find glimpses of a higher morality. For instance, in Homer’s magnificent
+poems, conjugal love and fidelity stand out nobly as the themes of his
+especial admiration. It would require a thorough examination of many of
+the passages of the _Iliad_, and greater space than we have now before us
+(since this idea can only be used here as a collateral one), to bring out
+the full force of this striking fact, and some day perhaps it may be our
+good fortune to return to this topic; suffice it to say at present, that
+any one who reads Homer attentively will be struck by the majestic
+attitude of Juno, the constant protectress of the Greeks, and by the
+hearty sympathy shown by the poet in a struggle undertaken purely to
+vindicate the dignity of marriage and the rights of hospitality. This is
+perhaps even more obvious from the fact that even the good personages of
+the poem, the self‐sacrificing and devoted Andromache, the noble Hector,
+the infirm and guiltless Priam, are all included in the sweeping
+misfortune which is the swift and just retribution of the cowardly rape of
+Helen. The vindication of the principle of marriage is evident, while in
+the _Odyssey_ its glorification is even more obvious. This illustration,
+for which we have to thank a very zealous and learned religious whose
+kindness put the suggestion entirely at our own disposal, is one which it
+is worth while for thoughtful persons to consider, as it gives a far
+greater moral importance, and consequently a more perfect artistic
+interest, to one of the few colossi of the intellectual world.
+
+The law of Jesus Christ succeeded the preparatory dispensation of Moses,
+and perfected all its enactments, marriage among the rest. It gave the
+marriage contract an added dignity by making it the image of the
+union—single and indivisible—of Christ and the church, and by elevating it
+into a sacrament; in other words, a means of sanctifying and special
+grace. In this is certainly the secret of the church’s inflexibility with
+regard to marriage. Since by it a distinct and sacramental grace was
+vouchsafed, it followed that this grace in itself was sufficient to enable
+the contracting parties, provided they faithfully corresponded to it, to
+remain holily in the state of matrimony until death; so that, whenever any
+serious breach took place between them, the church could reasonably argue
+that the fault lay with their dispositions, not with the contract itself.
+In the old law, marriage, though holy, was not a sacrament, and was
+susceptible of greater relaxations; but in the new law, with a higher
+dignity added to it, and more abundant grace attached to it, it is too
+strong to need concessions and too noble to wish for them.
+
+The Hebrews also, in propagating their own race, used the only means then
+in their power of propagating the knowledge of the true God; but in the
+new dispensation we have substituted a generation according to the spirit
+for the previous generation according to the flesh. Polygamous marriages
+among the Jews were a mysterious channel provisionally used for the
+increase and maintenance of God’s worship upon earth; but, since the
+coming of Christ, men have been won by the Word of God, the preaching of
+his servants, the sufferings of his martyrs, and the learning of his
+disciples. Those who are now constantly born into his fold are born “not
+of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of
+God.”(236) Having said so much upon the historical and Scriptural aspect
+of marriage, we leave it to others to dispute the particular meaning of
+such and such texts, and the particular inferences to be drawn from the
+context, and go back to the church’s firm stand upon this matter.
+
+Not only has she been the foremost champion of the integrity of marriage
+in past ages, but she is now almost its only one. No body of such force or
+numbers exists in the world, which alone gives her the priority among the
+upholders of Christian marriage; and when the tenets of the few other
+bodies to whom marriage is sacred are examined, they will be found to be
+inspired and created by her principles, so far as they refer to this
+matter.
+
+Of the Anglican communion, especially in its more advanced branches, it is
+sufficient to say that, having better than any other body preserved the
+forms, it has as its reward attained to more of the spirit, of a “church,”
+and consequently inculcates a higher morality. But the following
+testimony, which, from the name of the sheet furnishing it (the _Reformed
+Missionary_), we suppose represents some other Protestant body, is more
+interesting because more unexpected. A Catholic paper of Nov. 16, 1872,
+the _Standard_, has preserved this testimony for us. Under the title of
+“The Divorce Question Again,” it discusses church authority and its
+relation to the civil law, and uses the following strong language:
+“Spiritual interests and spiritual _discipline_ belong to that
+supernatural order of grace which has its home in the bosom of the
+Christian church.... There are many things besides loose divorce
+legislation which the state either tolerates or legalizes, but which the
+church cannot sanction or countenance for a single instant without
+committing spiritual suicide. And if the state should expressly dictate to
+the church a line of action at variance with the plain teaching of Christ,
+then it would be our _solemn duty_ to obey God rather than men.... The
+_church must interpret God’s Word_, and exercise spiritual discipline in
+accordance therewith, no _matter what course the state may take_ in
+disposing of kindred questions. As Dr. Woolsey has expressed it:
+‘_Whatever be the attitude_ of the state, the church _must stand_ upon the
+principles of the New Testament as she expounds them, and apply them to
+all within her reach!’ ”
+
+What is here said of the “state” may be applied to the people, the press,
+popular license, and all the modern agencies which the evil one has added
+to his former royal and learned tools. But if among earnest though
+mistaken Christians we find such auxiliaries as the _Reformed Missionary_
+and the eloquent sermons of Anglican divines,(237) we have also to
+encounter such authorities as the following on the side of passion and
+licentiousness: “Dr. Colenso, embarrassed by the obstinate adherence to
+polygamy which he observed among the Kaffirs, came to the resolution,
+after conference, it is said, with other Anglican authorities of the
+highest rank, to remove the difficulty by a process which, though adopted
+in a well‐known case by Luther and Melancthon, had not previously received
+the official sanction of Anglican bishops. As polygamy would not yield to
+Protestantism, Dr. Colenso agreed to consider polygamy ‘a Scriptural mode
+of existence.’ Here are his own words: ‘I must confess that I feel very
+strongly that the usual practice of enforcing the separation of wives from
+their husbands, upon their conversion to Christianity, is quite
+unwarrantable, and _opposed to the plain teaching of our Lord_.’ And then
+he proves, of course from the Bible, that polygamy is not inconsistent
+with the all‐holy religion of the Gospel. Here is the _proof_: ‘What is
+the use,’ he asks, ‘of our reading to them (the heathen) the Bible stories
+of Abraham, Israel, and David, with _their_ many wives?’ But Dr. Colenso
+was not without support in his view on polygamy. ‘The whole body of
+American missionaries in Burmah,’ he observes, ‘_after some difference of
+opinion_, came to the unanimous decision to admit in future polygamists of
+old standing to communion, but not to offices in the church (as if the
+last were a greater privilege than the first!)’ ‘I must say,’ he
+continues, ‘that this appears to me the only right and reasonable
+course!’ ”
+
+At the beginning of this extract, we read that Dr. Colenso was
+_embarrassed by the obstinate adherence to polygamy_ among the Kaffirs.
+This means, we infer, that he had originally withstood this heathen
+practice. Why had he done so? If he believed it sufficiently immoral to
+attack it, he was guilty of violating his conscience in ceasing his
+attack; if he had always believed it “Scriptural” or allowable, he was
+guilty of hypocrisy in attacking it at all. Then, when he asks, “What is
+the use of our reading to them the Bible stories of Abraham, Israel, and
+David, with _their_ many wives?” he gives us unconsciously another
+advantage by tacitly confessing the necessity of a divinely inspired
+interpreter of the Bible. If Dr. Colenso had been a Catholic, the
+difficulty would not have existed. Does he suppose that Catholic converts
+among savage nations do not hear the same stories? But in their case, a
+teaching and speaking church comes to their rescue, and explains what
+otherwise would seem dark. It is strange to hear a Protestant Christian,
+bred up on the rule of “the Bible, the whole Bible, and nothing but the
+Bible,” hesitate as to the effect of certain stories in the Bible. If the
+poor Kaffirs were to be evangelized upon the principle that a Bible
+precedent was practically a permission for all time, they would soon have
+Judiths and Jaels among them, as well as Abrahams, Israels, and Davids.
+
+In the _Times_ (London) of Dec. 20, 1872, on the occasion of a public “Day
+of Intercession” for more missionaries, we read the following stringent
+criticism upon the body which of all others most nearly approaches the
+ideal of a church: “The Church of England,” says the _Times_, “utterly
+abandons large regions on the ground that in tropical climes there will be
+polygamy or an equivalent disregard of the marriage ties, and that no
+preaching can prevail against it”—a confession of powerlessness which
+quite coincides with what we have said of Dr. Colenso. Still it is not
+fair to class the Anglican communion, despite this weak shrinking from a
+difficult task, with the more systematic deserters from the championship
+of duty; but, if we are grieved and astonished at her defection under
+certain circumstances, what shall we say of the following breach of
+ecclesiastical discipline on the part of those whose very names argue in
+this case a departure from the path of known duty? In the New York _World_
+of the 5th of January, 1873, we read among the announcements of business
+transacted in the mayor’s office the previous day this startling
+disclosure: “During the day the mayor was waited upon by a wedding‐party,
+the principals of which were Michael M’Clannahan and Mary Donovan, who
+wished to be united in matrimony without going to the trouble of getting
+up a public church celebration. Mr. H—— performed the duty according to
+the statute, and the bride and bridegroom went on their way rejoicing.”
+
+It is not for us to judge these persons, nor speculate upon the motives
+that led them to take such a step; but the occurrence is nevertheless a
+sign of the demoralization which is every day on the increase among our
+people.
+
+Polygamy, under the name of Mormonism, is still tolerated and protected in
+the United States, and the annals of divorce in the states where Mormonism
+is illegal quite make up the deficiency. In Connecticut, according to the
+deposition of the Rev. Dr. Woolsey, President of Yale College, made before
+the Western Social Science Congress in Chicago, the ratio of divorce is
+one in every _eight_ marriages. We were told by a distinguished New
+England convert that the Vermont marriage law was practically so lax that
+the following “cause” for a divorce was considered legal: A couple, not
+very long married, mutually wished for a separation, simply on the score
+that they were dissatisfied with their bargain. They went to a lawyer to
+ascertain the technicalities of the case, and were told—appearances having
+to be saved!—that some specific cause must be alleged. The easiest was
+cruelty. But the parties had never been violent; so the lawyer suggested
+that the husband should, in his presence, give his wife a “blow.” This was
+soon accomplished by a light slap on the cheek of the willing “victim”;
+cruelty was pleaded, and the divorce obtained.
+
+In Rhode Island, the proportion of divorces to marriages in 1869 was one
+to fourteen, and the law of that state leaves it practically to the
+discretion of the courts to annul any ill‐assorted marriage on the ground
+of uncongenial temper, desertion, drunkenness, or any sort of bad conduct.
+In that year, out of 166 divorces, only 66 were granted on the plea of
+adultery, while it must also be borne in mind that this grave charge is
+often unjustly and maliciously made to cover some shameful behavior on the
+part of the plaintiff, or to gratify his or her revenge. Speaking of a
+clergyman who was reported to have married one man successively to five
+wives, all of whom were living at the same time, a Protestant paper
+comments thus on the story: “It may be true or false. _It is not
+altogether improbable._ It suggests very serious reflections, as
+indicating what is possible under our laws, and the course things are
+taking in American society.” The paper goes on to speak of the clergyman’s
+responsibility in such a case, and although advocating the desirability,
+“for many reasons,” of the office of solemnizing marriage being “confined
+_almost entirely_ to ministers of the Gospel,” does not see that it
+stultifies itself directly after by explaining that “the trust is reposed
+in them, _not by any right to it on their part, as holding an
+ecclesiastical office_, but on account of their position and general
+character(!). They are able to guard marriage, and _give it_ a religious
+character and sanction. But they act, so far as the law goes, simply as
+civil magistrates.”
+
+And let us add that here is precisely the evil, and that as long as
+clergymen are lowered to the level of magistrates, loose morals will never
+be uprooted.
+
+The _Nation_ of March 2, 1871, has the following:
+
+
+    “We cut from the marriage notices of the _Philadelphia Press_ the
+    following illustration, omitting names, of the way in which
+    attempts to reduce human marriages to the level of those of the
+    lower animals are dressed up in fine language:
+
+    “ ‘In Philadelphia, February 23, S—— and S——, the parties
+    protesting against all marriage laws, whether legal or
+    conventional, which subject either the wife or the husband to any
+    control or influence on the part of the other which is not in
+    accordance with the dictates of pure and mutual love.’
+
+    “This is, of course, simple ‘pairing.’ Marriage means the
+    assumption by a moral agent of an obligation to perform certain
+    duties, even after they become disagreeable. The arrangement by
+    which the parties live together as long as they find it thoroughly
+    pleasant is that common among birds, beasts, and fishes, and has
+    nothing human about it.”
+
+
+The _Independent_, a Protestant religious paper, sneers at all barriers to
+divorce, Catholic, Protestant, or civil, as “shallow,” and declares that
+“no matter with what solemn ceremony the twain may have been made one, yet
+when love departs, then _marriage ceases_ and divorce begins.”
+
+A certain unhappy section of those waifs of womanhood, the advocates of
+woman’s rights, is known as the champion of “free‐love,” that is, in plain
+words, adultery. Mrs. Stanton, one of the leaders, has said somewhere that
+“marriage is but a partnership contract terminable at the will of the
+parties,” and has advocated marriages for three years.
+
+To this last proposition we have only one objection. Why _three_ years? If
+a marriage is based on mere passion, three _months_ or six at the furthest
+would be enough to exhaust the cohesive element, for if the adage be true
+that “_no man is a hero to his valet_,” it is equally certain that no man
+and woman could by any human possibility live together for that time in
+the familiar intercourse implied by marriage, without discovering to each
+other certain asperities of temper, inequalities of disposition, in short,
+all the little meannesses of our poor human nature. This disenchantment,
+following the close and daily companionship that is almost inevitable in
+married life, is enough to kill passion, though it cannot even daunt
+principle. Again, in a marriage based on passion, the satiety that follows
+in the train of unlawful love would be reproduced, and would break up the
+connection in far less than three years. In fact, when we come to sift the
+question, we find that, putting aside the religious spirit presiding over
+marriage, that state of life has no appreciable sign to distinguish it
+from the score of illicit connections punished by law or branded by
+society. We find here almost a parallel to the question lately agitated in
+England among Episcopalians, as to the reason why the Church of England
+should be called a “church,” and not, like all other independent
+Protestant bodies, a “sect.” We ask, What is to distinguish such a
+“marriage” as our modern reformers advocate from the “_liaisons_” at which
+society pretends to be so virtuously shocked? Where is the intrinsic
+difference between a woman who sells her honor to many men at once and one
+who surrenders it to a single man at a time for just that period during
+which pleasure shall keep her constant to him?
+
+Another form of attack upon the sanctity of marriage is the trade of the
+great journals in daily advertisements such as these, which meet our eyes
+every morning:
+
+
+    “Absolute divorces legally obtained in different states.
+    Desertion, etc., sufficient cause. No publicity. No charge until
+    divorce is obtained. Advice free.
+
+    ——, _Attorney_, —— Broadway.”
+
+
+Or, with slight variations, thus:
+
+
+    “Also Commissioner for every State.
+
+    ——, _Counsellor‐at‐Law_,
+    —— Broadway.”
+
+
+Here we see the press and the law conspiring to lend aid—and, more than
+that, encouragement—to the loosest and most devastating of passions. Then,
+again, the tone of the newspapers with regard to moral irregularities is a
+painful sign of the times. Thus we read in a great “daily”:
+
+
+    “Out West they call divorces ‘escapes.’ A speedy and safe ‘escape’
+    is guaranteed for a very low figure, and, _as usual_, a great many
+    parties figure for it.”
+
+
+There is a levity about such remarks that is saddening, when taken in
+connection with the future of a great people.
+
+The morbid curiosity of the public is thus excited under the convenient
+plea of satisfying it, while, with regard to the institution of marriage
+itself, the saying is exemplified, “Give a dog a bad name, and then shoot
+him.” Marriage is ridiculed, conjugal affection put down as antiquated,
+home‐lovingness pitied as old‐fashioned, family reunions voted dull, and,
+as a natural consequence, youth is more or less alienated from the
+unfashionable circle. It is easy, then, to turn on marriage as a
+principle, remove the stumbling‐block altogether, paint in seductive
+colors a substitute for home, and familiarize the public with so‐called
+legal but transient unions. Once this principle is established in the
+abstract, it will be merely a question of time as to its practical
+extension. Granted that a man or woman may change companions as often as
+they choose, who is to regulate _how_ often? Like the husband of
+Scheherazade in the _Arabian Nights_, every day? Why not? Again, if one
+man may have many “wives,” why should not a woman have many “husbands”?
+And so on _ad infinitum_ the license might spread unchecked, till there
+would be as many conflicting interpretations of marriage as there are
+already of the Bible. Absolute communism would be quite a logical
+sequence, and, in a society so utterly confused as to parentage, there
+could be little question as to inheritance!
+
+Christian marriage, on the contrary, has both a social and a sanitary, as
+well as a religious aspect. It creates a strong and healthy race, and at
+the very outset of each man’s career gives him a position by investing him
+with a responsibility. He feels that the pride which his old father and
+mother have in him must not be shamed; that the honor of his family is
+bound up in his actions; and that his behavior may influence for good or
+for evil both the moral and temporal prospects of his near kindred. A man
+so weighted feels a just pride, which, in default of higher motives, may
+even yet guide him into greatness; and though such a man may yield to
+temptation, fall into vice, and disgrace himself, so much at least of his
+early training will survive as to make him feel keenly the shame of his
+position. This alone has saved hundreds. It has been the serpent in the
+wilderness to many, but it would no longer be an imaginable motive were
+the ideal of Christian marriage, with its attendant responsibilities, to
+be swept away. There is another aspect under which the frequency of
+divorce and the condoned irregularities of intercourse between the sexes
+are a constant threat to public security—we mean in provoking murder.
+Three parts of the fearful murders committed in New York, and also in many
+other parts of the Union, are traceable more or less to ill‐assorted
+marriages and a spirit of unchristian rebellion against lawful restraints.
+Lately there has been a glaring case in point, the details of which are
+fresh in the memory of every one. A man is deliberately shot dead on the
+very threshold of what is practically a “Divorce Court”; the murderer is a
+brutal husband incensed at the victim’s testimony against himself. In
+1872, three of the most famous New York “characters” figured in a terrible
+drama ending in death, imprisonment, and disgrace. What was the reason
+that set two of the most unscrupulous speculators in the world at deadly
+enmity? The disputed favor of a woman who, according to the new code, only
+asserts her rights, and claims to change “husbands” as often as she
+pleases. God help the age and nation in which such things are daily done,
+and where animal passion laughs in the teeth of law! Who does not see how
+every right and security hangs by the sanctity of marriage? Marriage, in
+the proper sense of the word, implies exclusive and permanent possession,
+and represents the first and greatest right of property. If that property
+is to be made movable, salable, _takable_, in a word, why not other less
+sacred and less valuable property also? “Property is theft,” say the
+socialists, and certainly it is, if we can previously agree to consider
+marriage so. If all kinds of possessions (life itself included) are to be
+thus transferable, every individual will be reduced to protect them
+single‐handed against the world, and from this state of things will grow a
+monster system of organized murder and legalized rapine. The early
+Californian society would be nothing to this imaginary community.
+
+In France, Italy, and Spain, the infamous laws not only encouraging but
+actually enforcing _civil_ marriage are sapping the foundations of
+society; and in England, a country hitherto held as a model for its
+conjugal and homely tendencies, the tenets of “free‐love” are making giant
+inroads into social life, and leavening the mass of everyday literature.
+Bigamy and divorce are almost worn‐out sensations; they have supplied the
+ablest pens with thrilling subjects, and have furnished the best theatres
+with the only dramas that really “take.” Something new and more monstrous
+yet is needed, and the prurient imagination that shall first succeed in
+originating a new version of social sin will become the power of the
+moment.
+
+Such is the present situation. We do not know if there ever has been a
+worse stage of immorality, except, perhaps, that before the Flood; for at
+all times of unparalleled license there have been some extenuating
+circumstances, of which we are afraid we must own ourselves bereft. In the
+beginning of the Christian era, license was confined to pagans; for in the
+tottering Roman Empire the Christians were all soldiers of the cross, and
+their watch for the Bridegroom was too eager to allow them time for
+temptation; in the transition state that followed, the church’s power
+already made itself felt, and though barbarian kings still defied their
+pastors, the latter had at hand ecclesiastical terrors that seldom failed
+in the end to subdue the half‐converted Goth or Lombard. In the days of
+the ill‐starred Renaissance, when a spirit of neo‐classicism threatened
+once more to deify sin under the garb of art, the Council of Trent sat in
+solemn judgment, and condemned abuses which had unhappily paved an easy
+way for heresy: while later on, even in the days of the wicked and
+brilliant court of Versailles, there was found a Bourdaloue to rebuke the
+public sinners who sat in the high places, and to eulogize Christian
+marriage in the midst of a gathering which seemed to have utterly
+forgotten its meaning.
+
+Faith still lingered—the faith that made the middle ages what they
+were—that faith that condemned public sin to as public a penance, and out
+of great excesses drew great examples. Louise de la Vallière was almost
+the last representative of this mediæval spirit of generous atonement; and
+her heroic words, when told in her cloister of the death of her son, “I
+should weep rather for his birth than for his death,” were the genuine
+outcome of a faith that could restore a prostitute to innocence, and place
+upon a once guilty brow almost a virgin’s crown.
+
+With Voltaire, the work that Luther had begun was perfected, and
+henceforth it was not Europe that believed, but only a few scattered
+exiles who here and there kept the lamp of the faith dimly alight in the
+stifling atmosphere of universal and fashionable doubt. Even among
+believers the spirit of ready sympathy, with the slightest indication of
+the church’s unspoken meaning was gone, and there remained only the too
+self‐conscious effort of unquestioning loyalty. Still, thank God! it did
+and does remain, and, though shorn of all poetry, it is none the less
+vigorous in self‐defence. But we may now say that indeed the flood has
+broken loose, the Philistines are upon us, the whole array of the world’s
+newest forces is brought to bear against us, and behind her dismantled
+outposts the church retreats to her citadel, the naked Rock of Peter. Men
+say that the Council of the Vatican was inopportune, presumptuous, and
+imprudent; let the world’s gracefully lapsing course be a living
+refutation to such words. Every outward stay is gone; every difficulty in
+the way of the reunion of pastors is trebled; every see is hedged about
+with physical bars that are insurmountable; nothing remains free but what
+cannot be fettered—the tongue. Who can wonder if the church, in this dire
+emergency, delegates to one man the power she can no longer collectively
+exercise in peace? As in old Flemish cities there sits up in the lonely
+belfry of the cathedral a watcher whose duty it is to guard the city
+against fire, and to warn the people through a brazen trumpet at which
+spot he descries the first appearance of danger, so in the heart of the
+City of God there sits now the watchman whose eye and voice are bound to
+raise the alarm and direct the remedies through the length and breadth of
+listening Christendom.
+
+The Council of the Vatican has made the word of the Pope the brazen
+_tocsin_ of the Christian world.
+
+And now, having said so much of the possibilities opened up by the present
+lax spirit in morals and equally lax interpretation of what remains in the
+shape of legal restraints upon vice, let us speak of what Christian
+marriage ought to be. We will be brief, for the position almost defines
+itself. Of the indissolubility of marriage under all circumstances, even
+in the case of one of the parties breaking the marriage vow, we will not
+speak, nor even of the fidelity which marriage requires in every thought
+and slightest intention. But we would insist upon that which ensures a
+happy and holy union, namely, the preliminary motive. We have seen how bad
+marriages and an unworthy idea of this state of life lead to shame, to
+socialism, to violence, sometimes to a criminal ending in a common jail;
+let us see now what leads to bad marriages themselves. Two motives there
+are—one mercenary, and one sensual. We heard a very impressive Jesuit
+preacher say a few years ago, in the pulpit of one of the most beautiful
+and frequented churches in London, that to make a good marriage _both_
+prayer _and_ seemly preparation are necessary. Some parents, he said, in
+their pious anxiety to leave all things to Providence, and to avoid that
+solicitude for worldly things which the Gospel condemns, neglect to avail
+themselves for their children of the allowable means and legitimate
+opportunities of social life; but to these he would say, Remember the
+words of Christ: “Not every one that saith to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter
+into the kingdom of heaven.”(238) On the other hand, many parents sinned
+far more grievously and—he was loth to say it—more frequently by
+altogether leaving the Creator out of the question in the serious matter
+of their children’s settlement in life. Which of these two extremes is the
+prominent one in this country? We need not answer the question. We know
+too well how nine‐tenths of those marriages are made which within a few
+months or years are broken in the divorce courts, or otherwise dissolved
+by a shameful _esclandre_. We know how wealth especially, position,
+associations, beauty, and accomplishments all rank before moral worth in
+what is called lightly but too truly the “marriage‐market.” We know how
+marriage is looked forward to through girlhood, not as the assumption of a
+sacred responsibility, but as the preliminary step to emancipation; we
+know how it is heartlessly canvassed by men as an expensive but
+advantageous luxury, its cost being in proportion to the social figure it
+will enable them to make, but its essence of no deeper moral account to
+them than the purchase of one trotter or the undertaking of one
+speculation more or less. We do not say that there are no exceptions to
+this rule—far from it; but that is just the point: however honorable these
+cases are, the fact still remains that they _are_ exceptions. Again, where
+the motive is not directly mercenary, it is often selfish; old men will
+marry for mere comfort, physical luxury, and the regularity of a well‐
+appointed home—things which the presence of a handsome, thoughtful, and
+tolerably intellectual woman alone can ensure; women no longer young, but
+still hungering for the whirl of fashion, will marry unsuitably for the
+sake of an assured position and means to continue the frivolous course of
+their former lives; in fact, all shallow disguises of selfishness have
+their representatives in the “marriage‐market,” from that of the
+millionaire who wants a wife to sit at the head of his table and wear his
+diamonds, to that of the day‐laborer who wants one to cook his dinner,
+mend his clothes, and eke out his week’s earnings by her own hard work.
+Marriages made in this spirit are unblest and always end badly: the
+millionaire will divorce his wife, and the laborer murder his in a fit of
+intoxication; the end is the same, the means differ only according as
+natural temperament and habits of education diverge.
+
+How far otherwise with marriage in the true Scriptural, Christian sense of
+the word! In poverty or in riches, alike sacred and full of dignity;
+always conscious of its sacramental crown; ever mindful of its holy
+ministry, the salvation of two souls, the ladder to heaven of two lives
+that without it might have made shipwreck of their eternal interests! A
+thing apart from the common unions of earth, different from a commercial
+partnership, stronger than a political coalition, holier than even a
+spontaneous friendship. A thing which, like the riddle of Samson, is
+“sweetness out of strength,” and whose grace is so sublime that in heaven
+it can only find one transformation worthy of itself. “You err, not
+knowing the power of God; for in the resurrection they shall neither marry
+nor be married; but shall be as the angels of God in heaven.”(239) We are
+not told that the tie will be like brotherhood or like friendship; we are
+left to infer that between husband and wife some more peculiar link will
+exist hereafter than will be common to us all as children of the same
+Father, and it is plainly foretold that this relation will be as that of
+the angels towards each other.
+
+We have only to look into the gospels and the teachings of the Apostle of
+the Gentiles to see by what means we may in the married state so sanctify
+our lives as to deserve this heavenly transformation; we have only to read
+the marriage‐service to learn the plain, straightforward, but most solemn
+duties, the performance of which will secure us spiritual peace and joy in
+this life or the next. To use the sacrament worthily, we must come to it
+with worthy preparation and steadfast intention, first as Christians
+resolved never to perjure themselves before God, then as rational beings
+willing to abide by whatever unforeseen consequences their deliberate vow
+may entail in the future. For it is an idle pretext to allege that, if one
+party breaks the engagement, the other is _de facto_ absolved from it.
+Where in the formula, Catholic or Protestant, is this proviso? The only
+qualifying sentence is this, “Until death do us part.” How, then, can any
+reasonable person interpret “death” to mean sin, incompatibility, or any
+other incidental unpleasantness? We think that those who are so ready to
+foist unwarrantable meanings on the plain and naked oath they have sworn
+in full possession of their senses at the altar, would hardly be the
+persons we should like to trust as men or women of unimpeachable honor in
+the ordinary transactions of life.
+
+If mercenary motives are uppermost in the majority of marriages in this
+age and in this nation, sensuality is none the less responsible for a
+share of the misery attendant upon modern unions. We have already spoken
+of the evil of marriages founded on passion, and of the shameful way in
+which the colloquial adage, “Marry in haste, and repent at leisure,” is
+thus frequently illustrated. To this also the remedy lies in a serious
+Christian spirit of preparation for marriage. The root of all evil
+developments in the relations between the sexes lies in the early
+education of the contracting parties, and it is here that the only radical
+cure can be tried. The church bids her children be especially circumspect
+at the juncture of marriage, but she also teaches them to reverence the
+sacrament from childhood upward as a type of the union between herself and
+her divine Spouse. If, as children, marriage appears to us in the shape of
+the angel of home, watching over the existence it has created, and
+dignifying the parental authority it has built up; if in youth the goal of
+marriage is looked forward to as the _toga virilis_ of life, the reward of
+a dutiful childhood, the ennobling badge of our enrolment among the
+soldiers of the cross, then and only then will our country find in us
+efficient citizens, earnest patriots, and reliable defenders. If among men
+there is revived the chivalrous spirit of deference and forbearance
+towards women which sealed the middle ages as a charmed cycle among all
+divisions of time, and among women there is cultivated that generous and
+true womanliness which made SS. Monica and Paula, and Blanche of Castille,
+the typical heroines of the wedded state, then may we expect to see “a new
+heaven and a new earth.” Marriage means reverence for each other on the
+part of the persons married, as representing in themselves the sacrament
+typical of Christ’s union with the church; it means reverence for the
+children who are entrusted to their care by God and their country, and
+whom they are bound by the solemn adjuration of Christ not to scandalize;
+it means reverence for themselves, as the tabernacles of a special grace
+and the progenitors of new worshippers at God’s feet, new subjects of the
+kingdom of heaven. It is the woman especially who is bound to feel and
+express this reverence, for woman is, as the French poetically say, the
+priestess of the ideal. Besides, the highest perfection ever reached in
+the married state was reached by a woman, the Blessed Virgin, Mother of
+God. Among married saints there have always been more women canonized than
+men. The women of a nation form the men; and, if marriage is to be
+reformed, it must be done first through the women. We hope and pray that
+it may soon be so, but we fear that outside the church, where the reform
+is, in the abstract, not needed, there is not sufficient impetus to ensure
+its being made. We say in the abstract, because practically there are many
+marriages made among Catholics, celebrated in Catholic churches, and
+decorously observed through the course of a blameless life, which yet call
+loudly for reform, and sadly lack the noble Christian spirit that made
+perfect the unions of Delphina and Eleazar, and of S. Louis of France and
+Margaret of Provence. But however deficient in some cases our practice may
+unhappily be, our doctrine remains ever unchanged, and our laws ever
+inflexible. Thanks to the church, marriage is still recognized as an act
+not purely animal nor yet purely civil; and, thanks to the infallibility
+of the church and her calm expectancy of eternal duration, it will remain
+to the end of time an honored institution. If threatened, it will still
+live; if derided, it will nevertheless conquer. Christian marriage is the
+mould in which God has chosen to throw the lava of natural passion, and
+without whose wholesome restraints we should have a shapeless torrent of
+licentiousness, scathing mankind with its poisonous breath, carrying away
+all landmarks of ancestry, property, and personal safety, and finally
+exterminating the human race long before the appointed time for the dread
+judgment in the Valley of Josaphat.
+
+
+
+
+A Pearl Ashore.
+
+
+By The Author Of “The House Of Yorke.”
+
+If one should wish to enjoy perfectly a fugue of Bach’s, this is perhaps
+as good a way as any: listen to it on a warm afternoon, in a Gothic
+Protestant church, in a quiet city street, with no one present but the
+organist and one’s self. If any other enter, let him be velvet‐footed,
+incurious, and sympathetic. It would be better if each listener could
+suppose himself to be the only listener there.
+
+The wood‐work of the church is dark, glossy, and richly carved. Rose,
+purple, and gold‐colored panes strain the light that enters, full and
+glowing up in the roof, but dim below. On the walls, tinted with such
+colors as come to us from Eastern looms, and on the canvas of the old
+painters, are texts in letters of dull gold—those beautiful letters that
+break into bud and blossom at every turn, as though alive and rejoicing
+over the divine thought they bear. A sunbeam here and there, too slender
+to illumine widely, points its finger at a word, touches a dark cushion
+and brings out its shadowed crimson, or glimmers across the organ pipes,
+binding their silver with gold, as though Light would say to Song, “With
+this ring I thee wed!”
+
+Those clustered, silvery pipes are surrounded by a border of dark, lace‐
+like carving, and a screen of the same hides the keyboards. Through this
+screen shines the lamp on the music‐desk. Some one is stirring there. You
+lean back on the cushions, so that the body can take care of itself.
+Mentally, you are quiescent with a delightful sense of anticipation. If
+the situation should represent itself to you fancifully, you might say
+that your soul is somewhat dusty and weary, and has come down to this
+beach of silence for a refreshing bath. Knowing what you are to hear,
+watery images suggest themselves; for in the world of music it is the
+ocean that Bach gives us, as Beethoven gives us the winds, and Handel the
+stately‐flowing streams.
+
+We have made a Protestant church our music‐hall, because, though not the
+dwelling‐place of God on earth, it is often the temple of religious art,
+and, having nothing within it to which we can prostrate ourselves in
+adoration, it can yet, by signs and images, excite noble and religious
+feeling. Indeed, we would gladly banish to such concert‐rooms all that
+music, however beautiful in itself, which intrudes on the exclusive
+recollection proper to the house of God.
+
+This, we repeat, is as good a way as any to hear a fugue of John Sebastian
+Bach’s. So also thought Miss Rothsay; and she was one who ought to know,
+for she was a professional singer, and as sensitive musically as well
+could be.
+
+It was an afternoon in early September, and she had only the day before
+reached her native city, after a prolonged residence abroad. Hers had been
+that happy lot which seems to be the privilege of the artist: her work,
+her duty, and her delight were the same. That which she must and ought to
+do she would have chosen above all things as her recreation. Now, with a
+perfected voice, and a will to use truly and nobly that gracious power,
+she had returned to her native land.
+
+Her first contact with the New World had given her a slight jar. Utility
+seemed to mean here something rough and harsh, and the utility of beauty
+to be almost unrecognized. She had as yet met with only two kinds of
+people: those who regarded her talent as beautiful indeed and useful, in
+so far as it brought her money, but otherwise superfluous; and that yet
+more depressing class who were enthusiastic in hailing a new amusement, a
+new sensation, and who valued the singer as a necessity to elegant
+dissipation. As yet, she had met with no serious disciple of music.
+
+Yet, when she stepped from her door to walk about, to renew her knowledge
+of familiar scenes, and make acquaintance with changed ones, she was
+pleased to perceive some of that tranquillity which, in her foreign life,
+had been so conducive to a steady growth in art. The fine streets she
+traversed were quiet, distant from the business world, and out of its
+track. The September air was golden, and the sun so warm as to make the
+shade welcome. Here and there, through openings between the houses, or at
+the ends of long avenues, were to be seen glimpses of country; and a thin
+haze, so exquisite that it might be the cast‐off mantle of Beauty herself,
+half veiled, while it embellished, the landscape. It was quite in keeping
+to see an open church door. One who loitered on the steps explained that
+there was to be an organ recital, but could not say who the organist was
+to be.
+
+Miss Rothsay entered, scarcely seeing her way at first, seated herself,
+and looked about. The atmosphere of the place suited her taste. None but
+noble and sacred images presented themselves. Art was there in its
+sublimity, and in its naïve simplicity. Here was a form full of austere
+beauty, there one whose grace verged on playfulness. The scene had the
+effect of a sacred picture, in the corner of which one can see children
+playing or birds on the wing.
+
+Miss Rothsay, without knowing it, made, herself, a lovely picture in the
+place. Her oval, pale face was lighted by liquid gray eyes, now lifted,
+and drinking in the upper light. On her fair hair was set a foreign‐
+looking black hat, turned up over the left temple with an _aigrette_ and
+feather. A slight and elegant figure could be perceived beneath the dark‐
+blue mantle.
+
+Wondering a little, while she waited, who the organist might be, she ran
+over in her mind those she had known before going abroad. From that,
+dismissing the present, her thoughts glanced over those she had known
+abroad, and at last rested on one she had not seen nor heard of for eight
+years. Eight years before, Laurie had gone to Germany to study, and he was
+probably there yet. She recollected his face, more youthful than his
+years, and full of a dreamy beauty; the figure, tall and graceful, yet
+wanting somewhat in manly firmness. She heard again, in fancy, that
+changeful voice, so low, eager, and rich‐toned when he was in earnest; she
+met again the glance of his sparkling blue eyes, full of frankness and
+enthusiasm. Where was he now?
+
+Had he been a common acquaintance, she would have inquired concerning him
+freely; but he was a rejected lover, and she would not, by mentioning his
+name, remind people of that fact. Why had she rejected him? Simply because
+he had seemed to her not to reach her ideal. It had occurred to her since
+that time that possibly his manner and not his character had been at
+fault. At twenty years of age, she had been more mature than he at twenty‐
+five. She liked an appearance of dignity and firmness, and had made the
+mistake often made by those older and wiser than herself, of thinking that
+dignity of soul must always be accompanied by a grave manner, and that an
+air occasionally or habitually demonstrative and variable, which is merely
+temperament, indicates a fickle or superficial mind. Sometimes, indeed,
+the strongest and most profound feelings, in reserved and sensitive
+persons, seek to veil themselves under an affectation of lightness or
+caprice, and the soul looks forth with a sad scorn through that flimsy
+mask on the hasty and egotistical judge who pronounces sentence against
+it.
+
+
+    “And you must love him, ere to you
+    He will seem worthy of your love,”
+
+
+is true of some of the finest natures.
+
+Miss Rothsay, during these eight years of her separation from Laurie, had
+more than once felt a misgiving on his account, lest she had done him
+injustice. Observing and studying the manners of those she met, she saw
+that what passed for dignity was sometimes only the distrustfulness of the
+suspicious, the caution of the worldly‐wise, the unsympathizing coldness
+of the selfish, or the vanity of the conceited. She had lost not only her
+admiration, but her respect for that unchangeable loftiness which chills
+and awes the demonstrative into silence; and she had remembered, with a
+growing regret, Laurie’s cordial ways, that seemed to expect friendliness
+and sympathy from all, and to appreciate the purity of his soul, that
+never looked for evil, and turned away from it when it intruded itself,
+and thus seemed scarcely aware that evil existed. Still she had been too
+deeply engrossed in her studies to give him much thought, and it was only
+now that she became conscious of regret.
+
+Meantime, the organist had taken his place, and was arranging his music.
+The light of the lamp shone on a face wherein were exquisitely blended
+strength and refinement. One could see there passion purified by prayer,
+and enthusiasm too deep for trivial excitement. The face showed, too, when
+studied, that tranquil reserve, not without sadness, which is learned by
+those who have too often cast their pearls before swine, yet who do not
+despair of finding sympathy.
+
+He placed the music, sat an instant in fixed recollection, as though he
+prayed, then lifted his tapering hands, so nervous, light, and powerful,
+and let them fall on the keys. To the listener beyond the screen, it was
+as though her reverie had been broken by a burst of thunder. Then the sea
+rolled in its waves of sound, strong, steady, a long, overlapping rhythm.
+What did it mean, that fugue? Did it symbolize the swift‐coming assaults
+of evil that seek to drag the race of man downward, as the persistent sea
+eats away, grain by grain, the continents? Was it, perhaps, the ceaseless
+endeavor of the faithful will that, baffled once, returns ever to the
+charge, and dies triumphantly struggling? Did it indicate the generations
+of men flowing on in waves for ever, to break at the feet of God; or the
+hurrying centuries, cut short, at last, by eternity? However it might be
+interpreted, the music lifted and bore the listener on, and the silence
+that followed found her otherwhere than the last silence had left her. She
+was the same in nature, but her mood was higher; for music does not change
+the listener, it merely intensifies what is positive in his nature,
+whether it be good or bad, to its superlative degree.
+
+Vibrating and breathless still with the emotion caused by that grand
+composition so grandly rendered, Miss Rothsay perceived a slip of paper on
+the cushion, and reached her hand for it. It proved to be a programme of
+the Recital. She glanced along the list, and read the name of the organist
+at the end—it was Duncan Laurie!
+
+She heard, as in a dream, the soft‐toned Vorspiele that followed, and only
+came back to music when the third number, a toccata, began. But the music
+had now to her a new meaning. It seemed to triumph over and scorn her. She
+heard through that melodious thunder the voice of Nemesis.
+
+But when the closing piece, a noble concerto by Handel, sang out, it
+reproved that fancy of hers. There was no spirit of revenge nor mean
+triumph in Laurie’s nature.
+
+The audience, small and select, went out quietly. The organist closed the
+instrument, and prepared to follow, yet waited a moment to recover full
+consciousness of the everyday world he was going to meet. The air seemed
+to pulse about him still, and wings of flying melodies to brush his face.
+Never had he felt less inclined to meet idle compliment or talk
+commonplace. “I hope no one will wait for me,” he muttered, going out into
+the vestibule.
+
+But some one was waiting, a pale‐faced, lovely woman, who looked at him,
+but spoke not a word. The look, too, was short; for when he exclaimed and
+reddened up to the eyes, and held out a trembling hand, her eyes dropped.
+
+There is a commonplace which is but the veil to glory or delight, like
+Minerva in her russet gown. The conventional questions that Laurie
+properly asked of the lady, as they walked on together, were of this sort.
+When did she come home? was as one should say, When did Joy arrive? When
+do the stars come? And the steamer that brought her could be as worthy of
+poetical contemplation as the cloud that wrapped a descending Juno, or the
+eagle that bore away a Ganymede.
+
+Not long after, when some one asked them who was their favorite composer,
+each answered “Bach!” and, when alone together, each asked the other the
+reason for that answer.
+
+“Because,” said the lady, blushing, “it was on the waves of one of Bach’s
+fugues that I reached the Happy Islands.”
+
+“And because,” returned the lover, “when some of Bach’s music had rolled
+back into the ocean, it left a pearl ashore for me.”
+
+
+
+
+The Benefits Of Italian Unity.
+
+
+From The Etudes Religieuses.
+
+Revolution is a dangerous syren. The nations of the earth have yielded to
+her seductions, but the day is coming when with one voice they will curse
+the great enchantress who has lured them on to apostasy. For a century she
+has not ceased to announce an era of prosperity to the rising generation,
+but at length we see her promises are as deceptive as her principles are
+corrupt. From the heart of all nations rise up groans and maledictions
+against her teachings, and against her agents who have betrayed the hopes
+of their partisans, brought death instead of life, ruin instead of
+prosperity, and dishonor instead of glory. In a word, revolution is in a
+state of bankruptcy. This is not acknowledged by the politicians of the
+_tiers‐parti_ and their followers. They still continue to proclaim the
+sovereignty of the “immortal principles,” declare revolution a success,
+celebrate its material and moral benefits, and boast that “real social
+justice was _for the first time_ rendered in 1789”—after eighteen
+centuries of Christianity! But people are ceasing to be duped by any such
+political sophisms; they are beginning to regret profoundly the peace,
+order, and security, and all the benefits assured to the world by the
+supremacy of religion, and lost through social apostasy. The wisest of
+politicians are tired of revolutions. People who have lost their sacred
+heritage, and find themselves deprived of the highest blessings of life,
+are beginning to remember their baptismal engagements, and to feel the
+necessity of putting an end to revolution, and returning to the social
+order established of God. The prodigal son, famished with hunger, makes an
+energetic resolution: _Surgam et ibo ad patrem!_ Hesitation is no longer
+possible. Weary of your modern theories, we will return to our Father’s
+house—to Christ and his church!
+
+The man who comprehended most thoroughly the Satanic nature of the
+revolutionary spirit—Count Joseph de Maistre—had an intuitive assurance of
+the calamities that would avenge the disregard of the laws of order, and
+lead future generations back to the sacred principles of their ancestors.
+The foresight and warnings of this eminent writer are well known.
+Addressing the French, he says: “Undeceive yourselves, at length, as to
+the lamentable theories that have disgraced our age. You have already
+found out what the promulgators of these deplorable dogmas are, but the
+impression they have left is not yet effaced. In all your plans of
+creation and restoration you only leave out God, from whom they have
+alienated you.... How has God punished this execrable delirium? He has
+punished it as he created light—by a single word—_Fiat!_—and the political
+world has crumbled to atoms.... If any one wishes to know the probable
+result of the revolution, they need only examine the point whereon all its
+factions are united. They all desire the degradation, yea, the utter
+subversion, not only of the monarchy, but of Christianity; _whence it
+follows_ that all their efforts must finally end in the triumph of
+Christianity as well as the monarchy.”(240) In these few words the great
+philosopher gives us a complete history of the era of revolution in the
+past as well as the future. He declares it a widespread overturning of
+order, necessarily followed by terrible misfortunes, till a counter‐stroke
+turns the nations back to the way appointed by God.(241)
+
+While M. de Maistre was regarding the progress of events from the heights
+of his genius, he gave the most minute attention to the ravages of the
+revolutionary spirit in every department. In the _Mélanges Inédits_, for
+which we are indebted to Count Joseph’s grandson, and which appeared on
+the very eve of our great disasters (1870), we find more than a hundred
+pages devoted to reviewing the _benefits_ of the French Revolution. They
+contain an inventory drawn up by the aid of the republican papers of the
+time, in which the moral and material results of revolutionary barbarism
+are attested by the avowal of the barbarians themselves. A certain
+historian of the Revolution would have done well to examine this catalogue
+before officially undertaking, in the presence of the National Assembly,
+the awkward apology so generally known. And what if he had continued to
+verify the benefits of the revolutionary syren, still beloved of certain
+politicians, till the end of the year 1872? How glorious would be the
+balance‐sheet of the “immortal principles” in the eighty‐fourth year of
+their reign! Every Frenchman knows what it has cost to be the eldest son
+of the Revolution!—As statistics are held in such high honor in our day,
+why not draw up the accounts of ’89, and establish clearly the active and
+passive of the revolutionary spirit now spreading throughout the world?
+
+We lay before our readers some notes that may be of service in this vast
+liquidation, taken from two valuable works that have been kindly brought
+to our notice.(242) We do not feel at liberty to designate the eminent
+person who wrote these _Notes_, which, if we are rightly informed, were
+first published in the _Messager Russe_. All we feel permitted to state is
+that we can place full confidence in the probity of this traveller. He
+belongs to the diplomatic corps, but unfortunately is not of the Catholic
+religion. We will let him testify for himself. It will at once be seen by
+the frequent quotations we shall make that he is a man of superior mind,
+decision and honesty of character, and of an upright and incorruptible
+conscience.
+
+“Eleven years ago, I witnessed the foundation of the kingdom of Italy. I
+have just seen the work completed—the edifice crowned—Rome made the
+capital.—My observations have been made in person, and are impartial, as I
+had no preconceived opinions. My numerous quotations are taken in a great
+measure from Italian sources, nay, even _the most Italian_. My position as
+an independent observer, unbiassed by any feeling of responsibility,
+enables me to judge events in a cooler manner than might be done by an
+opponent of the various publicists that have treated of the successive
+phases of the great Italian drama.”(243)
+
+Here, then, is contemporaneous Italy studied by an observer of
+incontestable impartiality—studied on the spot, and from authentic
+sources. It is by no means uncommon to hear the correspondents of Catholic
+journals accused of exaggeration. Certain newspapers under party
+influence, like the _Journal des Débats_ and the _Indépendance Belge_, are
+paid to divert public attention from facts that cannot be denied. We are
+sure the Italo‐Parisian and the Italo‐Belgian press will not say a single
+word about the _Etudes sur l’Italie contemporaine_.(244)
+
+
+
+I.
+
+
+How shall we characterize the Italian crisis as a whole? Is it merely one
+of those accidental revolutions which history is full of, or is it a
+genuine revolution with its systematic hatred of Christian society? Our
+readers must not be astonished at such a question. I know some Catholics—a
+little too liberal, it is true—who have not thereon, even in these times,
+perfectly correct notions. We remember certain unfortunate expressions
+respecting the governments of the _ancien régime_ which committed the
+unpardonable fault of injuring Italian liberty, and even respecting that
+venerable Christian administration that has been dragged through blood and
+fire. Did not the honorable M. Dulaurier recently confess in an ingenuous
+manner the illusions he was under before he set foot on Italian soil, and
+how he believed in the possibility of a reconciliation between the Pope
+and the excommunicated king? He says he heard on all sides a sentiment to
+which he gave credence without much reflection: “Why interpose between the
+two parties contending for Rome? Pius IX. and Victor Emmanuel are both
+Italians: they will end by settling the difficulty, and we shall trouble
+ourselves for nothing.” The reality, the sad reality, forces us to a
+different opinion.
+
+It was a beautiful illusion—once greatly dwelt upon in official papers—to
+think Piedmont sincerely and uniquely preoccupied about the freedom of
+Italy; to believe in the Subalpine posture of disinterested chivalry, and
+in Napoleon III. going to war in a great cause merely for the glory of
+being a liberator. Doubtless there was, for some time, a liberal party in
+Italy dreaming at once of a confederacy and of national independence. But
+Mazzinism and its ideas of unity prevailed, and it was manifest to those
+whose eyes were not blinded that the Piedmontese government superseded
+_Giovane Italia_ by taking advantage of the _naïveté_ of honest
+liberals.(245) All sincere and upright minds must free themselves from so
+illusive a deception. The mask has fallen off, so must the scales from
+their eyes. The Italian movement is essentially revolutionary—or Satanic.
+It is not one of those transformations so frequent in the political life
+of a nation: it is a work of subversion, a war on the church, a religious
+persecution, and “pure impurity,” to use Joseph de Maistre’s words.
+
+It has been demonstrated quite recently in this magazine that the whole
+tendency of the Italian Peninsula, and its providential destiny, are
+opposed to unity; that the Revolution has done violence to nature and
+religion, to the institutions and traditions of the past, and to the faith
+and morals of the people weighed down by the yoke of unity; and that it
+has lied to history, to the world, and to God. _Les Etudes sur l’Italie
+contemporaine_ takes a similar view of the case:
+
+
+    “The unity of Italy was not a national necessity; ... the movement
+    was not spontaneous, but forced.... The Piedmontese government has
+    shown some shrewdness (unscrupulous shrewdness) in borrowing its
+    programme from Mazzini. The campaign of 1859 led the way to this
+    political intrigue. As to the nation, it imagined the promised
+    regeneration would produce a new era of happiness when the
+    foreigner was once got rid of. The masses have given in to the
+    ambition of the minority.
+
+    “In the transformation of Italy, we see action precede reflection;
+    we see what Frederick the Great said of Joseph II.—the second step
+    taken before the first.... It must be remembered that the
+    geography of Italy was one of the causes of its division, the
+    length being so disproportionate to its width, which prevented a
+    common centre, and led to separate developments and outlets....
+    Even if railways are now a means of greatly shortening distances,
+    the union of the remote parts ought to be the result of a natural
+    and progressive tendency—not revolutionary.
+
+    “The first idea of Rome as the capital sprang from the classics.
+    It was a rhetorical expression (according to Senator Stefano
+    Jacini).... If official Italy had need of Rome, Rome by no means
+    had need of Italy.... And what do they wish to do with Rome? The
+    unionists in favor of a monarchy wish to transform it into a
+    modern capital that it may become the centre of the general action
+    and influence which united Italy is ambitious of exercising in the
+    world. The Mazzinians, the socialist republicans, and the free‐
+    thinkers wish to make it the centre of the doctrines they are
+    desirous of substituting for Christianity. These new apostles are
+    not agreed among themselves, but they are all fighting in the
+    breach against the Catholic organization, and their real object is
+    the destruction of Christian principles.”(246)
+
+
+To effect the unification of Italy, it was therefore necessary to conspire
+against the natural inclinations of the inhabitants, against the rights of
+local principalities, and against the real interests of the nation, to
+conspire not only against the temporal, but the spiritual power of the
+papacy. Where they do not find the normal conditions of assimilation, they
+do not hesitate to resort to deeds worthy of brigands. Conspirators, alas!
+have never been wanting in the country of Machiavelli. In the present age
+they superabound. “It has been the misfortune of Italy—its robe of
+Nessus—that for twelve years all who have succeeded to power, even the
+best, have been conspirators.”(247) Yes; and foremost among them is the
+_great_ and _good_ Cavour, whom a French diplomatist—an honest man,
+however—has lately depicted, with an enthusiasm that has hardly died away,
+as struggling to promote the greatness of his country.(248) We do not
+dispute Cavour’s ability, or his perseverance in striving after a certain
+end, or his subtleness and patience in the execution of his designs, or
+his skill in availing himself of the very passions he pretended to yield
+to. He succeeded—is it not a glorious title to fame?—in keeping Napoleon
+III. in leading‐strings till a Prussian Cavour is found to continue the
+_rôle_ and lead the emperor on to Sedan. But herein Cavour showed himself
+crafty, deceitful, and—why should we not say it?—criminal. Has not M.
+Guizot called a certain writer a “_malfaiteur de la pensée_?” Besides,
+Cavour spoke of himself to his friends somewhat as we do. Our French
+diplomatist, M. Henry d’Ideville, in a curious page of his _Notes
+Intimes_, lets us into the secrets of the game and those who took part in
+it.
+
+
+    “You see, my dear d’Ideville (it is Cavour who is speaking), your
+    emperor will never change. His fault is a disposition to be for
+    ever plotting.... With a country as powerful as yours, a large
+    army, and Europe at peace, what is he afraid of? Why is he for
+    ever disguising his intentions, going to the right when he means
+    to turn to the left, and _vice versa_? Ah! what a wonderful
+    conspirator he makes!”
+
+
+M. d’Ideville is a man of wit. With all possible courtesy, he replied:
+
+
+    “But, M. le Comte, have you not been a daring conspirator also?”
+
+    “I? Certainly,” replied M. de Cavour. “I have conspired, and how
+    could I do otherwise at such a time?... We had to keep Austria in
+    the dark, whereas, your emperor, you may be sure, will remain for
+    ever incorrigible. I have known him a long time! To plot, for ever
+    plot, is the characteristic of his nature. It is the occupation he
+    prefers, and he pursues it like an artist—like a _dilettante_. In
+    this _rôle_ he will always be the foremost and most capable of us
+    all.”(249)
+
+
+US ALL! Yes, there it is ably expressed in a word: all conspirators and
+accomplices, not to speak of the dupes. On the 24th of March, 1860, M. de
+Cavour, after signing the treaty that ceded Nice and Savoy to France,
+approached M. de Talleyrand, and, rubbing his hands, whispered in his ear:
+“We are accomplices now, baron, are we not?”(250) Alas! wrongfully
+acquired, and never any benefit, we now see why we have lost Alsace and
+Lorraine!
+
+The entire route from Turin to Rome is marked by the deeds of these
+conspirators, by their tricks and intrigues, and by their crimes and
+double‐dealings, which have resulted in the profit of Piedmont and
+Prussia, and the disgrace of our poor France. M. d’Ideville’s conscience
+evidently reproached him at last for having liked Cavour so well, and for
+imprudently interesting himself in the Italian scheme. The other
+diplomatist, who has anonymously given his _Etudes sur l’Italie_ to the
+public, seems never to have had the least sympathy with the iniquitous and
+sacrilegious ambition of the Sardinian government. It is true he does not
+belong to the French diplomacy infatuated with the ideas of ’89!(251) He
+finds nothing seductive in the policy of the conspirators. The fiction
+disguised under the attractive title of national rights, the age of
+annexations, the trick of the plebiscites, the system of moral agency, the
+so‐called exigencies of civilization and progress, and the revolutionary
+messianism which constitutes the foundation of the Napoleonic ideas, have
+no attraction for him. His style is tolerably forcible when he speaks of
+all these stratagems: “Such tactics are nothing new. They have always been
+resorted to in order to palliate schemes of ambition and hypocrisy.”(252)
+
+
+
+II.
+
+
+A government given to conspiracy condemns the nation that supports it, as
+well as itself, to degradation—to moral and material ruin. If for a while
+it flatters itself with the hope of systematizing the revolution and
+directing its energies, it soon becomes its slave and finally its victim.
+When the hand is caught in machinery, the whole body is soon drawn after
+it, the head as well as the rest.
+
+Our diplomatic traveller states some aphorisms in connection with this
+subject that are full of significance, and reveal the genuine statesman.
+
+
+    “A government that owes its existence to a revolution is not
+    viable in the long run unless it has the power and wisdom to
+    sunder all the ties that connect it with the party to which it
+    owes its origin.
+
+    “Every government that has a similar origin to the Napoleonic
+    Empire, and, still more, one which owes its existence thereto,
+    will find itself in danger when traditionary principles once more
+    assert themselves for the safety of society.
+
+    “Governments of a revolutionary origin have been known to become
+    conservative and renounce their former principles of action. The
+    Italian government may likewise wish to do this, but it cannot.
+
+    “All who have risen to power in Italy have had some connection
+    with the revolutionary party, and are obliged to favor it. In
+    particular instances, they have sometimes manifested a certain
+    firmness towards its factions, but in essentials they have yielded
+    to the inevitable pressure.
+
+    “Revolution leads to disorder, and, when it triumphs, the destiny
+    of the country is thrown into the hands of its adherents.
+    Political bias must take the place of capacity and often of honor
+    itself.”(253)
+
+
+One of the first material disasters produced by a triumphant conspiracy is
+the squandering of the finances. There is an immediate necessity of
+enriching itself, repairing all deficiencies, paying traitors, buying
+consciences and votes, keeping a secret reserve of ready money to reward
+the zeal of journalists, and stimulate or lull the passions according to
+the exigencies of the moment. The wretched state of the budgets in United
+Italy will become as proverbial as the _marchés_ of the 4th of September
+in France. With all the domains Piedmont has received from the annexed
+states, it ought to be rich—rich enough to pay the debt its accomplice,
+the Empire, has bequeathed to us. The finances of the different states,
+especially of Rome, were in perfect order, and, with the exception of the
+kingdom of Sardinia, the receipts surpassed the expenses. Now the credit
+of Italy is destroyed, and nothing is heard of but duties and taxes, such
+as were unknown throughout the Peninsula in 1859, more particularly at
+Rome. Figures are eloquent—we must refer to them:
+
+
+    “Previous to 1860, there were seven states in Italy, each with its
+    court, ministers, administration, and diplomatic corps. All these
+    governments expended about five hundred millions of francs a year,
+    and the imposts amounted to nearly the same sum. These seven
+    states had a debt of about two milliards and a half. At the
+    present time, without reckoning the interest on the floating debt
+    to the National Bank, Italy annually pays about three hundred
+    millions of interest, corresponding to a debt of seven milliards,
+    and all this notwithstanding the sale of domanial property
+    amounting to six hundred and fifty millions, notwithstanding the
+    alienation of the railways of the state and the manufacture of
+    tobacco, and notwithstanding the seizure of ecclesiastical
+    property, all of which have amounted _in nine years_ to nine
+    milliards three hundred and sixteen millions of francs received at
+    the state treasury. Nevertheless, the public debt amounts to the
+    aforesaid sum of seven milliards. And yet the army is badly
+    maintained, the navy poorly organized, and the administration in a
+    state of chaos and unparalleled demoralization.”(254)
+
+
+And here is M. Quintino Sella, who has just made known the projected
+budget for 1873; he acknowledges a deficit of sixty millions, as had been
+anticipated, while the ordinary receipts amount to eight hundred and five
+millions. If the kingdom of Italy were administered as economically as in
+the time of the seven sovereigns, a budget of eight hundred and five
+millions would leave a surplus of three hundred millions. And yet one of
+the pretexts of unification was that it would save the expense of so many
+courts, which bore hard on the people! Poor people! they know now what to
+think of cheap governments, and will soon see that the ministration of the
+imposts is leading to bankruptcy, in spite of the fresh confiscations and
+appropriation of conventual property about to be made at Rome.(255)
+
+And it must be remembered that, in spite of these great budgets, the army
+is badly maintained and the navy poorly organized. Custozza and Lissa had
+previously convinced us of this. Austria was well aware of it, and even
+the France of M. Thiers suspects that, in spite of the valor of the old
+Piedmontese soldiery, and the discipline of the Neapolitan army; in spite
+of the aptitude of the Genoese and Venetian sailors, the military forces
+of Italy are a mere illusion, particularly on account of the inefficiency
+of the leaders of the army and navy. Since the time of M. de Cavour, whose
+ability is by no means beyond doubt, there have been only second‐rate men
+beyond the Alps—not a statesman, not an orator, not a minister, not a
+financier, not a genuine soldier—everywhere and in everything there is the
+same disgraceful deficiency. _Facundum sed male forte genus._
+
+
+    “I knew well the men of 1848, some of whom are still remaining,
+    but they must have degenerated through ambition and the necessity
+    of sustaining their position, for even in the revolutionary ranks
+    there was more elevation in 1848 than at the present time.
+
+    “Previous to 1860, the armies of the different states, including,
+    of course, the Piedmontese army, constituted a more powerful and
+    better organized force than is now under arms. ‘Our army,’ says
+    General La Marmora, ‘has the traditional reputation of being
+    disciplined, but it is demoralized by a want of stability in its
+    organization, and a lack of moral influences.’ La Marmora opposes
+    among other things the exclusion of chaplains and of the religious
+    element among the troops.
+
+    “The Sardinian and Neapolitan navies greatly surpassed the
+    Italian. The men were better drilled, and the shipping in better
+    order. Such is the opinion recently expressed by the English naval
+    officers in port at Naples who were at the exposition of the
+    present year.”(256)
+
+
+And yet the military forces are the only remaining bulwark of order in
+Italy—I mean material order, for moral order no longer exists anywhere.
+The so‐called conservative party, that is to say, the moderate
+revolutionists, rely on the army. But the ultra revolutionary element is
+also to be found there, and some day the advanced party will, for its own
+designs, entice away the officers that followed the hero of Caprera in his
+campaigns. It will not be sufficient to name Cialdini, Cadorna, or even La
+Marmora, to counteract the fatal consequences of Castelfidardo and the
+Porta Pia. By excluding religious influences from the army, and giving it
+a false idea of patriotism, the source of courage and energy is dried up.
+After all, revolution will never be friendly to the army, and the genuine
+soldier will always execrate revolution, whether instigated by princes,
+citizens, or the mob. A soldier who entered Rome through the breach,
+lately wrote to the _Libertà_: “The day the King of Italy is satisfied
+with mere volunteers, as the Pope was, we shall see whether it is the Pope
+or the king that is loved and esteemed the most by the Italian people.”
+
+In opposing the system of territorial divisions on account of the army,
+which he considers unsuited to the Peninsula, General La Marmora’s opinion
+is founded on a proof that has the misfortune to prove too much. “If there
+were small territorial armies,” says he, “in addition to separate
+administrations in the various regions of Italy, the unity for which we
+have done so much, and Providence still more than we, would incur great
+danger.”(257) Why not boldly declare, general, that there are two
+Italys—the _Reale_ and the _Legale_, one of which has a tendency to revolt
+against the other? And, above all, why utter a blasphemy against the
+sovereign providence of God?(258) _Italia legale_ labors in vain; the
+revolutionary impulse given to it by Cavour is an accelerated movement; it
+will never reascend the declivity that leads _al fondo_. It will always
+have against it not only the betrayed interests and the revolted
+conscience of _Italia reale_, but, above all, Divine Providence, who will
+one day show that the favors and proofs of protection accorded to the
+“regenerators” were merely for them, as for Napoleon III., the snares of
+avenging justice. _In insidiis suis capientur iniqui._
+
+
+    “As to greatness and political importance, admitting even the
+    possibility of indefatigable and intelligent effort, Italy will
+    never equal the glorious traditions of its past history. Italian
+    glory is the glory of the different states of the Peninsula.... To
+    acquire fresh glory, there must be, besides unity, a strength of
+    organization it does not possess, and cannot, because it is a
+    mirage and not a reality.
+
+    “The North invades the South: this cannot be called community of
+    interests. It is an attempt at absorption on the part of the
+    North, and at the expense of the South.
+
+    “Once at Rome, the programme was to have ended. A new life was to
+    commence; fresh energy was to be the signal of an era of grandeur
+    and prosperity; interiorly, there was to be a more perfect
+    administration; exteriorly, a prudent _national_ policy, that is
+    to say, the Napoleonic idea of the Latin races that Italy was to
+    revive. Rome was to be the great centre of liberal influences....
+    All this had been announced and promised. As for me, I see no
+    choice between a blind alley and a _politique d’aventure_.
+
+    “It seems to me the union, at a critical moment, should find
+    protection in the wishes of the inhabitants. I can testify that if
+    the former sovereigns of Naples, Florence, Parma, and Modena could
+    return, the day would be hailed by a majority of the inhabitants
+    as one of deliverance. In Lombardy it is different, I acknowledge.
+    The _noblesse_ say, as I myself heard a personage of great note:
+    We are badly governed, but at least it is no longer by foreigners.
+    The middle classes are republicans, and in the country the
+    Austrian rule is regretted. The people of Venice either aspire to
+    a republic or regret the unfortunate Archduke Maximilian, whom
+    they would have liked as an independent sovereign. In the old
+    pontifical provinces called the Legations, they would not care to
+    return to the former condition of things as they were, but some
+    would be satisfied with the Pope and a local autonomy; the
+    remainder form a sufficiently numerous republican party.”
+
+    “In a word, THERE IS EVERYWHERE DISSATISFACTION AS WELL AS
+    DISAPPOINTMENT, AFTER TWELVE YEARS OF EXPERIENCE.”(259)
+
+
+It is not astonishing, therefore, that at an audience on the 18th of last
+Nov., the Grand Duke Nicholas, nephew of the Emperor of Russia, said to
+Pius IX., with all a young man’s frankness: “Most holy Father, since I
+have been in Italy, everywhere I go, I hear nothing but evil of King
+Victor Emmanuel and his government.”(260)
+
+We need only open our eyes to see the interior condition of united Italy
+as soon as there was any question, no longer of conspiring and declaiming,
+but of organizing and governing. And its exterior political relations
+compare quite as unfavorably with the programme of emancipation. By a kind
+of divine irony, Italy has become a mere humble vassal of Germany—of the
+Holy Protestant Empire of Berlin—and the future King of Rome was only
+acting his part when he proclaimed himself the King of Prussia’s
+hussar.(261) It is well known at the Quirinal that, though influenced for
+the moment by the dominant party, the authorities may some day return,
+even through interest, to traditional principles and the old political
+code which does not recognize the revolutionary schemes of nations or
+parties. Besides, the Italian princes, who represent the law, are still
+living. Francis II. may be found to be a genuine Neapolitan, Ferdinand IV.
+a very good Tuscan, Robert I. an excellent Parmesan, and Francis V. the
+best of Modenais. And, lastly, is not Pius IX. more of an Italian than the
+Savoyard who styles himself the King of Italy?... And if the French, whose
+connivance can no longer be expected, even under M. Thiers, should favor
+the restoration of the throne to a prince, “_qui a la justice dans le sang
+et dans l’âme_,” and would at need have it in his hand, the Italian
+framework, which merely stands through toleration, would be threatened
+with sudden and ignominious ruin. It is all this that recently induced the
+_prince‐héritier_ to mount like a Hungarian foot‐soldier behind the
+triumphal chariot of the German Cæsar.
+
+Another evil: the Prussians are not the most scrupulous people in the
+world about other people’s property, and their investigations in the
+Peninsula have excited suspicions as to the object of their cupidity. Let
+M. de Bismarck, more audacious and grasping than the late M. de Cavour,
+once succeed in driving the Hapsburgs from Germany, will it not occur to
+him to take advantage of the title of the Lombardo‐Venetian kingdom for
+the benefit of the Cæsar of Berlin? For it is skilfully demonstrated in
+Germany that the Germanic race has the power, and, therefore, the right,
+to a powerful navy, and, for the benefit of this navy, an outlet on the
+Adriatic. And there is no other possible ally but Prussia to protect what
+calls itself the kingdom of Italy!
+
+
+    “Alliances are beneficial when the parties unite their influence
+    for a common end. (Allies, in our day, no longer seek to know each
+    other’s principles or origin.) But when they are not formed _inter
+    pares_, or nearly so, and especially when they are intended to
+    guarantee the very existence—the vital principle—of the weaker
+    ally, then the alliance loses its true character, and soon ends in
+    subjection on the ground of politics or economy, and sometimes
+    both.”(262)
+
+
+Such are the glories of Italy _free from the Alps to the Adriatic_! If, in
+spite of her presumptuous _farà da se_, she was obliged to have recourse
+to a foreign hand in order to rise, and still needs a foreign arm to stand
+erect, she will, according to appearances, have need of no one to aid her
+in falling: she will topple over of herself. The so‐called free country is
+only an enslaved kingdom—a vassal, a satellite without strength and
+without prestige.
+
+
+
+III.
+
+
+Of all the Italian formulas that have served to mislead the liberal mind,
+there is not one more odiously false and deceptive than the too famous
+expression, _A free church in a free country_. History has already
+interpreted it, A persecuted church in an enslaved country. The
+revolutionary factions that have assumed the authority have imposed
+thereon the complete execution of their plan, and we know that the Masonic
+lodges, though they denounce Mazzinian deism, have fallen into the atheism
+of Renan, _al fondo_!
+
+The sacrilegious frenzy of the Revolution, and the madness of those that
+encouraged it, have been stigmatized in forcible terms by the august
+prisoner of the Vatican:
+
+
+    “Unbelief assumes an air of authority, and proudly stalks
+    throughout the length and breadth of the earth, doubtless
+    imagining it is to triumph for ever.... Woe to those who are
+    linked with the impious, and dally with the Revolution under the
+    pretence of directing it! Sooner or later they will be drawn into
+    the abyss. The recent disasters at Naples may be adduced as an
+    example. A great number of curious people, heedless and devoid of
+    all prudence, hastened to get a nearer view of the devouring
+    flames issuing from the fearful mouth of Vesuvius, and many of
+    them became victims of mistaken curiosity. So it is with those who
+    covenant with the Revolution and the revolutionists, hoping to
+    overrule the former and keep down the latter. Rash people! they
+    will all become a prey to the flames that surround them on every
+    side.”(263)
+
+
+The revolutionary lava floods the streets of Rome and covers the whole
+Peninsula. It began in the cities, spread into the country, and will end
+by swallowing up the army. The universities and common schools are
+invaded, the torrent engulfs the workshops and stalls, and undermines the
+walls of palaces. Princes even have opened their gates at its approach. In
+vain the Holy Father sounds the cry of alarm; in vain his prime minister
+publicly denounces the progress of the deadly current—party spirit seems
+to have paralyzed all in authority.
+
+We will not describe the exploits of this new Islamism against the papal
+power. The history of its ambuscades and pillages is sufficiently well
+known. There never was a richer treasure of dishonor for revolution to
+endow a people with. “The title of liberators was all the same retained.”
+Yes, all the same!
+
+Joseph de Maistre somewhere refers to an English functionary as saying
+that every man who spoke of taking an inch of land from the Pope ought to
+be hung. “As for me,” adds the witty writer, “I cheerfully consent, in
+order to avoid carnage, that _hung_ should be changed to _hissed_.”(264)
+
+Let us wait. An avenging God will do both: _subsannabit_, _conquassabit_.
+Had the plots of the unionists merely aimed at the temporal power, perhaps
+divine justice would have been satisfied with a hiss at the hour of some
+Italian Sedan, but the gibbet—it is a law of history—is reserved for
+persecutors and apostates.
+
+When the Sardinian government knocked at one of the gates of Rome, as it
+awaited a propitious moment for battering it down, it bound itself before
+all Europe to solve the problem of the separation of church and state
+which had puzzled all the doctors of liberalism, and of which it pretended
+to have found the key. It was said the Roman question and the Italian
+question were to cease to be antagonistic, or, at least, they were to
+resemble those rivers that, while mingling their waters, preserve their
+own colors, as we see in the Rhône and the Saône. It was promised a
+channel should be made wide enough for this double current of opinions.
+Hence the origin of the famous law of the Guarantees. This scheme of
+conciliation is properly appreciated in the _Etudes sur l’Italie
+Contemporaine_:
+
+
+    “How many times I have heard it said that the Papacy and the
+    Italian government, even though they never came to an agreement,
+    might at least be like two parallel lines indefinitely and
+    pacifically prolonged! This is a mistake arising from a judgment
+    founded on impressions—and when I say impressions, I mean
+    appearances.
+
+    “From the beginning, this law of Guarantees was a one‐sided and
+    fruitless attempt.... The government and the Chambers never had
+    any doubt as to the refusal of the Pope. This law was like an
+    olive branch presented at the point of the sword as a suitable
+    corrective to palliate the violent occupation of Rome.... I do not
+    think a single statesman could really have believed in the success
+    of this law, otherwise than as the decree of the conqueror.
+
+    “Besides the moral, juridical, and historic reasons to hinder an
+    understanding between the Pope and a sovereign master of Rome,
+    there was also the impossibility of coexisting with a power that
+    rests on an unstable foundation.
+
+    “Even from the point of view of modern but not subversive ideas, A
+    SEPARATION MORE IMPORTANT THAN THAT OF STATE AND CHURCH IS THE
+    SEPARATION OF STATE AND REVOLUTION.”(265)
+
+
+These are golden words. But our diplomatic traveller is forced to
+acknowledge that the Italian government cannot break its iniquitous bonds,
+that it lacks honesty and force, and that all the factions seek their own
+good first and then the evil of others. Our author, though, unfortunately,
+too indifferent a spectator to Italian persecution, at least has the
+advantage of being an unexceptionable witness.
+
+
+    “Practically, it is not the state, it is society, that modern
+    Italy separates from the church.... One of the greatest mistakes
+    the unionists have made since the beginning of the Revolution has
+    been the war declared against the clergy and the church. It is at
+    once a political and historical error, and the greater for being
+    committed at Rome.
+
+    “Tolerance (practised from time to time according to orders) has
+    its reaction, and of the deepest die, in a recrudescence of
+    insults, sequestrations and confiscations imposed on the ministers
+    of the sanctuary and even the sanctuaries themselves.
+
+    “Anti‐Christianity has established itself with a bold front at
+    Rome—with its schools of free‐thinkers, speeches in which atheism
+    is proclaimed without the least reticence, burial without any
+    religious ceremony, and irreligious books sold at low prices.
+
+    “In everything relating to teaching, the choice generally falls on
+    the unbeliever.
+
+    “Materialism is taught _ex cathedra_ in all the universities.
+
+    “They have not yet touched on the most vital question—the
+    suppression of the convents (at Rome) and the incameration of the
+    property of the clergy. But they will come to that, and
+    speedily.... The attempt at what is called a conciliation must
+    sooner or later end in an outbreak.”(266)
+
+
+They did come to it—to that shameful encroachment of the government on the
+religious corporations. The party demanded it, M. de Bismarck advised it,
+and the diplomatic corps tolerated it. What will not diplomacy tolerate?
+It was, however, clearly demonstrated to the representatives of different
+governments the urgent necessity there was of taking under their united
+protection the independence of the Sovereign Pontiff so poorly guaranteed
+by the usurper, of declaring the inviolability of church property, the
+possession of which—and it is a wholly legitimate one—is a _sine qua non_
+condition of pontifical independence, without considering that most of
+these establishments have a double claim as to their origin and
+destination, to be regarded as international property.(267) Nothing was
+done. The tolerance of official Europe towards the Piedmontese
+filibustering has been unlimited, though unrestricted usurpation has been
+followed by open persecution. Pius IX. had good reason to severely allude
+to “the so‐called governments” that find amusement in the Revolution.
+Europe seems to have sent its diplomatists to the court of the usurper in
+the capital of the Christian world, that they might close their eyes to
+all the schemes of Freemasonry, and the numberless vexations and
+spoliations, that they might play the _rôle_ of stage‐dancers in the
+sacrilegious comedy! Such base complacency justifies the expression of a
+Catholic writer: “Europe is in a state of mortal sin!”
+
+I am almost ashamed to be obliged to refer to the authority of a
+diplomatist who belongs neither to our nation nor our religion. I wish I
+could quote some official report of a minister from France! Might not M.
+Fournier have employed his time better than in figuring at banquets
+offered to a renegade, and in listening to heretical and atrocious
+speeches from the professors of the Romano‐Piedmontese university? I will
+console myself in transcribing a page from M. Dulaurier, the honorable
+member of the Institute, likewise an ocular witness, and a witness worthy
+of credit, even from a subscriber to the _Débats_:
+
+“These grievances and many others are aggravated by the excesses to which
+the press—the illustrated press, above all—has given itself up, and by the
+incessant war it wages against religion. Ignoble caricatures are daily
+exposed for sale in the sight of the police, and to their knowledge, in
+all the Kiosques and newspaper shops, and on the walls, or are hawked
+around by miserable creatures in rags. The _Don Pirloncino_, a humorous
+paper, obsequious to the government, diffuses three times a week its
+abominations on the most august mysteries of the Christian faith and the
+ministers who dispense them. The cross itself—the cross before which
+Christians of all communions bow with respect—not only Catholics, but
+schismatics, Greeks, and Orientals, and even Protestants—is not safe from
+its insults. My heart swells with horror when I recall one of these
+pictures—a caricature of the Crucifixion. In the place of the God‐Man is
+Dr. Lanza, Minister of the Interior. The words put in his mouth, and on
+the lips of his murderers, are untranslatable. Under his feet, at the
+lower extremity of the tree of the cross, is fastened transversely an
+instrument that I dare not designate otherwise than by saying it is made a
+burlesque use of at the end of the first act of _M. de Pourceaugnac_. Our
+French revolutionists, in their senseless fury, have broken the cross in
+pieces, but it never occurred to them to defile it in such a manner. So
+revolting an idea could only spring from imaginations the country of
+Aretino alone is capable of producing.
+
+“In the presence of these abominations echoed by the political press
+devoted to the advancement of free‐thinking, the Sovereign Pontiff, the
+clergy, and the Roman people who are fundamentally religious, can only
+veil their faces, resign themselves, and have recourse to prayer. And
+prayer rises unceasingly to heaven in expiation of so many horrors. It is
+the only consolation left to all these afflicted souls. There is a
+constant succession of triduos, announced by blank notices, headed _Invito
+sacro_, and signed by Mgr. Patrizi, the Cardinal Vicar. One of these
+notices, which I saw affixed to the columns at the entrance to his
+eminence’s palace near the Church of Sant’ Agostino, gives an idea, in the
+very first line, of the indignation that is fermenting in every Catholic
+breast: ‘The earth is full of the most horrible blasphemies. _La terra è
+piena della più orrende bestemmie._’ ”
+
+
+
+IV.
+
+
+We will not deny one benefit—and this time a real one!—that has sprung
+from the Italian Revolution: it has served to revive the fidelity and
+fervor of all true Italians. It can be rightly said of it, as M. Guizot
+says of the Reformation of the sixteenth century, It has awakened, even
+among its adversaries [we must correct this Protestant writer’s mistake—he
+should have said among its adversaries alone], religious faith and civil
+courage. Some natures that were formerly nonchalantes, timid, and
+delicate, are no longer satisfied with groaning over the evil, but take a
+bold stand against the inroads of impiety. Italy, somewhat inclined to the
+_far niente_, might of itself have yielded; sustained by the hand of a
+great Pope, she is roused to withstand the unloosed tempest. She no longer
+falters before the responsibility of a religious manifestation or an anti‐
+revolutionary vote. No longer afraid of the threats of the poniard, or of
+conciliating, through culpable prudence, her temporary masters, she at
+last ventures to show herself openly, as she really is—the cherished and
+faithful daughter of the Church of Rome. Roused by provocations and
+blasphemies, her filial piety towards the Papacy has become more lively
+and aggressive. She protests solemnly against the schemes of the
+adventurers who have trampled under foot their faith, honesty, morality,
+and honor. At the sight of these sublime outbursts of a spirit at once
+Catholic and Roman, the church is consoled, and observant Christendom
+begins to hope the reaction will be the more salutary from the extreme
+violence of the crisis.
+
+One of our co‐laborers has expressed all this much better than we can:
+
+
+    “If there is a country we have reason to conceive such consoling
+    hopes of, assuredly it is Italy, in spite of all the scandals and
+    all the infamy that now degrade it. All who have had a favorable
+    opportunity of observing the moral condition of the country agree
+    in declaring the greater part of the inhabitants faithful to their
+    belief. It is merely the froth and pestilential impurities that
+    are seething on the surface. Some day it will doubtless be with
+    this impure froth as with the stagnant waters for which Pius IX.
+    some years ago made an opening to the sea, giving fresh fecundity
+    to the old Italian soil. Purified by trials, as by a new baptism,
+    this nation, in many respects so highly gifted, will once more
+    have acquired a beneficial discipline of mind and character, the
+    advantages of a robust and manly training, the practice of
+    energetic individual action, and especially of great combined
+    efforts which she is beginning to give us the consoling spectacle
+    of in the recently formed Catholic associations.”(268)
+
+
+In France we think lightly, or rather we have an incorrect idea, of what
+our brethren in Italy are effecting. The very people among us who only
+talk of harmony and compromise reproach the Catholics of the Peninsula for
+being inactive and inefficient. They even make them partly responsible for
+the national misfortunes and the decay of moral principle beyond the Alps.
+We protest against such superficial judgments. We know Italy too well not
+to have a right to speak in favor of those who are so unjustly accused.
+Catholics in Italy decline public offices, _ne eletti, ne elettori_; and
+they do well, because the Sardinian government imposes an oath after the
+style of Henry VIII. and Elizabeth. Tell us if it is proper for a Catholic
+to take a seat in a parliament established at Rome between the Vatican
+where the Pope is imprisoned, and the Quirinal where the Piedmontese has
+established himself by the aid of a false key. Does the military career
+offer much attraction when he might be ordered to assassinate the
+pontifical zouaves, open a breach in the walls of Rome, bombard Ancona or
+even the quarter of the Vatican? He might without any great difficulty
+present himself at the municipal and provincial ballot‐boxes. The faithful
+Neapolitans, at the invitation of their archbishop, formed a majority
+there, and this is not an isolated case. But do you, who are the safety of
+France, set the example of hastening to the polls?—No; good Christians in
+Italy are far from being inert, nor do the clergy inculcate inertness.
+Abstaining is quite a different thing from inaction. Is the public aware
+that the Catholic press is one of the glories of the Peninsula? There are
+a hundred journals and reviews on the other side of the Alps consecrated
+to the service of the truth, and some of these publications are of
+unequalled merit. It is sufficient to name the _Civiltà Cattolica_, the
+_Unità Cattolica_, and the _Voce della Verità_. We confess our admiration
+for the courageous journalists who keep their own course in spite of
+arrests, law‐suits, fines, imprisonment, and threats of _coltellate_. And
+the tone of these papers, with some insignificant exceptions, is healthier
+than with us, the union of sentiment stronger, and their adhesion to the
+apostolic constitutions more sincere and open. Associations have spread
+from one end of the Peninsula to the other, and everywhere produce the
+most beneficial results. I need only mention the Society of Catholic Youth
+at Bologna, celebrated on account of the generous filial stand it has
+taken from the first in favor of Pius IX., and the Roman Society for the
+promotion of Catholic interests, which, by its branches and parish
+committees, exercises so prodigious an influence over the city of Rome as
+to excite the anxiety of those in authority.
+
+But let us once more listen to our unexceptionable witness, whom I think
+every one will feel indebted to us for quoting so much at length:
+_testimonium animæ naturaliter Christianæ_.
+
+
+    “The religious reaction is more and more decided, even in the
+    middle and lower classes, owing to the zealous associations that
+    have assumed the direction. This movement is worthy of study....
+    At Rome, and throughout Italy, this reaction has given rise to
+    societies composed for the most part of men still young, whose
+    object is to oppose all pernicious doctrines. These societies are
+    to be found at Rome, Florence, Venice, Milan, Naples, Turin,
+    Verona, Genoa, Lucca, Padua, Pisa, and Bologna.
+
+    “In January, 1871, the following statement was made in the
+    _Riforma_, the organ of Rattazzi: ‘The clerical party is being
+    more and more reinforced at Rome; the clerical press every day
+    acquires more strength, its organs increase in number and
+    boldness.’... The clerical press is really well sustained, and, in
+    spite of the persecutions and ill‐treatment of all kinds the
+    editors of these journals have to undergo, they do not cease their
+    energetic efforts.
+
+    “The administering of the oath has caused wholesale resignations
+    in all the _dicastères_ (at Rome). Many of these functionaries are
+    left without any means of subsistence.... As early as the year
+    1871, there were more than four thousand resignations.
+
+    “Thousands of Romans go to the Vatican to give their plebiscites,
+    and to the basilica of St. Peter to offer solemn prayers for
+    hastening THE DAY OF DELIVERANCE.”(269)
+
+
+The day of deliverance will arrive, and, in spite of the sneers about our
+wailing over disappointed hopes, it will come soon! But how will this
+deliverance be effected? United Italy has against it the upper and nether
+fires—the Catholic reaction that will never stoop to parley, and the
+exertions of the demagogues, which are continually increasing. At present
+the nether fires seem like the prelude of the Internationale.
+
+The intermediate party, which would like to consolidate _le fait
+accompli_, and which recruits adepts from the very opposers of the _mezzi
+morali_, is not sufficiently free from all alloy of party spirit to
+constitute a government capable of resistance and of exacting respect from
+the league of destruction.
+
+Unhappy but beloved Italy! Great and holy city of Rome! shall we have the
+sorrow of seeing the enemy _flamber_ your palaces, your museums, your
+churches?
+
+Not long since we were asked at Florence to read the prophecy of Joel, so
+applicable to the future of Italy: “Hear this, ... tell ye of this to your
+children, and let your children tell their children, and their children to
+another generation. That which the palmer worm hath left, the locust hath
+eaten; and that which the locust hath left, the bruchus hath eaten; and
+that which the bruchus hath left, the mildew hath destroyed. Awake, ye
+that are drunk, and weep, and mourn, all ye that take delight in drinking
+sweet wine; for it is cut off from your mouth.”—Joel. i. 2‐5.
+
+It is true too large a part of the Italian nation have grown giddy from
+the intoxicating draught of liberalism, and it is to be feared they may be
+condemned to drink the bitter cup of expiation to the dregs. The
+international “locusts” will devour that which the Sub‐Alpine “palmerworm”
+hath left. To‐day, the taxes of Sella; to‐morrow, the communism of
+Castellani: yesterday, a political revolution; to‐morrow, a radical
+revolution: yesterday and to‐day, the hypocrisy of the tribune; to‐morrow,
+the bloody scenes of the national Comitia. After the physicians and
+lawyers, after the members of the Consorteria and the friends of Rattazzi,
+the lowest grade of society—the “bruchus” and the “mildew”—like a
+barbarous horde, will overturn, and destroy, and deluge with petroleum.
+
+Italy, more than France or Spain, has abused the divine gift. She has “the
+light of Rome and the sun,” but has been ungrateful, proud, impious,
+shameless, and reckless. The whole land is now a mere haunt for banditti,
+traitors, and buffoons.
+
+Alas! it is so: but Pius IX. still prays for his beloved Italy! Following
+the example of its lawful ruler, the nation—at least, the better portion
+of the nation—have multiplied their holy prayers, which daily grow more
+frequent from the delay of the benefit and the example of France. It has a
+clearer sense of equity and justice; it already feels disposed to renew
+its former covenant with God, return to the path of order, and take up its
+national traditions of glory. It is awakening from its dreams of moral and
+social primacy. It will be satisfied with, and glory in, being the _patrie
+environnante_ of the Vicar of Christ. Would that France, once more
+regenerated, might speedily aid her in breaking loose from the tyranny of
+lodges, and shaking off the Prussian suzerainty!
+
+In 1860, the unhappy King of Sardinia said to M. de la Tour d’Auvergne,
+the French minister at Turin: “I do not wish you to leave me under false
+impressions. I feel sure you regard me as impious—as an infidel, as people
+persist in saying. You are wrong.—If I number kings among my ancestry,
+there are likewise saints. Here, look around.—Well, do you think that in
+yonder world all these sainted relatives of mine have any other occupation
+than to pray for me?”(270)
+
+Our Saviour prayed for those who knew not what they did! _Pater dimitte
+illis._ May all the saints in heaven and on earth pray for poor Italy! It
+has need of it.
+
+
+
+
+Sonnet.
+
+
+FROM THE ITALIAN OF GIOVANNI BATTISTA ZAPPI, UPON THE MOSES OF MICHAEL
+ANGELO IN THE CHURCH OF SAN PIETRO IN VINCOLI, AT ROME.
+
+
+    Whose form there, sculptured in such mass of stone,
+      Sits like a giant, carrying art so far
+    Beyond all works most beautiful and known?
+      On those quick lips life’s very accents are!
+    That man is Moses: on the awful front
+      The double ray,(271) the glory of his beard,
+    Reveal as much: ’tis Moses from the Mount
+      When much of Deity in his face appeared!
+    So looked he once when he the vasty fount
+      Of sounding waters with his one word stayed.
+    Such was his aspect when the sea obeyed
+      And swallowed Egypt. O ye tribes that bent
+      Before the calf! had you an image made
+      Like this to worship, less were to repent.
+
+
+
+
+Recollections Of Père Hermann.
+
+
+France has a strange, magnetic power of attracting to herself, and
+absorbing into her mould, all the great talent of the world. How many men
+there are in Paris, who, from the ends of the earth, come together to lose
+their nationality in her appreciative bosom, and to gain there instead a
+reflected light of popularity ensured by her endorsement alone! All
+countries have adopted citizens, it is true, some by social, some by
+artistic, some by political adoption, but no country has a larger share of
+adopted intellect than France.
+
+To all intents and purposes, the famous artist‐convert and artist‐monk,
+Père Hermann, was a Frenchman, though he was born a German Jew, in the
+free city of Hamburg. His biographers have told us all the striking
+incidents of his life; they have dwelt on his intoxicating success during
+youth, his mad extravagance of opinion, of expenditure, and of depravity,
+and, lastly, on his almost miraculous conversion and religious vocation.
+His death, which was a fitting crown to his life, and can be dignified by
+no lesser title than martyrdom, has endeared his memory still more to all
+those who knew him personally and had many secret reasons to admire his
+sanctity and feel grateful for his spiritual direction. His was a figure
+not easily forgotten, and perhaps a few touches of personal reminiscences
+will not be unacceptable to our readers, since all that links us to the
+saints, and brings the shadow of their sanctity nearer to our littleness,
+can hardly fail to be of interest.
+
+The first time we were brought in contact with him was in the summer of
+1862, when he came by special invitation to spend a few days with us in
+the country. The house itself had a monastic appearance and origin. It had
+been, so said tradition, a rural dependency, half farm, half infirmary, of
+a great Franciscan convent. It had been restored in 1849 and 1850, or
+thereabouts, and thanks to the good taste of the owner and the talent of
+the architects employed, had developed into a gem of Elizabethan Gothic
+and of domestic comfort. The little market‐town adjoining, once a centre
+of wealthy wool‐merchants and a great mediæval mart, contained several
+XIVth century buildings in a state of entire preservation, besides the
+later pile of the almshouses (XVIIth century), which, both as a building
+and an institution, was the pride of the surrounding country. Twelve old
+and destitute people, six men and six women, invariably widows or
+widowers, are generously supported on the fund left in perpetuity for this
+purpose by Joanna, Lady C——, wife of the great loyalist Baptist, Viscount
+C——, who burnt down his manor‐house (opposite the almshouses), rather than
+let it fall, with its treasures of plate and furniture, into the hands of
+Cromwell’s Roundheads.
+
+It was the yearly custom to feast these good people at the manor, the
+restored Franciscan dependency, and thither they were conveyed one day
+during the summer in question, in a large covered cart provided with seats
+like a French _char‐à‐banc_. Père Hermann had been in the house since the
+previous evening, and had stipulated with his cordial host and hostess
+that he should wear his Carmelite habit while within the limits of the
+private grounds. The sight of this alone had in it something homely; it
+was a rest to the eye to see the cowled figure pacing the terrace in the
+early morning, Breviary in hand, and to lapse into beautiful day‐dreams of
+what might have been had England kept true to the faith. The Carmelite was
+delighted at the prospect of seeing this annual feast given to the
+almshouse people, and no sooner had they all assembled round the ample
+board spread for them on a shady part of the terrace at the back of the
+house, than he made his way towards them, and, saluting them, showed how
+much he sympathized in their enjoyment. His English was, of course, very
+imperfect; indeed, he never grew to any proficiency in speaking that
+language, but his interest in the scene was none the less vividly
+expressed. The old people still wear the costume appointed by the
+foundress of the institution: for the men, gaiters and a long coat of
+rough black cloth, with a silver badge or medal; for the women, a narrow,
+old‐fashioned dress of the same material, and a similar badge. These
+badges, we believe, have never been renewed since the original endowment,
+and are handed down from one bedesman to his successor, and so on; the
+clothes are renewed every two years. If we mistake not, Père Hermann said
+grace for these poor people, who, though all Protestants, seemed not at
+all shocked at the “popish” apparition. Indeed, he gained the hearts of
+all who ever saw him, his gentleness and recollection inspiring a respect
+for his person which was little short of veneration. He seemed as though
+he were walking with angels and listening to heavenly converse even while
+charitably lending his time and his bodily presence to earth. When he had
+enjoyed, with the simplicity of a child, the sight of the innocent sports
+and merriment of the old people, he left us for the chapel, where he spent
+a great part of his time. We cannot help adverting to a little occurrence
+which took place at one of these almshouse feasts (we believe this very
+one), and which was certainly very pathetic. A monk might well take
+pleasure in such unaffected simplicity and gentleness among those whose
+ancestors had been so intimately linked of old with monastic patrons. One
+of the old women, speaking to one of her host’s daughters of her little
+grandchild, a baby girl who was just dead, said, in the broad dialect of
+the county of Gloucester (which, however, we dare not imitate in print):
+
+
+    “When the child was born, my daughter made me notice how long the
+    little thing’s fingers were, and said, ’Bless its little heart!
+    they are long enough for the baby to be a waiting‐maid on the
+    queen.’ And we agreed, laughing‐like, that a waiting‐maid the
+    child would surely be. But when it died, I said to my daughter,
+    said I, ‘Jane, we were mistaken about the baby’s fingers, you see.
+    I tell you the Lord gave her those beautiful long fingers, not to
+    attend on any great lady or queen on earth, but to play on the
+    golden harps in his kingdom of heaven.’ ”
+
+
+No truer nor more reverent poetry can be found anywhere than that simple
+utterance of an unlettered old woman who had not even that instinctive
+education which belongs to all those who learn the Catholic catechism.
+Such women and such poetry used to abound in the England of historic
+times, but error and materialism have but too well succeeded during the
+last three centuries in making the type rare and not easily discoverable,
+save in some forgotten nook of the rural districts.
+
+Père Hermann that evening allowed us to enjoy _our_ treat, after giving
+him his among the bedesmen, by playing a little on a cottage piano‐forte
+in what we called the oak drawing‐room. The servants were all collected in
+the next room (the library), and this seemed to give him particular
+satisfaction, as he was ever most fastidiously thoughtful of the comforts
+and pleasures of those in inferior station. His playing, though not
+comparable to his triumphant successes as an artist nearly twenty years
+before, was still admirable, and, above all, so _sympathetic_. He played,
+among other things, the “Prayer of Moses” with great solemnity and
+expression, and also some of his own _Cantiques_, which for blending
+passion with religious earnestness are something unique. He never played
+anywhere save in private, and then only to small audiences in an informal
+manner, and never touched the organ save by obedience in his own church,
+or for the Forty Hours’ Exposition, saying that he wished to have his art
+ever sanctified by a religious inspiration. The fascination and temptation
+of artistic triumphs must still have been appreciable stumbling‐blocks in
+his spiritual career. Therefore, to hear him play at all was no slight
+favor, and, while on this visit, he repeated this favor more than once. On
+the last day, he said Mass in the domestic chapel, and distributed the
+Scapular to the household, enrolling nearly every member in the
+Confraternity. He gave a short address on the origin and meaning of this
+devotion, the distinctive one of his Order, and which was further made
+interesting on this occasion by the fact of the host’s having in former
+years rescued a picture of S. Simon Stock in the act of receiving the
+first miraculous Scapular. The figures were life‐size, and the painting
+after the manner of the later Italian school; the canvas was found riddled
+with holes, having been used as a target by ignorant or fanatical
+possessors. The restored picture was hung in the drawing‐room, where it
+became a great source of interest to the zealous convert Carmelite, our
+dear guest. During this visit was laid the foundation of a spiritual
+friendship between him and the writer—a friendship which proved a great
+benefit and guidance in our after‐life.
+
+Meeting him again in London a few months later, we learnt a singular
+occurrence connected with his influence over souls. A young girl, not much
+over seventeen, and of a wilful and rebellious nature, who was under Père
+Hermann’s spiritual direction, happening to come up to town for a few
+days, experienced a strange phase of religious excitement. Careless as she
+was about all serious matters regarding the future state, she was
+nevertheless seized with a strong feeling of inadequacy in her religious
+efforts. She rose suddenly (it was a bright moonlight night), and went to
+the window, where the chastened beauty of the moon made even the
+monotonous landscape of London roofs and chimneys shine with a weird charm
+and take on suggestive shapes of startling vividness. Something—the grace
+of God, we ought no doubt reverently to say—seemed to take hold of her
+heart and shake her whole being. It was not the fear of punishment, the
+blank of unsated frivolity, that moved her; only one cry burst from her
+heart—“I have never loved God enough—I have never loved him at all.” If
+any but the saints ever feel perfect contrition, she did at that moment;
+for in that one sin she saw all others contained. Sobs came from the
+depths of her heart; she paced her room with naked feet, unmindful of
+discomfort, unheeding the autumn chill that is never long absent from
+London atmosphere, repeating again and again, like a dirge, those words,
+“I have never loved God enough—I have never loved him at all.” Then came a
+wondering feeling as to what this awakening meant; was it conversion, or
+the beginning of a vocation, or a sign that some special self‐devotedness
+would be required of her through life? She said to herself, “I will see
+Père Hermann, and tell him; I wonder if this will last!”
+
+Strange to say, the blessed excitement passed away, and the next morning,
+though she tried to revive it, it was impossible. Not a trace of emotion
+was left, although the mind recalled distinctly what an ecstasy of sorrow
+it had been, and how it had shaken the soul to its very centre. The young
+girl, however, saw Père Hermann, and told him of it, and in the parlor of
+the nuns of the Assumption, Kensington Square, he gave her the advice of a
+father and a saint. She is still living, and none can tell if that
+prophetic call may not yet have unexpected fulfilment through the prayers
+of one who is now a saint in heaven. This occurrence led to a very
+interesting and intimate correspondence, which we have examined ourselves,
+and of which we would gladly give some extracts were the letters not
+unfortunately beyond our reach at the present moment.
+
+Père Hermann was peculiarly fond of children, as indeed all saints are.
+Going one day to the Brompton Oratory, which the finest organ in London
+and a very perfect and numerous surpliced choir contribute to make one of
+the leading Catholic churches of the English capital, he was prevailed
+upon to play a voluntary after the Offertory. There sat a child in that
+choir, only a little chorus singer, but whose early dream it had ever been
+to become a musician and play upon an organ such as that majestic,
+imperial instrument which he listened to with vague awe every Sunday. He
+knew the story of the great artist who now sat at the organ in his
+Carmelite habit, and he drank in eagerly the grand strains he could but
+dimly understand, yet admired so intensively. Things which he never knew
+technically till many years after, yet seemed not unknown to his
+sympathetic ear, and, if he understood but little of the science that
+created those rolling chords and modulations, he could worship the beauty
+they expressed.
+
+A few days later, the little chorister, with six or seven companions from
+the Oratory School, was taken to the temporary Carmelite chapel in
+Kensington. It was all very poor and unpretending, but the spirit of
+recollection and peace made an Eden of the temporary refuge of these
+“knights of poverty,” and the children were very much impressed. Père
+Hermann came to the parlor to see them, and inquired severally after each
+one from the Oratorian Father in whose special charge they were. Our
+little chorister was dumb with awe and delight, expecting the holy
+Carmelite to notice him particularly; but when the Oratorian was
+questioned about this boy, he answered laughingly:
+
+“Oh! this fellow is going to be a tinker.”
+
+Père Hermann looked amused but incredulous, and the child grew hot and
+uncomfortable under the laughing gaze of his companions. He had long made
+up his mind as to what he would like to be, and the tinker suggestion was
+peculiarly hateful to him, because systematically used by his wise
+instructor to “break his pride.” But the gentle monk saw the boy’s
+discomfiture, and came skilfully to the rescue.
+
+“And will you really be a tinker, my little man?” he said, smiling.
+
+“No, father,” readily answered the little one. “A musician.”
+
+“You mean a tinker, Peter,” teasingly suggested the Oratorian, and the boy
+blushed with annoyance.
+
+“No, no,” said Père Hermann; “he will be a musician, as he says, and a
+good one. And now,” he continued, “it is nearly time for Benediction, and
+I am going to play the harmonium; would you like to stay for that?”
+
+The child was speechless with delight, and then the holy monk added:
+
+“You shall pull out the stops for me, Peter,” which was done, and, though
+it seemed the acme of happiness to Peter, it probably did not improve the
+music.
+
+After the service, the father called one of the lay brothers, and
+entrusted the children to his care, saying, with simple glee, and in the
+broken accent which all who knew him remember as a characteristic of his
+otherwise terse and appropriate language:
+
+“Now, brother, go and feed these little ones, and mind you give them
+plenty of good things.”
+
+The order was well obeyed, for the tradition of ample and eager
+hospitality has never been lost among religious orders, be they poor and
+struggling and even proscribed, or rich, powerful, and influential. Rich
+plum‐cake and good wine, with candies of every sort, were set before the
+little musician and his friends, but the child was even then thinking
+exultingly that Père Hermann had really said he should be an artist. In
+later years, when studying his art in Flanders, or earning his bread by it
+in England, this saying, that from such holy lips seemed a prophetic
+blessing and an earnest of success, often and often recurred to his mind,
+and encouraged him in the many dark days through which he had to pass.
+
+To all those who learned to love Père Hermann from personal intercourse
+with him, every remembrance of his words, however trifling, is now doubly
+treasured; his death, uniting as it did in itself the heroism of
+philanthropy, of patriotism, and of divine charity, has already
+practically canonized him in the eyes of his friends and spiritual
+children; and as we lay this slender wreath of praise among the more
+important tributes that literature, art, and religion have heaped around
+his memory, we are fain to exclaim, with the wise man of Israel, “Blessed
+are they that saw thee, and were honored with thy friendship.”(272)
+
+
+
+
+A Daughter Of S. Dominic.
+
+
+Concluded.
+
+It was a singular proof, not only of respect for her character, but of
+confidence in her judgment and discretion, on the part of the government,
+to have entrusted her with this right of mercy; knowing, as no one who
+knew anything about her could fail to know, her extraordinary tenderness
+of heart and compassion for suffering, especially in the case of the
+soldiers. It seemed a risk to invest her with a sort of judicial right to
+interfere in their behalf at the hands of law and justice; but they never
+had reason to regret it. She showed herself to the last worthy of the
+trust reposed in her. In the exercise of a privilege whose application was
+one of the keenest joys of her life, Amélie evinced a mind singularly well
+balanced, a judgment always clear, and a prudence ever on the alert to
+guide and control the impulses of her heart. But when her judgment
+approved the promptings of charity, no consideration could deter her from
+obeying them. She was by nature very timid, and of late years, owing to
+her having quite broken off intercourse with the world, properly speaking,
+this timidity had grown to a painful shyness. Whenever there was a
+necessity, however, she could brave it, and face a gay crowd or a doughty
+magnate with as much ease and cheerfulness as if the act demanded no
+effort or sacrifice of natural inclination. Such sacrifices were
+frequently required of her. Her name had a prestige that gained entrance
+through doors closed to persons of infinitely higher social position and
+importance; and when a community, or a hospital, or a family wanted a
+mediator in high quarters, they turned quite naturally to Amélie. On one
+occasion her courage and good‐nature were put to a rather severe test. It
+was in the case of a poor man who had been condemned to a long term of
+punishment for some fraudulent act. The circumstances of the case, the
+hitherto excellent character of the man, the fierce pressure of want under
+which the fraud was committed, and certain points which threw doubts on
+the extent to which he had been consciously guilty, along with the misery
+his condemnation must entail on a wife and young family, roused strong
+sympathy for him, and a general impulse seized the townspeople to appeal
+to the emperor for his pardon. But how to do it so as to make the appeal
+efficacious—who to entrust with the delicate mission? Every heart turned
+instinctively to Amélie. Her name rose to every tongue. The most
+influential of the petitioners went to her, and besought her to go to
+Paris and obtain an audience of the emperor, and implore of his clemency a
+free pardon for the convict. Her first impulse was to draw back in dismay
+at the mere contemplation of such a feat; but the petitioners brought out
+an array of arguments that it was not in Amélie’s nature to resist. She
+called up her courage, recommended the success of her mission to the
+prayers of the Marseillese and the protection of N. Dame de Garde, and
+started off to Paris. Thanks to her previous relations with the
+ministerial world, she was able to obtain, after some delay, an audience
+of the emperor. He received her with the most flattering marks of personal
+consideration, and granted her at once the pardon she sued for. Amélie
+telegraphed the good news to Marseilles on leaving his majesty’s presence,
+and was met on her arrival there the following day by her protégé and his
+family in tears of joy and gratitude.
+
+On another occasion, she was applied to for a rather large sum of money
+for a very pressing charity. She happened for the moment to have exhausted
+all her own and her friends’ resources, and knew not where to turn for the
+necessary sum. Some enterprising person proposed that she should go and
+beg it at the house of a banker who was giving a grand ball that night,
+and at which all the wealthy notabilities of the town were to be present.
+It was quite an unprecedented proceeding, and one that it required the
+humility and the courage of Amélie to undertake. She hesitated as usual at
+first, and as usual, seeing that the thing had to be done, and that no one
+else would do it, she consented. A preliminary step was to obtain the
+host’s permission. This he at first emphatically refused; and, seeing that
+it required nearly as much courage on his part to allow his guests to be
+waylaid as for Amélie to waylay them, it is not much to be wondered at.
+Courage, however, is catching. Amélie pleaded, and the banker gave way. He
+opened her list of contributions by a handsome sum, and consented that she
+should come the same evening and beg the rest at his house. It was a
+strange episode in the brilliant scene—the pale, dark‐eyed woman, in her
+homely black gown and neat little black net cap, standing at the door of
+the ball‐room; and stretching out her little bag to the votaries of
+pleasure as they passed her: “_Pour les pauvres, mesdames! Pour les
+pauvres, messieurs!_” The words must have struck in oddly enough through
+the clanging of the orchestra, and the rustling of silken robes, and the
+hum of laughter as the merrymakers swept round in the mazes of the dance.
+But the low, sweet voice of the beggar rose above the music and the din
+loud enough to reach many hearts that night; no one turned a deaf ear to
+the suppliant; the gentlemen gave money, or pledged themselves to give it;
+the women dropped rings and bracelets into the velvet bag that soon
+overflowed with its own riches; and when all the guests had arrived, and
+the festivity was at its height, Amélie, after admiring, as she was always
+ready to do, everything bright and beautiful that was not sinful—the
+brilliancy of the scene, the bright jewels and the pretty toilets, and the
+artistic decoration of the rooms—bade good‐night to it all and to her
+host, and went home with her heart full of love and gratitude towards her
+kindly fellow‐creatures.
+
+But we should never end if we were to narrate all the acts of charity and
+zeal that she was never tired of performing. The following, however, are
+too characteristic to be omitted:
+
+Late one evening, in her rounds through one of those dark centres of
+misery and crime that are to be found in all big cities, Amélie heard that
+a mountebank was dying in a neighboring cellar, all alone and in great
+pain. She made her way to the place at once. The dying man was lying on a
+heap of a straw, but he was not alone; a bear and a monkey shared his
+wretched abode; they had enabled the poor mountebank to live, and now they
+stood by while he was dying, watching his death‐throes in dumb sympathy.
+Nothing scared by the presence of his strange company, Amélie went up to
+the man and spoke to him gently of his soul. If he had ever heard of such
+a thing as an essential part of himself, he seemed to have altogether
+forgotten it, but he did not repulse her; he let her sit down beside him
+on the live, fetid straw and try to soothe him in his pains, and instruct
+him in the intervals, and prepare him to make his peace with God. By the
+time her part of the task was done, the night was far spent, but there was
+no time to lose. Amélie went straight to the priest’s house and woke him
+up. On the road, she told him what he would find on arriving.
+
+The two went in together. Amélie knelt down in the furthest corner of the
+place and prayed, and the bear and the monkey looked on while the sweet
+and wondrous mystery between Jesus and the good thief was renewed before
+their blank, unintelligent eyes. The mountebank made a general confession
+of his whole life, and received the last sacraments. Then the priest went
+home, and Amélie remained alone with the dying man, who expired a few
+hours later with his head resting on her shoulder.
+
+On another occasion, she heard that a woman whose life had been a public
+scandal in the town was at the point of death. She rose at once to go to
+her, and, in spite of the remonstrances of those present, she did go. The
+character of the woman and her associates, and the place where she lived,
+were indeed enough to deter a less daring spirit than Amélie, but whenever
+an objection was raised on prudential grounds to her visiting here or
+there, she would playfully point to her hump, and say:
+
+“With a protector like that, a woman may go anywhere.”
+
+The woman at first repulsed her fiercely and bade her begone, and refused
+to hear the name of God mentioned; but Amélie held her ground, pleading
+with all the eloquence at her command—and those who have heard it in
+moments when her soul was stirred by any great emotion declare that it was
+little less than sublime. She caressed the wretched creature, calling her
+by the most endearing names, till at last the obdurate heart was softened,
+she let Amélie stay and speak to her, and even asked her to come back the
+next day. “But,” she added, “you’ll find a _monsieur_ at the door, and
+he’s capable of beating you if you try to come in against his will.”
+
+But Amélie was not likely to be deterred by this. She came the following
+morning, and found the _monsieur_. He met her with insulting defiance, and
+dared her to enter, and, on her attempting to do so, he raised his hand
+and clenched it, with a savage oath threatening to strike her.
+
+“Hit here!” said Amélie, coolly turning her hump to him.
+
+Confounded by the words and the action, the man let his arm drop. Before
+he had recovered from his surprise, she had passed into the sick room, and
+he stood silently looking on and listening in wonder to what was going on
+before him. Amélie left the house unmolested, and returned a few hours
+later with a priest. The unhappy woman had been a Christian in her youth.
+She made a general confession in the midst of abundant tears, and died the
+next day in admirable sentiments of contrition and hope. The example was
+not lost on her companion; he made a sudden and generous renunciation of
+his sinful life, and Amélie had to rejoice over the return of two souls
+instead of one.
+
+As we have said before, her charity was essentially catholic, universal in
+every sense. She was ready to pity everybody’s troubles, and, with Amélie,
+to pity meant to help. The poor widow toiling broken‐hearted for her
+children in the courts and alleys of the big town; the father struggling
+with adversity in another sphere, trying to educate his sons and marry his
+daughters and pay the inexorable debt of decency that society exacts from
+a gentleman; the poor, lone girl battling with poverty, or perhaps
+writhing in agonized shame at having fallen in the battle; the rich mother
+weeping over the wanderings of a son; the poor orphan without bread or
+friends; the rich orphan pursued by designing relations, or in danger of
+falling into the hands of a worthless husband; high and low, rich and poor
+alike, all came to Amélie for sympathy and counsel, and no one was ever
+repulsed. Even those difficulties which are the result of culpable
+weakness, and which meet generally with small mercy, not to say
+indulgence, from pious people, found Amélie full of indulgent pity and a
+ready will to help. An officer on one occasion was drawn inadvertently
+into contracting a debt of honor which he had no means of paying. In his
+despair he thought of Amélie, and, half maddened with shame and remorse,
+he came to her to ask for pity and advice. The sum in question was two
+thousand francs. Amélie happened to have it at the moment, and, touched by
+the distress of the man of the world, she gave it to him at once. There
+was no spirit of criticism, no censoriousness in her piety, no fastidious
+condemnation of things innocent in themselves, however apt to be dangerous
+in their abuse. She loved to see young people happy and amused, and would
+listen with real interest and pleasure to an account of some fête where
+they had enjoyed themselves after the manner of their age. This simplicity
+and liberty of spirit enabled her often to take advantage of opportunities
+for doing good that never would occur to a person whose piety turned in a
+narrower groove; she was wont to exclaim regretfully against good people
+for being so overnice in the choice of opportunities, and thus cramping
+their own power and means of usefulness. With regard to the choice of
+tools in the same way, she would often deprecate the fastidiousness of
+certain pious people, urging that, when there was a work to do, an aim to
+accomplish, an obstacle to overcome, we should take up whatever tools
+Providence put in our way, not quarrelling with their shape or quality,
+but doing the best we can with them, profiting by a knave’s villany or a
+fool’s folly to further a just purpose, or a noble scheme, or a kind
+action, making, as far as honesty and truth can do it, evil accomplish the
+work of good.
+
+Faithfully bearing in mind that we may do no evil that good may come of
+it, Amélie had withal an ingenious gift of turning to good account the
+evil that was done by others; but she was slow to see the evil, and, when
+it was forced upon her, she had always more pity than censure for it. Her
+lamp was always lighted, and she was ever ready to help the foolish ones
+who go about this world of ours crying out to the wise ones: “Give me of
+your oil!” For it is not only when the Bridegroom comes that we need to
+have our lamp lighted, we want it all along the road, for others as well
+as for ourselves; we must even adapt it to the necessities of the road by
+changing the color of its light. This we can do by changing the oil. We
+must use the oil of faith when we want a strong, bright blaze to keep our
+feet straight amidst the ruts and snares and pools of muddy water that
+abound at every step; we must burn the oil of hope to frighten away
+despondency and cheer us when our hearts are heavy and our courage ebbing;
+but we must be chiefly prodigal of the rich and salutary oil of charity,
+for the flame it sends out is often more helpful to others than to
+ourselves. Sometimes, when our lamp is so low that it hardly shows the
+ground clear under our own feet, it is shedding—thanks to this marvellous
+oil of charity—a heavenly radiance on the path of those journeying behind
+us; its flame is luminous as a star and soft as moonlight; people on whom
+we turn its roseate glow rejoice in it as in sunshine: it softens them, it
+heals them, it takes the sting out of their worst wounds. The lamp fed
+with this incomparable oil is, moreover, often brightest when we ourselves
+are sick at heart, and when it costs us an effort to pour in the oil and
+set the wick in order. We do not realize it, but we can believe it by
+recalling the effect of kindness on our own souls in some well‐remembered
+hour, when it came from one in great sorrow, and who we knew was setting
+aside her own grief to enter into ours. Let us be brave, then, to hold up
+our lamp arm‐high to the pilgrims who are toiling foot‐sore and faint up
+the steep and rugged path of life along with us; its flame soars on to
+heaven, and shines more brightly before God than the fairest and loveliest
+of his stars.
+
+We mentioned already that Amélie, on her father’s death, made a vow of
+personal poverty. She observed this vow with the utmost rigor as far as
+was consistent with decorum and the absence of anything approaching to a
+display of holiness—a thing of which she was almost morbidly afraid. Her
+usual dress was a black woollen gown and a shawl of the same material; her
+appearance in the street was that of a respectable housekeeper, but no one
+who saw the outward decency of her attire suspected the sordid poverty
+that often lay beneath it. She limited herself to a pittance for her
+clothes, and she would submit to the most painful inconvenience rather
+than exceed it. Once she gave away her strong boots and a warm winter
+petticoat to a poor person at the beginning of the winter, and, though the
+cold set in suddenly with great severity, she bore it rather than replace
+either of them till her allowance fell due. How her health bore the amount
+of labor and austerities that she underwent it is difficult to explain
+without using the word miraculous.
+
+When, under the pious auspices of Monseigneur de Mazenod, the devotion of
+the Perpetual Adoration was established at Marseilles, Amélie at once had
+herself enrolled in the confraternity; unable to spare time from her
+multiform works of mercy during the day, she entrenched upon her nights,
+and used to spend hours in adoration before the Tabernacle. Fatigue and
+bodily suffering were no obstacle to the ardor of her soul; her spirit
+seemed to thrive in proportion as her body wasted. After a day of arduous
+labor, constantly on her feet, going and coming amongst the poor and the
+sick, breathing the foul air of hospital wards, and dingy cellars, and
+garrets, fasting as rigorously as any Carmelite, and grudging her body all
+but the bare necessaries of life, she was able to pass an entire night on
+her knees before the Blessed Sacrament, and be apparently none the worse
+for it. Such wonderful things are those who love God strengthened to do
+for him. Yet this woman was made of the same flesh and blood as ourselves;
+she had the same natural shrinkings and antipathies; her body was not made
+of different clay from ours, or supernaturally fashioned to defy the
+attacks of the devil and the repugnances of nature, to endure hunger, and
+pain, and fatigue without feeling them; she had the same temptations to
+fight against, the same corrupt inclinations to overcome, and the same
+weapons of defence against her enemies that we have—faith and prayer and
+the sacraments. What, then, is the difference between us? Only this, she
+was generous and brave, and we are mean and cowardly. We bargain and hang
+back, whereas she made no reserves, but strove to serve God with all her
+heart and all her strength, and he did the rest. He always does it for
+those who trust him and hearken unconditionally to that hard saying: “Take
+up thy cross and follow me!” For them he changes all bitter things into
+sweet, all weakness into strength; for the old Adam that they cast aside
+he clothes them with the new, thus rendering them invincible against their
+enemies, and repaying a hundred‐fold, even in this life, the miserable
+rags that we call sacrifices; he fills the hungry with good things, and in
+exchange for creatures and the perishable delights which they have
+renounced for his sake he gives them himself and a foretaste of the bliss
+of Paradise.
+
+During her solitary vigils before the altar, the thought of the
+ingratitude of men and their cruel neglect of our Saviour in his
+Eucharistic prison sank deeply into Amélie’s heart, and filled it with
+grief and an ardent desire to make some reparation to his outraged love.
+We have all read the wonderful chapter on Thanksgiving in that wonderful
+book, _All for Jesus_. Most of us have felt our hearts stirred to
+sorrowful indignation at the sad picture it reveals of our own unkindness
+to God, and the tender sensitiveness of the Sacred Heart to our
+ingratitude, and his meek acceptance of any crumb of thanksgiving that we
+deign once in a way to throw to him; we have felt our tepid pulses quicken
+to a momentary impulse of generosity and passionate desire to call after
+the nine ungrateful lepers, and constrain them to return and thank him; we
+watch them going their way unmindful, and we cast ourselves in spirit at
+the feet of Jesus, gazing after them in sad surprise, and we pour out our
+souls in apologies—so bold does the passing touch of love make the meanest
+of us in consolations to him for the unkindness of his creatures. Alas!
+with most of us it ends there. Next time he tries us we follow the nine
+selfish lepers, and leave him wondering and sorrowing again over our
+ingratitude. But with Amélie it was different. No inspiration of divine
+grace ever found her deaf to its voice; her love knew no such things as
+barren sighs and idle mystic sentimentalities. Her whole heart was stirred
+by that touching and powerful appeal of Father Faber’s, and she began to
+consider at once what she could do to respond to it. The idea occurred to
+her of instituting a community, to be called _Sœurs Réparatrices_, whose
+mission should be to give thanks and to console our divine Lord for the
+ingratitude of the world by perpetual adoration before the Tabernacle, and
+at the same time of getting up a regular service of thanksgiving among the
+faithful at large, to have short prayers appointed and recommended by the
+church to their constant use, for the sole and express purpose of thanking
+God for his countless mercies to us all, but more especially to those
+among us who never thank him on their own account. Both suggestions were
+warmly approved of by many pious souls to whom she mentioned them.
+
+In order, however, to carry them out effectively, it was deemed advisable
+that Amélie should go to Rome and obtain the authorization and blessing of
+the Holy Father. She had never been to Rome, but it was the desire of her
+life to go there; it drew her as the magnet draws the needle; Rome, to her
+filial Catholic heart, was the outer gate of heaven; it held the Father of
+Christendom, the Vicar of Christ; it held the tombs of the martyrs, its
+soil was saturated with their blood, all things within its walls were
+stamped with the seal of Christianity, and told of the wonders that it had
+wrought. Amélie, glad of the necessity which compelled her to fulfil her
+long‐cherished desire, set out for the Eternal City. She received the most
+affectionate welcome from the Holy Father, who had been long acquainted
+with her by name, and knew the apostolic manner of life she led. With
+regard to the community which she desired to found, and of which she was
+to become a member, but not superioress, His Holiness approved of it, but
+beyond this, of what passed between him and Amélie on the subject, no
+details have transpired. She said that the Holy Father encouraged her to
+carry out the design and gave her his blessing on it, and promised her his
+fatherly countenance and protection; but whether she submitted any rule to
+him at this period we have not been able to ascertain. As to the scheme of
+general thanksgiving that she proposed to inaugurate, he gave her abundant
+blessings on it, and indulgenced several prayers that she submitted to his
+inspection. Unfortunately, we have not been able to procure a copy of the
+little book which contained them all; this is the more to be regretted,
+that some of them were drawn up by Amélie herself and full of the spirit
+of her own tender piety; they were also preceded by a preface in which she
+appealed very lovingly to the children of Mary and the members of the
+Confraternity of the Sacred Heart, and begged their zealous co‐operation
+in the service of thanksgiving. We may mention, however, that she was in
+the habit, during the few remaining years of her life, of constantly
+recommending to her friends the use of the _Gloria Patri_ and the
+ejaculation _Deo Gratias!_ as having been particularly commended to her
+devotion by the Holy Father himself.
+
+An incident occurred to Amélie during her stay in Rome which she often
+narrated as a proof of the extreme need we have of a service of
+thanksgiving. She went one morning to an audience at the house of a
+cardinal, and while she was waiting for her turn she got into conversation
+with the Superior of the Redemptorist Fathers in France. Always on the
+watch to gain an ally to the cause, she told him the motive of her journey
+to Rome, and begged that he would use his influence in his own wide sphere
+to forward its success amongst souls.
+
+“Ah! madame!” exclaimed the Redemptorist, “it was a good thought to try
+and stir up men’s hearts to a spirit of thanksgiving, for there is nothing
+more wanted in the world. The story of the nine lepers is going on just
+the same these eighteen hundred years. I have been forty years a priest,
+and during that time I have been asked to say Masses for every sort of
+intention, _but only once_ have I been asked _to say a Mass of
+thanksgiving_!”
+
+Yes, truly the story of the nine lepers is being enacted now as in the old
+days when Jesus exclaimed sorrowfully, “Is there no one but this stranger
+found to return and give thanks?”
+
+But for all her clear‐sighted sensitiveness to the sins and shortcomings
+of her day, Amélie was full of hope in it; nothing annoyed her more than
+to see good people lapse into that lugubrious way so common to them of
+always crying anathema on their age and despairing of it; she used to say
+that she mistrusted the love and the logic of such; that those who love
+God and their fellow‐creatures for his sake never despair of them, but
+work for them, trusting in God’s help and in the ultimate triumph of good
+over evil; that despair was a sign of stupidity and cowardice. And was she
+not right? Surely every age has in its ugliness some counterbalancing
+beauty, some redeeming grace of comeliness, in the tattered raiment that
+hangs about its ulcers and its nakedness. God never leaves himself at any
+time without witnesses on the earth, and it is our fault, not his, if we
+do not see them. There are always bright spots in humanity, and those who
+cannot discern them should blame their own dull vision, not their fellow‐
+men. As poets who have the mystic eye see beauties of hue and color in the
+material world where common men see nothing but ruin and decay, so do the
+saints and the saint‐like, with the keen vision of faith and hope, alone
+penetrate the external darkness and decay of humanity, and discover in the
+midst of gloom and evil much that is promising and fair; they see
+elemental wines boiling up in the cauldron of travail and suffering, and
+they know that their bitterness is salutary and their fire invigorating
+unto life.
+
+Amélie returned to Marseilles well satisfied with her visit to the Holy
+City, and resumed her labors with renewed zest. But she had left her heart
+behind her, and from the day she left Rome she had but one desire, and
+that was to return and end her days there. Her health had of late grown so
+feeble that it was more and more a subject of wonder to those who
+witnessed it how she was able to continue her life of superhuman activity
+without flagging for a day. Amélie felt, however, that it could not last
+much longer now. She had frequently expressed in the midst of her busy,
+active life a longing for a life of contemplation, and in proportion as
+the end drew near, the yearning for an interval of silence and solitude
+increased. She was often heard to say to her fellow‐laborers:
+
+“It is time I left off looking after other people’s souls, and attended a
+little to my own; I feel the want of more prayer, of more time before the
+Blessed Sacrament; really, I must begin to get ready.”
+
+In the year 1869, she determined to carry this desire into execution, and
+begin to get ready, as she said, by withdrawing into a more solitary life.
+Her love for the church had taken a new impetus from her intercourse with
+the Holy Father; from the first the Denier de S. Pierre counted her among
+its most zealous promoters, but more so than ever now. An abundant
+collection which she made just at this time offered a plausible pretext to
+her for going to Rome, in order to lay it at the feet of Pius IX. So after
+putting her affairs in order, and bidding good‐by to only her immediate
+and intimate friends, so as to avoid anything like resistance or a
+demonstration on the part of the multitude of people to whom she knew her
+departure would be painful, Amélie took leave of the hospitable old home
+in the Rue Grignan, and set her face once more toward the Eternal City.
+
+But she had a last work to do for her native town on the road. The
+splendid military hospital of Marseilles, in which she had taken so deep
+and active an interest, was served by lay nurses, and both the soldiers
+and the civil authorities were anxious to have these replaced by Sisters
+of Charity. Easy as the thing seemed, up to the present all endeavors to
+effect the substitution had failed. It rested with the government to make
+the appointment and to grant a certain sum for the maintenance of the
+community when attached to the hospital, but, owing either to the case not
+being properly represented, or to the ill‐will of certain officials who
+put obstacles in the way, every application on the subject had been met by
+a refusal. The authorities, seeing all else fail them, turned to Amélie.
+They remembered her success on a former occasion, and requested her to
+take the affair in hand on arriving in Paris, and get from the minister
+the desired concession. The mission was repugnant to her, because she
+foresaw it would involve her having to come forward and put herself in the
+way of notabilities and magnates; but, as there seemed just a chance of
+being able to perform a last service to the soldiers, she accepted, and
+promised to do her best.
+
+She had a military friend in Paris, who, though a practical Catholic,
+occupied a distinguished position in the service, and was on good terms
+with its chiefs. This gentleman procured an audience for her of Marshal
+——, who was then in the ministry, and the person to whom she was directed
+to apply in the first instance.
+
+The marshal, who had been made aware of the subject of her visit, received
+her, according to his custom, in shirt‐sleeves and a towering rage, asked
+her a dozen questions, one on top of another, without giving her time to
+edge in a word of protest, wondered very much what she or anybody else
+meant by interfering with soldiers and their hospitals and the supreme
+wisdom of the government, of dictating to them what they ought to do; but
+that was the way with women; women were always meddling with what didn’t
+concern them; they were the most difficult subjects to govern; for
+himself, he would rather have the management of ten armies than a village
+full of women, etc. In fact, his excellency bullied his visitor after the
+usual manner of his peculiar courtesy, and Amélie was obliged to take her
+leave after a very brief audience, during which she had been rated like a
+naughty schoolboy and not allowed to say three sentences in self‐defence.
+Clearly there was not much to be done in that quarter. Her friend then
+proposed getting her without further preamble an audience of the emperor.
+Amélie preserved a grateful recollection of the reception she had met with
+from his majesty some years before, and the idea of entering his presence
+again inspired her with less terror than the prospect of a second edition
+of the marshal; she thought, moreover, that there might be a speedier and
+better chance of success by applying directly to the emperor than by
+beating about the bush with his ministers, admitting even that they were
+not all of the same type as the one she had tried. Amélie accepted the
+offer, therefore, and, after a shorter delay than any one but a cabinet
+minister might have been obliged to undergo, she received a letter from
+the Lord Chamberlain notifying the day and hour when she was to present
+herself at the Tuileries.
+
+She was shown into the antechamber, where generals, dignitaries of the
+state, bishops, and other important personages were waiting their turn to
+enter the imperial presence. His majesty was giving audience to an
+ambassador when Amélie arrived, and there was rather a long delay before
+the door opened. When it did, it was not his chamberlain, but the emperor
+himself who appeared on the threshold; he stood for a moment, and looked
+deliberately round the room, where he recognized many noble and
+influential personages, and then, perceiving an elderly lady in a rusty
+black gown sitting at the furthest end of it, he walked straight up to
+her, and held out both his hands. “Mademoiselle Lautard,” said his
+majesty, “I thank you for the honor you do me by this visit; I am sure I
+have only to mention your name for every one present to admit your right
+to pass before them.”
+
+There was a general murmur of assent, though it must have puzzled most if
+not all of the spectators of this strange scene who this poverty‐stricken,
+humpbacked elderly lady was to be thus greeted by Napoleon III., and
+handed over their heads to the presence‐chamber. As soon as they were
+alone, the emperor drew a chair close to his own, and, inviting his
+visitor to sit down, he said:
+
+“Now, tell me if, over and above the pleasure of seeing you, I am to have
+that of doing something that can give you pleasure?”
+
+Amélie, in relating the interview to her friend, said that, when she saw
+his majesty bearing down upon her before the assembled multitude in the
+antechamber, she felt ready to sink into the ground, and wished herself at
+Hongkong; but the moment he spoke her terrors vanished, and she had not
+been two minutes with him before she felt perfectly at her ease, and
+talked on as fearlessly as if he had been an old friend. She told him her
+wishes about the hospital, and he promised unconditionally that they
+should be carried out. For certain formalities, however, it was necessary
+to refer her to his minister.
+
+“You will call on Marshal ——,” said his majesty; “he is the person to do
+it.”
+
+“Sire!” exclaimed Amélie, throwing up her hands in dismay, “anything but
+that; your majesty must really manage it without sending me again to
+Marshal ——.”
+
+“Ah! you have been to him already,” said the emperor, with a quiet smile;
+“well, try him again, and this time I warrant you a better reception; he
+is _bon enfant au fond_, but you must not let him think that you’re afraid
+of him.”
+
+Thus warned and encouraged, Amélie promised to take her courage in both
+hands, as the emperor said, and beard the lion once more in his den.
+Before letting her go, his majesty questioned her minutely about the
+condition of the hospitals and other charitable institutions at
+Marseilles, concerning all of which he appeared to be singularly well
+informed.
+
+The next day, she presented herself at the _ministère_, and was ushered
+into the marshal’s presence. He had his coat on this time; whether the
+fact was due to accident, or to a desire to propitiate the lady who had
+complained of him to his master, history does not say; but, as soon as
+Amélie entered, his excellency accosted her with: “Well, so you were
+affronted with me, it seems! What did you say about me to the emperor?”
+
+“Excellency,” replied Amélie, “I told his majesty that I had expected to
+find a minister of France, but I found instead a man in a passion.”
+
+The marshal grunted a laugh, and told her to sit down and explain her
+business. She did so, this time with perfect satisfaction to both parties,
+and they parted the best friends in the world.
+
+This closed her career of usefulness in France; she waited to make the
+needful arrangements for the departure of the nuns, their reception at
+Marseilles, etc., and then she started for Rome.
+
+On setting out for the Eternal City, Amélie seemed to have had the
+presentiment that she had entered on the last stage of her pilgrimage. The
+sense of her approaching end, which betrayed itself, perhaps
+unconsciously, in conversing both by word and letter with her most
+intimate friends, was accompanied by an increase of fervor and a serenity
+which struck every one who approached her as something almost divine. The
+project which she had formed of founding and entering a community of
+_Sœurs Réparatrices_ was still unrealized, but she hoped now to carry it
+into effect, to make the remainder of her life a perpetual _Deo Gratias_!
+and to die in the outward livery of the religious state whose spirit her
+whole life had so faithfully embodied. But God had other designs upon her.
+Meantime, in the twilight interval of comparative leisure that she had
+looked forward to so long and enjoyed so thankfully, Amélie did not give
+up all active work; she prayed more, and lived in greater retirement; but
+she still gave a fair proportion of each day to her accustomed service of
+the poor and the sick.
+
+These were troubled days that she had fallen upon in Rome. The
+sacrilegious hand of parricides had robbed the church of her possessions,
+and reduced Pius IX. to the nominal sovereignty of the capital of
+Christendom, as a prelude to making it, what it is now, his prison.
+Catholic hearts were sad; but, amongst all his children, the Vicar of
+Christ had no more faithfully sorrowing heart than Amélie’s, none who
+entered more keenly into his griefs or responded with more filial alacrity
+to their claim on her sympathy and participation and righteous anger. She
+beheld the persecutions of God’s church, the hatred and malice of its
+enemies, the cowardice of those who called themselves its friends, but
+stood by passive and cold while the crime perpetrated outside Jerusalem
+eighteen hundred years ago was renewed before their eyes on the body of
+that church which Christ had died to found; she saw pride and materialism
+everywhere at work striving to undo his work, to prevent the coming of his
+kingdom, and to establish the kingdom of sin upon earth; and the sight of
+all this filled her heart with grief, but not with despair. It was indeed
+an hour of unexampled grief for Christendom, but it was also an hour for
+activity, and zeal, and renewed courage; it was a time for each individual
+member to prove himself, for all to put their hand to the plough that was
+furrowing the bosom of the church, and to water the travailed soil with
+fertilizing tears, and, if need be, blood, thus preparing it for the
+future harvest that was inevitable. For even as God’s enemies of old had
+stood at the foot of Calvary, and shook their heads at the bleeding victim
+of their own hate and envy, and bade him come down from the cross, knowing
+not the dawn of the Resurrection was nigh, when the victim would arise
+triumphant over death, and compel his murderers to acknowledge that this
+man must indeed have been the Son of God—so now the enemies of his church
+had their hour of triumph, and clapped their hands for joy to see the
+church that he had built upon the Rock, and promised that the gates of
+hell should not prevail against, tottering and crumbling under the blows
+of progress and an enlightened civilization and the force of arms. But
+their triumph was but the hour of the powers of darkness that was not to
+endure, but would perish at the appointed time before the manifestation of
+the Sun of Justice.
+
+Still, even faithful hearts quailed before the storm, and were scandalized
+at the way in which God seemed to forsake his own, not recognizing in this
+mysterious abandonment another trait of resemblance between his Vicar and
+the divine Model, who cried out in his dereliction, “Why hast thou
+forsaken me?”
+
+Amélie was forced to hear and see much that was unutterably painful to
+hear as a true child of the church; many who called themselves such, and
+who were glad enough to draw upon her magnificent sacramental treasury,
+and to praise and serve her in the days of peace, were not stout‐hearted
+enough to share her tribulations or even to understand them, and stood
+aloof when they ought to have acted, or remained dumb when they ought to
+have spoken, or spoke what they had better have left unsaid. But alongside
+of this indifference or treachery she witnessed a great deal that was
+beautiful and consoling. Pilgrims were flocking from the four quarters of
+the globe to lay at the feet of Pius IX. the tribute of their fidelity and
+abundant offerings, often collected in perilous journeys at great risk and
+sacrifice. Then there were the Zouaves, _nos chers Zouaves_, as Amélie
+always called them, presenting a noble example to us all by their heroic
+devotion to the cause of God, their spirit of immolation, their chivalrous
+valor in action, and the marvellous purity of their lives. These modern
+crusaders replaced the suffering soldiers of Marseilles in Amélie’s
+solicitude during her stay in Rome. She tended them and worked for them
+indefatigably, and dwelt continually in letters home on the consolation
+the spectacle of their childlike piety afforded her.
+
+Early in December she wrote to a friend at Marseilles: “Our dear Zouaves
+have made their entry into Rome. They passed under my windows. They are
+the flower of the French nation. They are full of that energy which
+nothing but the spirit of the faith gives. It is beautiful to see them
+receive Holy Communion before arming themselves. This morning eighteen
+hundred of them, bent on shedding their blood in the cause of God, marched
+proudly into the Eternal City with the band playing and colors flying;
+they reminded one of the Theban legion. I witnessed a touching sight. The
+Holy Father met them on their way, and they fell on their knees like one
+man to get his blessing. He blessed them with visible emotion. How could a
+father not be moved at seeing the devotion of his children? The Flemish
+and the Bretons are particularly conspicuous; ancient traditions have been
+preserved amongst them, and have come down from the fathers to the sons.
+This evening they accompanied His Holiness to the Vatican, where they
+cheered him with the enthusiasm of Christian hearts. It was impossible to
+withhold one’s tears as one beheld the venerable Pontiff rest his loving
+and gentle gaze on all this youth, so devoted to him, and burning to prove
+their fidelity. In these days, the position of the Zouaves amongst
+Christian soldiers is a noble one. Oh! if the idle youth of France knew
+what a happiness it is to serve God, how many families would be happy and
+blest even in this world as well as the next! I see here numbers of young
+men who had strayed away from the right path for a time, but who had the
+grace to return to it, and are now as happy as children, pure as angels,
+attached to the church and the Vicar of Christ. Their sole ambition is
+martyrdom; their joy is to look forward to it. Oh! I see here admirable
+things. Adieu, dear friend. Let us pray always.”
+
+Sinister reports and wild alarms, sometimes the result of malice,
+sometimes of fear, were constantly starting up in Rome, terrifying the
+weak, and stimulating the brave to greater vigilance and courage, but
+keeping every one on the _qui vive_ from day to day. In the midst of the
+general excitement of expectation or terror, the serene confidence of Pius
+IX. remained unshaken, like the rock on which it rested. Amélie, who was
+admitted frequently to the honor and happiness of speaking to the Holy
+Father, was lost in wonder at it—at the unearthly peace that was visible
+in his countenance and pervaded every word of his conversation. Shortly
+before the date of the foregoing letter, she wrote to the same friend:
+
+“The most contradictory stories are current here, but the peace, the calm,
+the _abandon_ of the Holy Father are indescribable, and go further to
+inspire confidence than the most sinister conjectures to create terrors.
+The daughters of Jerusalem followed our Redeemer to Calvary: a sort of
+filial sentiment holds me in Rome. I cannot go away.... Let us pray! The
+power of prayer obtains all things.”
+
+Let us pray! This had been the lifelong burthen of her song, and the cry
+grew louder and more intense as she drew near the close. It was not the
+shrill cry of those who say, Lord! Lord! but the irrepressible voice of a
+soul whom the spirit of prayer possessed in the fulness of its availing
+power, and side by side with whose growth grew the spirit of sacrifice,
+the thirst for self‐immolation. She clung firmly to hope as the anchor of
+courage and resignation in the present trials of the church, but the sense
+of the outrages that God’s glory was enduring in the person of His Vicar
+increased in her soul to positive anguish. The consideration of her own
+nothingness and utter inability to lighten the cross that was pressing on
+the saintly Pontiff, pursued her day and night with the mysterious pain
+that is born of the love of God.
+
+What a wonderful thing the soul of a saint or even a saintlike human being
+must be! How one longs to go within the veil and get a glimpse of the life
+that is lived there! It is so strange to us to see a creature take God’s
+cause to heart, and pine and suffer about it as we do about our personal
+cares and sorrows. It sets us wondering what sort of inner life theirs can
+be, and through what process of grace and correspondence and mysterious
+training they have grown to that state of mind when the things of God and
+his eternity are poignant realities, and the things of earth hollow
+phantoms that have lost the power to charm, or terrify, or touch. We see
+them hungering after justice as we hunger after bread, pining actually for
+the accomplishment of God’s will as eagerly as we pine for the success of
+our puny enterprises and the triumph of our small ambitions; and we are
+astonished, as it behoves our stupidity and hardness of heart to be, at
+the incomprehensible character of their faith and love. When life presses
+heavily upon us, and the cross is bruising our shoulders, and all things
+are dark and dreary, we catch ourselves occasionally sighing for death.
+This is about our nearest approach to that homesick yearning expressed in
+the words of the apostle: “I long to die, to be dissolved, and to be with
+Christ!” What an altogether different feeling it must be with these
+saintlike souls when they long for death! They are not impatient of life,
+or, like tired travellers, angry with the dust and sun of the road, and
+disgusted with the uncomfortable wayside inn where they put up; they are
+impatient of heaven and of the vision that makes the bliss and the glory
+of heaven. Too jealous of their Creator’s rights to rob him even in desire
+of one year, or day, or hour of their poor service while he sees good to
+employ them, they are willing to go on toiling through eternity if he
+wishes it; but they are homesick, they long to see him, they yearn after
+his possession with a sacred unrest that we who have but little kinship
+with their spirit cannot understand. They are saddened by their exile and
+by the sight of sin and of the small harvest their Lord’s glory reaps
+amidst the great harvest of iniquity that overruns the world. They watch
+the sea of humanity rolling its waves along time, moaning with conscious
+agonies of sin, storm‐lashed and terrible, breaking in billows of impotent
+rage against the Rock of redemption, and dashing headlong past it into the
+gulf, where it is sucked down into everlasting darkness; and seeing these
+things as God sees them, and as they affect his interests, they are filled
+with sorrow, and call out for the end, that this mighty torrent may be
+stayed. They call out to the stars to rise on the far‐off heights, that
+loom dim and gloomy through the swirl and vapor of the storm. They would
+fain hush the winds and the waves, and hasten the advent of the Judge
+before whose splendor the dark horizon will vanish, and whose glory will
+outshine the sunrise and fill the universe with joy. It is not their own
+selfish deliverance or the world’s annihilation that they long for, but
+its consummation in man’s happiness and the Creator’s glory.
+
+Amélie longed with all the strength of her generous heart to do something
+for her Lord, to help ever so little towards hastening the coming of his
+kingdom before he called her away. One morning, after communion, as she
+was praying very fervently for the Holy Father, whose health just then was
+a source of great anxiety amongst the faithful, this longing came upon her
+with an intensity that she had never felt before; she was seized with a
+sudden impulse to make the sacrifice of her life in exchange for his, and
+to offer herself as a victim that he might be spared yet awhile to guide
+and sustain the church through the trials and temptations that were
+afflicting her. The impulse was so vehement that it was with difficulty
+she restrained herself from obeying it on the spot; the desire, however,
+to obtain the blessing of obedience in her sacrifice enabled her to do so.
+She quietly continued her thanksgiving, and, on leaving the church, went
+straight to the Vatican. There, kneeling at the feet of the suffering
+Vicar of Christ, she told him of the desire that had come to her, and
+begged him to bless it, and to permit her to offer herself up next day at
+Holy Communion as a victim in his place if it should please God to accept
+her.
+
+Pius IX. was silent for some moments, while Amélie, with uplifted face and
+clasped hands, awaited his reply. Then, as if obeying a voice that had
+spoken to him in the silence, he laid his hand upon her head, and said,
+with great solemnity: “Go, my daughter, and do as the Spirit of God has
+prompted you.” He blessed her with emotion, and Amélie left his presence
+filled with gladness and renewed fervor. She spent the greater part of the
+day in prayer. In the afternoon she wrote two letters: one of them, of too
+private a character to be given at length, contained the foregoing account
+of the morning’s occurrences; the other we transcribe. It is a revelation
+beyond all comment of the state of her soul as it stood on what she
+believed to be the threshold of eternity.
+
+
+    SATURDAY, Dec. 15—ROME.
+
+    “We still continue in the greatest calm. _Nos chers Zouaves_ have
+    the courage of lions; they draw their strength from the blood of
+    the martyrs. Generally speaking, they are pious as angels. You see
+    them constantly during their free hours slipping off their
+    knapsack and their arms to go and kneel at the feet of the priest
+    in the confessional, or to pray at the shrine of the queen of
+    martyrs; they are truly the children of the church, and—”
+
+
+Here the letter broke off.
+
+The next morning was Sunday. Amélie repaired, as usual, to early Mass at
+S. Peter’s. She received Holy Communion, and then, with the Eucharistic
+Presence warm upon her heart, she offered up her life to him who had been
+its first and last and only love. The words were hardly cold upon her
+lips, when she was seized with sudden and violent pain, and fell with a
+cry to the ground. She was surrounded immediately, and carried home.
+Priests and religious of both sexes who were in S. Peter’s at the moment,
+and knew her, filled with alarm and distress, accompanied her to the
+Strada Ripresa dei Barberi. Medical aid was sent for, but it was soon
+evident that her illness was beyond the reach of human skill. All that day
+and the next she continued in agonizing pain, unable to speak or to thank
+those about her except by a smile or a pressure of the hand. Early on the
+following morning, Wednesday, she grew calmer, the pain subsided, and
+Amélie asked for the last sacraments. She received them with sentiments of
+ecstatic devotion, and for some time remained absorbed in prayer. Her
+thanksgiving terminated, she took leave tenderly of those friends who
+surrounded her, and then begged they would begin the prayers for the
+dying; they did so, and she joined in the responses with a fervor that
+went to every heart. When they came to those grand and solemn words with
+which the church speeds her children into the presence of their merciful
+Judge, “Depart, Christian soul, in the name of the Father who created
+thee, in the name of the Son who redeemed thee, in the name of the Holy
+Ghost who sanctified thee,” Amélie bowed her head and died.
+
+The news was conveyed at once to the Vatican. When Pius IX. heard it, he
+evinced no sudden surprise, but raised his eyes to heaven, and murmured
+with a smile:
+
+“_Si tosto accetato!_”(273)
+
+The announcement of Amélie’s death was received with universal expressions
+of dismay and sorrow. It was not only the poor, who had been her chief and
+most intimate associates in Rome, that mourned her, all classes of society
+joined in a chorus of heartfelt regret, and proved how well they had
+appreciated the gentle French sister who had dwelt humbly amongst them
+doing good. The house where she lay in her beautiful and heroic death‐
+sleep was besieged by people from every part of the city; all were anxious
+to gaze once more upon her face, to touch her hands with crosses and
+rosaries, to kneel in prayer beside the victim who had offered herself for
+the sins of the people, and been accepted by him who delighteth not in
+burnt‐offerings, but in the sacrifice of a contrite heart. To her truly it
+had been answered: “O woman, great is thy faith: be it done unto thee
+according to thy word!”
+
+The miraculous circumstances of her death were soon proclaimed. In the
+minds of those who had known her well they excited no surprise. From all
+they called out sentiments of admiration and praise. Tears flowed
+uninterruptedly round the austere court where the virgin tabernacle rested
+from its labors, but they were tears sweeter than the smiles and laughter
+of earth; prayers for the dead were suspended by common impulse, and the
+spectators, exchanging the _De Profundis_ for the _Te Deum_ and the
+_Magnificat_, broke out into canticles of triumph and hymns of rejoicing.
+
+The Zouaves, her beloved Zouaves, hurried in consternation to the house as
+soon is the news reached them that the gentle, devoted friend of the
+soldier was no more; and it was a beautiful and stirring sight to see them
+sobbing like children beside her, touching her hands with their sword‐
+hilts and their rosaries, and swelling in broken but enthusiastic voices
+the hymns of thanksgiving.
+
+The Holy Father, wishing to pay his tribute to the general testimony of
+love and admiration, commanded that the child of S. Dominic should be
+carried to her grave with a pomp and splendor befitting the holiness of
+her life and the heroic character of her death. The remains were conveyed
+accordingly first to the Basilica of the Apostles in solemn state,
+escorted by a vast concourse of people, priests and religious, and exposed
+there throughout the morning to public veneration; a requiem Mass and the
+office of the dead were chanted; in the afternoon, the body, followed by
+all that Rome held of greatest and best, was transported to the Church of
+Santa Maria in Ara Cœli. The Zouaves claimed the privilege of bearing the
+precious remains upon their shoulders, and it was granted them. By special
+permission of His Holiness, Amélie was interred in Santa Maria; but her
+death was no sooner known at Marseilles than the townspeople spontaneously
+demanded that the body should be returned to them. But Pius IX. replied
+that Rome had now a prior claim to its guardianship; Amélie had made the
+sacrifice of her life at Rome and for Rome; it was fitting that the ashes
+should remain where the holocaust had been offered and consumed.
+Marseilles yielded to the decision of the Sovereign Pontiff, and the
+daughter of S. Dominic was left to sleep on under the august dome of the
+Ara Cœli, there to await the angel of the resurrection, whose trumpet
+shall awake the dead and bid them come forth and clothe themselves with
+immortality.
+
+                  ‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐‐
+
+The following is the authentic record of this miraculous death, as copied
+from the original, legalized by Cardinal Patrizi, Vicar of His Holiness:
+
+“Je soussigné, curé de la trèssainte basilique constantinienne des douze
+saints apôtres de Rome, certifie que dans le registre XII. des défunts,
+lettre N, page 283, se trouve l’acte dont l’extrait mot à mot suit:
+
+“Le vingt‐deux décembre mil‐huit cent soixante six.—Mademoiselle Claire‐
+Françoise‐Amélie Lautard de Marseille, fille de M. Jean Baptiste Lautard,
+vierge très pieuse, pendant quelle offrait Dimanche dernier à Dieu sa
+propre vie pour le salut du souverain Pontife, Pie IX. de Rome et de la
+sainte église, a été saisie sur le champ par la maladie, et ayant reçu
+très pieusement les sacraments de l’église, jouissant de la plenitude de
+ses facultés, en prière, entourée de plusieurs prêtres et vierges, a rendu
+son âme a Jésus Christ son époux, avec la plus grande sérénité, le
+Mercredi dix‐neuf à neuf heures et demie du matin dans la maison Rue
+Ripresa dei Barberi 175, l’âge de cinquante neuf ans; son corps, le
+lendemain vingt, après le completuum a été conduit accompagné par un grand
+nombre de religieuse en cette basilique et y a été exposé pendant la
+matinée suivant l’usage des nobles, l’office et la Messe ont été dit, dans
+l’après‐midi le corps a été transporté à l’église de Sainte Marie in Ara‐
+Cœli, òu il a été enseveli dans le tombeau des Sœurs de St. Joseph de
+l’Apparition.
+
+“Donné à Rome,” etc.(274)
+
+
+
+
+The International Congress Of Prehistoric Anthropology And Archæology.
+
+
+From La Revue Generale De Bruxelles
+
+Concluded.
+
+The sessions of August 25 began with fresh discussions concerning the
+troglodytes of Menton and the so‐called tertiary skull from California
+already spoken of. M. Desor entered into extensive details concerning the
+hatchets of nephrite and jade found in the Alps, and apparently of
+Oriental origin. “I do not believe,” said he, as he ended, “that these
+hatchets were utensils, but merely objects of display, like the
+dolmens(!)—precious memorials and relics of the first ages of humanity.”
+M. de Quatrefages thought these hatchets a proof of ancient commercial
+relations with the East. A great deal was said in this discussion of the
+use of stone knives by the Egyptians in embalming the dead, and among the
+Jews for circumcising. Only one thing was forgotten—neither the Egyptians
+nor the Jews ever attached any religious importance to the use of stone,
+and they likewise made use of bronze and iron knives in these operations.
+The instrument of circumcision at the present day is a steel blade.(275)
+M. Leemans, director of the museum at Leyden, thought these hatchets came
+from Java. He reminded us that there has always been constant intercourse
+between Switzerland and that island, and that the majority of the soldiers
+of the East India Company were traditionally recruited in Switzerland. The
+Abbé Delaunay refuted M. Desor’s opinion by merely referring to the
+collection at Pont‐Levoy, where there are fourteen hatchets of jade found
+in that vicinity. It was thought desirable to ascertain the as yet unknown
+source of jade. They now returned to the _hiatus_ mentioned by M. de
+Mortillet at the previous session, in order to oppose it by bringing
+forward an intermediary race, for whom M. Broca was the sponsor, though
+without flattering it much. He engaged in a long, subtile argument on the
+way tertiary flints were introduced into the valleys and caverns. They
+were not agreed on this question, which is one we can only regard with
+speculative interest.
+
+The excursions to the _ateliers_ of Spiennes and Mesvin were not as
+pleasant as the one to the Lesse. For that, the country around Mons should
+be as charming as that of the Meuse—and the people likewise. There is a
+very complete work by M. Dupont concerning these excavations, in which
+have been found millions of rough flints, to which he does not hesitate to
+assign a quaternary origin of the mammoth period. When one has a taste of
+the mammoth, he cannot get too much of it. I know of sceptics and
+controversialists who through speculations of another kind are plunged
+into foolish incredulity. Here is an instance: from time immemorial our
+forefathers made use of flints for striking fire, and many of us can still
+remember the custom, which may not have wholly disappeared. For centuries,
+households had to be supplied with flints for the tinder‐box, and in
+abundance, for this stone is soon worn out by iron; it becomes furred and
+smooth, and is soon unfit for use. If we compare the considerable traffic
+in flints that must have been carried on with the enormous consumption
+that supports the fabrication of chemical matches, we can easily see that
+the sites of the workshops where flints for striking fire were cut must
+have been heaped with millions of rough ones—nodules, chips, and _débris_
+of all kinds; that excavations must have been made by pits, which
+necessarily extended to considerable depth, and crossed very old geologic
+strata, for silex is found imbedded in chalk at a depth of thirty or forty
+metres in some places; that to argue from the stratification of
+surrounding formations, in order to decide on the synchronism of the
+excavations, would expose us to conclude _post hoc, ergo propter hoc_. And
+I have not mentioned all the common uses made of flints in a household.
+For many years they were used for firearms, and silex is still used in
+ceramic manufactures, the origin of which is lost in the darkness of ages.
+A great many of the flints that appear cut are only fragments that may
+have been owing to spontaneous fracture. Now, whence came all the flints
+used for striking fire during the historic periods that go back from our
+time to the middle ages and to antiquity? Has it been proved that these
+remains, so‐called prehistoric, do not come within the domain of history;
+nay, even of modern history? At all events, the age of the quaternary
+deposits is by no means established, and it is on the mere presence of
+human remains, or of the productions of human labor among these deposits,
+that certain anthropologists found the millions of ages they attribute to
+our species. These remains do not indicate the site of ancient
+settlements; they have been washed away from those settlements by currents
+of water, and the question is, What epoch produced these changes?—a
+question not solved, and perhaps never will be.
+
+Besides, the primary defect of the whole prehistoric system is the
+indissolubly confounding of two orders of very evident facts, but which
+may by no means have any correlation as to time. Wrought flints show
+evident traces of human labor, and there is no unprejudiced person who
+cherishes the least doubt about it. The evidence of design shown by the
+examination of two or three specimens is in itself a proof of some value,
+but this proof makes an irresistible impression on the mind when, in
+addition, we see an accumulation of specimens. It is, then, no longer
+possible to attribute the uniform shape of the flints to a mere accident.
+But were they fashioned at the time of the formation of the _terrains_ in
+which they are embedded? That is another problem, the solution of which is
+liable to controversy. Mr. Taylor, who is very respectable authority in
+such matters, declares, after much conscientious research, that the
+gravel‐beds of St. Acheul were deposited in the earlier part of the
+Christian era. People of the historic period, such as the first
+inhabitants of Umbria and the Egyptians, made flints precisely like those
+of St. Acheul. The prodigious antiquity of man must be greatly shaken by
+these observations. At Sinai, flint has been used to effect immense
+excavations in the rock; it is again utilized under the form of hammers
+and chisels in the ancient copper mines of the Aztecs, in Canada, Spain,
+Wady‐Maghara, and Bethlehem, as well as on Lake Superior, in Tuscany, and
+in Brittany. The Bedouins of Africa and the Indians of Texas still make
+use of them; and M. Reboux, who gave the Congress a practical
+demonstration of the mounting and use of the utensils of the stone age,
+received his inspiration from those savages. They make the handles out of
+the sinews of the bison, covered with a wide strip of the animal’s skin
+recently taken off. This band is wound around grooves made in the middle
+of the hammer. The skin, as it dries, contracts, and the stone, the
+extremities of which alone are uncovered, is enclosed in a sheath so tight
+that it cannot be drawn out.(276) It must be acknowledged, then, that the
+authenticity of these beds at Spiennes, as prehistoric _ateliers_, appears
+exceedingly doubtful, and there is a tinge of similar incredulity in the
+behavior of the people around the _Camp des Cayaux_: “Countrymen, and even
+little peasant girls,” says a reporter of one of our principal journals,
+“were selling the finest stones to the travellers, making superhuman
+efforts to repress smiles that threatened to explode into loud laughter. A
+singularly ironic expression was legible in the large eyes of these
+_fillettes_ and broke through their pretended seriousness. It was very
+evident that the benighted villagers in the vicinity of Mons were not
+sufficiently initiated into the new gospel of science, and by no means had
+implicit faith in it. The irreverence of the population was still more
+evident at the entrance of the hamlet, where a group of young women
+manifested quite an uncivil merriment at the sight of some of the princes
+of science who were toiling along under the heavy burden of quaternary
+flint.” As an example of moral contrasts, I will merely allude to Hennuyer
+and the peasant of Furfooz, one sceptical and contemptuous of everything,
+and the other with genuine respect for the traditions of his beloved
+valleys.
+
+The morning of the twenty‐seventh was mostly taken up with a report from
+General Faid’herbe on the dolmens of Algeria. A burst of applause greeted
+the illustrious and genial hero of Lille. Popular sentiment seemed an
+embodiment of the
+
+
+    “_Placuit victrix causa diis, sed victa Catoni_”
+
+
+in the very teeth of the Borussians.(277)
+
+General Faid’herbe assigned a historic epoch to the origin of the dolmens.
+These monuments, which are tombs, were the work of one race found on every
+shore from Pomerania to Tunis, and which, according to him, proceeded from
+the north to the south. The dolmens of Africa are like those of Europe.
+But what race was this? A blonde race from the shores of the Baltic, as
+the speaker proved by three facts: 1. Blondes are still to be found in
+Barbary. 2. Ancient historians speak of the blonde people who lived there
+before the Christian era. 3. Fifteen centuries before Christ the blonde
+inhabitants of that country attacked Lower Egypt. M. Faid’herbe stated
+that when he lived in Senegal there were two powerful negro tribes in the
+countries on the upper Niger having a political organization of relative
+advancement. The complexion of the royal family was somewhat clear, and
+they prided themselves on their descent from white ancestors. Etymological
+indices lead us to believe that this dynasty descended from the blonde
+race of the dolmens.
+
+M. Worsaae opposed the general’s opinion, and maintained that the builders
+of the dolmens, on the contrary, proceeded from the south to the north,
+where they attained the height of their civilization. M. Cartailhac,
+however, stated an important fact that weakens this objection: the dolmens
+of the South of France contain metallic objects whose place of fabrication
+could not have been far off; those of the interior and the North only
+contained articles of polished stone.
+
+A small man now sprang into the tribune, fierce as Orestes tormented by
+the Eumenides, with black eyes, long streaming hair, and a person of
+incessant mobility. It is one of the princes of oriental philology—M.
+Oppert, who began a demonstration of the chronology of remote historical
+times, which he continued in the afternoon session. He assured us, as he
+began, that he did not intend to offend any one’s religious convictions,
+or to discuss the chronology of the Bible, which, in his eyes, is
+eminently respectable. In his opinion, the difference of the dates pointed
+out in different chronological tables can be explained without any
+difficulty. M. Oppert showed us how the chronologies of Egypt and Chaldea,
+which were calculated by cycles of unequal length, begin with the same
+date—the 19th of January, Gregorian (the 27th of April, Julian), of the
+year 11542 B.C.!
+
+He therefore concluded that the people of those regions must have observed
+the important astronomical phenomena of that time, the risings of Sirius
+perhaps, which would indicate a degree of civilization somewhat advanced
+for a period _still ante‐historic_. I like to recall the very words he
+used; they are full of meaning.
+
+M. Ribeiro had made researches in Portugal that appeared to him conclusive
+as to the existence of pliocene man, and he produced tertiary flints which
+he believed to be cut. The Abbé Bourgeois, who could not remain
+indifferent to any proof of tertiary man, allowed an unexpected
+declaration to escape his lips. “I should like,” said he, “to consider
+these fragments as authentic proofs of the truth of my theory, but the
+truth obliges me to declare that I cannot discover any evidence of human
+labor in them.” M. Ribeiro sank into his seat under this _coup de hache‐
+polie_, and tertiary man was properly buried, after a later correction
+from M. Bourgeois, who admitted that one of M. Ribeiro’s flints bore marks
+of human labor, but he had doubts as to its bed.
+
+Anthropology and ethnography had the honors during the greater part of
+this session.
+
+M. Lagneau said the researches made in Belgium showed there were three
+perfectly distinct species of men in this country, and he opposed M.
+Dupont’s opinion that the skulls of Furfooz belong to the Mongoloid race.
+M. Hamy demonstrated anatomically that a particular race, the Australioid,
+is spread throughout Europe. The jaw from Naulette appears to belong to
+this race; the skull from Engis belongs to another. M. Hamy thought he
+discovered some of the characteristics of the Australioid race in certain
+inferior types in Belgium and France. These primitive races are not
+extinct. They still peep out in isolated cases of atavism, and he
+exhibited a curious instance—the hideous portrait of a boat‐woman of the
+neighborhood of Mons, with all the characteristics of the Australioid race
+of the mammoth period. In this selection of a Montois type there was a
+spice of revenge evident to every one. M. Virchow found a manifest
+difference between the skulls at the British Museum and those of criminals
+in the collection at the university. The Flemish skulls present the same
+prognathism as those of Furfooz, and certain types have characteristics
+that might cause them to be classed with the Mongoloid race.
+
+As to the size of the skull, it is not owing to the development of the
+psychical faculties, and we should be cautious about drawing premature
+conclusions concerning the primitive races of this country. M. Virchow
+cited the example of the two skulls found in a Greek tomb of the
+Macedonian epoch, the form and size of which induced him to class them
+unhesitatingly with the Mongoloids of the caverns of the Lesse. Now, one
+of these skulls was that of a Greek woman of great distinction, both as to
+her social condition and intellectual culture. The learned professor from
+Berlin expressed a doubt as to the Germanic origin of the Flemings. M.
+Lagneau also thought we should not decide too hastily about the races that
+first inhabited Belgium. He could not see why the Flemings and Germans
+should have the same origin. In Germany, Belgium, and France the races are
+excessively mixed up. Germany was repeatedly invaded by people from Gaul.
+Prognathism alone is not typical any more than the temperament, color of
+the hair, etc.
+
+M. Vanderkindere thought the Flemish of Germanic origin, and the Walloon
+of Celtic. Blondes do not belong to the Aryan races. Prognathism is more
+common in them than in the dark people of the country, in which the
+speaker finds Ligurian traces, as in the basin of the Loire (Liger‐
+Liguria). Now, the blonde race, has always thought itself superior, and
+this belief was so strong in Flanders in the heart of the middle ages that
+the mother of Berthulphe de Ghistelles, displeased at the alliance her son
+had contracted with the beautiful Godelive, a native of Boulonnais, whom
+her contemporaries reproached solely on account of her black hair and
+eyebrows, expressed her contempt in these significant terms: “_Cur,
+inquit, cornicem de terra aliena eduxisti?_” She thought it disgraceful to
+defile the pure blood of her antique Germanic race (_alti tui sanguinis_)
+by such an alliance.
+
+In a subsequent session, this question of races came on the carpet again.
+M. Dupont, combining the observations made in the three excursions (that
+to Namur had taken place the day before), established a filiation between
+the different peoples who inhabited Belgium in different periods of the
+stone age. The people of Mesvin, the Somme, the Tamise, and the Seine were
+contemporaries. The race of Mesvin inhabited Hainault at the same time as
+the troglodytes, whom they did not know. It might have been the people of
+Mesvin and the Somme, who, gradually attaining to polished stone, invaded
+the country occupied by the less advanced people of the caverns. M.
+Virchow could not recommend too much prudence to those who are
+investigating the science of anthropology. In prehistoric times, as in our
+day, there were variations of the same race, but that is not accounted for
+by atavism. It must be concluded that men were simultaneously created or
+born in several places, and different types sprang from the commingling of
+the actual races. We take pleasure in collecting these indirect
+acknowledgments from the lips that dared say, “There is no place in the
+universe for a God, nor in man for a soul.” M. de Quatrefages thought,
+like M. Virchow, that all the various races cannot be owing to atavism.
+Crossing has a good deal to do with it. It is allowable to refer the
+variety of types to the more or less commingling of the ancient races, as
+they are everywhere mingled now. We can hardly deny, however, that the
+present population partly descended from the troglodytes. The people of
+Furfooz must still have some representatives in Belgium, especially among
+the women. Science proves that woman retains the type of the race to which
+she belongs longer than man. At a later day we shall doubtless succeed in
+deciphering the origin of the human races. In these researches we must
+also consider the action of _les milieux_. Mlle. Royer expressed a
+disbelief in the unity of the human species. Unfortunately, the inevitable
+crossing is always obstructing her observations. She absolutely refuses to
+admit that the white man is Aryan, or at least Asiatic. She hopes,
+however, some day to obtain a solution of these great problems. How far,
+madame, your knowledge extends, and how astonishingly you have retained
+the persistent type of _madame la guenon_ from whom you flatter yourself
+to have descended! After other discussions concerning the bronze utensils
+found in various parts of Europe, and the influence of Etruscan art, which
+extended even to the North, M. Baudre undertook the demonstration of a
+point singular enough. Primitive man, he said, doubtless possessed the
+musical faculty, and it is impossible with his knowledge of the flint he
+daily used that it should not have occurred to him to apply the
+sonorousness of that stone to some practical use. No one can positively
+declare this was so, but who can deny it? M. Baudre has constructed an
+instrument composed of accordant flints—a prehistoric piano—on which he
+executed a _brabançonne_ that would have excited the envy of the
+_Moncrabeaux_. It is neither more nor less insupportable than the modern
+instrument of torture of which some unideal creature, with bent body and a
+prey to convulsive jerks, strikes the senseless ivory with his skinny
+phalanges till it shrieks under the touch.
+
+Of the excursion to Namur we will only allude to what bore on the
+scientific labors of the Congress; that is, the visit to the Camp of
+Hastedon. The delightful, cordial reception given us in that pleasant
+town, the banquet and concert which followed, will not soon be effaced
+from the memory of the excursionists. The plateau of Hastedon, close to
+Namur, rests on a solid mass of dolomite, and is surrounded by a bastion
+composed of fagots calcined—it is not known how, huge boulders, and a
+thick layer of earth and stones. The Romans occupied it for a certain
+time, but the parapets that surround it are much more ancient. It is an
+immense plain, eleven hectares in extent, strewed with flints, both
+wrought and polished, that came from Spiennes, while those of the caverns
+of the Lesse came from Champagne. The troglodytes of the Lesse and the
+people of Spiennes were contemporaries in the age of cut stone, but there
+was no intercourse between them. During the age of polished stone, on the
+contrary, the importation of flints from Champagne ceased in the region of
+the caverns, and the flint of Spiennes was diffused among the plateaux of
+upper Belgium. The inhabitants of Spiennes extended their former bounds,
+penetrated to that region, and fortified it. According to M. Dupont, the
+Camp of Hastedon must have been one of their fortresses.
+
+The final _séance_ of the Congress opened with a very interesting and
+animated discussion as to the first use of bronze and iron. Where did the
+bronze come from? M. Oppert thought it of European origin. The Phœnicians
+went to England for tin rather than to the East. M. Worsaae was convinced
+it came from Asia, and that a bronze age will be discovered in Egypt. M.
+Leemans was of the opinion that the iron age preceded the bronze in India
+and Ceylon. M. Conestabile was inclined to think the Phœnicians obtained
+their tin from the Caucasus rather than England. M. Franks said they might
+have found it in Spain and Portugal, and M. Waldemar‐Schmidt thought the
+Egyptians obtained theirs from Africa.
+
+M. de Quatrefages afterwards summed up the character of the Congress of
+Brussels: it appears from scientific evidence in every direction that
+certain existing types have an incontestable resemblance to the people of
+the quaternary period. In the second place, it now seems established that
+man of the stone age travelled much more than has been supposed.
+
+The close of the session was marked by two occurrences that produced a
+strong impression on the assembly. The two workmen who so ably assisted M.
+Dupont in the exploration of the caverns had, at the solicitation of the
+committee, the _décoration ouvrière_ conferred on them by Messrs. de
+Quatrefages and Capellini. Then a letter from M. G. Geefs was read,
+stating that he had made a bust of M. d’Omalius unbeknown to the latter,
+which he offered as a mark of homage to the Congress. This bust, concealed
+at the end of the apartment, was uncovered and presented to the venerable
+president, old in years but youthful in feeling, whose fine noble career
+M. de Quatrefages retraced in an address sparkling with wit. Then, after
+some isolated communications, the Congress passed a resolution to hold its
+seventh meeting at Stockholm, in 1874, under the effective presidency of
+Prince Oscar of Sweden, and the Congress was declared adjourned.
+
+We cannot better end this report, which I should have liked to make more
+complete, than by quoting M. Dupont’s _résumé_ (a little indefinite, in my
+opinion) of the labor of the Sixth International Congress of Prehistoric
+Anthropology and Archæology:
+
+“After the weighty discussions that have taken place at the Congress of
+Brussels,” says M. le Secrétaire Général, “it is proper to lay before the
+public the chief problems discussed by the learned assembly. These
+problems have not all been definitely solved. That was not to be expected,
+for the result of such scientific meetings is seldom the decision of
+questions, but rather stating them with clearness and precision. The
+discussions at such meetings lead to the opening of new paths, and
+preparing the way, by throwing new light on it, for calm and persevering
+labor in the study. There alone is it possible to weigh the value of
+arguments, elucidate obscure points, and arrive at conclusions. In this
+spirit six principal points have been drawn up:
+
+“1. Did man really exist in the middle of the tertiary period? Several of
+the specialists present at the Congress declared in the affirmative. But
+it appeared, especially from the flints discovered by the Abbé Bourgeois,
+that further researches should be undertaken before science can decide on
+a point so important in the history of mankind. The bed of the flints in
+question was ultimately regarded as incontestable.
+
+“2. The formation of the valleys and the filling of the caverns were
+regarded as the result of fluvial action. The study of these phenomena may
+be considered as the fundamental point of research respecting man of the
+quaternary epoch.
+
+“3. The bones of goats, sheep, and oxen, discovered in the deposits of the
+mammoth age in the Belgian caverns, were acknowledged to be similar to our
+goats, sheep, and certain species of our domestic cattle. An opinion was
+advanced that perhaps they originated these domestic species, whose origin
+has often been sought in vain.
+
+“4. Communications between different tribes of the stone age in Western
+Europe were for the first time distinctly stated. The people of the
+quaternary epoch were divided into two classes, one of which, by the
+regular development of its industrial pursuits, arrived at such a degree
+of progress that it was thought they must have invaded the region of the
+Belgian caverns in the age of polished stone, and subjugated our
+troglodytes.
+
+“5. The discovery at Eygenbilsen gave occasion for recognizing the
+Etruscan influence in our region previous to the Roman conquest. There was
+a disposition to admit that the intercourse between Italy and the
+Scandinavian countries must have been much later.
+
+“6. The opinion that the anthropological types of the quaternary epoch
+have survived, and constitute an essential element of existing European
+nations, was admitted in principle by all the anthropologists who
+expressed any opinion on the subject. The problem of the origin of
+European races is thus placed in an entirely new light.”
+
+
+
+
+Atlantic Drift—Gathered In The Steerage.
+
+
+By An Emigrant.
+
+Concluded.
+
+The generally fortunate voyage of our vessel was varied by two or three
+days of very rough weather, and the miseries of our first night at sea
+were intensified by a violent gale. The fast steamer, built with lines
+calculated for excessive speed, cut through rather than breasted the
+waves. Tons of clear water washed over the whaleback, knocking over one or
+two hapless wights, and drenching many others. Her wind‐ward side was
+incessantly swept by blinding showers of heavy spray. To pass from the
+shelter of the main deck to the entrance of our steerage was a veritable
+running the gauntlet. You watched till the ship rose, and then ran at full
+speed for the shelter of the whaleback, happy if you reached it without
+being rolled by a sudden lurch into the scuppers, or losing your balance
+and clinging to the nearest rope or stanchion, being soused by the spray
+from the next wave that struck her.
+
+The storm raged more fiercely as the evening advanced, and from timid lips
+came stories of the lost _City of Boston_ and the hapless _London_, while
+more experienced hands regretted their precipitancy in selecting a vessel
+of a line in which every other quality was said to have been sacrificed to
+that of excessive speed, and indulged in uncomfortable surmises as to the
+consequences of the shaft snapping or the engines breaking down. When the
+damp and chill of the advancing night drove us to our bunks, we clambered
+down‐stairs, and, staggering away into our respective streets, crawled in.
+To realize my first impression of the steerage of our vessel at night,
+when its cavernous space was lit, or rather its grim darkness made
+visible, by a single lantern, would require the pen of Dickens or the
+graphic pencil of Gustave Doré. Crouching between those bunks and the roof
+grotesque forms, dimly seen in the obscure light, threw weird shadows on
+the cabin sides. Here one busily engaged, under innumerable difficulties,
+in making up a neat bed of sheets and blankets, into which he afterwards
+burrows by an ingenious backward movement, like a shore crab hiding
+himself in the sand left uncovered by the receding tide; while his next
+neighbor retires to rest by the simple process of kicking off his boots,
+pulling his battered night‐cap over his eyes, and stretching himself on
+the bare boards, with a muttered string of curses on the ship, the
+weather, and the world in general, for his evening orisons. At a corner of
+one of the tables appear a group of players poring over their cards in a
+_chiaro‐oscuro_ that recalls a scene of Teniers or Van Ostade, while at
+another a group are gathered round a young vocalist who quavers out in a
+dull monotone a curious medley of sentimental ditties and music‐hall
+vulgarities. Gradually all drop away into their bunks, and everything is
+still, save the deep breathing of some hundred souls, and the groans of
+the sufferers from the malady of the sea. Occasionally the heavy plunge of
+the ship, as she dashes into some mountainous wave, extinguishes the lamp
+with the shock, and buries the little windows under water, leaving the
+cabin for a few seconds in profound darkness. In the gale during the first
+night of our voyage, one tremendous billow struck the ship, burying us in
+black night, and rolling trunks, tins, and clothes cluttering to leeward
+with the lurch of the vessel, and awakening all in a moment from their
+slumbers. A general consternation prevailed, and while some called in
+angry tones for the lamp to be relighted, others could be heard muttering
+the unfamiliar words of a half‐forgotten prayer. As the great ship shook
+in her conflict with the raging sea, and we heard overhead the rush of
+many feet and the swash on deck of a heavy mass of water, I felt nervous
+enough till she rose again and, creeping to the little window, I could see
+the cold moon throwing a silvery track across the waste of raging, wind‐
+lashed surges.
+
+I thought of the great ships that had gone down, crowded with hundreds of
+unprepared and unthinking souls, into the cruel bosom of the great ocean;
+perhaps their unknown fate was to sink in the darkness of the night,
+crushed in a moment by an iceberg, or, maimed and helpless, battered to
+pieces and submerged by the angry waves. What a horrible death‐agony must
+be that of the doomed, who, after the sudden crash of a collision, or
+battened down in their dark prison in a raging storm, heard the cataract
+of water roar down the hatchway, greedy to engulf them! For a few moments
+what fearful struggles would take place in the crowded cabin to mount the
+bunks and gain the last mouthful of the retiring air, until the flood
+buried all in the bosom of the deep, in a silence to be broken only by the
+trumpet of the Judgment Day! Should I, I pondered, in such a dark hour,
+have the strength of mind or grace of God to lie still on my bed and let
+the rising water cut short the prayer on my lips, or, hoping against hope,
+with angrily raging heart die fighting to breathe a few seconds longer the
+vital air? Of a truth, to die suffocated in the darkness, without a last
+look at the great vault of heaven, a last breath of the pure air, seemed
+to me to be to doubly die.
+
+If I suffered some discomfort and perhaps a little anxiety from the
+occasional anger of the mighty main, it was far more than compensated for
+by its aspect in its calmer and more peaceful moods. I cannot understand
+how in a few days voyagers can learn to complain of the monotony of the
+sea; to me, its different moods in calm and storm, the snowy crests of the
+dancing waves, the foaming and often phosphorescent wake of the great
+steamer, and the ever‐changing aspects of the cloud‐laden heavens, were
+objects of untiring interest. If I had the magic pen of the author of the
+_Queen of the Air_, I would write a book on the cloud‐scenery of the
+Atlantic. Never, even in the purest Italian sky or the cloudless heavens
+above the vast expanse of a Western prairie, have I seen Diana so purely
+fair, Lucifer so bright, or Aurora clad in such varied garments of purple
+and rose; such a wonderful vault lined with innumerable flakes of spotless
+wool left by the dying wind; such masses of cumulus, sometimes as solidly
+white as Alpine summits, sometimes before the rain‐storm luridly gray‐
+black with the gathered water, like the massive bulk of Snowdon seen
+through a driving rain; and, once or twice, the pall of the thunder‐storm
+rising over the leeward heaven and advancing towards us, its ragged edge
+momentarily lit up with the blazing tongues of the lightning, until it
+rolled over, deafening with its dread artillery and hiding all around in
+mist and blinding rain. The grandeur of sunset and of sunrise, when not
+obscured by the mistiness of a moist atmosphere, was indescribable. Every
+night, with renewed pleasure, we watched the god of day sink beneath the
+western horizon. Turner, in his wildest dreams of those gorgeous heaven‐
+pictures that he had not seen on earth but felt that he would love to see,
+imagined no greater luxury of gold, carmine, purple, crimson, rose, and
+rose‐tinged snow, than was afforded by some of the spectacles of the
+setting sun. One evening still holds my memory entranced: the heavy
+curtain of dull gray mist that all day had lain low over the sea rolled
+eastward before the evening breeze; the emerging sun, low on the horizon,
+dyed the receding masses of cloud with a thousand shades of livid purple;
+the peaks and shoulders of the eastern range of mountains of dark vapor
+caught the light, while between them sank valleys and depths more sombre
+by the contrast. Westward, below the rosy, almost blood‐red sun, ran two
+long narrow filaments of purple cloud, dark across the glow of the
+heavens, like bars across a furnace. A few moments, and the shining orb
+sinks beneath them, fringing their edges with refulgent gold, then falls
+into a sea of liquid fire. A little longer the crimson hues linger on the
+eastern curtain of clouds, then grow fainter and fainter, and die away
+into the gray hues of a moonless night.
+
+Among the five hundred emigrants our good ship carried there were, it is
+needless to say, many men of different speech, and almost every diversity
+of occupation and character. Besides the four nations of Great Britain, we
+had Germans, Danes, Swedes, and Norwegians in considerable numbers, a few
+French, Poles, and Russians, a Levantine Jewess and her children, and a
+solitary American. With the Teutons my ignorance of their language
+prevented me holding further converse than to learn their nationality and
+their destination—generally Illinois, Minnesota, or Wisconsin. Unlike the
+Irish, with whom New York seemed to fulfil all their notions of America,
+the Germans and Scandinavians appeared all westward bound, in large
+parties, organized for agricultural life; and while they were in a
+considerable minority on the vessel, they formed much the larger
+proportion of the passengers in the emigrant cars. The amount of their
+baggage was something prodigious. Nearly all apparently peasants in their
+native land, they seemed on leaving it to transport everything they
+possessed except the roof over their heads to their adopted country. What
+would not break they enclosed in immense bags of ticking and rough canvas,
+and the residue of their property in arklike chests, the immense weight
+and sharp iron‐bound corners of which moved the sailors to multiform
+blasphemy. For my part, I had read so much of the contented prosperity of
+the peasantry in Norway and Sweden that I speculated not a little as to
+what cause could lead them to make the long and expensive migration from
+Christiania or Gottenburg to the so far off shores of the Mississippi.
+
+With the Germans, who came principally from the neighborhood of Mannheim,
+the case was different. Several of them could speak a little French, nor
+were they reticent as to the principal cause that led them to desert their
+fatherland: it was the man tax, levied by the empire of blood and iron on
+their youth and manhood, that drove them from their farms in the sweet
+Rhine valley to seek abodes in the new and freer world. Several of them
+had followed the Bavarian standard under Von Tannen through the hardships
+and carnage of the Franco‐German war; but to the shrewd sense of the
+peasant the halo of military glory and the pomp of wide empire meant but
+conscription and taxation, fields untilled, and wife and children
+starving, while the blood of father and son was poured out to indite a new
+page in the gory annals of warlike fame.
+
+By the way, one of them assured us that never in the fiercest time of that
+deadly strife, even when, in long forced marches, driving Bourbaki’s
+broken bands through the snows of Jura, had they fared so badly as he did
+then, to which I may add the experience of an Englishman—whose sinister
+countenance and shabby attire gave increased weight to his testimony—who
+averred that we fared little better than in a workhouse and worse than in
+a jail.
+
+Amongst us there were many mechanics, principally Irish, who were
+returning from visits to their friends; nor can I omit to chronicle their
+uniform and emphatic testimony as to the benefit they had received from
+their emigration. In New York, Philadelphia, Boston, or Chicago, they were
+sure of work, could live and dress comfortably, and lay by a large
+proportion of their earnings, while in England, and still more in Ireland,
+they were happy when their earnings kept them in lodging, food, and
+clothing, and saving was neither thought of nor possible. From what I
+could learn, the position of the unskilled laborer appeared by no means so
+bright. The different system of hiring in America made the nominally
+higher wages more precarious than in the old country; and I suspect that
+everywhere the untaught man, who, ignorant of any distinct branch of
+industry, brings only his thews and sinews to market, is, and will ever
+be, but “a hewer of wood and drawer of water”—an ill‐paid and little
+valued drudge.
+
+For one class of the Irish emigrants, of whom we had a certain number on
+board, their countrymen entertained a profound and not unfounded contempt.
+Youths from Cork or Dublin shops or offices, whom dissipation or
+misconduct had thrown out of place, or the desire of novelty or adventure
+had attracted to the New World—unfit for manual labor, and without any
+special qualification for commerce—their heads were turned with tales of
+the giddy whirl of New York life, in their notions of which gallantry,
+whiskey, politics, calico balls, and rowdy patriotism made a curious
+medley. Their general ambition was to be bar‐tenders, and with some
+exceptions their usual behavior showed them to be little fitted for any
+better avocation.
+
+One of the characters that most attracted my attention, though I elicited
+but little response to my advances from his taciturn nature, was a miner
+from Montana—a man of short stature but powerful build, with, a
+determined, weather‐beaten face, and a decidedly sinister squint, who had
+rambled over the greater part of California, Nevada, Utah, Washington, and
+Montana, and apparently returned no richer from his wanderings. Having
+been a seaman before he took to a mountain life, his gait had acquired an
+indescribably curious mixture of the out‐kneed walk of a man constantly on
+horseback with the roll of a sailor, while he had, too, a curious habit of
+involuntarily working the fingers of his right hand as if they held a six‐
+shooter. He usually restricted himself to the bachelor society under the
+whaleback, and, chary of his words, amused himself with an amateur
+surveillance of the operations of the men, or occasionally exchanged
+reminiscences in brief sentences with two or three other returned
+Californians: how he and his mates had killed a grizzly at the foot of
+Mount Helena; how he had made £1,200 in eight months from a claim in
+Siskiyou County, and lost it all in working another in El Dorado County,
+at which he persevered fruitlessly for three years, while the claims on
+each side brought heavy piles to their workers; how he had seen twenty‐six
+“road agents” hanged together in Montana; and other tales of far West
+mining, murder, and debauchery. Once only his hard face relaxed into a
+laugh at a story he told of two men who quarrelled in a California saloon,
+and, dodging round the table, while the rest of the company made for the
+door or skulked behind the beer barrels, emptied their revolvers at each
+other with no worse effect than one slight scratch. That twelve barrels
+should go off and no one be killed seemed to be too ridiculous, and his
+risible faculties overcame him accordingly. Strangely enough, while he
+spoke with the most hearty enthusiasm as to the pleasures of a
+mountaineering life, which he declared, with a good horse, a trusty rifle,
+and staunch mates, was the finest in the world, and to judge from
+appearances had certainly not made his pile, he never intended to return
+westward, but was bound for some city of the South. Possibly some episodes
+in his checkered existence had caused him to bear in mind the shortened
+career of the twenty‐six road agents with a distinctness that determined
+his preference for this side of the Rocky Mountains.
+
+The most lively time of the day was the evening after the five o’clock
+tea; the sailors during the dog‐watches—from four to eight—do not turn in,
+but remain on deck, and they amused or persecuted the female passengers
+with a coarse gallantry that generally made the more modest women remain
+below; the cooks, engineers, and firemen stood at their doors in the deck‐
+house and greeted with horse‐banter the passers‐by; while on the open
+space before the wheel‐house a few couples danced to the music of an
+accordion, or tried to tire each other out to the whistled tune of an
+Irish jig. A pair of professional singers, husband and wife, to whose
+retinue I usually attached myself, used to sit at the door of the saloon
+and favor us with selections from their repertory, often with a success
+that brought metallic appreciation from the gentlemen in the neighboring
+smoking‐room; till after sunset—generally interpreted with extreme
+liberality—one of the stewards of the after‐steerage literally hunted the
+women down‐stairs; and then often on fine nights the sailors would cluster
+round the open hatchway and sing for or banter with their favorites below.
+
+The behavior of the sailors towards the women was the subject of constant
+complaint by the more respectable of the passengers throughout the voyage;
+in the evening, no woman without her husband was safe from their
+persecution, and not always with him at her side; as they stood by each
+other, and always had the sheath‐knife at their side, the men were not
+very ready to commence a quarrel with them; if their advances were
+resented, they were apt to change from coarse good‐humor to the most
+revolting and obscene abuse. Hence, as I have mentioned, many of the women
+would not return to the deck after the evening meal. In short, if other
+steamers are like the one in which we made the passage, no young woman
+could cross in the steerage without her modesty being daily shocked, and,
+if she was unprotected, running great risk of actual insult. I have
+mentioned that the deck bar was at the head of our staircase and
+consequently near the sailors’ cabin; one night it was broken open and
+cleared of its contents; whether the culprits were either sought for or
+detected, I never heard; but certainly the seamen next day were in a state
+of extreme conviviality: and, under the emboldening influence of liquor,
+one lively young mariner put his arm round the waist of a very handsome
+young Englishwoman, whose ladylike dress and appearance had so far
+prevented her from being molested in this way. A fight between her husband
+and the delinquent was with difficulty prevented by the bystanders, and
+the former went to complain to the chief officer; he mustered the watch
+and read them a lecture on their not interfering with the female
+passengers, and told the culprit he would hand him over to the authorities
+at Castle Garden on his arrival at New York, who would certainly send him
+for six months to prison. The latter did not seem much discomposed at the
+intimation, and the day I landed in the Empire City he appeared at our
+boardinghouse on Washington Street in a state of great hilarity and beer,
+and informed us with much blasphemy that he had cut his connection with
+the ship.
+
+The emigrant passengers on board our ship suffered much annoyance and
+discomfort; but I do not hesitate to say that most of our troubles arose
+from the crew and attendants rather than the arrangements of the ship
+itself. Much of the accommodation provided—for instance, in the case of
+the wash‐houses and fresh‐water pumps—was made useless by the negligence
+or surliness of the men by whom they were controlled; the victuals seemed
+generally to be of good quality, and, except in the case of the fresh
+bread and sugar, were provided with lavish if not wasteful abundance, but
+they were usually carelessly cooked, if not actually uneatable, and served
+in the roughest and most heedless manner. The crew were a most disorderly
+set—quarrels were of constant occurrence. I saw two fights—one between the
+interpreter attached to the after‐steerage and one of the stewards; and
+another, which took place between the head‐cook and the butcher in the
+saloon galley; and I heard of several others. The cooks and bakers in the
+steerage galley were changed once or twice during the voyage, but no
+change for the better resulted. I attribute this want of anything like
+discipline or attentiveness to their duties to the constant change of the
+men on board these steamers; they only sign articles for the run out and
+home, rarely remaining more than one or two voyages in the ship, and many
+go the westward voyage merely to get to New York and desert the ship the
+moment they arrive there. I was told the chief officer called the _milors_
+together and promised them, as the ship was short‐handed (she had seven
+less than her complement of 28 seamen), they should receive £5 10_s._ per
+month instead of the £4 10_s._ for which they had shipped; but in spite of
+this, nearly half of them would desert when the ship came to her moorings.
+The cooks, bakers, and stewards are engaged in the same way, and the
+consequence is, before they can all be got to understand their positions
+and work well together, they are paid off and a new set come on board. If
+the companies could form a permanent staff for their vessels, and go to
+the same care and expense over their organization as they give to the
+material equipment of their splendid vessels, an immense change for the
+better would be effected in the comfort and convenience of the emigrant.
+As to the distribution of provisions, the passengers might be arranged in
+messes of ten or twenty, some of whose number would fetch their food from
+the galley for allotment among themselves, and thus give them an
+opportunity of eating their meals at table in a more Christianlike and
+less piggish manner than the majority are at present compelled to do. Nor
+do I see any great difficulty or additional expense in a different
+arrangement of the bunks, by which, at the sacrifice of the wide space in
+the middle of the steerage, they could be grouped on each side of a
+central table, so that each twenty or thereabouts would form a partially
+separated room, with its own table and its own mess.
+
+At last, early on the second Sunday morning, the thunderlike roll of the
+cable paid out over our heads awoke us as the ship came to anchor off
+Staten Island, and later in the day she moored alongside the company’s
+wharf in New Jersey. In sight of the promised land, the fatigue and
+annoyance of the voyage were soon forgotten. A liberal meal of fresh and
+unusually well‐cooked beef and plum‐duff, eaten undisturbed by the
+vessel’s motion, made the memory of the disgusting messes we had endured
+or revolted at less poignant. The entire passengers went on shore in the
+forenoon, but none of the emigrants were allowed to leave, or any one to
+come on board the ship. Boatfuls of friends of the passengers came
+alongside, and the word passed along the deck that Mrs. Brady’s husband or
+Mary Cahill’s brother was seeking her. Numberless inquiries were shouted
+as to Mike, or Mary, or the children, until the gray twilight hid the
+spires and streets of the great city across the river. The chief officer
+came round early with a lantern, and summarily dismissed all the women
+below, and all went quietly to rest. Often, I believe, the last night on
+board the emigrant ship is a scene of wild revelry, if not actual
+debauchery; but the want of liquor—none was sold after the vessel came to
+her moorings—and the absence of the fairer sex, effectually quenched any
+convivial tendencies.
+
+At an early hour next morning the luggage was run out of the hold, and
+tumbled pell‐mell on deck; and the youth of either sex, hitherto contented
+with the shabbiest and most negligent of attire, watched eagerly for their
+boxes, dragged them to a convenient corner, and made an elaborate
+toilette, either for the benefit of their American friends or to give the
+_coup de grâce_ to the sweethearts they had encountered on the voyage. It
+was like the transformation scene in a pantomime, and I could hardly
+recognize my lady acquaintances in their gay bonnets and neat dresses.
+Much of their finery, however, suffered serious damage before they emerged
+on the Bowery. In the afternoon, the custom‐house officer came on board
+and took his place near the gangway, alongside of which lay a tender for
+the passengers and a barge for the luggage. The boxes were scattered all
+over the deck, and to get them examined one had to drag them to the
+officer, open them and close them, obtain a Castle Garden check from an
+official at the head of the gangway, and then they went over the side on
+to the barge, and the passenger on to the tender. Every one was anxious to
+be off, and all scrambled at once towards the gangway, dragging boxes and
+bundles with them. Never did we see such a scene of tumult and confusion.
+Such a babel of tongues; such despair at boxes that either would not open,
+or more frequently, being opened, would not shut; such lamentations over
+their often hopelessly shattered contents—the married women imploring some
+one to mind their children while they dragged their boxes to the gangway;
+the single ones begging quondam admirers to help them to move their heavy
+trunks—appeals to which the latter, sufficiently engrossed with their own
+struggle to be off, generally turned a deaf and unkind ear. The custom‐
+house officer seemed to discharge his duty with as much good‐humor as the
+necessity of examining some thousand boxes in a limited time would allow.
+We got off with the first tenderful, and after waiting an hour or two in
+Castle Garden, where we at once cleared the refreshment stall of what we
+then thought delicious coffee and pies, we were told to fetch our luggage
+on the following day, and then passed out into Broadway to seek our
+various fortunes.
+
+In the boarding‐house where I spent the night in New York, I met
+passengers from most of the other lines. All complained of their
+accommodations, and affected to believe that they had unfortunately
+selected the most uncomfortable service. For my own part, I believe that
+on the whole there is but little to choose between the accommodations and
+provisions supplied by the different companies, and that the description I
+have given of the arrangements of one line would generally apply to the
+rest.
+
+
+
+
+Martyrs And Confessors In Christ.
+
+
+Nor let any of you be sad, on the ground that he is less than those who,
+before you having suffered torments, have come by the glorious journey to
+the Lord, the world being conquered and trodden down. The Lord is the
+searcher of the reins and heart, he sees the secret things, and looks into
+things hidden. The testimony of him alone, who is to guide, is sufficient
+for earning the crown from him. Therefore each thing, O dearest brethren,
+is equally sublime and illustrious. The former, namely, to hasten to the
+Lord by the consummation of victory, is the more secure; the latter is
+more joyful, to flourish in the praises of the church, having received a
+furlough after the gaining of glory. O blessed church of ours, which the
+honor of divine condescension thus illumines, which in our own time the
+glorious blood of martyrs thus makes illustrious! Before, it was white in
+the works of the brethren; now, it is made purple in the blood of martyrs.
+Neither lilies nor roses are wanting to its flowers. Let all now contend
+for the most ample dignity of both honors. Let them receive crowns, either
+white from their works, or purple from their martyrdom. In the heavenly
+camp peace and war have their respective flowers, by which the soldier of
+Christ is crowned for glory. I pray, bravest and most blessed brethren,
+that you be always well in the Lord, and mindful of us. Farewell.—_S.
+Cyprian._
+
+
+
+
+The Roman Empire And The Mission Of The Barbarians.
+
+
+Third Article.
+
+So the great Roman world sinned on to the last. Christianity, with a cry
+of fear and alarm, pointed to the stormful North, and exhorted to
+repentance; but her voice was drowned in the mad shouts of revelry and the
+wild din of reckless passion. The mistress of nations would not consent to
+show signs of fear or alarm. She cast her far‐seeing eye over her wide,
+rich provinces towards the frowning horizon, and she had some knowledge of
+what sort of elements were hidden behind the black cloud‐wall there. Never
+yet had the whole terrible ferocity of latent wrath burst forth; but
+still, from time to time, as she had watched for some centuries back, the
+storm‐cloud had opened for a moment, and the low thunder‐peal had been
+heard, and the lightning‐fires had scathed her frontiers, and sometimes
+even had touched the very heart of some of her outlying provinces. But the
+fiery sword had been sheathed. The rent seemed to close again, and the
+thunder‐murmurs died away. Still no brightness tinged the angry North. But
+darker, wilder, more fiercely threatening the storm‐cloud grew. There was
+an angry God behind it, with his warrior hosts, hidden, and biding the
+solemn, predetermined moment. If the queen of empire felt, at times, a
+thrill of alarm, she tried to shake it off again. For proudly she gazed
+around on her widespreading dominions, and counted her almost countless
+monuments of conquest and glory, and appealed to the long past for her
+claim to live on immortally; and then took consolation and confidence to
+herself that the pillars of the firmament would crumble to dust, and the
+heavens fall, before she could be moved from her everlasting foundations.
+But still there were hearts that trembled for fear, conscious that
+something terrible was coming upon the world. The cry of the rapt seer of
+Patmos seemed still to be rising from the bosom of the Ægean Sea, and
+ringing in the ears of those who had faith in a God of justice. All those
+terrible woes foretold in the sixteenth and seventeenth chapters of the
+Apocalypse seemed about to be accomplished. With strange wailing sound, as
+of a warning archangel’s trumpet, the prophetic voice appeared to repeat:
+“Thou art just, O Lord, who art, and who wast, the holy one, because thou
+hast judged these things: for they have shed the blood of saints and
+prophets, and thou hast given them blood to drink.... And great Babylon
+came in remembrance before God, to give her the cup of the wine of the
+indignation of his wrath.” Louder still that voice seemed to rise in tones
+of merciful warning: “Go out from her, my people; that you be not
+partakers of her sins, and that you receive not of her plagues. For her
+sins have reached unto heaven, and the Lord hath remembered her
+iniquities.... She saith in her heart: I sit a queen, and am no widow; and
+sorrow I shall not see. Therefore shall her plagues come in one day,
+death, and mourning, and famine, and she shall be burned with fire;
+because God is strong, who shall judge her.” So appeared to sound out
+clear the sad, wailing voice of the prophet in these sorrowful days. And
+the people of God took warning. Full of fear and dread, they fled from the
+“great Babylon” and the other principal cities of the empire, and hid
+themselves from the wrath that was to come. Those who remained behind
+laughed with mocking incredulity at their fears, and, as if in defiance of
+a mighty God, drained the sparkling goblet with an intenser relish, and
+the din of revelry waxed louder, and the Circensian games were applauded
+with a wilder joy. Countless numbers of Christians, who still had faith in
+God’s Word and fear of his justice, hurried with rapid steps from these
+scenes of reckless dissipation and pleasure. They went to kneel with
+uplifted hands amid the sands of the Libyan Desert, or the wooded
+mountains of Lebanon; to implore mercy on a wicked world, amid the islets
+of the Tyrrhenian Sea, or in the rocky caves of the Thebaid.
+
+At intervals another warning voice is heard, sounding, with the vehemence
+of the Baptist’s cry, from the holy precincts of Bethlehem. S. Jerome is
+meditating and commenting, in his convent cell, on the prophecy of
+Ezekiel. As he ponders on the judgments of God on Jerusalem of old, he
+cannot but think of Rome in his own day. As the images of ruin and
+destruction grow before his mind, and his great heart burns with
+compassion for sinful, sinning man, he pauses in his reading, and lifts
+his voice in warning of the vials of wrath that are about to be poured out
+upon the empire. Through the voluptuous palaces of Rome which he once knew
+so well, the loud warning voice of the holy anchoret of Bethlehem pierces
+with an awakening sound, and helps to persuade many a patrician beauty “to
+exchange the dream of pleasure, so soon to be interrupted by the clangor
+of the Gothic trumpet, for the sacred vigils and austerities of the Holy
+Land.” “Read,” he cries out, “the Apocalypse of S. John: mark what is
+written of the woman clothed in scarlet, with the mystic inscription on
+her forehead, and seated upon seven hills, and of the destruction of
+Babylon. ‘Go out of her, my people,’ saith the Lord; ‘that you be not made
+partakers of her crimes, and partners in the plagues that shall afflict
+her.’ Leave the proud city to exult in everlasting uproar and dissipation,
+satiating her bloodthirstiness in the arena, and her insane passion in the
+circus. Leave it to her to trample under foot every sense of shame in her
+lascivious theatres.” After these words of startling vehemence, he attunes
+his voice to gentler accents. And pours out his enthusiastic soul in
+language of sweetest music, winning and captivating both ear and heart. He
+throws a ravishing fascination and sweetness around his life at Bethlehem
+that must have been irresistible to souls in which yet lingered any purity
+of sentiment or love for the holy and beautiful. “How different,” he
+exclaims, “the scenes that invite you hither! The most rustic simplicity
+is characteristic of the natal village of our Redeemer, and sacred hymns
+and psalmody are the only interruptions of the heavenly stillness and
+serenity which reign on every side. Walk forth into the fields: you
+startle with mingled astonishment and delight to find that ‘Alleluia’ is
+the burden of the ploughman’s song; that it is with some inspired canticle
+the reaper recreates himself, in reposing at noontide from his
+overpowering toil; and that it is the royal Psalmist’s inspiration that
+attunes the voice of the vine‐dresser, as, scroll in hand, he plies his
+task all day.” Thus does he paint in charming colors the immediate
+neighborhood in which he lived so happily. His words take us back to the
+days of Eden, and make us realize what unfallen and sinless mankind would
+have been. Then he passes on to those scenes and names which are
+interwoven into the history of our Lord’s life, and round these again he
+casts the fascination of his poetical outpourings. We are carried on as by
+a magic spell, and we feel ourselves drawn captives after the mighty heart
+that glows with such a fiery heat of love in that grotto of Bethlehem. We
+cannot wonder that many souls felt the wondrous spell of that clear, sweet
+voice, as it broke with its music‐tones of penetrating power into the
+palaces of Rome. The loud‐wailing trumpet‐tones of the Apocalyptic seer,
+as they rose with terrific warning from the bosom of the Ægean, and the
+melodious music of the anchoret of Bethlehem, as it was carried westward
+on the breeze, both conveyed a message from a merciful God to the children
+whom he yet loved. But we will listen again to that winning voice from
+Bethlehem, as it pleads on, trying to draw Christians from the perils that
+were so near: “Oh! when shall that blessed day arrive,” it continues,
+“when it shall be our own delight to conduct you to the cave of the
+Nativity; together to mingle our tears with those of Mary and of the
+Virgin Mother in the sepulchre of our Lord; to press the wood on which he
+redeemed us to our throbbing lips; and, in ardent desire, to ascend with
+him from Mount Olivet?” We will hasten thence to Bethany to see Lazarus
+come forth in his winding‐sheet, and to the banks of that blessed stream
+sanctified by the baptism of the Word made flesh. Thence to the huts of
+the shepherds who heard the canticle of “Glory to God on high” and
+“Tidings of great joy,” as they were keeping their night‐watch over their
+flocks. We will pray at the tomb of David, and meditate under the steep
+precipice where inspiration used to come on the prophet Amos, until we
+hear again the living clangor of his shepherd‐horn. In Mambre, we shall
+commune in spirit with the great patriarchs and their consorts who were
+buried there; visit the fountain where the eunuch was baptized by Philip;
+and in Samaria honor the relics of S. John the Baptist, of Abdias and
+Eliseus, and devoutly explore the caverns where the choirs of the prophets
+were miraculously fed, in the days of famine and persecution. We will
+extend our pilgrimage to Nazareth, and, as the name implies, behold the
+_flower_ of Galilee. Hard by is Cana, where he changed water into wine.
+Thence to Mount Tabor, where our prayer shall be that our rest may not be
+with Moses and Elias, but in the eternal tabernacle, where we shall enjoy
+the beatific vision of the Father and the Holy Ghost. Thence returning, we
+shall see the Lake Genesareth, and the wilderness where the merciful Jesus
+feasted the multitudes; and Naim shall not be passed by unheeded, where he
+gave back to the disconsolate mother “her only son.” Hermon shall be
+pointed out, and the torrent of Endor where Sisera was overcome; and
+Capharnaum, the theatre of so many miracles. Thence going up to Jerusalem,
+as it were in the retinue of our Lord, as the disciples were wont to do,
+we will pass through Silo and Bethel; and having made the circuit of so
+many scenes, consecrated by the presence, the preaching, and the miracles
+of the Son of God, to that grotto where he was born to us a Saviour, we
+shall at last return; perpetually to hymn his praises, to deplore our
+trespasses with frequent tears; to give our days and nights to holy
+orisons, as if smitten with the same love which exclaimed, “Him whom my
+soul hath yearned for, have I found. I will hold him, and will not let him
+go.”(278) Such wondrous music did the spiritual enchanter pour forth from
+his lonely grotto. In such words as these, throbbing with love and holy
+zeal, did the great heart of the worn ascetic of Bethlehem gush forth. And
+they depicted in such vivid colors the sweet peace and purity and
+happiness of a new earthly paradise far away in the Eastern land, that
+many souls were lured away by the charmer’s voice out of the great Western
+Babylon in time to escape the tempest that was just about to descend upon
+it. Many illustrious names appear among the fugitives. Paula forgot her
+lofty pedigree and her more than princely fortune, and fled eastward, and
+S. Melania and many others of patrician rank hurried away to Bethlehem to
+escape the impending doom. And there, whilst the mighty God thundered, and
+hurled his flaming arrows of vengeance, and the great sinful empire
+tottered and crashed under the awful blows of his wrath, did those favored
+Christians tremble and pray amid holy scenes and sweet associations, round
+the grand spiritual figure of S. Jerome.
+
+But it was not only among the believers in God’s Word, and those who
+observed the signs of the times from their watch‐towers in the heart of
+the empire, that the belief in the imminent catastrophe had taken a strong
+hold. The idea that vengeance was close at hand was agitating with fierce
+intensity the barbaric nations themselves. Whence that idea came, they
+themselves could not have told. It had long been working in their minds
+like a living fire; it had gone on inflaming their souls till they felt
+their whole being on fire with an ungovernable passion for destruction and
+vengeance. They had been kept for long centuries by an overruling power in
+their northern forests, waiting for an unknown moment in the future. But
+that moment, they felt, was now at hand. They were ready for it, for they
+knew they were the scourges of wrath in the hands of a mighty God.
+
+But before that fierce, black storm‐cloud up yonder in the North pours out
+its fiery wrath upon the doomed empire, we will try to get a glimpse
+behind it to see what elements are hidden there.
+
+Let the reader open his historical atlas, and follow with his eye the
+boundaries of the Roman Empire in the West. He will see that the east,
+west, and south of Europe are lying at the feet of Rome, the heart and
+centre of the world. As he casts his glance over his chart, he will be
+struck by the countless names that cover the face of Italy and Gaul and
+Spain, and all those countries that are comprehended within the rule and
+civilization of the great capital of the empire. But as he raises his eye
+northwards, he marks the outlines of Roman power. He might say that the
+Rhine and the Danube are the boundaries in that direction of imperial
+dominion. And what does he see beyond? Nothing that denotes that
+civilization has ever set a firm foot there. The great Hercynian forest
+begins at the Rhine, and stretches far away, with its dense, impenetrable
+blackness, as far as the Vistula. It looks like a long, broad line of
+fortification thrown up by nature to guard the North from Roman ambition.
+Beyond this, again, is a wild unknown land. The student becomes bewildered
+as he tries to gain an accurate knowledge of it. It is a dreary wilderness
+of forest, and swamp, and vast tracts of land that have known no tillage.
+He finds no name of city or town, but only the hard names of countless
+barbaric tribes. These seem to fill, without order or defined limit of
+dominion, the vast area from the borders of the Rhine and Danube to the
+Baltic Sea, and the mainland and innumerable islets of Scandinavia. If he
+cast his eye towards the North‐east, the prospect is of a land still less
+known, and, at the same time, less thickly peopled. But the barbaric names
+are there, though few in number, and the wild waste seems to stretch away
+interminably into the darkness. The map calls it Scythia, and that is
+almost all the student can gather from looking at it; but it seems to him
+that it is the high‐road by which the countless barbarian tribes have come
+into Europe. We may well believe Gibbon when he tells us that this vast,
+unknown northern land, cut off from the Roman Empire by the Rhine and the
+Danube, and shrouded in gloom and darkness by its widespreading forests,
+extended itself over a third part of Europe.(279) Tacitus describes it as
+a country under a gloomy sky, rude, dismal in aspect and cultivation; more
+humid than Gaul, more stormy than Noricum and Pannonia.(280) It was a
+country where the waters were often covered with thick ice, and the
+mountains with snow, where the air was cold and sharp, and the storms blew
+fierce and strong. It was, in a word, a country where no delicate, soft
+races could have lived, but where only men of stalwart frame and hardy
+natures could have their home; men who could bound up the snowy mountain
+heights with a feeling of luxury, could hunt with delight among the frozen
+swamps, and run in the teeth of the sharp blast through thick forests
+where the warm sun‐rays never penetrated. And what was this strange,
+unknown land, so dark and impenetrable, so vast in its extent, so defended
+by rivers and ocean and far‐reaching fortification of Hercynian forest, so
+wild and uncultivated, so dismal and cold, and overhanging with its
+savage, frowning aspect the empire of Rome? It was the camp of the God of
+battles. With a divine purpose of his own, he had kept it free from Roman
+conquest. He had marked it off for himself by those wide rivers and stormy
+seas, and planted that thick long line of forest trees on its frontier,
+and shrouded its vast area in secrecy and mystery by widespreading woods.
+And under the shadow of these thick forests he had, for long generations,
+been gathering his warrior‐bands. The great empire had been growing for
+centuries in power and riches, and had piled up her monuments to tell the
+ages of her glories, and had come to think herself everlasting; but whilst
+she thus developed her power so mightily, her destroyers were being
+gathered together in secret in that Northern land. It was not by chance
+that the Roman Empire had built herself up in such glory and imposing
+magnitude on the ruins of the great empires that had preceded her, and not
+for a barren purpose. God had marked with his finger the boundary‐line of
+her dominions long before she extended her power so far, and he had
+appointed her the work which she was to do for him. But he had marked out,
+also, the term in the future whereunto she should endure, and had chosen
+beforehand the instruments which he would use for her destruction. As she
+was to be the most mighty of all empires which the world had ever seen, so
+would her destroyers have to be mighty and terrible in their powers of
+destruction. And those destroyers God will have ready at the right moment.
+No human eye could see what was going on under that dense darkness in the
+North; its mysterious depth was impenetrable to mortal kin. It was the
+secret laboratory of God, where he was fashioning his instruments of
+wrath. He had long been there amidst the terror and gloom beckoning the
+wild races of the earth to come to him, and they had obeyed his call,
+though they knew not why. Far back in the ages of time, before history had
+taken up her pen, there was a great breaking up of the Aryan family in the
+Eastern land, and they divided themselves into two great sections. They
+moved in opposite directions, one towards the East, the other towards the
+West. Though that breaking up seems, at first sight, to have nothing
+providential about it, yet it was no accidental separation. Bringing our
+Catholic principles to bear upon it, we soon see that it was the work of
+God. The wild tribes wandered on, they knew not whither. But they had a
+guide as real and definite as the Israelites in after‐times. It was,
+perhaps, no pillar of fire nor mysterious moving cloud, but yet as
+unerring in its leading. The Eastern Aryans took possession of Persia,
+and, invading India, gradually made themselves masters of the country as
+far as the Ganges. In this rich and fertile region they soon advanced,
+with rapid steps, to a high state of civilization. When we first meet them
+in history, they are a powerful nation, with well‐disciplined armies, and
+arts and sciences highly cultivated. Of those who took the westerly
+course, some settled down in the southern parts of Europe, and at the
+opening of history are found in a state of civilization. One section of
+them, wild, bold, and free, remain in a nomadic state. They wander on
+towards the Northwest, never settling down, ever restless. They feel
+themselves drawn ever onward, as by some mysterious power which they
+cannot resist. That strange, unseen power is he who dwells amid the
+darkness of the Scandinavian and Suabian forests. And as they pour into
+that weird gloom, band after band, they are lost to view. God wants them
+there for a time. They are one day to rush forth again, at his bidding,
+wild and fierce as ever, to do their appointed work.
+
+Of these multitudinous tribes, hidden under the dark covering of those
+Northern forests, we cannot undertake to give any detailed account. The
+student who has ever pored over his historical chart representing the home
+of the barbarians, knows well how impossible it is to obtain accurate
+ideas about them. He is simply bewildered with the number of tribes, and
+the hard names by which they are designated. He is content to let Dr.
+Latham and Mr. Kingsley dispute at their pleasure as to whether the Goths
+were Teutons or a separate tribe. Some authors, with Gibbon, would make
+the Teutons the great tribe which included and absorbed almost all the
+rest, whilst Dr. Latham insists that they were far less in numbers than is
+commonly supposed. It is not now our purpose to enter on a question of
+this nature. Our view of them is simply as a _fourmillement des nations_,
+confused, indistinguishable, undefinable. We cannot pretend to speak with
+accuracy as to what territory was occupied by each tribe. What they do we
+can only guess at. They do not regard themselves as in their settled home.
+They wander about restless, and unsatisfied in their wild forest lands.
+They have only an indistinct idea whence they came, but they have a
+mysterious instinct whither they are to go when the appointed day comes.
+At one time they are on the Baltic shore, at another on the Danube bank.
+They never think of marching back Eastward, whence they came; their faces
+are turned towards the South, and they dream of a rich, golden city in
+which they are one day to revel and feast to their heart’s content.
+
+It is something bewildering to pause over and think upon, in our
+historical studies, is this Northern land of darkness, with its hidden
+millions of wild savages silently wandering about in their gloomy forest,
+under the eye of God, and waiting for the signal to rush forth upon the
+sin‐laden empire of Rome! There never was anything more mysterious in
+history. They hang for long years, like a suspended curse, over a sinful
+world. They would have come down thundering like a crushing avalanche long
+before they did, if God had not held them back. It is wonderful to think
+how really they were in the hand of the great Over‐ruler. Suddenly it had
+entered into their minds, as we have seen, to break up their home in the
+far East, in prehistoric times, and they had obeyed the instinct. They
+moved away from their native land, and set out upon their wanderings. They
+knew no land beyond their own, nor had they reason to expect that they
+would discover anything better than what they enjoyed in the country of
+their birth. But still they wandered on. Whither they were journeying they
+had no knowledge, but they were obeying an overmastering power. They found
+themselves, at last, gathered together in a mysterious land of darkness,
+and there they paused. They felt they were at the rendezvous to which they
+had been called. They were at the feet of him who had beckoned to them to
+leave their homes in the Eastern land. Their instinct now was to remain
+hidden there for a time behind the great fortification of the Hercynian
+forest. From beginning to end all through their history these barbarians
+are in the hand of God, under his generalship, and used to execute his
+designs. Such teaching as this will, no doubt, appear puerile to the
+sneering atheism of men like Herbert Spencer. He and those of his school
+have discovered that God has nothing to do with the course of human events
+or the government of the universe.(281) Social Science has led them far
+beyond the old‐world ideas of God and divine government; but, thanks to
+the sound and safe teaching of Catholic principles, there are yet men in
+these days who refuse to run after the _ignis fatuus_ of Spencerian
+philosophy.
+
+But when we consider how the great civilized world of the Roman Empire and
+this world of the barbarian tribes bordered so close on one another for so
+long a time, and when we think what conquests Christianity had made
+wherever civilization had set its foot, we wonder how that dark Northern
+land could remain still heathen. Were not the citadels of the Christian
+religion planted all along the borders of the Roman Empire? Did no gleams,
+then, of Christian light shoot forth into the darkness beyond? We know
+that such certainly was the case in the Northwestern portion, where the
+Goths dwelt, for we read of Ulphilas and his apostolic labors among that
+tribe. But for the most part, the darkness was unpenetrated, and we are
+struck by the sight of two worlds running so close up to one another and
+yet remaining so isolated in a religious point of view. The fact was, the
+time for the conversion of the Northmen had not yet come. Their apostles
+were to be a race of heroes born on the mountain‐heights, and nourished in
+the pure, bracing air of monastic solitude. The barbarians were waiting
+for the monks. It is true that these wild tribes had already a worship of
+their own, and deeply religious in their way they certainly were. It was a
+religion quite in keeping with their wild, free character. Men who were so
+restless and active in their disposition, who delighted in storm and
+mountain and roaring torrents, would have no temple of wood or stone for
+their place of worship. Their temple was out in the open air, under the
+driving clouds, within hearing of the tumbling waterfalls, in sight of
+nature’s face; for nature to them was God. They saw him in the great
+mountain towering up on high, in the rocking forest‐trees, in the wide‐
+stretching plain, in the flowing river, in the gushing fountain. He was in
+every object around them; in every speck of light in the overarching
+heavens; in the glistening streamlet; in the variegated flowers bedecking
+nature’s face; in the rock that stood out to break the power of the
+rushing sea‐waves; in the very stones scattered around them on the plain.
+There was a divinity of some kind in everything they saw.(282) It would,
+perhaps, be more true to say that their religion was polytheism rather
+than pantheism. We find, moreover, that the tendency of their religious
+belief was to keep alive in their souls the warlike spirit. The greatest
+and highest of their gods were beings of mighty power and terrible
+violence. “Woden, or Odin, as he was called in Scandinavia, was the
+omnipresent, the almighty creator, the father of gods and men; who ruled
+the universe, riding on the clouds, and sending rain and sunshine; in whom
+were centred all godlike attributes, of which he imparted a share to the
+other gods; and from whom proceeded all beauty, wisdom, strength, and
+fruitfulness, the knowledge of agriculture and the arts, the inspirations
+of music and song, and all good gifts. He was the giant hunter, who in the
+darkest nights rushed through the air on his white charger, clad in a
+brown mantle, his white locks streaming from beneath his slouching hat,
+followed by a train of wild huntsmen, the horses snorting fire, the
+bloodhounds baying, announcing war and carnage, danger and distress, as he
+passed along with lightning speed. But he was in a more special way the
+god of war, revelling in blood and slaughter, giving courage and victory
+to his votaries, and admitting to his Valhalla, or hall of bliss, none but
+those who died by the sword.
+
+“Next to him was his son Thor, who rode on the thunder‐cloud and
+whirlwind, whose hammer was the thunderbolt, whose arrows were the
+lightning flashes, and whose wagon dashed through the heavens with
+crashing noise and ungovernable fury.”(283)
+
+Then there was Saxnôt, another son of Woden, who occupied the third place
+among the gods. His name is afterwards associated with those of Woden and
+Thor in the abjuration of paganism made by those who were converted to
+Christianity. He is designated under many different names. He is Eor, or
+Are, or Ere, or Cheru, Tyr, Zio, Tuisco, or Tuis. He was the god of war,
+fierce and terrible, rushing to battle, at Woden’s side, and bearing down
+whole hosts with his mighty sword of iron or stone.
+
+War, blood, and violence, then, were ever, in the minds of the barbarians,
+associated with the greatest of those beings whom they worshipped and
+admired. The character and the deeds of these gods were the highest and
+the noblest they could conceive. To be mighty in battle like them; to
+wield their war‐weapon as Thor wielded his huge hammer; to mow down
+enemies as Tuisco did with his terrible sword, would be the grand object
+of their soul’s desire. We may judge how little there was in their
+religious worship to tone down their fierce natures. Everything symbolized
+war; their deities were almost all warlike. Even Freyja, the Northern
+Venus, was pictured to their imagination as delighting in war. She was
+believed to be ever present in the battle‐field, wielding her flaming
+sword, with frantic joy, over the heads of their enemies, and ready to
+bear off the souls of the slain to Odin’s Valhalla. In that imaginary
+Elysium the joys of their fallen heroes were also of a warlike and savage
+character. They revelled there in “constantly massacring visionary foes,
+and drinking without satiety, out of the skulls of the slain, brimming
+ale‐cups presented by lovely Valkyrja.” What shall we expect, then, when
+these wild warriors are turned loose upon the Roman Empire?
+
+But is it possible to obtain a further glimpse behind that vast, dark line
+of pine‐trees? Can we, by any means, get a glance at the wild indwellers
+of the mysterious land beyond? What are those men like whom God has so
+long kept hidden there? From time to time they have come forth from their
+forest homes and stood on the boundaries of the civilized world, and
+rolled their glaring eyes around over the rich empire that was to be their
+booty. But that has been, as it were, only for a moment. They have plunged
+again into their native darkness. Yet such writers as Apollinaris and
+Ammianus Marcellinus have told us something of them. By their aid we can
+picture to ourselves what those terrible hosts of avengers will be like,
+who will presently come down with such a headlong sweep upon the doomed
+empire of Rome.
+
+All that we can imagine savage and terrible and extraordinary in figure
+and habit is found in real fact among those barbaric hordes. There are
+among them tribes who are small of stature, and thin and brawny, but quick
+and fierce as the wild‐cat. There are, too, men of giant height and
+strength, who can wield their huge clubs like playthings, and shiver the
+hard rock like glass. They have blue, flashing eyes, and bathe their
+flaxen hair in lime‐water, and anoint it with the unsavory unguent of
+rancid butter. Some of them roam about nude and uncovered as the wild
+animals of the forest, proud of their iron necklaces and golden bracelets;
+others are partially clothed with the skins of savage beasts, cut and
+shaped after the most odd and fantastic fashions. Some give additional
+terror to their appearance by wearing helmets made to imitate the muzzles
+of ferocious beasts. Plutarch tells us that all the Cimbrian horsemen wore
+helmets made in the form of the open jaws and muzzles of all kinds of
+strange and savage animals, and surmounted these by plumes shaped like
+wings, and of a prodigious height. This gave them the appearance of
+monstrous giants. They were armed with cuirasses of most brilliant metal,
+and covered with bucklers of uniform whiteness. Some shaved their chins,
+and, what must have added much to their hideousness, the back of their
+heads, whilst their hair was drawn to the front and hung down over their
+eyes like the forelock of a horse. So says Apollinaris,
+
+
+    “Ad front em coma tracta jacet, nudata cervix
+    Setarum per summa nitet.”(284)
+
+
+Others, again, allowed their hair to grow, and wore long mustachios and
+beard. Their weapons of war were various and strange as their own
+appearance. Some fought on foot, wielding with savage fury the huge club,
+or crushing mallet, or heavy‐headed hammer; or they did fierce work with
+their rude sword, or long javelin with its two points, or double‐edged
+hatchet; or they were skilful in the use of the sling or the arrow pointed
+with sharp pieces of bone. Others rushed to battle on high war‐steeds
+barded with steel, or on small horses, ugly and wretched to look at, but
+swift as eagles in their course. If they fought on the level plain, these
+barbarians were sometimes scattered over a large space, or they formed
+themselves into cuneiform bodies, or they pressed together into compact,
+impenetrable masses. If the contest was waged in the forests, they clomb
+the trees, which they worshipped, with the agility of monkeys, and there
+combated their enemies with wild ferocity, thus borne on the shoulders and
+in the arms of their gods. If they were conquerors in the battle, they
+abandoned themselves to acts of the most savage cruelty. To illustrate
+this we need only think of the tragic deeds that were done amid the swamps
+and the wooded hills of the Teutoberger Wald in the latter days of
+Augustus. It is sad, indeed, to read in Tacitus and the pages of Dio of
+the fate of that noble Roman army over which Varus held command. Yet we
+cannot regret to see the well‐concerted rising of the German tribes, under
+the splendid military genius of Arnim, to throw off the Roman yoke. We
+hold in deepest horror the wrongs, the oppressions of the Romans from the
+first ravages of Cæsar to the judicial murders of Varus. We think with
+feelings of indignation of the treachery and the bloody cruelty of Cæsar
+when the Usipetes and the Teuchteri were all but annihilated on the banks
+of the Rhine, and the Roman general rejoiced at his own unprovoked
+atrocity. We recall with sorrow all that the barbarians had had to suffer
+from their Roman conquerors through succeeding years, and our souls are on
+fire at the recollection of it. When, then, we see that the day of
+deliverance is at hand, we carrot but rejoice with Arnim and his brother
+Adelings at the prospect of future freedom. Our sympathies are with the
+Germans, not with their Roman oppressors. Whilst the Romans, then, are
+hungry and starved in the long, boggy valley between the sources of the
+Ems and the Lippe, and the rain falls in torrents through the cold night,
+and the soldiers’ spirits sink as they find themselves hemmed in by the
+enemy on all sides, we are, meantime, in imagination and feeling with the
+barbarian chiefs holding high festival as they recall the memory of
+ancient freedom and the deeds of former days, and we join in the war songs
+as they echo among the wild, dreary hills, and swell above the howlings of
+the storm. And when the morning breaks ominously and darkly over the
+Teutoberger Wald, and the tempest rises higher, and the heavy‐armed Romans
+cannot advance, and find it difficult, even, to keep their footing in the
+wet and slippery swamp; when we see their bows now useless from the wet,
+and their spears and shields no longer glittering in military pride, and
+their entire armor and clothing drenched and made too heavy for the poor
+benumbed and hunger‐stricken soldiers to bear, we can scarcely feel one
+pang of sorrow. On the contrary, our heart leaps with gladness when Arnim
+from his watch‐eminence gives the signal, and the trumpets ring out and
+the war‐weapons clang, and the terrible Barritum described by Tacitus(285)
+is heard rising above the howlings of the storm. We know how that tragic
+day ended, and how the evening saw the Roman host covering, with their
+dead bodies, the length and breadth of the battle‐field. Never had there
+been, in the annals of military warfare, such a terrible massacre of Roman
+legions. The news of it seized upon Augustus like a madness, and the old
+man, during the short remainder of his life, wandered sad and disconsolate
+through the apartments of his palace, sometimes dashing his white head
+against the walls, and murmuring, _Quintili Vare, legiones redde!_(286)
+But the barbarians were not content with such terrific slaughter as nearly
+annihilated the Roman army; their wild ferocity and cruelty showed
+themselves in their treatment of the captives. Tacitus in his _Annals_
+tells us(287) that in the neighboring woods the barbarians had altars
+erected to their gods, and there the surviving Roman tribunes and the
+centurions of the first class were offered in sacrifice. Around Varus’s
+camp Roman heads were fixed, in cruel mockery, on the trunks and branches
+of trees, and in the midst arose a huge mound of Roman bones, left to be
+stripped of their flesh by the wild birds of prey, and then to whiten
+under that northern sky into a long enduring monument of a great barbarian
+victory.
+
+If, on the contrary they were conquered, their fury was boundless, and was
+even turned against each other. When Marius overcame the first Cimbrian
+league, those who composed it were found on the field of battle bound fast
+to each other, so that they could not fall back before the enemy, and thus
+were compelled to conquer or die. Their wives were armed with swords or
+hatchets, and, shrieking and gnashing their teeth with rage and grief,
+they struck both Cimbrians and Romans. They rushed into the thickest of
+the fight, snatching with their naked hands at the sharp‐cutting Roman
+sabres; they sprang upon the legionaries like tigers, tearing from them
+their bucklers, and thus purposely drawing upon themselves their own
+destruction. It was a dreadful sight also to witness some of them when the
+fortune of the day had turned against them, rushing to and fro with
+dishevelled hair, their black dresses all torn and bloody, or to see them
+mounted like mad fiends on the chariots, killing their husbands and
+brothers, fathers and sons, strangling their new‐born infants and casting
+them under the horses’ hoofs, and then plunging the dagger into their own
+bosoms.(288)
+
+Some of the barbarians delighted in eating human flesh. Ammianus
+Marcellinus gives us a picture in his history which freezes our blood and
+haunts us with its horrid memory. He tells us that, after the defeat of
+Valens under the walls of Constantinople, a barbarian was seen rushing
+among the imperial troops, naked down to his waist, sword in hand, and
+uttering a hoarse, lugubrious cry. He sprang with savage fury upon an
+enemy whom he had slain, and, applying his lips to his throat, sucked out
+his life‐blood with a wild beast’s relish. The Scythians of Europe were
+amongst those who showed this same instinct of the weasel and the hyena.
+We have the authority of S. Jerome for believing that the Atticoti also
+were accustomed to feed on human flesh. When they were wandering about in
+the woods of Gaul, and happened to meet herds of swine or other cattle,
+they cut off the breasts of the shepherdesses, and large pieces from the
+bodies of the shepherds, and ate them as dainty bits.(289) The Alans tore
+off the heads of their enemies, and caparisoned their horses with the
+skins of their bodies. The Budini and Geloni were accustomed to do much
+the same, being particular in reserving their enemies’ heads for
+themselves. The appearance of the Geloni was a sickening sight to look
+upon. They were accustomed to have their cheeks cut and gashed; and their
+proudest distinction was a face all covered with wounds that were scaly,
+and livid and crowned with blood‐red crests.
+
+But if there is something terrible in the appearance and customs of the
+barbarians whom we have mentioned, it is surpassed by what we are told of
+the Huns. We shall not be able to form a true idea of the dreadful
+avengers who are to come down out of that Northern gloom, unless we look
+for a moment at this most terrible of the barbaric tribes. The Goths
+themselves, the stalwart giants of the Scandinavian forests, who knew no
+fear of men, could not but be terrified when they first fixed eyes on the
+hideous forms of the Huns. Jornandes, the Gothic historian, tells us that
+“the livid color of their skin had in it something shocking to the sight;
+theirs was not a face, but a deformed mass of flesh, provided, instead of
+eyes, with two black sinister spots. Their cruelty wreaked itself even
+upon their own new‐born offspring, whose cheeks they lacerated with iron
+before they had tasted their mother’s milk; and from this cause no down
+graced their chin in youth, no beard gave dignity to their old age.” We
+are told by Ammianus that “they looked not like men, but like wild beasts
+standing on two legs, as if in mockery of the human species.” They were,
+in truth, the wildest and most savage of all the barbarian hordes. They
+loved to be free and unrestrained as the wandering blasts of their native
+solitudes. They ate and slept on the ground under the open sky. They took
+their food raw and uncooked, like the tigers of the forest. No temples of
+worship had they; their God was a naked sword fixed in the ground. They
+were devoured by an insatiable thirst for gold, which they were ever ready
+to procure through blood, and smoke, and wholesale ruin. But the
+characteristic of their race was a ferocious delight in cruel massacre,
+and they gloried in pillaging, burning, and levelling down to the ground
+every monument of civilization that came in their path, till the regions
+over which they swept bore a resemblance to their native deserts. The rest
+of the barbarians were amazed at their inhumanity, and looked upon them as
+fiends under the likeness of men.
+
+But we need say no more. We have caught some few glimpses of what is
+behind the dark storm‐cloud, and we can form some idea of the horrors that
+are hidden there. Well may men tremble as they look northwards in the Vth
+century. Well may Christians think they hear now again, ringing out more
+clearly than ever, the warning voice of S. John, and flee to far‐off
+hiding‐places. The sinful empire herself feels, at times, as if under the
+horrors of a nightmare; in her frightful dreams she thinks she is trampled
+upon, and crushed under the feet of fierce, wild men of terrible aspect,
+and torn and hacked by their strange weapons of war. As the tempest lowers
+over her darker and darker, and threatens to become all‐enveloping in its
+wrath, a deep shudder runs through her mighty frame. And well may she
+stagger and quake for fear. The reckoning‐day is close at hand, so long
+waited for by the holy martyrs of foregone centuries. And a day of
+dreadful destruction it will be.
+
+But lo! the hour has already struck. God has given the signal to his
+warrior‐hosts. The Goth has given a ringing blast on his horn, and the
+German has shouted the first notes of his terrible war‐song, and the pine‐
+trees of the Hercynian forest are trembling at the sound. The avengers of
+the martyrs and the Christian name are coming, and the whole North is
+shaking under their tread. At last the storm‐cloud bursts, and fiery
+destruction sweeps down upon the doomed empire of Rome.
+
+
+
+
+New Publications.
+
+
+    IRELAND’S CASE STATED: IN REPLY TO MR. FROUDE. By the Very Rev. T.
+    N. Burke, O.P. New York: P. M. Haverty. 1873.
+
+
+Ireland’s case has been stated, argued, vindicated, and, so far as the
+verdict of the American people is concerned, adjudicated. Mr. Froude has
+given his last scowl and his last growl, and gone back to his own
+country—which he has damaged by his foolish escapade—the most badly beaten
+man of the present decade. It is rather late in the day to revert to the
+topic of F. Burke’s combat with this obstinate champion of bad characters
+and bad causes, and we will, therefore, let it pass with these few words.
+We are hoping to see soon issued Mr. Haverty’s promised second volume of
+F. Burke’s _Discourses and Lectures_, and we once more express our regret
+that any should be found so unmindful of propriety and courtesy, to say
+the least, as to interfere with F. Burke’s control of the publication of
+his own works. The eloquent Dominican preacher may be assured that the
+respect and sympathy not only of all Catholic Irishmen, but of all other
+Catholics of the United States, will be his while he remains here as our
+honored guest, and will follow him when he returns to his native land, or
+to his own beloved and imperial Rome.
+
+
+    KEEL AND SADDLE: A RETROSPECT OF FORTY YEARS OF MILITARY AND NAVAL
+    SERVICE. By Joseph W. Revere. Boston: J. R. Osgood & Co. 1872.
+
+
+We are so often disgusted, in reading books of entertainment, with a
+revelation of positive rascality and impiety, or at least of a want of
+high moral and religious principle in the author, that it is a relief to
+meet sometimes with a happy disappointment. This is a lively, entertaining
+book of varied adventures on field and flood. Yet we always find the
+author, when his personality comes into view, not only a bold and brave
+soldier, but a gentleman, an honorable man, and a frank, staunch Catholic
+Christian, who never obtrudes yet never hides his faith and his principles
+of virtue. His views of Spanish affairs strike us as rather defective, and
+occasionally there is a narrative concerning persons of depraved morals
+which would have been better omitted for the sake of his youthful readers.
+The “Golondina” episode in chapter xxiv. relates an adventure whose
+lawfulness, we suspect, though perhaps admitted by quarter‐deck theology,
+would not stand the test of a strict examination. Sometimes we are at a
+loss to discover whether the author intends us to understand his narrative
+as historical, or is merely relating a _conte_ for our amusement. In his
+own personal adventures and the descriptions he gives of what he has seen,
+we discover at once that his narrative is real as well as picturesque. And
+it is certainly most interesting. The off‐hand, unstudied, and unaffected
+style reveal the character of the true, genuine, frank sailor and soldier;
+while at the same time, the refinement of taste and the cultivation of
+mind which are manifest throughout give these sketches from the diary of a
+long and adventurous life the literary finish which belongs to the work of
+a scholar. Notwithstanding certain exceptions we have made, we reiterate
+our commendation of the high tone of moral principle, the unaffected
+religious reverence, and the generally healthful and invigorating spirit
+which pervades the book which the gallant General Revere has given to the
+public as the retrospect of his forty years of naval and military service.
+
+
+    HYMNS AND POEMS: ORIGINAL AND TRANSLATED. By Edward Caswall, of
+    the Oratory. Second Edition. London: Burns, Oates & Co.;
+    Pickering. 1873. (New York: Sold by The Catholic Publication
+    Society.)
+
+
+Father Caswall’s hymns are as well known as Father Faber’s. Indeed, if we
+mistake not, many of them are popularly attributed to the departed writer.
+In the present volume we have a complete collection of the Breviary hymns,
+in the first place. This is especially valuable as the only one in the
+language (as far, at least, as we are aware). And the author deserves the
+more praise for this labor of love, because of the great difficulty of
+rendering the terse, stiff Latin. Then, secondly, we have “Hymns and
+Sequences of the Roman Missal”; followed by “Hymns from Various Offices
+and other Sources.” Thus the translated portion of the volume is quite
+sufficient to make it worth possessing. The execution, too, is very happy,
+on the whole. No one who has attempted to translate these hymns himself
+will insist overmuch on the absence of phrases commonplace or prosaic.
+
+The second portion of the volume, “Original Hymns and Meditative Pieces,”
+also contains much that entitles it to a place in every household. The
+devout Catholic, and more especially the convert, will find many things
+said for him which have come into his mind, but without his being able to
+express them. Moreover, several pieces turn on topics which are generally
+supposed themes for the dryest meditation. They are here proved suggestive
+of true poetry.
+
+The only fault we have to find with Father Caswall’s verse is the same
+that we find with Wordsworth’s: the too frequent sacrifice of poetic
+diction and the use of too many long Latin words. But this defect is
+unimportant compared with the value of the thoughts and teachings
+conveyed, and we fervently thank Father Caswall for his contribution to
+our scanty Catholic poetry.
+
+
+    THE POET AT THE BREAKFAST‐TABLE. Boston: James R. Osgood & Co.
+    1872.
+
+    “Once I wrote because my mind was full;
+    But now I write because I feel it growing dull,”
+
+
+or,
+
+
+    “I have lived long enough,”
+
+
+or,
+
+
+    “Poor old man, thou prun’st a rotten tree
+    That cannot so much as a blossom yield
+    In lieu of all thy pains and husbandry,”
+
+
+or some such saw, this Poet at the Breakfast‐table should have affixed to
+these four hundred pages of incomparable drivelling.
+
+“I talk half the time,” says the poet, in his opening paragraph, “to find
+out my own thoughts, as a schoolboy turns his pockets inside out to see
+what is in them.”
+
+And what does the schoolboy find there?
+
+Rusty nails, old shoe‐strings, copper pennies, dead bugs, crumbs of bread,
+broken knives, and other trash neither beautiful nor useful. The
+similitude is just. The contents of the Poet’s brain are as precious as
+those of the boy’s pocket; and if we wish to push the comparison further,
+the wares of both are often of doubtful ownership. The only serious thing
+in the book is its humor.
+
+“I don’t suppose my comic pieces are very laughable,” writes this poet,
+philosopher, sage; “at any rate, the man who makes a business of writing
+me down says the last one I wrote is very melancholy reading; and that if
+it was only a little better, perhaps some bereaved person might pick out a
+line or two that would do to put on a gravestone.” He has a most
+infallible instinct for the right comparison; as, for instance: “I love to
+talk, as a goose loves to swim. Sometimes I think it is because I _am_ a
+goose.” This is the first evidence of intelligent thought in the whole
+book. “My book and I,” he informs us, “are pretty much the same thing.
+Sometimes I steal from my book in my talk, without mentioning it, and then
+I say to myself: ‘Oh! that won’t do; everybody has read my book, and knows
+it by heart.’ And then the other _I_ says: You know there are two of us,
+right and left, like a pair of shoes! The other _I_ says: ‘You’re
+a—something or other—fool.’ ” The other _I_ is evidently a sensible
+fellow. “They haven’t read,” continues the other _I_, “your confounded old
+book; besides, if they have, they have forgotten all about it.”
+
+Again, the other _I_ says: “What a Balaam’s quadruped you are to tell ’em
+it’s in your book; they don’t care whether it is or not, if it’s anything
+worth saying; and if it isn’t worth saying, what are you braying for?”
+This is the question the reader asks himself all along, as the evidence
+that the poet has nothing to say worth the saying becomes more and more
+overwhelming. This kind of criticism, we know, is little better than
+trifling; but the performance deserves no other treatment, for we candidly
+think that a sorrier book could not proceed from a mind untouched.
+
+Why did this Poet, when he meant to write a book, seat himself at the
+breakfast‐table? Did he not know that a full stomach does not argue a mind
+replete? Had not Shakespeare said long ago that fat paunches have lean
+pates, or was he not physician enough to know that the _mens divinior_ is
+not to be found in hot rolls and coffee?
+
+We shall conclude with one other brief quotation from the Poet:
+
+“What do you do when you receive a book you don’t want from the author?
+said I: ‘Give him a good‐natured adjective or two if I can, and thank him,
+and tell him I am lying under a sense of obligation to him. This is as
+good an excuse for lying as any, I said.’ ”
+
+As we do not believe there can be an excuse for lying, and as we are
+certain that in this case there is no obligation under which to lie, we
+cannot give the author “a good‐natured adjective or two”; but we shall
+thank him to give us no more such nonsense.
+
+
+    YOUNG AMERICA ABROAD. Second Series: Cross and Crescent; or, Young
+    America in Turkey and Greece. A Story of Travel and Adventure. By
+    William T. Adams (Oliver Optic), author of “Outward Bound,”
+    “Shamrock and Thistle,” “Red Cross,” “Down the Rhine,” etc.
+    Boston: Lee & Shepard, Publishers. New York: Lee, Shepard &
+    Dillingham. 1873.
+
+
+This is the third volume of the second series of _Young America Abroad_,
+and, like all the rest of the series, is most instructive and
+entertaining.
+
+
+    THE TREASURE OF THE SEAS. By Prof. James De Mille, author of “The
+    B. O. W. C.,” “The Boys of Grand Pre School,” “Lost in the Fog,”
+    “Fire in the Woods,” “Among the Brigands,” etc. Illustrated.
+    Boston: Lee & Shepard, publishers; New York: Lee, Shepard &
+    Dillingham. 1872.
+
+
+This is one of the best of the “B. O. W. C. Series,” and will certainly be
+a favorite with the boys.
+
+
+    THE POLYTECHNIC: A Collection of Music for Schools, Classes, and
+    Clubs. Compiled and written by U. C. Burnap and Dr. W. J. Wetmore.
+    New York: J. W. Schermerhorn & Co.
+
+    THE ATHENÆUM: A Collection of Part‐Songs for Ladies’ Voices.
+    Arranged and written by U. C. Burnap and Dr. W. J. Wetmore. New
+    York: J. W. Schermerhorn & Co.
+
+
+The best criticism of both these musical publications is found in the
+preface to the first one cited:
+
+“Collections of school music are already sufficiently numerous and bulky,
+but too often they are found to contain very little that is available for
+the ordinary or the extraordinary occasions of school life.”
+
+
+    HART’S MANUAL OF AMERICAN LITERATURE—A MISTAKE CORRECTED.—Since
+    writing the brief notice of this really valuable work which
+    appeared in our December number, we have observed a very serious
+    misstatement in it respecting a distinguished convert to the
+    Catholic faith, the late Dr. Ives, formerly Protestant Bishop of
+    North Carolina. Prof. Hart states that he _returned to the
+    Episcopal Church_. He never dreamed of such an act of superlative
+    folly. He died, as he had lived, a most fervent and devout
+    Catholic, we might almost say—a _saint_, and was buried with all
+    the rites and all the honors of solemn obsequies in St. Patrick’s
+    Cathedral, New York. Prof. Hart, who always endeavors to be fair,
+    and whose notices of Catholic writers are marked by their
+    courtesy, would never have made this incorrect statement unless he
+    had been misled by some false information, and we rely on his
+    rectifying it in his next edition.
+
+
+    The following circular has been sent to us, and we publish it
+    because we think there is nothing more hostile to such nefarious
+    projects than free and early ventilation. Why does not Mr. _Abbot_
+    renounce his popish name, in his zeal to abolish every vestige of
+    Christianity? Our readers will not fail to see how apposite an
+    illustration this document furnishes of some of the remarks in our
+    first article. We have also received an article from the
+    _Cincinnati Gazette_ advocating the persecution of Catholics in
+    this country, with a trenchant reply by F. Callaghan.
+
+    (_From_ THE INDEX, _January 4, 1873_.)
+
+    Organize!
+
+    Liberals Of America,
+
+    The hour for action has arrived. The cause of freedom calls upon
+    us to combine our strength, our zeal, our efforts. These are
+
+    The Demands Of Liberalism.
+
+    1. We demand that churches and other ecclesiastical property shall
+    no longer be exempted from just taxation.
+
+    2. We demand that the employment of chaplains in Congress, in
+    state legislatures, in the navy and militia, and in prisons,
+    asylums, and all other institutions supported by public money,
+    shall be discontinued.
+
+    3. We demand that all public appropriations for sectarian,
+    educational, and charitable institutions shall cease.
+
+    4. We demand that all religious services now sustained by the
+    government shall be abolished; and especially that the use of the
+    Bible in the public schools, whether ostensibly as a textbook or
+    avowedly as a book of religious worship, shall be prohibited.
+
+    5. We demand that the appointment, by the President of the United
+    States or by the Governors of the various states, of all religious
+    festivals and feasts, shall wholly cease.
+
+    6. We demand that the judicial oath in the courts and in all other
+    departments of the government shall be abolished, and that simple
+    affirmation under pains and penalties of perjury shall be
+    established in its stead.
+
+    7. We demand that all laws directly or indirectly enforcing the
+    observance of Sunday as the Sabbath shall be repealed.
+
+    8. We demand that all laws looking to the enforcement of
+    “Christian” morality shall be abrogated, and that all laws shall
+    be conformed to the requirements of natural morality, equal
+    rights, and impartial liberty.
+
+    9. We demand that not only in the constitutions of the United
+    States and of the several States, but also in the practical
+    administration of the same, no privileges or advantage shall be
+    conceded to Christianity or any other special religion; that our
+    entire political system shall be founded and administered on a
+    purely secular basis; and that whatever changes shall prove
+    necessary to this end shall be consistently, unflinchingly, and
+    promptly made.
+
+    Liberals! I pledge to you my undivided sympathies and most
+    vigorous co‐operation, both in _The Index_ and out of it, in this
+    work of local and national organization. Let us begin at once to
+    lay the foundations of a great national party of freedom, which
+    shall demand the entire secularization of our municipal, state,
+    and national government.
+
+    Let us boldly and with high purpose meet the duty of the hour.
+    Rouse, then, to the great work of freeing America from the
+    usurpations of the church! Make this continent from ocean to ocean
+    sacred to human liberty! Prove that you are worthy descendants of
+    those whose wisdom and patriotism gave us a constitution untainted
+    with superstition! Shake off your slumbers, and break the chains
+    to which you have too long tamely submitted.
+
+    FRANCIS E. ABBOT.
+
+    TOLEDO, OHIO, Jan. 1, 1873.
+
+    Liberals Of New York,
+
+    Shall the coming “National Association to secure a Religious
+    Amendment to the United States Constitution,” to be held in New
+    York in February, find us unorganized for resistance? Let us at
+    once form a “Liberal League,” in which we may arrange a campaign
+    offensive and defensive for our liberties. Send me at once the
+    addresses of those who sympathize with us, that a meeting may be
+    called at an early day: remember that “he who is not for me is
+    against me,” and that our liberties are threatened.
+
+    E. F. DINSMORE,
+    36 Dey Street, New York,
+    Agent of _The Index_.
+
+
+
+
+
+[Transcriber’s Note: Obvious printer’s errors have been corrected.]
+
+
+
+
+
+
+FOOTNOTES
+
+
+    1 Alfred de Musset.
+
+    2 _The Life and Labors of S. Thomas of Aquin._ By the Very Rev. Roger
+      Bede Vaughan, O.S.B., Cathedral‐Prior of S. Michael’s, Hereford. 2
+      vols. London: Longmans; Hereford: James Hull. 1871‐2.
+
+    3 Proverbs vi., vii.
+
+    4 _Adv. Prax._, c. 2.
+
+    5 Bishop Wilson, _Sacra Privata_.
+
+    6 _Homil._, in S. Ignat., vii. p. 593.
+
+    7 Οὐχ ὡς Πέτρος καὶ Παῦλος διατάσσομαι ὑμῖν· ἐκεῖνοι Ἀπόστολος Ἰησοῦ
+      Χριστοῦ, ἐγὼ δὲ ἐλάχιστος.
+
+    8 Κλήμης ἐν ἕκτῳ των Ὑποτυπώσεων παρατέθειται την ἱστορίαν·
+      συνεπιμαρτυρει δὲ αυτῷ καὶ ὁ ἱεραπολίτης ἐπίσκοπος ὀνόματι Παπίας.
+      Τοῦ δὲ Μάρκου μνημονεύειν τὸν Πέτρον ἐν τῇ προτέρᾳ ἐπιστολῇ, ἦν καὶ
+      συντάξαι φασὶν ἐπ᾽ αὐτῆςς Ῥώμης· σημαίνειν τε τοῦτο αὐτὸν τὴν πόλιν
+      τροπεκώτερον Β βυλῶνα προσειπόντα, διὰ τούτων· Λοπαζεται ὑμᾶς,
+      κ.τ.λ.
+
+    9 Eusebius’ _Eccl. Hist._, l. 2, c. 25.
+
+   10 Τοῦ Πέτρου καὶ τοῦ Παύλου εν Ρώμηλ εὐαγγελιζομένων καὶ θεμελιούντων
+      τὴν ἑκκλησιαν.—_Eusebius_, l. 5, c. 8; also, S. Irenæus, _Adv.
+      Hæreses_, l. 3, c. 3.
+
+   11 Ἐγω δε τα τρόπαια των Ἀποστόλων ἔχω δεῖζαι, κ.τ.λ.—_Eusebius_, l. 2,
+      c. 25.
+
+   12 _Eusebius_, l. 3, c. 1.
+
+   13 “Edant ergo origines ecclesiarum suarum; evolvant ordinem
+      episcoporum suorum, ita per successiones ab initio decurrentem, ut
+      primus ille episcopus aliquem ex apostolis, vel apostolicis viris,
+      qui tamen cum apostolis perseveraverit, habuerit auctorem et
+      antecessorem. Hoc enim modo ecclesiæ apostolicæ census suos
+      deferunt: sicut Smyrnæorum Ecclesia Polycarpum ab Joanne collocatum
+      refert; sicut Romanorum, Clementum a Petro ordinatum
+      itidem.”—_Tertulliani_, _De Præscriptione Hæreticorum_, c. 32.
+
+   14 “Si autem Italiæ adjaces, habes Romam, unde nobis quoque auctoritas
+      præsto est. Ista quam felix ecclesia, cui totam doctrinam apostoli
+      cum sanguine quo profuderunt! ubi Petrus passioni Dominicæ
+      adæquatur; ubi Paulus Joannis exitu coronatur.”—_Tertulliani_, _De
+      Præscriptione Hæreticorum_, c. 36.
+
+   15 “Videamus quod lac a Paulo Corinthii hauserint; ad quam regulam
+      Galatæ sint recorrecti; quid legant Philippenses, Thessalonicenses,
+      Ephesii; quid etiam Romani de proximo sonent, quibus evangelium et
+      Petrus et Paulus sanguine quoque suo signatum
+      reliquerunt.”—_Tertulliani_, _Adv. Marcionem_, l. 4, c. 5.
+
+   16 1 _S. Peter_ v. 13: “The church that is at Babylon, elected together
+      with you, saluteth you; and so doth Marcus, my son.”
+
+   17 _S. John_ xxi. 18: “Verily, verily I say unto thee, when thou wast
+      young, thou girdedst thyself, and walkedst whither thou wouldst: but
+      when thou shalt be old, thou shalt stretch forth thy hands, and
+      another shall gird thee, and carry thee whither thou wouldst not.”
+      Also, 2 _S. Peter_ i. 14: “Knowing that shortly I must put off this
+      my tabernacle, even as our Lord Jesus Christ hath showed me.”
+
+   18 “Seven Roman cities strove for Homer dead
+      Through which the living Homer begged his bread.”
+
+   19 “Veteres omnes in errorem abrepti sunt.”
+
+   20 _Instit._, l. 4, c. 6, n. 15.
+
+   21 “De Babylone dissident veteres et novi interpretes. Veteres Romam
+      interpretantur, ubi Petrum fuisse nemo verus Christianus dubitavit:
+      novi, Babylonem in Chaldea. Ego veteribus assentior.”
+
+   22 Prof. Stuart, Andover _Biblical Repository_, Jan., 1833, vol. iii.
+      p. 153.
+
+   23 _Lectures on Ecclesiastical History._
+
+   24 _Introduction to the Study of the Holy Scriptures_, vol. ii. p. 361.
+
+   25 _A New Literal Translation, from the Original Greek, of all the
+      Apostolic Epistles; with a Commentary and Notes._
+
+   26 Prior Vaughan, _S. Thomas of Aquin_, i. 464.
+
+   27 _S. Thomas of Aquin_, Introduction.
+
+   28 _Christian Schools and Scholars_, ii. 20, 21.
+
+   29 _S. Thomas of Aquin_, i. 369.
+
+   30 _Christian Schools and Scholars_, ii. 325.
+
+   31 _Ibid._
+
+   32 _Christian Schools and Scholars_, i. 9‐11.
+
+   33 _S. Thomas of Aquin_, i. 134.
+
+   34 Montalembert, _Monks of the West_, i. Edin. ed.
+
+   35 _Monks of the West._
+
+   36 _Ibid._
+
+   37 _Monks of the West._
+
+   38 _Christian Schools and Scholars_, ii. 426.
+
+   39 _Monks of the West_, ii.
+
+   40 _Christian Schools and Scholars_, i.
+
+   41 _Ibid._
+
+   42 _Ibid._
+
+   43 _Christian Schools and Scholars._
+
+   44 _Christian Schools and Scholars_, i.
+
+   45 Montalembert’s _Monks of the West_, iii. 195, 197.
+
+   46 _Monks of the West._
+
+   47 _Monks of the West._
+
+   48 _Monks of the West._
+
+   49 _Monks of the West._
+
+   50 _Ibid._
+
+   51 _Christian Schools and Scholars._
+
+   52 _Christian Schools and Scholars._
+
+   53 _Ibid._
+
+   54 _Christian Schools and Scholars._
+
+   55 _Christian Schools and Scholars._
+
+   56 _Ibid._
+
+   57 _Ibid._
+
+   58 _Christian Schools and Scholars._
+
+   59 _Monks of the West._
+
+   60 _Gladstone._
+
+   61 _Christian Schools and Scholars._
+
+   62 _Monks of the West._
+
+   63 _Monks of the West._
+
+   64 _S. Thomas of Aquin._
+
+   65 _Christian Schools and Scholars._
+
+   66 “All the more reason.”
+
+   67 Term for the peasants and workingmen.
+
+   68 “Go, my son, there are now no Pyrenees.”
+
+   69 The queen’s bed‐chamber.
+
+   70 The king’s bed‐chamber.
+
+   71 “I am the state!”
+
+   72 “An instant more, and I should have had to wait!”
+
+   73 “The king is dead, long live the king.”
+
+   74 The Duchesse de Polignac.
+
+   75 Louis only knew how to love and to forgive; had he known how to
+      punish, he would have known how to reign.
+
+   76 Bancroft.
+
+   77 Bancroft.
+
+   78 Shea.
+
+   79 Lake George.
+
+   80 Caughnawaga.
+
+   81 _Christian Schools and Scholars_, i. 327.
+
+   82 _Ibid._
+
+   83 _Ibid._
+
+   84 _Christian Schools and Scholars._
+
+   85 _Life of S. Thomas of Aquin._
+
+   86 _S. Thomas of Aquin._
+
+   87 _Ibid._
+
+   88 _S. Thomas of Aquin._
+
+   89 _Christian Schools and Scholars._
+
+   90 _Ibid._
+
+   91 _Christian Schools and Scholars._
+
+   92 _Ibid._
+
+   93 _Christian Schools and Scholars_, ii. 370.
+
+   94 See _S. Thomas of Aquin_, i. 42.
+
+   95 Montalembert, _Monks of the West_, v. 159.
+
+   96 _Ibid._, v. 97.
+
+   97 _Christian Schools and Scholars._
+
+   98 _Ibid._
+
+   99 _Christian Schools and Scholars._
+
+  100 For all these and the following details, see _Christian Schools and
+      Scholars_.
+
+  101 _Christian Schools and Scholars._
+
+  102 _Ibid._
+
+  103 _The Condition of the Catholics under James I. Father Gerard’s
+      Narrative of the Gunpowder Plot._ Edited, with his Life, by John
+      Morris, Priest of the Society of Jesus. London: Longmans, Green &
+      Co. 1871. New York: Sold by The Catholic Publication Society.
+
+      _Her Majesty’s Tower._ By William Hepworth Dixon. Second series.
+      Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott & Co. 1869. Reprinted.
+
+  104 “The great house then rising at Charing Cross was said, in reference
+      to these gifts, to be plated with King Philip’s gold. Much of Don
+      Juan’s money passed in Cecil’s pocket.... Northampton and Suffolk
+      also obtained the most princely sums.”—_Her Majesty’s Tower_, pp.
+      59, 60.
+
+  105 _History of England_, ix. 36.
+
+  106 _Statutes of Elizabeth_, chap. i., v., xiii., xxi., xxiii., xxvii.,
+      xxviii., xxix., xxxv.
+
+  107 _The Life of Father John Gerard_, xcvii.‐ix.
+
+  108 Fifth Examination of Fawkes, November 9th and 10th, _State Paper
+      Office_, No. 54.
+
+  109 _Life of Father John Gerard_, p. clxxviii.
+
+  110 Page 221.
+
+  111 _A Narrative, etc._, pp. 76‐77.
+
+  112 Told to the writer as a fact.
+
+  113 This incident is authentic, and occurred at No. 13 Rue Royale.
+
+  114 _The Life and Labors of S. Thomas of Aquin._ By the Very Rev. Roger
+      Bede Vaughan, O.S.B. 2 vols. London: Longmans; Hereford: James Hull.
+      1871‐2.
+
+  115 xiv. 15, 16.
+
+  116 “Stop, traveller.”
+
+  117 “Behold, traveller.”
+
+  118 “Farewell,” or “Hail, for ever.”
+
+  119 _Sit tibi terra levis._
+
+  120 _Locus_, _loculus_.
+
+  121 Matt. xii. 32.
+
+  122 1 Cor. iii. 13, 15.
+
+  123 1 Pet.
+
+  124 Apocalypse xxi. 27.
+
+  125 2 Mach. xii. 43‐46.
+
+  126 xvi. 14.
+
+  127 xxxv. 19, 20.
+
+  128 2 Chron. xxi. 19.
+
+  129 “_Les morts ne sont pas les oubliés: ils ne sont que les absents._”
+
+  130 Sismondi, _His. Ital. Rep._
+
+  131 See CATHOLIC WORLD, vol. xiii., No. 73, April, 1871, p. 1.
+
+  132 _The Following of Christ_, b. iii. chap. v.
+
+  133 _Following of Christ_, b. iii. chap. v.
+
+  134 The Marquisate or March of Ancona was then governed by Charles of
+      Valois, who held Naples.
+
+  135 That is, in the territory of Padua, founded, as the student will
+      remember, by the Trojan Antenor, whose tomb is shown in Padua to
+      this day.
+
+  136 That is to say, the hermitage of the Camaldolites in Milton’s
+      Vall’ombrosa.
+
+  137 _Oriental and Linguistic Studies. The Veda; The Avesta; The Science
+      of Language_. By William Dwight Whitney, Prof. of Sanskrit and
+      Comparative Philology at Yale College. One vol. 8vo, 416 pp. New
+      York: Scribner, Armstrong & Co. 1873.
+
+  138 _Oriental and Linguistic Studies. The Veda; The Avesta; The Science
+      of Language_. By William Dwight Whitney, Prof. of Sanskrit and
+      Comparative Philology at Yale College. One vol. 8vo, 416 pp. New
+      York: Scribner, Armstrong & Co. 1873.
+
+  139 Title of the work given at head of this article.
+
+  140 Still stronger in the original: “Vielleicht ist noch kein Europäer
+      so tief in diese Sprache eingedrungen als er.”—_Mithridates_, vol.
+      i. p. 134.
+
+  141 Sidnarubam seu Grammatica Samscrdamica, cui accedit dissertatio
+      historico‐critica in linguam Samscrdamicam, vulgo Samscret dictam,
+      in qua hujus linguæ existentia, origo, exarati critice recensentur,
+      et simul aliquæ antiquissimæ gentilium orationes liturgicæ paucis
+      attinguntur et explicantur autore Paulino a S. Bartolomæo. Romæ,
+      1790.
+
+  142 _Catalogo de las Lenguas de las Naciones conocidas._ Madrid,
+      1800‐1805. Six large 8vo volumes.
+
+  143 These lectures, printed in book‐form at London, were soon after
+      first published in the United States by the Presbyterian College of
+      Andover.
+
+  144 “Wouldst thou the young year’s blossoms and the fruits of its
+      decline,
+      And all by which the soul is charmed, enraptured, feasted, fed,
+      Wouldst thou the earth and heaven itself in one sole name combine?
+      I name thee, O Sakuntula, and all at once is said.”
+
+  145 _L’Aryanisme, et de la trop grande part qu’on a faite à son
+      influence, etc._
+
+  146 How such information could have been had from the _Fasti Consulares_
+      is difficult to say; the suppression was probably a _lapsus memoriæ_
+      for Josephus Flavius. The date of S. Paul’s coming to Rome is too
+      uncertain to be fixed at 61, yet we accept this year on the
+      authority of those who put it forward in the discussion.
+
+  147 See _Op. S. Irenæi_, Ed. Cong. S. Mauri, Ven. an. 1734.
+
+  148 _De Viris Illustribus_, c. i.
+
+  149 _Ap. Eusebium_, H. E. lib. iii. c. i.
+
+  150 _Via Appia da Porta Capena a Boville._ Descritta dal Commendatore L.
+      Canina. 2 vols. Roma. 1853.
+
+  151 _La Roma Sotterranea Christiana._ Descritta ed illustrat dal Cav. G.
+      B. de Rossi. Roma. 1864.
+
+  152 _Defense de l’Esprit des Lois_, 3e partie.
+
+  153 Aringhi, _Roma Subterr._ lib. iii. c. 2.
+
+  154 _Ner._ 48.
+
+  155 _Pro Cluent._ 13.
+
+  156 _I cimeteri sotteranei di Roma sono stati scavati dai cristiani
+      fossari tranne pochissime eccezioni, le quali importanti per la
+      storia, nell’ampiezza però della sotteranea escavazione scompajono;
+      e possono veramente dirsi quello, che i matematici appellano una
+      quantitià infinitesima e da non essere tenuta a calcolo._—App. p.
+      39.
+
+  157 Psalm xxiii.
+
+  158 S. John x. 14‐16.
+
+  159 _O præclarum diem, cum ad illud divinum animorum concilium cœtumque
+      proficiscar, cumque ex hac turba et colluvione discedam! Proficiscar
+      enim, non ad eos solum viros, de quibus ante dixi, sed etiam ad
+      Catonem meum._—_De Senectute_, 25.
+
+  160 Coleridge’s _Piccolomini_, scene iv.
+
+  161 xii. 40.
+
+  162 Newman’s _Church of the Fathers_, Introduction.
+
+  163 Jonas iv. 2.
+
+  164 S. Augustine says:—“Love the men, destroy the errors: be bold
+      without pride in the maintenance of truth; strive for the truth
+      without harshness; pray for those whom you rebuke and
+      confound.”—_Contra lit. Petiliani_, l. i.
+
+  165 xx. 23.
+
+  166 Romans vi. 3, 4.
+
+  167 S. Augustine, _Serm._ 296, p. 1195, tom. v.
+
+  168 Tertullian, _Scorpiace_, p. 628.
+
+  169 1 Epist. iii. 2.
+
+  170 Am. ed. p. 82.
+
+  171 _An Eirenicon_, Eng. ed., p. 101.
+
+  172 “If there be one writer in the Anglican Church who has discovered a
+      deep, tender, loyal devotion to the Blessed Mary, it is the author
+      of _The Christian Year_. The image of the Virgin and Child seems to
+      be the one vision upon which both his heart and intellect have been
+      formed; and those who knew Oxford twenty or thirty years ago say
+      that, while other college rooms were ornamented with pictures of
+      Napoleon on horseback, or Apollo and the Graces, or Heads of Houses
+      lounging in their easy‐chairs, there was one man—a young and rising
+      one—in whose rooms, instead of these, might be seen the Madonna di
+      Sisto or Domenichino’s S. John—fit augury of him who was in the
+      event to do so much for the revival of Catholicism.”—Newman’s
+      _Essays_, vol. ii. p. 453.
+
+  173 _Memoir of Keble._ By Sir J. T. Coleridge, Eng. ed., p. 305.
+
+  174 Dr. Nevin, one of the leaders of religious thought in the German
+      Reformed communion, of which the _Mercersburg Review_ is the organ,
+      has said: “The man cannot be right at heart in regard to the faith
+      of the Incarnation, whose tongue falters in pronouncing Mary Mother
+      of God!”
+
+  175 _A Letter to Dr. Pusey on his recent Eirenicon_, p. 59.
+
+  176 The late Dr. Faber, when an Anglican, said: “Thus I hold it pious to
+      believe that in pagan times many a wandering beam, many a pitying
+      angel, many a rent in heaven, many a significant portent, many an
+      overflow of the appointed channels of grace, were vouchsafed,
+      whereon a poor glimmering faith might feed, and grow, not wholly of
+      itself, into a feeble yet steady light, acceptable for his sake who
+      sent such faith its food.”—_Foreign Churches and Peoples_, p. 535.
+
+  177 Horace, _De Arte Poetica_, 391.
+
+  178 Keble’s _Christian Year_—Easter Eve.
+
+  179 Lib. iv. c. 4.
+
+  180 _A Hist. de l’Art._
+
+  181 Page 36.
+
+  182 Page 30.
+
+  183 The scourge used by one of the executioners at the pillar was
+      amongst the number, and is now to be seen in the cathedral of
+      Aachen. It is composed of narrow leathern thongs, terminated by an
+      iron point, the whitish color of the leather bearing manifest stains
+      of the precious blood that bespattered it. Constantine’s signet, the
+      eagle and ciphers, is distinctly visible on the time‐worn, faded
+      seal, that looks like a sort of hard chalk. The reliquary is a
+      crystal vase, encased in gold and gems.
+
+  184 It is not within the limits of this sketch to follow the “Saint
+      Suaire” through its subsequent translations, but it may interest
+      such of our readers as are not acquainted with the fact, that it is
+      now at Aix‐la‐Chapelle, where _every seven years_ it is opened by
+      the chief prelates of Catholic Germany, and in the presence of
+      princes and bishops exposed to the veneration of the faithful for
+      three days, the church bells ringing all the time, and the cathedral
+      crowded day and night.
+
+  185 _The Russian Clergy._ Translated from the French of Father Gagarin,
+      S.J. By Ch. Du Gard Makepeace, M.A. London: Burns & Oates. 1872.
+      (New York: Sold by The Catholic Publication Society.)
+
+  186 “L’ouvrage s’ouvre par une introduction majestueuse sur le treizième
+      siècle.”
+
+  187 _Memoir of Count De Montalembert, Peer of France, Deputy for the
+      Department of Doubs._ A Chapter of recent French History. By Mrs.
+      Oliphant, author of _The Life of Edward Irving_, _S. Francis of
+      Assisi_, etc. In two volumes. William Blackwood & Sons, Edinburgh
+      and London. 1872.
+
+  188 The Anitchkoff Palace, on the Nevskoi Prospekt.
+
+  189 In 1859, _Le Second Empire_; in 1860, _La France, l’Autriche et
+      l’Angleterre_; in 1865, _France et l’Allemagne_.
+
+  190 _Particularism_ here means the tendency and policy on the part of
+      Bavaria and the Southern States of Germany to resist absorption of
+      their autonomy in certain matters by Prussia.—_Translator._
+
+  191 The town where Henry IV., of Germany, performed a penance imposed by
+      Pope Gregory VII.—_Trans._
+
+  192 In the work, published in 1865, which procured me the honor of being
+      made the subject of a parliamentary debate, I had dwelt upon the
+      two‐fold danger to be feared, whether from an alliance which might
+      reopen the Belgian question, or from a war on our frontiers, it
+      might be, on our invaded territory. I advised appeasing our
+      political discords, the better to resist this double peril. This
+      sums up in a few words the purport of my pamphlet.
+
+      My adversaries in the tribune and in the press denied the existence
+      of these dangers which they asserted were merely imaginary; they
+      charged me with having got up a sham Belgian question, and with
+      having, in that way, spread the knowledge of it abroad.
+
+      “With what have I charged the Honorable M. de Champs?” said M.
+      Dolez. “It is with having pretended that our nationality was
+      environed by perils, and that a Belgian question was on foot in
+      which our independence might be taken away from us.”
+
+      M. Frère‐Orban ridiculed in a pleasant way my forebodings. He said
+      that I was “a lookout man who, in his tower, descries that which no
+      one else can possibly see, ... who imagines that he has discovered
+      that which nobody had seen before. To‐day,” he added, “when there is
+      _nothing, absolutely nothing_, of a nature to cause uneasiness to
+      the country, we are told, in consequence of a party scheme: Let us
+      hold our tongues and appease our discords. The liberal party must,
+      in order to save Belgium from a _danger which does not exist_, cease
+      resisting the pretensions of the clerical party.”
+
+      Well, what does M. Frère‐Orban think now? While he, as minister, was
+      uttering in the tribune the above quieting and optimist statements,
+      M. Benedetti had entered with M. von Bismarck into a parley, the
+      subject of which was the Belgian question. This was the diplomatic
+      peril. The other peril has been clearly revealed to us after Sedan.
+      General de Wimpfen has stated to General Chazal that the question of
+      invading or not the territory of Belgium had been earnestly
+      discussed at Sedan. This would have been bringing the war on our
+      violated soil.
+
+  193 Priests and religious, men and women, numbering together 1,909, have
+      given corporeal and spiritual attendance to 21,000 sick and wounded,
+      and this only out of love for God and their neighbor.
+
+  194 Referring to the very bitter attack on the definition of
+      infallibility and the doings of the council which appeared about
+      that time in pamphlet form from a writer under the _nom de plume_ of
+      Janus.—_Translator._
+
+  195 The bien‐aimé of the Almanac is no more the bien‐aimé of France,
+      He does everything ab hoc and ab hac, puts all in the same sack,
+      Justice and finance, this bien‐aimé of the Almanac, etc., etc.
+
+  196 Zamore was a negro who repaid by the basest treachery the favors
+      lavished on him by Madame du Barry; he was the immediate cause of
+      her execution, having betrayed her hiding‐place to the convention.
+      She is the only woman of that period who died like a coward,
+      struggling to the last.
+
+  197 “Let our hearts be light and gay,
+      Glory’s hour is here to‐day;
+      The blood‐red blade is raised on high,
+      We conquer when we die—
+      Rally to victory.
+      ’Neath the flag of a dying God!
+      We tread the path he trod;
+      We run, we fly
+      To glory nigh.
+      Behold our ardor rise,
+      Our hearts are in the skies,
+      Arise, arise!
+      The scaffold mount—and God’s the victory.”
+
+  198 Blue is the color of knowledge.
+
+  199 _Der liebe Gott_, the received formula in Germany, as the “good
+      God,” _le bon Dieu_, in French, and Almighty God in English.
+
+  200 Exod. xv. 11.
+
+  201 Matt. vi. 33.
+
+  202 Eccl. xx. 9.
+
+  203 Lam. iii. 31.
+
+  204 Is. xxix. 18.
+
+  205 Matt. v. 10.
+
+  206 Rom. xi. 33.
+
+  207 Ps. xlii. 1.
+
+  208 Baruch v. 6.
+
+  209 The Arno, Chiana, and Mugnone.
+
+  210 London _Times_, Feb. 3.
+
+  211 As was shown in THE CATHOLIC WORLD last month, excommunication is
+      not only recognized by the law in the case of Protestant
+      excommunicators, but has been sanctioned and confirmed by law, on an
+      actual case being brought into court. Of course we shall be met by
+      the objection that the formal declaration of Papal Infallibility has
+      altered the connection between the Catholic Church and the state.
+      Unfortunately for this easy method of explaining away difficult
+      matters, excommunication has not been a whit altered in force,
+      relation, or form from the days of the Apostles to Pius IX.
+
+  212 In proof of which read the declaration of Count Andrássy to the
+      Austrian Parliament that, notwithstanding the friendly assurances
+      with which the three emperors parted at the breaking up of their
+      recent conference at Berlin, he could not guarantee peace even up to
+      Christmas. Observe also the significant rearming of all the great
+      European powers and the recent order from Berlin of 3,000,000 rifles
+      of a new pattern.
+
+  213 Witness Bavaria’s remonstrance, which was disregarded, at the sudden
+      imposition of the severe military code of Prussian service without
+      allowing it time to recover. As a more recent comment on that, read
+      the very able and interesting letters which appeared in the _New
+      York Herald_, Nov. 22, on the European situation, a short extract
+      from which, of a Bavarian view on German unity, we give: “Germany
+      accepts it, because it in some respects realizes the German dream of
+      unity. That, of course, every German wants. But no one wants a
+      united despotism, a military code that turns the whole nation into a
+      camp, and takes half a million able‐bodied men away from the farms
+      and industrious callings. We want a Germany for the good of the
+      fatherland, not for the glory of a little upstart Prussian prince
+      whose name is not much older than the Bonapartes’ crown.”
+
+  214 “Desine fata deûm flecti sperare precando.”—_Virg. Æn._ vi. 376.
+
+  215 In Germany.
+
+  216 “Divorce Legislation in Connecticut,” and “The Indissolubility of
+      Christian Marriage.”
+
+  217 For this and the following references, see Rohrbacher’s _Histoire
+      Universelle de l’Eglise Catholique_. This work is so comprehensive,
+      and so full of the most learned and accurate researches, that we
+      have relied entirely upon its lengthened narratives for the facts
+      mentioned in this article. The work is excessively voluminous (28
+      vols 8vo), and to verify personally each separate reference given by
+      the author would be almost impossible, besides being a very tedious
+      undertaking. We have preferred, therefore, to rely upon the single
+      authority of one who is confessedly the best modern church
+      historian.
+
+  218 _History of the Reformation._
+
+  219 E. Dally.
+
+  220 “It is an error to suppose that the Catholic faith limits the
+      existence of man to about six thousand years. The church has never
+      decided this delicate question, and this abstention is full of
+      wisdom. Nothing positive, in fact, has been revealed to us on this
+      point. The various chronological systems are the work of man; they
+      rest on bases often hypothetical. Nevertheless, we cannot admit even
+      the possibility of the arbitrary theories of several distinguished
+      geologists who date the appearance of man on the earth twenty and
+      even thirty millions of years back. Good‐sense alone should incline
+      one to be moderate on this point.”—Mgr. Meignan, _Le Monde et
+      l’Homme primitif_, chap. vi.
+
+  221 _L’Homme pendant les Ages de la Pierre dans les Environs de Dinant‐
+      sur‐Meuse._ 2e édition. Bruxelles: Muquardt. 1872.
+
+  222 This is true, at most, of the formations previous to the quaternary
+      deposits; in the latter, the synchronism of the fauna becomes wholly
+      uncertain, and only founds the emigration or disappearance of
+      certain species of animals on inductions that have a hypothetical
+      basis. As to their emigration, we have had too many instances in the
+      historic period, as M. Chabas justly observes, to make us regard
+      that necessarily the index of vast chronological intervals. Where
+      are the elephants that abounded in Mauretania Tingitana, according
+      to Solinus’ _Polyhistor_; the hippopotami of Lower Egypt, the boas
+      of Calabria, the lions, aurochs, and bears of Macedonia, the beaver,
+      etc.? In the XVIIth century of our era, the stag, roebuck, wild
+      boar, wolf, and bear still formed a part of the fauna of the
+      Cevennes. The reindeer lived in the Black Forest in the time of
+      Cæsar, who describes this animal from hearsay, but characterizes it
+      sufficiently by the peculiarity of the male and female having the
+      same kind of horns. M. Lartet is also inclined to the opinion that
+      _the age of the reindeer is perhaps not so ancient as was once
+      supposed_. The mammoth is no longer found alive, but has been
+      discovered with its flesh and skin still remaining, embedded in ice,
+      and affording nourishment to dogs and other animals. Struck with
+      this preservation, M. d’Orbigny expresses a doubt as to the
+      antiquity of the mammoth. He thinks it may have existed five or six
+      thousand years ago, and believes it may still live in some
+      unexplored locality. At least, it lived in America till a
+      comparatively recent period. Its remains, and those of the mastodon,
+      have been found in the auriferous deposits of California, among
+      remarkable traces of human labor. At the Congress of Copenhagen, M.
+      Schaffhausen expressed the opinion that the lost species should
+      rather be regarded of a more recent date than that the antiquity of
+      man should be extended to hundreds of thousands of years. As to the
+      wretchedness and inferiority evident from the primitive pursuits of
+      man and the conformity of his organs, the enemies of Christianity
+      triumph over the discovery. We believe with Mgr. Meignan that “a
+      proof of the authenticity of the Bible has been lightly transformed
+      into an objection against it. The revolt and disobedience of man
+      explain the wretched state in which he at first lived; and the
+      hardships he underwent during the period he inhabited caverns and
+      lacustrine dwellings prove to all who believe in the goodness of God
+      that a great crime must have armed His justice.”
+
+  223 “In the year of the Nativity of our Lord 710, the sixth day of the
+      month of December, under the reign of Eudes, most pious King of the
+      French, during the ravages of the perfidious Saracen nation, the
+      body of the most dear and venerable Marie Madeleine was secretly and
+      by night transferred from its alabaster sepulchre into the present
+      one, which is of marble, and whence the body of Sidonius has been
+      withdrawn, in order that the other may be better concealed and be
+      beyond the reach of the above‐named perfidious nation.”
+
+  224 Seven years later, when the head was taken to Rome by Charles,
+      Boniface VIII. sent to S. John of Lateran for a relic which had long
+      been venerated there as the maxillar bone of Magdalen; on adjusting
+      it to the broken part, it fitted in so exactly as to leave no doubt
+      as to where it had originally been taken from.
+
+  225 Shea.
+
+  226 See the narrative and map in Shea’s _History of the Discovery and
+      Exploration of the Mississippi_.
+
+  227 Pronounced Ac‐o‐ma—the accent on the first syllable.
+
+  228 “This way, gentlemen.”
+
+  229 Red pepper; _chile verde_, green pepper.
+
+  230 This estimate, which was considered as too high by some of the
+      clergymen present, is given only as conjectural. It is based on the
+      census of 1870, according to which there are in the state, in round
+      numbers, 203,000 persons of foreign parentage at least on one side,
+      of whom 113,000 are foreign‐born. It would seem probable that we
+      might allow out of this number 83,000  foreign‐born and 67,000
+      native‐born Catholics. It is certain, from other evidence, that the
+      number is over 100,000, and, whatever the correct number may be,
+      nine‐twentieths is very near the proportion of the native‐born to
+      the whole number. The entire population of the state is 537,000.
+      Nearly two‐fifths of the whole are, therefore, of foreign parentage.
+
+  231 Eugénie de la Ferronnays.
+
+  232 “The Church the Champion of Marriage,” CATHOLIC WORLD, February,
+      1873.
+
+  233 Deut. xxi 16, 17.
+
+  234 Gen. xxiv. 39, 57, 58.
+
+  235 Numb. xxvii. 8; xxxvi. 3, 8.
+
+  236 S. John i. 13.
+
+  237 Jeremy Taylor’s “On the Marriage Ring,” besides many modern ones,
+      especially by the Rev. Dr. Morgan Dix, New York.
+
+  238 Matt. vii. 21.
+
+  239 Matt. xxii. 29, 30; Mark xii. 24, 25.
+
+  240 _Considérations sur la France_, chapter x. _et alibi passim_.
+
+  241 M. de Maistre is sometimes quoted as taking a different view; for
+      example, in an article in the _Correspondant_ for Nov. 10, Joseph de
+      Maistre declared revolution an epoch and not an event. But this by
+      no means signifies that the illustrious publicist meant that
+      revolution was about to prevail. He says: “The French Revolution is
+      an important epoch, and its manifold consequences will be felt far
+      beyond the time of its outbreak and the limits of its original
+      sphere.... If there is not a moral revolution throughout Europe, if
+      the religious spirit is not strengthened in this part of the world,
+      the bonds of society will dissolve.” The clergy of France, in
+      particular, are called to “the essential work” of reacting against
+      the influence of the _Goddess of Reason_. See _Considérations sur la
+      France_, chap. ii.
+
+  242 _Etudes sur l’Italie contemporaine_, and _Notes d’un Voyageur_.
+      _Première Etude_, June, 1871; _Seconde Etude_, July, 1872. Paris:
+      Amyot.
+
+  243 _Première Etude_, p. 3.
+
+  244 “Except the _Univers_, which has a correspondent at Rome, and keeps
+      up constant communications with that city in other ways, and, on the
+      other side, the _Journal des Débats_, which is supplied with
+      information by the Italian government, and, as we have been assured,
+      receives a handsome subsidy for the patronage accorded, most of the
+      French papers have no other source of supplying their readers with
+      news than the conjectures, more or less unreliable, of the Havas
+      agency, a _succursale_, as to what concerns Italy, of the Stefani
+      agency at Florence. It is supposed, however, that nothing is easier
+      than to obtain information about a country at our very doors.”—M.
+      Ed. Dulaurier, member of the Institute, “Impressions et Souvenirs de
+      Rome,” in the _Gazette du Languedoc_ for Sept. 19. I take the
+      liberty of recommending to M. Dulaurier, and all who wish to know
+      the state of affairs in Italy, the valuable _Correspondance de
+      Genève_. The _Journal_ of Florence, recently combined with the
+      _Cattolica_ of Rome, affords instructive reading. Besides
+      information peculiar to itself, this paper reproduces in each number
+      interesting extracts from various Italian journals.
+
+  245 “The French, under Napoleon I., introduced the idea of
+      centralization into Italy and the code of the Revolution which the
+      restored princes had the want of foresight to retain. The old
+      municipalities were destroyed, and never recovered their former
+      independence even in the States of the Church. Piedmont, of all the
+      states of the Peninsula, was the longest under the poisonous
+      influence of foreign ideas. Hence it became the centre of the
+      Revolution.”—_Quel est l’Avenir de l’Europe?_ pages 40‐41. Geneva:
+      Grosset, 1871. The author of this remarkable work is of the school
+      of the Count de Maistre, and worthy of his master.
+
+  246 _Première Etude_, pp. 6, 12, 13, 15; _Seconde Etude_, pp. 4, 10, 11.
+
+  247 _Première Etude_, p. 10.
+
+  248 _Journal d’un Diplomate en Italie._—See the _Etudes_ for July, 1872.
+
+  249 _Journal d’un Diplomate en Italie_, pp. 305, 306.
+
+  250 _Journal d’un Diplomate en Italie_, pp. 116, 117.
+
+  251 _Les Diplomates Français sous Napoléon III._, by B. d’Agreval.
+      Paris: Dentu. 1872. A work we recommend to all publicists who wish
+      to add to their knowledge.
+
+  252 _Première Etude_, p. 10.
+
+  253 _Première Etude_, pp. 5, 10, 11; _Seconde Etude_, p. 4.
+
+  254 _Première Etude_, p. 7.
+
+  255 The minister has laid before the Parliament the account of the
+      expense of opening the breach in the walls of Rome. This crime cost
+      nearly forty‐eight millions.
+
+  256 _Première Etude_, p. 11; _Seconde Etude_, p. 12.
+
+  257 Cf. _Première Etude_, p. 10.
+
+  258 See a forcible and eloquent article in the _Civiltà Cattolica_ on
+      the _Caresses de la Providence_. Sér. viii. vol. v., No. 519, Feb.,
+      1872.
+
+  259 (_Première Etude_, pp. 7, 8, 27; _Seconde Etude_, pp. 11, 12.) “The
+      invaders take the stand of masters, but the people have not joined
+      them. They remain isolated in their midst in the position of a
+      military and administrative colony, about as favorably regarded and
+      received as the Prussians in those departments of our country where
+      they are still encamped. The Romans, it cannot be denied, love their
+      Pope.”—M. Ed. Dulaurier, _loc. cit._
+
+  260 _Union_, Nov. 26.
+
+  261 “We continue to be regarded at Berlin with the most favorable
+      dispositions, as the demonstrations of which our princes were the
+      object prove.”—_Speech of M. Visconti‐Venosta_ in the Chamber of
+      Deputies, Nov. 27, 1872.
+
+  262 _Seconde Etude_, p. 13.
+
+  263 _Address_, April 28, 1872.
+
+  264 _Correspondance Diplomatique_ in the year 1815.
+
+  265 _Première Etude_, p. 17; _Seconde Etude_, pp. 4, 14, 15, 16, 17.
+
+  266 _Première Etude_, pp. 25, 26; _Seconde Etude_, pp. 15, 16, 26.
+
+  267 See, in the _Etudes_ for Oct., 1871, the article by Fr. Ch. Clair,
+      who, in an address to the government of M. Thiers, carries on a
+      vigorous argument _ad hominem_ respecting the “necessary liberties”
+      of the Pope.
+
+  268 P. Toulement, _La Providence et les Chàtiments de la France_, ch.
+      xvii.
+
+  269 _Première Etude_, pp. 24, 25, 26: _Seconde Etude_, pp. 17, 22, 34.
+
+  270 _Journal d’un Diplomate en Italie_, pp. 17, 18.
+
+  271 This alludes to the indication of superhuman power by the budding
+      horns which Michael Angelo has represented upon the head of Moses,
+      adopting the Jewish symbol of strength so frequent in Scripture.
+
+  272 Ecclus. xlviii. II.
+
+  273 So soon accepted!
+
+  274 “I, the undersigned, parish priest of the most holy Constantinian
+      Basilica of the Twelve Apostles of Rome, certify that in Register
+      XII. of the dead, letter N, page 283, is to be found the deed of
+      which the following is the copy, word for word.
+
+      “The twenty‐second of December, eighteen hundred and sixty‐six,
+      Mademoiselle Claire‐Françoise‐Amélie Lautard, of Marseilles,
+      daughter of M. Jean Baptiste Lautard, a most pious virgin, while
+      offering last Sunday her life to God for the Holy Father, Rome, and
+      the church, was seized on the spot by illness, and having received
+      most piously the sacraments of the church, in the full possession of
+      her faculties, in prayer, and surrounded by several priests and
+      virgins, gave up her soul to Jesus Christ, her spouse, with the
+      greatest serenity, Wednesday the 19th, at half‐past nine in the
+      morning, in the house Rue Ripresa‐dei‐Barberi 175, at the age of
+      fifty‐nine years. The following day, the 20th, her body was carried,
+      after the completuum, accompanied by a great number of religious, to
+      this basilica, and was here exposed during the morning after the
+      manner of nobles, the office of the dead and a solemn Mass being
+      performed; in the afternoon it was conveyed to the Church of Santa
+      Maria in Ara Cœli, and there interred in the tomb of the Sisters of
+      St. Joseph of the Apparition.
+
+      “Given at Rome,” etc.
+
+  275 This mistake is awing to a wrong meaning given to a word in the Book
+      of Joshua in the Septuagint; where the word _tsorim_ is translated
+      _knife of stone_, when it also means _a sharp knife_; _tsor_ only
+      means _stone_ in the sense of _rock_ or _block_.
+
+  276 Simonin, _La Vie Souterraine_.
+
+  277 Ancient name of the Prussians.—Trans.
+
+  278 S. Jerome’s _Epist._ 44, 45.
+
+  279 _Hist. of Decline and Fall of Rom. Emp._, vol. iv. ch. ix. p. 262,
+      1st ed.
+
+  280 _Germania_, i. 5.
+
+  281 “The Study of Sociology,” by H. Spencer, in the May No. of _The
+      Contemporary Review_, 1872.
+
+  282 See Mrs. Hope’s _Conversion of the Teutonic Race_, ch. i.
+
+  283 _Conv. of Teut. Race_, p. 20.
+
+  284 Apollin., _Paneg. Major_.
+
+  285 _Germania_, iii.
+
+  286 Suet., _in Oct._ xxiii.
+
+  287 I. 61.
+
+  288 Plutarch, _Vita Marii_.
+
+  289 S. Jer. _adv. Jovin._ ii.
+
+
+
+
+
+***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE CATHOLIC WORLD, VOL. 16, OCTOBER 1872‐MARCH 1873***
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