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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/8686-0.txt b/8686-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9c7c899 --- /dev/null +++ b/8686-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3149 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Delicious Vice, by Young E. Allison + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Delicious Vice + +Author: Young E. Allison + + +Release Date: August, 2005 [EBook #8686] +This file was first posted on August 1, 2003 +Last Updated: March 14, 2018 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DELICIOUS VICE *** + + + + +Produced by Ted Garvin, Charles Franks and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + + + + + + + + +THE DELICIOUS VICE + +Pipe Dreams and Fond Adventures of an Habitual Novel-Reader Among Some +Great Books and Their People + +By Young E. Allison + +_Second Edition_ + +(Revised and containing new material) + +CHICAGO THE PRAIRIELAND PUBLISHING CO. 1918 Printed originally in the +Louisville Courier-Journal. Reprinted by courtesy. + +First edition, Cleveland, Burrows Bros., 1907. + +Copyright 1907-1918 + + + + + +I. A RHAPSODY ON THE NOBLE PROFESSION OF NOVEL READING + +It must have been at about the good-bye age of forty that Thomas Moore, +that choleric and pompous yet genial little Irish gentleman, turned a +sigh into good marketable “copy” for Grub Street and with shrewd economy +got two full pecuniary bites out of one melancholy apple of reflection: + + “Kind friends around me fall + Like leaves in wintry weather,” + + --he sang of his own dead heart in the stilly night. + + “Thus kindly I scatter thy leaves on the bed + Where thy mates of the garden lie scentless and dead.” + --he sang to the dying rose. In the red month of October the rose is +forty years old, as roses go. How small the world has grown to a man of +forty, if he has put his eyes, his ears and his brain to the uses for +which they are adapted. And as for time--why, it is no longer than a +kite string. At about the age of forty everything that can happen to a +man, death excepted, has happened; happiness has gone to the devil or +is a mere habit; the blessing of poverty has been permanently secured +or you are exhausted with the cares of wealth; you can see around +the corner or you do not care to see around it; in a word--that is, +considering mental existence--the bell has rung on you and you are up +against a steady grind for the remainder of your life. It is then there +comes to the habitual novel reader the inevitable day when, in anguish +of heart, looking back over his life, he--wishes he hadn't; then he asks +himself the bitter question if there are not things he has done that he +wishes he hadn't. Melancholy marks him for its own. He sits in his room +some winter evening, the lamp swarming shadowy seductions, the grate +glowing with siren invitation, the cigar box within easy reach for that +moment when the pending sacrifice between his teeth shall be burned out; +his feet upon the familiar corner of the mantel at that automatically +calculated altitude which permits the weight of the upper part of the +body to fall exactly upon the second joint from the lower end of the +vertebral column as it rests in the comfortable depression created by +continuous wear in the cushion of that particular chair to which every +honest man who has acquired the library vice sooner or later gets +attached with a love no misfortune can destroy. As he sits thus, +having closed the lids of, say, some old favorite of his youth, he will +inevitably ask himself if it would not have been better for him if he +hadn't. And the question once asked must be answered; and it will be an +honest answer, too. For no scoundrel was ever addicted to the delicious +vice of novel-reading. It is too tame for him. “There is no money in +it.” + + * * * * * + +And every habitual novel-reader will answer that question he has asked +himself, after a sigh. A sigh that will echo from the tropic deserted +island of Juan Fernandez to that utmost ice-bound point of Siberia where +by chance or destiny the seven nails in the sole of a certain mysterious +person's shoe, in the month of October, 1831, formed a cross--thus: + + * + * * * + * + * + * + +while on the American promontory opposite, “a young and handsome woman +replied to the man's despairing gesture by silently pointing to heaven.” + The Wandering Jew may be gone, but the theater of that appalling +prologue still exists unchanged. That sigh will penetrate the gloomy +cell of the Abbe Faria, the frightful dungeons of the Inquisition, the +gilded halls of Vanity Fair, the deep forests of Brahmin and fakir, the +jousting list, the audience halls and the petits cabinets of kings of +France, sound over the trackless and storm-beaten ocean--will echo, in +short, wherever warm blood has jumped in the veins of honest men and +wherever vice has sooner or later been stretched groveling in the dust +at the feet of triumphant virtue. + +And so, sighing to the uttermost ends of the earth, the old novel-reader +will confess that he wishes he hadn't. Had not read all those novels +that troop through his memory. Because, if he hadn't--and it is the +impossibility of the alternative that chills his soul with the despair +of cruel realization--if he hadn't, you see, he could begin at the very +first, right then and there, and read the whole blessed business through +for the first time. For the FIRST TIME, mark you! Is there anywhere in +this great round world a novel reader of true genius who would not do +that with the joy of a child and the thankfulness of a sage? + +Such a dream would be the foundation of the story of a really noble Dr. +Faustus. How contemptible is the man who, having staked his life freely +upon a career, whines at the close and begs for another chance; just +one more--and a different career! It is no more than Mr. Jack Hamlin, a +friend from Calaveras County, California, would call “the baby act,” + or his compeer, Mr. John Oakhurst, would denominate “a squeal.” How +glorious, on the other hand, is the man who has spent his life in his +own way, and, at its eventide, waves his hand to the sinking sun and +cries out: “Goodbye; but if I could do so, I should be glad to go over +it all again with you--just as it was!” If honesty is rated in heaven +as we have been taught to believe, depend upon it the novel-reader +who sighs to eat the apple he has just devoured, will have no trouble +hereafter. + +What a great flutter was created a few years ago when a blind +multi-millionaire of New York offered to pay a million dollars in cash +to any scientist, savant or surgeon in the world who would restore +his sight. Of course he would! It was no price at all to offer for the +service--considering the millions remaining. It was no more to him than +it would be to me to offer ten dollars for a peep at Paradise. Poor as I +am I will give any man in the world one hundred dollars in cash who will +enable me to remove every trace of memory of M. Alexandre Dumas' “Three +Guardsmen,” so that I may open that glorious book with the virgin +capacity of youth to enjoy its full delight. More; I will duplicate the +same offer for any one or all of the following: + +“Les Miserables,” of M. Hugo. + +“Don Quixote,” of Senor Cervantes. + +“Vanity Fair,” of Mr. Thackeray. + +“David Copperfield,” of Mr. Dickens. + +“The Cloister and the Hearth,” of Mr. Reade. + +And if my good friend, Isaac of York, is lending money at the old +stand and will take pianos, pictures, furniture, dress suits and plain +household plate as collateral, upon even moderate valuation, I will go +fifty dollars each upon the following: + +“The Count of Monte Cristo,” of M. Dumas. + +“The Wandering Jew,” of M. Sue. + +“The Memoirs of Barry Lyndon, Esq.,” of Mr. Thackeray. + +“Treasure Island,” of Mr. Robbie Stevenson. + +“The Vicar of Wakefield,” of Mr. Goldsmith. + +“Pere Goriot,” of M. de Balzac. + +“Ivanhoe,” of Baronet Scott. + +(Any one previously unnamed of the whole layout of M. Dumas, excepting +only a paretic volume entitled “The Conspirators.”) + +Now, the man who can do the trick for one novel can do it for all--and +there's a thousand dollars waiting to be earned, and a blessing also. +It's a bald “bluff,” of course, because it can't be done as we all know. +I might offer a million with safety. If it ever could have been done the +noble intellectual aristocracy of novel-readers would have been reduced +to a condition of penury and distress centuries ago. + +For, who can put fetters upon even the smallest second of eternity? Who +can repeat a joy or duplicate a sweet sorrow? Who has ever had more than +one first sweetheart, or more than one first kiss under the honeysuckle? +Or has ever seen his name in print for the first time, ever again? Is it +any wonder that all these inexplicable longings, these hopeless hopes, +were summed up in the heart-cry of Faust-- + +“Stay, yet awhile, O moment of beauty.” + + * * * * * + +Yet, I maintain, Dr. Faustus was a weak creature. He begged to be given +another and wholly different chance to linger with beauty. How much +nobler the magnificent courage of the veteran novel-reader, who in the +old age of his service, asks only that he may be permitted to do again +all that he has done, blindly, humbly, loyally, as before. + +Don't I know? Have I not been there? It is no child's play, the life of +a man who--paraphrasing the language of Spartacus, the much neglected +hero of the ages--has met upon the printed page every shape of perilous +adventure and dangerous character that the broad empire of fiction could +furnish, and never yet lowered his arm. Believe me it is no carpet duty +to have served on the British privateers in Guiana, under Commodore +Kingsley, alongside of Salvation Yeo; to have been a loyal member of +Thuggee and cast the scarf for Bowanee; to have watched the tortures of +Beatrice Cenci (pronounced as written in honest English, and I spit upon +the weaklings of the service who imagine that any freak of woman called +Bee-ah-treech-y Chon-chy could have endured the agonies related of that +sainted lady)--to have watched those tortures, I say, without breaking +down; to have fought under the walls of Acre with Richard Coeur de Lion; +to have crawled, amid rats and noxious vapors, with Jean Valjean through +the sewers of Paris; to have dragged weary miles through the snow with +Uncas, Chief of the Mohicans; to have lived among wild beasts with Morok +the lion tamer; to have charged with the impis of Umslopogaas; to have +sailed before the mast with Vanderdecken, spent fourteen gloomy years +in the next cell to Edmund Dantes, ferreted out the murders in the Rue +Morgue, advised Monsieur Le Cocq and given years of life's prime in +tedious professional assistance to that anointed idiot and pestiferous +scoundrel, Tittlebat Titmouse! Equally, of course, it has not been all +horror and despair. Life averages up fairly, as any novel-reader +will admit, and there has been much of delight--even luxury and +idleness--between the carnage hours of battle. Is it not so? Ask that +boyish-hearted old scamp whom you have seen scuttling away from the +circulating library with M. St. Pierre's memoirs of young Paul and his +beloved Virginia under his arm; or stepping briskly out of the book +store hugging to his left side a carefully wrapped biography of Lady +Diana Vernon, Mlle. de la Valliere, or Madame Margaret Woffington; or +in fact any of a thousand charming ladies whom it is certain he had met +before. Ladies too, who, born whensoever, are not one day older since +he last saw them. Nearly a hundred years of Parisian residence have not +served to induce the Princess Haydee of Yanina to forego her picturesque +Greek gowns and coiffures, or to alter the somewhat embarrassing status +of her relations with her striking but gloomy protector, the Count of +Monte Cristo. + +The old memories are crowded with pleasures. Those delicious mornings in +the allee of the park, where you were permitted to see Cosette with her +old grandfather, M. Fauchelevent; those hours of sweet pain when it was +impossible to determine whether it was Rebecca or Rowena who seemed to +give most light to the day; the flirtations with Blanche Amory, and the +notes placed in the hollow tree; the idyllic devotion of Little Emily, +dating from the morning when you saw her dress fluttering on the beam as +she ran along it, lightly, above the flowing tide--(devotion that is yet +tender, for, God forgive you Steerforth as I do, you could not smirch +that pure heart;) the melancholy, yet sweet sorrow, with which you +saw the loved and lost Little Eva borne to her grave over which the +mocking-bird now sings his liquid requiem. Has it not been sweet +good fortune to love Maggie Tulliver, Margot of Savoy, Dora Spenlow +(undeclared because she was an honest wife--even though of a most +conceited and commonplace jackass, totally undeserving of her); Agnes +Wicklow (a passion quickly cured when she took Dora's pitiful leavings), +and poor ill-fated Marie Antoinette? You can name dozens if you have +been brought up in good literary society. + + * * * * * + +These love affairs may be owned freely, as being perfectly honorable, +even if hopeless. And, of course, there have been gallantries--mere +affaires du jour--such as every man occasionally engages in. Sometimes +they seemed serious, but only for a moment. There was Beatrix Esmond, +for whom I could certainly have challenged His Grace of Hamilton, had +not Lord Mohun done the work for me. Wandering down the street in London +one night, in a moment of weak admiration for her unrivalled nerve +and aplomb, I was hesitating--whether to call on Mrs. Rawdon Crawley, +knowing that her thick-headed husband was in hoc for debt--when the +door of her house crashed open and that old scoundrel, Lord Steyne, came +wildly down the steps, his livid face blood-streaked, his topcoat on +his arm and a dreadful look in his eye. The world knows the rest as I +learned it half an hour later at the greengrocer's, where the Crawleys +owed an inexcusably large bill. Then the Duchess de Langeais--but all +this is really private. + +After all, a man never truly loves but once. And somewhere in Scotland +there is a mound above the gentle, tender and heroic Helen Mar, where +lies buried the first love of my soul. That mound, O lovely and loyal +Helen, was watered by the first blinding and unselfish tears that +ever sprang from my eyes. You were my first love; others may come and +inevitably they go, but you are still here, under the pencil pocket of +my waistcoat. + +Who can write in such a state? It is only fair to take a rest and brace +up. [Blank Page] + + + + +II. NOVEL-READERS + +AS DISTINGUISHED FROM WOMEN AND NIBBLERS AND AMATEURS + + +There is, of course, but one sort of novel-reader who is of any +importance He is the man who began under the age of fourteen and +is still sticking to it--at whatever age he may be--and full of +a terrifying anxiety lest he may be called away in the midst of +preliminary announcements of some pet author's “next forthcoming.” For +my own part I cannot conceive dying with resignation knowing that the +publishers were binding up at the time anything of Henryk Sienckiewicz's +or Thomas Hardy's. So it is important that a man begin early, because he +will have to quit all too soon. + +There are no women novel-readers. There are women who read novels, of +course; but it is a far cry from reading novels to being a novel-reader. +It is not in the nature of a woman. The crown of woman's character is +her devotion, which incarnate delicacy and tenderness exalt into +perfect beauty of sacrifice. Those qualities could no more live amid the +clashings of indiscriminate human passions than a butterfly wing could +go between the mill rollers untorn. Women utterly refuse to go on with a +book if the subject goes against their settled opinions. They despise a +novel--howsoever fine and stirring it may be--if there is any taint of +unhappiness to the favorite at the close. But the most flagrant of all +their incapacities in respect to fiction is the inability to appreciate +the admirable achievements of heroes, unless the achievements are solely +in behalf of women. And even in that event they complacently consider +them to be a matter of course, and attach no particular importance to +the perils or the hardships undergone. “Why shouldn't he?” they argue, +with triumphant trust in ideals; “surely he loved her!” + +There are many women who nibble at novels as they nibble at +luncheon--there are also some hearty eaters; but 98 per cent of them +detest Thackeray and refuse resolutely to open a second book of Robert +Louis Stevenson. They scent an enemy of the sex in Thackeray, who never +seems to be in earnest, and whose indignant sarcasm and melancholy +truthfulness they shrink from. “It's only a story, anyhow,” they argue +again; “he might, at least write a pleasant one, instead of bringing in +all sorts of disagreeable people--some of them positively disreputable.” + As for Stevenson, whom men read with the thrill of boyhood rising new +in their veins, I believe in my soul women would tear leaves out of his +novels to tie over the tops of preserve jars, and never dream of the +sacrilege. + +Now I hold Thackeray and Stevenson to be the absolute test of capacity +for earnest novel-reading. Neither cares a snap of his fingers for +anybody's prejudices, but goes the way of stern truth by the light of +genius that shines within him. + +If you could ever pin a woman down to tell you what she thought, instead +of telling you what she thinks it is proper to tell you, or what she +thinks will please you, you would find she has a religious conviction +that Dot Perrybingle in “The Cricket of the Hearth,” and Ouida's Lord +Chandos were actually a materializable an and a reasonable gentleman, +either of whom might be met with anywhere in their proper circles, I +would be willing to stand trial for perjury on the statement that I've +known admirable women--far above the average, really showing signs of +moral discrimination--who have sniveled pitifully over Nancy Sykes and +sniffed scornfully at Mrs. Tess Durbeyfield Clare. It is due to their +constitution and social heredity. Women do not strive and yearn and +stalk abroad for the glorious pot of intellectual gold at the end of the +rainbow; they pick and choose and, having chosen, sit down straightway +and become content. And a state of contentment is an abomination in the +sight of man. Contentment is to be sought for by great masculine minds +only with the purpose of being sure never quite to find it. + + * * * * * + +For all practical purposes, therefore--except perhaps as object lessons +of “the incorrect method” in reading novels--women, as novel-readers, +must be considered as not existing. And, of course, no offense is +intended. But if there be any weak-kneed readers who prefer the +gilt-wash of pretty politeness to the solid gold of truth, let them +understand that I am not to be frightened away from plain facts by any +charge of bad manners. + +On the contrary, now that this disagreeable interruption has been forced +upon me--certainly not through any seeking of mine--it may be better to +speak out and settle the matter. Men who have the happiness of being in +the married state know that nothing is to be gained by failing to settle +instantly with women who contradict and oppose them. Who was that mellow +philosopher in one of Trollope's tiresomely clever novels who said: “My +word for it, John, a husband ought not to take a cane to his wife +too soon. He should fairly wait till they are half-way home from the +church--but not longer, not longer.” Of course every man with a spark +of intelligence and gallantry wishes that women COULD rise to real +novel-reading Think what courtship would be! Every true man wishes to +heaven there was nothing more to be said against women than that they +are not novel-readers. But can mere forgetting remove the canker? Do not +all of us know that the abstract good of the very existence of woman is +itself open to grave doubt--with no immediate hope of clearing up? Woman +has certainly been thrust upon us. Is there any scrap of record to show +that Adam asked for her? He was doing very well, was happy, prosperous +and healthy. There was no certainty that her creation was one of that +unquestionably wonderful series that occupied the six great days. +We cannot conceal that her creation caused a great pain in Adam's +side--undoubtedly the left side, in the region of the heart. She +has been described by young and dauntless poets as “God's best +afterthought;” but, now, really--and I advance the suggestion with +no intention to be brutal but solely as a conscientious duty to the +ascertainment of truth--why is it, that--. But let me try to present the +matter in the most unobjectionable manner possible. + +In reading over that marvelous account of creation I find frequent +explicit declaration that God pronounced everything good after he had +created it--except heaven and woman. I have maintained sometimes to +stern, elderly ladies that this might have been an error of omission by +early copyists, perpetuated and so become fixed in our translations. To +other ladies, of other age and condition, to whom such propositions +of scholarship might appear to be dull pedantry, I have ventured the +gentlemanlike explanation that, as woman was the only living thing +created that was good beyond doubt, perhaps God had paid her the +special compliment of leaving the approval unspoken, as being in a sense +supererogatory. At best, either of these dispositions of the matter is, +of course, far-fetched, maybe even frivolous. The fact still remains +by the record. And it is beyond doubt awkward and embarrassing, because +ill-natured men can refer to it in moments of hatefulness--moments +unfortunately too frequent. + +Is it possible that this last creation was a mistake of Infinite Charity +and Eternal Truth? That Charity forbore to acknowledge that it was a +mistake and that Truth, in the very nature of its eternal essence, could +not say it was good? It is so grave a matter that one wonders Helvetius +did not betray it, as he did that other secret about which the +philosophers had agreed to keep mum, so that Herr Schopenhauer could +write about it as he did about that other. Herr Schopenhauer certainly +had the courage to speak with philosophical asperity of the gentle +sex. It may be because he was never married. And then his mother wrote +novels! I have been surprised that he was not accused of prejudice. + +But if all these everyday obstacles were absent there would yet remain +insurmountable reasons why women can never be novel-readers in the sense +that men are. Your wife, for instance, or the impenetrable mystery +of womanhood that you contemplate making your wife some day--can you, +honestly, now, as a self-respecting husband of either de facto or in +futuro, quite agree to the spectacle of that adored lady sitting over +across the hearth from you in the snug room, evening after evening, with +her feet--however small and well-shaped--cocked up on the other end of +the mantel and one of your own big colorado maduros between her teeth! +We men, and particularly novel-readers, are liberal even generous, in +our views; but it is not in human nature to stand that! + +Now, if a woman can not put her feet up and smoke, how in the name +of heaven, can she seriously read novels? Certainly not sitting bolt +upright, in order to prevent the back of her new gown from rubbing the +chair; certainly not reclining upon a couch or in a hammock. A boy, yet +too young to smoke may properly lie on his stomach on the floor and read +novels, but the mature veteran will fight for his end of the mantel as +for his wife and children. It is physiological necessity, inasmuch as +the blood that would naturally go to the lower extremities, is thus +measurably lessened in quantity and goes instead to the head, where a +state of gentle congestion ensues, exciting the brain cells, setting +free the imagination to roam hand in hand with intelligence under the +spell of the wizard. There may be novel-readers who do not smoke at the +game, but surely they cannot be quite earnest or honest--you had better +put in writing all business agreements with this sort. + + * * * * * + +No boy can ever hope to become a really great or celebrated novel-reader +who does not begin his apprenticeship under the age of fourteen, and, as +I said before, stick to it as long as he lives. He must learn to scorn +those frivolous, vacillating and purposeless ones who, after beginning +properly, turn aside and whiling away their time on mere history, or +science, or philosophy. In a sense these departments of literature are +useful enough. They enable you often to perceive the most cunning and +profoundly interesting touches in fiction. Then I have no doubt that, +merely as mental exercise, they do some good in keeping the mind in +training for the serious work of novel-reading. I have always been +grateful to Carlyle's “French Revolution,” if for nothing more than that +its criss-cross, confusing and impressive dullness enabled me to find +more pleasure in “A Tale of Two Cities” than was to be extracted from +any merit or interest in that unreal novel. + +This much however, may be said of history, that it is looking up in +these days as a result of studying the spirit of the novel. It was +not many years ago that the ponderous gentlemen who write criticisms +(chiefly because it has been forgotten how to stop that ancient waste +of paper and ink) could find nothing more biting to say of Macaulay's +“England” than that it was “a splendid work of imagination,” of Froude's +“Caesar” that it was “magnificent political fiction,” and of Taine's +“France” that “it was so fine it should have been history instead +of fiction.” And ever since then the world has read only these three +writers upon these three epochs--and many other men have been writing +history upon the same model. No good novel-reader need be ashamed to +read them, in fact. They are so like the real thing we find in the +greatest novels, instead of being the usual pompous official lies of +old-time history, that there are flesh, blood and warmth in them. + +In 1877, after the railway riots, legislative halls heard the French +Revolution rehearsed from all points of view. In one capital, where I +was reporting the debate, Old Oracle, with every fact at hand from “In +the beginning” to the exact popular vote in 1876, talked two hours of +accurate historical data from all the French histories, after which +a young lawyer replied in fifteen minutes with a vivid picture of the +popular conditions, the revolt and the result. Will it be allowable, in +the interest of conveying exact impression, to say that Old Oracle was +“swiped” off the earth? No other word will relieve my conscience. +After it was all over I asked the young lawyer where he got his French +history. + +“From Dumas,” he answered, “and from critical reviews of his novels. +He's short on dates and documents, but he's long on the general facts.” + +Why not? Are not novels history? + +Book for book, is not a novel by a competent conscientious novelist +just as truthful a record of typical men, manners and motives as formal +history is of official men, events and motives? + +There are persons created out of the dreams of genius so real, so +actual, so burnt into the heart and mind of the world that they have +become historical. Do they not show you, in the old Ursuline Convent at +New Orleans, the cell where poor Manon Lescaut sat alone in tears? And +do they not show you her very grave on the banks of the lake? Have I +not stood by the simple grave at Richmond, Virginia, where never lay the +body of Pocahontas and listened to the story of her burial there? One +of the loveliest women I ever knew admits that every time she visits +relatives at Salem she goes out to look at the mound over the broken +heart of Hester Prynne, that dream daughter of genius who never actually +lived or died, but who was and is and ever will be. Her grave can be +easily pointed out, but where is that of Alexander, of Themistocles, of +Aristotle, even of the first figure of history--Adam? Mark Twain found +it for a joke. Dr. Hale was finally forced to write a preface to “The +Man Without a Country” to declare that his hero was pure fiction and +that the pathetic punishment so marvelously described was not only +imaginary, but legally and actually impossible. It was because Philip +Nolan had passed into history. I myself have met old men who knew sea +captains that had met this melancholy prisoner at sea and looked upon +him, had even spoken to him upon subjects not prohibited. And these old +men did not hesitate to declare that Dr. Hale had lied in his denial and +had repudiated the facts through cowardice or under compulsion from the +War Department. + + * * * * * + +Indeed, so flexible, adaptable and penetrable is the style, and so +admirably has the use and proper direction of the imagination been +developed by the school of fiction, that every branch of literature has +gained from it power, beauty and clearness. Nothing has aided more in +the spread of liberal Christianity than the remarkable series of “Lives +of Christ,” from Straus to Farrar, not omitting particular mention of +the singularly beautiful treatment of the subject by Renan. In all of +these conscientious imagination has been used, as it is used in the +highest works of fiction, to give to known facts the atmosphere and +vividness of truth in order that the spirit and personality of the +surroundings of the Savior of Mankind might be newly understood by and +made fresh to modern perception. + +Of all books it is to be said--of novels as well--that none is great +that is not true, and that cannot be true which does not carry inherence +of truth. Now every book is true to some reader. The “Arabian Nights” + tales do not seem impossible to a little child, the only delight him. +The novels of “The Duchess” seem true to a certain class of readers, if +only because they treat of a society to which those readers are entirely +unaccustomed. “Robinson Crusoe” is a gospel to the world, and yet it is +the most palpably and innocently impossible of books. It is so plausible +because the author has ingeniously or accidentally set aside the usual +earmarks of plausibility. When an author plainly and easily knows +what the reader does not know and enough more to continue the chain of +seeming reality of truth a little further, he convinces the reader of +his truth and ability. Those men, therefore, who have been endowed with +the genius almost unconsciously to absorb, classify, combine, arrange +and dispense vast knowledge in a bold, striking or noble manner, are the +recognized greatest men of genius for the simple reason that the readers +of the world who know most recognize all they know in these writers, +together with that spirit of sublime imagination that suggests still +greater realms of truth and beauty. What Shakesepare was to the +intellectual leaders of his day, “The Duchess” was to countless immature +young folks of her day who were looking for “something to read.” + +All truth is history, but all history is not truth. Written history is +notoriously no well-cleaner. + + + + +III. READING THE FIRST NOVEL + +BEING MOSTLY REMINISCENCES OF EARLY CRIMES AND JOYS + + +Once more and for all, the career of a novel reader should be entered +upon, if at all, under the age of fourteen. As much earlier as possible. +The life of the intellect, as of its shadowy twin, imagination, begins +early and develops miraculously. The inbred strains of nature lie +exposed to influence as a mirror to reflections, and as open to +impression as sensitized paper, upon which pictures may be printed +and from which they may also fade out. The greater the variety of +impressions that fall upon the young mind the more certain it is that +the greatest strength of natural tendency will be touched and revealed. +Good or bad, whichever it may be, let it come out as quickly as +possible. How many men have never developed their fatal weaknesses until +success was within reach and the edifice fell upon other innocent ones. +Believe me, no innate scoundrel or brute will be much helped or hindered +by stories. These have no turn or leisure for dreaming. They are eager +for the actual touch of life. What would a dull-eyed glutton, famishing, +not with hunger but with the cravings of digestive ferocity, find in +Thackeray's “Memorials of Gormandizing” or “Barmecidal Feasts?” Such +banquets are spread for the frugal, not one of whom would swap that +immortal cook-book review for a dinner with Lucullus. Rascals will not +read. Men of action do not read. They look upon it as the gambler does +upon the game where “no money passes.” It may almost be said that the +capacity for novel-reading is the patent of just and noble minds. You +never heard of a great novel-reader who was notorious as a criminal. +There have been literary criminals, I grant you--Eugene Aram Dr. Dodd, +Prof. Webster, who murdered Parkmaan, and others. But they were writers, +not readers And they did not write novels. Mr. Aram wrote scientific and +school books, as did Prof. Webster, and Dr. Wainwright wrote beautiful +sermons. We never do sufficiently consider the evil that lies behind +writing sermons. The nearest you can come to a writer of fiction who +has been steeped in crime is in Benvenuto Cellini, whose marvelous +autobiographical memoir certainly contains some fiction, though it is +classed under the suspect department of History. + +How many men actually have been saved from a criminal career by the +miraculous influence of novels? Let who will deny, but at the age of +six I myself was absolutely committed to the abandoned purpose of riding +barebacked horses in a circus. Secretly, of course, because there were +some vague speculations in the family concerning what seemed to be +special adaptability to the work of preaching. Shortly after I gave that +up to enlist in the Continental Army, under Gen. Francis Marion, and no +other soldier slew more Britons. After discharge I at once volunteered +in an Indiana regiment quartered in my native town in Kentucky, and beat +the snare drum at the head of that fine body of men for a long time. But +the tendency was downward. For three months I was chief of a of robbers +that ravaged the backyards of the vicinity. Successively I became a spy +for Washington, an Indian fighter, a tragic actor. + +With character seared, abandoned and dissolute in habit through and +by the hearing and seeing and reading of history, there was but one +desperate step left So I entered upon the career of a pirate in my ninth +year. The Spanish Main, as no doubt you remember, was at that time upon +an open common across the street from our house, and it was a hundred +feet long, half as wide and would average two feet in depth. I have +often since thanked Heaven that they filled up that pathless ocean in +order to build an iron foundry upon the spot. Suppose they had excavated +for a cellar! Why during the time that Capt. Kidd, Lafitte and I +infested the coast thereabout, sailing three “low, black-hulled +schooners with long rakish masts,” I forced hundreds of merchant seamen +to walk the plank--even helpless women and children. Unless the sharks +devoured them, their bones are yet about three feet under the floor of +that iron foundry. Under the lee of the Northernmost promontory, near +a rock marked with peculiar crosses made by the point of the stiletto +which I constantly carried in my red silk sash, I buried tons of plate, +and doubloons, pieces of eight, pistoles, Louis d'ors, and galleons by +the chest. At that time galleons somehow meant to me money pieces in +use, though since then the name has been given to a species of boat. The +rich brocades, Damascus and Indian stuffs, laces, mantles, shawls and +finery were piled in riotous profusion in our cave where--let the whole +truth be told if it must--I lived with a bold, black-eyed and coquettish +Spanish girl, who loved me with ungovernable jealousy that occasionally +led to bitter and terrible scenes of rage and despair. At last when I +brought home a white and red English girl whose life I spared because +she had begged me her knees by the memory of my sainted mother to spare +her for her old father, who was waiting her coming, Joquita passed all +bounds. I killed her--with a single knife thrust I remember. She was +buried right on the spot where the Tilden and Hendricks flag pole +afterwards stood in the campaign of 1876. It was with bitter melancholy +that I fancied the red stripes on the flag had their color from the +blood of the poor, foolish jealous girl below. + + * * * * * + +Ah, well-- + +Let us all own up--we men of above forty who aspire to respectability +and do actually live orderly lives and achieve even the odor of +sanctity--have we not been stained with murder?--aye worse! What man has +not his Bluebeard closet, full of early crimes and villainies? A certain +boy in whom I take a particular interest, who goes to Sunday-school and +whose life is outwardly proper--is he not now on week days a robber of +great renown? A week ago, masked and armed, he held up his own father in +a secluded corner of the library and relieved the old man of swag of +a value beyond the dreams--not of avarice, but--of successful, +respectable, modern speculation. He purposes to be a pirate whenever +there is a convenient sheet of water near the house. God speed him. +Better a pirate at six than at sixty. + +Give them work to do and good novels to read and they will get over it. +History breeds queer ideas in children. They read of military heroes, +kings and statesmen who commit awful deeds and are yet monuments of +public honor. What a sweet hero is Raleigh, who was a farmer of piracy; +what a grand Admiral was Drake; what demi-gods the fighting Americans +who murdered Indians for the crime of wanting their own! History hath +charms to move an infant breast to savagery. Good strong novels are the +best pabulum to nourish difference between virtue and vice. + +Don't I know? I have felt the miracle and learned the difference so well +that even now at an advanced age I can tell the difference and indulge +in either. It was not a week after the killing of Joquita that I read +the first novel of my life. It was “Scottish Chiefs.” The dead bodies of +ten thousand novels lie between me and that first one. I have not read +it since. Ten Incas of Peru with ten rooms full of solid gold could +not tempt me to read it again. Have I not a clear cinch on a delicious +memory, compared with which gold is only Robinson Crusoe's “drug?” After +a lapse of all these years the content of that one tremendous, noble +chapter of heroic climax is as deeply burned into my memory as if it had +been read yesterday. + +A sister, old enough to receive “beaux” and addicted to the piano-forte +accomplishment, was at that time practicing across the hall an +instrumental composition, entitled, “La Rève.” Under the title, printed +in very small letters, was the English translation; but I never thought +to look at it. An elocutionist had shortly before recited Poe's Raven +at a church entertainment, and that gloomy bird flapped its wings in my +young emotional vicinity when the firelight threw vague “shadows on +the floor.” When the piece of music was spoken as “La Rève,” its sad +cadences, suffering, of course, under practice, were instantly wedded in +my mind to Mr. Poe's wonderful bird and for years it meant the “Raven” + to me. How curious are childish impressions. Years afterward when I +saw a copy of the music and read the translation, “The Dream” under the +title, I felt a distinct shock of resentment as if the French language +had been treacherous to my sacred ideas. Then there was the romantic +name of “Ellerslie,” which, notwithstanding considerable precocity in +reading and spelling I carried off as “Elleressie” Yeas afterward when +the actual syllables confronted me in a historical sketch of Wallace, +the truth entered like a stab and I closed the book. O sacred first +illusions of childhood, you are sweeter than a thousand year of fame! It +is God's providence that hardens us to endure the throwing of them down +to our eyes and strengthens us to keep their memory sweet in our hearts. + + + * * * * * + +It would be an affront then, not to assume that every reputable novel +reader has read “Scottish Chiefs.” If there is any descendant or any +personal friend of that admirable lady, Miss Jane Porter, who may now be +in pecuniary distress, let that descendant call upon me privately with +perfect confidence. There are obligations that a glacial evolutionary +period can not lessen. I make no conditions but the simple proof of +proper identity. I am not rich but I am grateful. + +It was a Saturday evening when I became aware, as by prescience, that +there hung over Sir William Wallice and Helen Mar some terrible shadow +of fate. And the piano-forte across the hall played “La Rève.” My heart +failed me and I closed the book. If you can't do that, my friend, then +you waste your time trying to be a novel reader. You have not the true +touch of genius for it. It is the miracle of eating your cake and having +it, too. It must have been the unconscious moving of novel reading +genius in me. For I forgot, as clearly as if it were not a possibility, +that the next day was Sunday. And so hurried off, before time, to bed, +to be alone with the burden on my heart. + + “Backward, turn backward, O Time in your flight-- + Make me a child again just for tonight.” + +There are two or three novels I should love to take to bed as of +yore--not to read, but to suffer over and to contemplate and to seek +calmness and courage with which to face the inevitable. Could there be +men base enough to do to death the noble Wallace? Or to break the heart +of Helen Mar with grief? No argument could remove the presentiment, but +facing the matter gave courage. “Let tomorrow answer,” I thought, as the +piano-forte in the next room played “La Rève.” Then fell asleep. + +And when I awoke next morning to the full knowledge that it was Sunday, +I could have murdered the calendar. For Sunday was Dies Irae. After +Sunday-school, at least. There is a certain amount of fun to be to +extracted from Sunday-school. The remainder of those early Sundays +was confined to reading the Bible or storybooks from the Sunday-school +library--books, by the Lord Harry, that seem to be contrived especially +to make out of healthy children life-long enemies of the church, and to +bind hypocrites to the altar with hooks of steel. There was no whistling +at all permitted; singing of hymns was encouraged; no “playing”--playing +on Sunday was a distinct source of displeasure to Heaven! Are free-born +men nine years of age to endure such tyranny with resignation? Ask +the kids of today--and with one voice, as true men and free, they will +answer you, “Nit!” In the dark days of my youth liberty was in chains, +and so Sunday was passed in dreadful suspense as to what was doing in +Scotland. + + * * * * * + +Monday night after supper I rejoined Sir William in his captivity and +soon saw that my worst fears were to be realized. My father sat on the +opposite side of the table reading politics; my mother was effecting the +restoration of socks; my brother was engaged in unraveling mathematical +tangles, and in the parlor across the hall my sister sat alone with +her piano patiently debating “La Rève.” Under these circumstances I +encountered the first great miracle of intellectual emotion in the +chapter describing the execution of William Wallace on Tower Hill. No +other incident of life has left upon me such a profound impression. +It was as if I had sprung at one bound into the arena of heroism. +I remember it all. How Wallace delivered himself of theological and +Christian precepts to Helen Mar after which they both knelt before the +officiating priest. That she thought or said, “My life will expire with +yours!” It was the keynote of death and life devotion. It was worthy to +usher Wallace up the scaffold steps where he stood with his hands bound, +“his noble head uncovered.” There was much Christian edification, but +the presence of such a hero as he with “noble Head uncovered” would +enable any man nine years old with a spark of honor and sympathy in him +to endure agonizing amounts of edification. Then suddenly there was a +frightful shudder in my heart. The hangman approached with the rope, and +Helen Mar, with a shriek, threw herself upon Wallace's breast. Then the +great moment. If I live a thousand years these lines will always be +with me: “Wallace, with a mighty strength, burst the bonds asunder that +confined his arms and clasped her to his heart!” + + * * * * * + +In reading some critical or pretended text books on construction since +that time I came across this sentence used to illustrate tautology. It +was pointed out that the bonds couldn't be “burst” without necessarily +being asunder. The confoundedest outrages in this world are the capers +that precisionists cut upon the bodies of the noble dead. And with +impunity too. Think of a village surveyor measuring the forest of Arden +to discover the exact acreage! Or a horse-doctor elevating his eye-brow +with a contemptuous smile and turning away, as from an innocent, when +you speak of the wings of that fine horse, Pegasus! Any idiot knows +that bonds couldn't be burst without being burst asunder. But, let the +impregnable Jackass think--what would become of the noble rhythm and the +majestic roll of sound? Shakespeare was an ignorant dunce also when +he characterized the ingratitude that involves the principle of public +honor as “the unkindest cut of all.” Every school child knows that it is +ungrammatical; but only those who have any sense learn after awhile +the esoteric secret that it sometimes requires a tragedy of language to +provide fitting sacrifice to the manes of despair. There never was yet +a man of genius who wrote grammatically and under the scourge of +rhetorical rules. Anthony Trollope is a most perfect example of the +exact correctness that sterilizes in its own immaculate chastity. +Thackeray would knock a qualifying adverb across the street, or thrust +it under your nose to make room for the vivid force of an idea. Trollope +would give the idea a decent funeral for the sake of having his adverb +appear at the grave above reproach from grammatical gossip. Whenever I +have risen from the splendid psychological perspective of old Job, the +solemn introspective howls of Ecclesiasticus and the generous living +philosophy of Shakespeare it has always been with the desire--of course +it is undignified, but it is human--to go and get an English grammar +for the pleasure of spitting upon it. Let us be honest. I understand +everything about grammar except what it means; but if you will give me +the living substance and the proper spirit any gentleman who desires the +grammatical rules may have them, and be hanged to him! And, while it +may appear presumptuous, I can conscientiously say that it will not be +agreeable to me to settle down in heaven with a class of persons who +demand the rules of grammar for the intellectual reason that corresponds +to the call for crutches by one-legged men. + + * * * * * + +If the foregoing appear ill-tempered pray forget it. Remember rather +that I have sought to leave my friend Sir William Wallace, holding Helen +Mar on his breast as long as possible. And yet, I also loved her! Can +human nature go farther than that? + +“Helen,” he said to her, “life's cord is cut by God's own hand.” He +stooped, he fell, and the fall shook the scaffold. Helen--that glorified +heroine--raised his head to her lap. The noble Earl of Gloucester +stepped forward, took the head in his hands. + +“There,” he cried in a burst of grief, letting it fall again upon the +insensible bosom of Helen, “there broke the noblest heart that ever beat +in the breast of man!” + +That page or two of description I read with difficulty and agony through +blinding tears, and when Gloucester spoke his splendid eulogy my head +fell on the table and I broke into such wild sobbing that the little +family sprang up in astonishment. I could not explain until my mother, +having led me to my room, succeeded in soothing me into calmness and +I told her the cause of it. And she saw me to bed with sympathetic +caresses and, after she left, it all broke out afresh and I cried myself +to sleep in utter desolation and wretchedness. Of course the matter +got out and my father began the book. He was sixty years old, not an +indiscriminate reader, but a man of kind and boyish heart. I felt a sort +of fascinated curiosity to watch him when he reached the chapter that +had broken me. And, as if it were yesterday, I can see him under the +lamplight compressing his lips, or puffing like a smoker through them, +taking off his spectacles, and blowing his nose with great ceremony and +carelessly allowing the handkerchief to reach his eyes. Then another +paragraph and he would complain of the glasses and wipe them carefully, +also his eyes, and replace the spectacles. But he never looked at me, +and when he suddenly banged the lids together and, turning away, sat +staring into the fire with his head bent forward, making unconcealed use +of the handkerchief, I felt a sudden sympathy for him and sneaked out. +He would have made a great novel reader if he had had the heart. But he +couldn't stand sorrow and pain. The novel reader must have a heart +for every fate. For a week or more I read that great chapter and its +approaches over and over, weeping less and less, until I had worn out +that first grief, and could look with dry eyes upon my dead. And never +since have I dared to return to it. Let who will speak freely in other +tones of “Scottish Chiefs”--opinions are sacred liberties--but as for +me I know it changed my career from one of ruthless piracy to better +purposes, and certain boys of my private acquaintance are introduced to +Miss Jane Porter as soon as they show similar bent. + + + + +IV. THE FIRST NOVEL TO READ + +CONTAINING SOME SCANDALOUS REMARKS ABOUT “ROBINSON CRUSOE” + + +The very best First-Novel-To-Read in all fiction is “Robinson Crusoe.” + There is no dogmatism in the declaration; it is the announcement of a +fact as well ascertained as the accuracy of the multiplication table. +It is one of the delights of novel reading that you may have any opinion +you please and fire it off with confidence, without gainsay. Those who +differ with you merely have another opinion, which is not sacred and +cannot be proved any more than yours. All of the elements of supreme +test of imaginative interest are in “Robinson Crusoe.” Love is absent, +but that is not a test; love appeals to persons who cannot read or +write--it is universal, as hunger and thirst. + +The book-reading boy is easily discovered; you always catch him reading +books. But the novel-reading boy has a system of his own, a sort of +instinctive way of getting the greatest excitement out of the story, the +very best run for his money. This sort of boy soon learns to sit with +his feet drawn up on the upper rung of a chair, so that from the knees +to the thighs there is a gentle declivity of about thirty degrees; +the knees are nicely separated that the book may lie on them without +holding. That involves one of the most cunning of psychological secrets; +because, if the boy is not a novel reader, he does not want the book to +lie open, since every time it closes he gains just that much relief +in finding the place again. The novel-reading boy knows the trick of +immortal wisdom; he can go through the old book cases and pick the +treasures of novels by the way they lie open; if he gets hold of a new +or especially fine edition of his father's he need not be told to wrench +it open in the middle and break the back of the binding--he does it +instinctively. + +There are other symptoms of the born novel reader to be observed in him. +If he reads at night he is careful to so place his chair that the light +will fall on the page from a direction that will ultimately ruin the +eyes--but it does not interfere with the light. He humps himself over +the open volume and begins to display that unerring curvalinearity of +the spine that compels his mother to study braces and to fear that he +will develop consumption. Yet you can study the world's health records +and never find a line to prove that any man with “occupation or +profession--novel reading” is recorded as dying of consumption. The +humped-over attitude promotes compression of the lungs, telescoping of +the diaphragm, atrophy of the abdominal abracadabra and other +things (see Physiological Slush, p. 179, et seq.); +but--it--never--hurts--the--boy! + +To a novel reading boy the position is one of instinct, like that of +the bicycle racer. His eyes are strained, his nerves and muscles at +tension--everything ready for excitement--and the book, lying open, +leaves his hands perfectly free to drum on the sides of the chair, slap +his legs and knees, fumble in his pockets or even scratch his head as +emotion or interest demand. Does anybody deny that the highest proof of +special genius is the possession of the instinct to adapt itself to the +matter in hand? Nothing more need be said. + + * * * * * + +Now, if you will observe carefully such a boy when he comes to a certain +point in “Robinson Crusoe” you may recognize the stroke of fate in his +destiny. If he's the right sort, he will read gayly along; he drums, +he slaps himself, he beats his breast, he scratches his head. Suddenly +there will come the shock. He is reading rapidly and gloriously. +He finds his knife in his pocket, as usual, and puts it back; the +top-string is there; he drums the devil's tattoo, he wets his finger +and smears the margin of the page as he whirls it over and then--he +finds--“The--Print--of--a--Man's--Naked--Foot--on--the--Shore!!!” + +Oh, Crackey! At this tremendous moment the novel reader who has genius +drums no more. His hands have seized the upper edges of the muslin lids, +he presses the lower edges against his stomach, his back takes an +added intensity of hump, his eyes bulge, his heart thumps--he is +landed--landed! + +Terror, surprise, sympathy, hope, skepticism, doubt--come all ye +trooping emotions to threaten or console; but an end has come to fairy +stories and wonder tales--Master Studious is in the awful presence of +Human Nature. + + * * * * * + +For many years I have believed that that +Print--of--a--Man's--Naked--Foot was set in italic type in all editions +of “Robinson Crusoe.” But a patient search of many editions has +convinced me that I must have been mistaken. + +The passage comes sneaking along in the midst of a paragraph in common +Roman letters and by the living jingo! you discover it just as Mr. +Crusoe discovered the footprint itself! + +No story ever written exhibits so profoundly either the perfect +design of supreme genius or the curious accidental result of slovenly +carelessness in a hack-writer. This is not said in any critical spirit, +because, Robinson Crusoe, in one sense, is above criticism, and +in another it permits the freest analysis without suffering in the +estimation of any reader. + +But for Robinson Crusoe, De Foe would never have ranked above the level +of his time. It is customary for critics to speak in awe of the “Journal +of the Plague” and it is gravely recited that that book deceived the +great Dr. Meade. Dr. Meade must have been a poor doctor if De Foe's +accuracy of description of the symptoms and effects of disease is not +vastly superior to the detail he supplies as a sailor and solitaire upon +a desert island. I have never been able to finish the “Journal.” + The only books in which his descriptions smack of reality are “Moll +Flanders” and “Roxana,” which will barely stand reading these days. + +In what may be called its literary manner, Robinson Crusoe is entirely +like the others. It convinces you by its own conviction of sincerity. +It is simple, wandering yet direct; there is no making of “points” or +moving to climaxes. De Foe did unquestionably possess the capacity to +put into his story the appearance of sincerity that persuades belief at +a glance. In that much he had the spark of genius; yet that same case +has not availed to make the “Journal” of the Plague anything more than +a curious and laborious conceit, while Robinson Crusoe stands among +the first books of the world--a marvelous gleam of living interest, +inextinguishably fresh and heartening to the imagination of every reader +who has sensibility two removes above a toad. + +The question arises, then, is “Robinson Crusoe” the calculated triumph +of deliberate genius, or the accidental stroke of a hack who fell upon a +golden suggestion in the account of Alexander Selkirk and increased +its value ten thousand fold by an unintentional but rather perfect +marshaling of incidents in order, and by a slovenly ignorance of +character treatment that enhanced the interest to perfect intensity? +This question may be discussed without undervaluing the book, the +extraordinary merit of which is shown in the fact that, while its idea +has been paraphrased, it has never been equalled. The “Swiss Family +Robinson,” the “Schonberg-Cotta Family” for children are full of merit +and far better and more carefully written, but there are only the desert +island and the ingenious shifts introduced. Charles Reade in “Hard +Cash,” Mr. Mallock in his “Nineteenth Century Romance,” Clark Russel in +“Marooned,” and Mayne Reid, besides others, have used the same theater. +But only in that one great book is the theater used to display the +simple, yearning, natural, resolute, yet doubting, soul and heart of man +in profound solitude, awaiting in armed terror, but not without purpose, +the unknown and masked intentions of nature and savagery. It seems +to me--and I have been tied to Crusoe's chariot wheels for a dozen +readings, I suppose--that it is the pressing in upon your emotions of +the immensity of the great castaway's solitude, in which he appears like +some tremendous Job of abandonment, fighting an unseen world, which is +the innate note of its power. + + * * * * * + +The very moment Friday becomes a loyal subject, the suspense relaxes +into pleased interest, and after Friday's funny father and the Spaniard +and others appear it becomes a common book. As for the second part of +the adventures I do not believe any matured man ever read it a second +time unless for curious or literary purposes. If he did he must be one +of that curious but simple family that have read the second part of +“Faust,” “Paradise Regained,” and the “Odyssey,” and who now peruse +“Clarissa Harlowe” and go carefully over the catalogue of ships in +the “Iliad” as a preparation for enjoying the excitements of the city +directory. + +Every particle of greatness in “Robinson Crusoe” is compressed within +two hundred pages, the other four hundred being about as mediocre trash +as you could purchase anywhere between cloth lids. + + * * * * * + +It is interesting to apply subjective analysis to Robinson Crusoe. The +book in its very greatness has turned more critical swans into geese +than almost any other. They have praised the marvelous ingenuity with +which De Foe described how the castaway overcame single-handed, the +deprivations of all civilized conveniences; they have marveled at the +simple method in which all his labors are marshaled so as to render his +conversion of the island into a home the type of industrial and even of +social progress and theory; they have rhapsodized over the perfection +of De Foe's style as a model of literary strength and artistic +verisemblance. Only a short time ago a mighty critic of a great +London paper said seriously that “Robinson Crusoe and Gulliver appeal +infinitely more to the literary reader than to the boy, who does +not want a classic but a book written by a contemporary.” What an +extraordinary boy that must be! It is probable that few boys care for +Gulliver beyond his adventures in Lilliput and Brobdignag, but they +devour that much, together with Robinson Crusoe, with just as much +avidity now as they did a century ago. Your clear-headed, healthy boy is +the first best critic of what constitutes the very liver and lights of +a novel. Nothing but the primitive problems of courage meeting peril, +virtue meeting vice, love, hatred, ambition for power and glory, will +go down with him. The grown man is more capable of dealing with social +subtleties and the problems of conscience, but those sorts of books do +not last unless they have also “action--action--action.” + +Will the New Zealander, sitting amidst the prophetic ruins of St. +Paul's, invite his soul reading Robert Elsmere? Of course you can't say +what a New Zealander of that period might actually do; but what would +you think of him if you caught him at it? The greatest stories of the +world are the Bible stories, and I never saw a boy--intractable of +acquiring the Sunday-school habit though he may have been--who wouldn't +lay his savage head on his paws and quietly listen to the good old tales +of wonder out of that book of treasures. + + * * * * * + +So let us look into the interior of our faithful old friend, Robinson +Crusoe, and examine his composition as a literary whole. From the moment +that Crusoe is washed ashore on the island until after the release of +Friday's father and the Spaniard from the hands of the cannibals, there +is no book in print, perhaps, that can surpass it in interest and the +strained impression it makes upon the unsophisticated mind. It is +all comprised in about 200 pages, but to a boy to whom the world is +a theater of crowded action, to whom everything seems to have come +ready-made, to whom the necessity of obedience and accommodation to +others has been conveyed by constant friction--here he finds himself +for the first time face to face with the problem of solitude. He can +appreciate the danger from wild animals, genii, ghosts, battles, sieges +and sudden death, but in no other book before, did he ever come upon a +human being left solitary, with all these possible dangers to face. + +The voyages on the raft, the house-building, contriving, fearing, +praying, arguing--all these are full of plaintive pathos and yet of +encouragement. He witnesses despair turned into comfortable resignation +as the result of industry. It has required about twelve years. Virtue is +apparently fattening upon its own reward, when--Smash! Bang!--our young +reader runs upon “the--print--of--a--man's--naked--foot!” and security +and happiness, like startled birds, are flown forever. For twelve more +years this new unseen terror hangs over the poor solitary. Then we +have Friday, the funny cannibals later and it is all over. But the vast +solitude of that poor castaway has entered the imagination of the youth +and dominates it. + +These two hundred pages are crowded with suggestions that set a boy's +mind on fire, yet every page contains evidence of obvious slovenliness, +indolence and ignorance of human nature and common things, half of which +faults seem directly to contribute to the result, while the other half +are never noticed by the reader. + +How many of you, who sniff at this, know Crusoe's real name? Yet it +stares right out of the very first paragraphs in the book--a clean, +perhaps accidental, proof of good scholarship, which De Foe possessed. +Crusoe tells us his father was a German from Bremen, who married an +Englishwoman, from whose family name of Robinson came the son's name +which was properly Robinson Kreutznaer. This latter name, he explains, +became corrupted in the common English speech into Crusoe. That is an +excellent touch. The German pronunciation of Kreutznaer would sound like +Krites-nare, and a mere dry scholar would have evolved Crysoe out of the +name. But the English-speaking people everywhere, until within the past +twenty years or so, have given the German “eu” the sound of “oo” or “u.” + Robinson's father therefore was called Crootsner until it was shaved +into Crootsno and thence smoothed to Crusoe. + +But what was the Christian name of the elder Kreutznaer? Or of the boy's +mother? Or of his brothers or sisters? Or of the first ship captain +under whom he sailed; or any of them; or even of the ship he commanded, +and in which he was wrecked; or of the dog that he carried to the +island; or of the two cats; or of the first and all the other tame +goats; or of the inlet; or of Friday's father; or of the Spaniard he +saved; or of the ship captain; or of the ship that finally saved him? +Who knows? The book is a desert as far as nomenclature goes--the only +blossoms being his own name; that of Wells, a Brazilian neighbor; Xury, +the Moorish boy; Friday, Poll, the parrot; and Will Atkins. + + * * * * * + +You may retort that all this doesn't matter. That is very true--and be +hanged to you!--but those facts prove by every canon of literary art +that Robinson Crusoe is either a coldly calculated flight of consummate +genius or an accidental freak of hack literature. When De Foe wrote, it +was only a century after Drake and his companions in authorized +piracy had made the British privateer the scourge of the seas and had +demonstrated that naval supremacy meant the control of the world. The +seafaring life was one of peril, but it carried with it honor, glory and +envy. Forty years later Nelson was born to crown British navalry with +deathless Glory. Even the commonest sailor spoke his ship's name--if it +were a fine vessel--with the same affection that he spoke his wife's +and cursed a bad ship by its name as if to tag its vileness with +proverbiality. + +When De Foe wrote Alexander Selkirk, able seaman, was alive end had +told his story of shipwreck to Sir Richard Steele, editor of the English +Gentleman and of the Tattler, who wrote it up well--but not half as well +as any one of ten thousand newspaper men of today could do under similar +circumstances. + +Now who that has read of Selkirk and Dampierre and Stradling does not +remember the two famous ships, the “Cinque Ports” and the “St. George?” + In every actvial book of the times, ship's names were sprinkled over the +page as if they had been shaken out of the pepper box. But you inquire +in vain the name of the slaver that wrecked “poor Robinson Crusoe”--a +name that would have been printed on his memory beyond forgetting +because of the very misfortune itself. Now the book is the autobiography +of a man whose only years of active life between eighteen and twenty-six +were passed as a sailor. It was written apparently after he was +seventy-two years old, at the period when every trifling incident and +name of youth would survive most brightly; yet he names no ships, no +sailor mates, carefully avoids all knowledge of or advantage attaching +to any parts of ships. It is out of character as a sailor's tale, +showing that the author either did not understand the value of or was +too indolent to acquire the ship knowledge that would give to his work +the natural smell of salt water and the bilge. It is a landlubber's sea +yarn. + +Is it in character as a revelation of human nature? No man like unto +Robinson Crusoe ever did live, does live, or ever will live, unless as a +freak deprived of human emotions. The Robinson Crusoe of Despair Island +was not a castaway, but the mature politician. Daniel Defoe of Newgate +Prison. The castaway would have melted into loving recollections; the +imprisoned lampoonist would have busied himself with schemes, ideas, +arguments and combinations for getting out, and getting on. This poor +Robin on the island weeps over nothing but his own sorrows, and, +while pretending to bewail his solitude, turns aside coldly from +companionships next only in affection to those of men. He has a dog, two +ship's cats (of whose “eminent history” he promises something that is +never related), tame goats and parrots. He gives none of them a name, +he does not occupy his yearning for companionship and love by preparing +comforts for them or by teaching them tricks of intelligence or +amusement; and when he does make a stagger at teaching Poll to talk it +is for the sole purpose of hearing her repeat “Poor Robin Crusoe!” + The dog is dragged in to work for him, but not to be rewarded. He dies +without notice, as do the cats, and not even a billet of wood marks +their graves. + +Could any being, with a drop of human blood in his veins, do that? He +thinks of his father with tears in his eyes--because he did not escape +the present solitude by taking the old man's advice! Does he recall his +mother or any of the childish things that lie so long and deep in +the heart of every natural man? Does he ever wonder what his old +school-fellows, Bob Freckles and Pete Baker, are doing these solitary +evenings when he sits under the tropics and hopes--could he not at +least hope it?--that they are, thank God, alive and happy at York? He +discourses like a parson of the utterly impossible affection that +Friday had for his cannibal sire and tells you how noble, Christian and +beautiful it was--as if, by Jove! a little of that virtue wouldn't have +ornamented his own cold, emotionless, fishy heart! + +He had no sentimental side. Think of those dreary, egotistic, awful +evenings, when, for more than twenty years this infernal hypocrite kept +himself company and tried patiently to deceive God by flattering Him +about religion! It is impossible. Why thought turns as certainly to +revery and recollection as grass turns to seed. He married. What was his +wife's name? We know how much property she had. What were the names of +the honest Portuguese Captain and the London woman who kept his money? +The cold selfishness and gloomy egotism of this creature mark him as a +monster and not as a man. + + * * * * * + +So the book is not in character as an autobiography, nor does it contain +a single softening emotion to create sympathy. Let us see whether it +be scholarly in its ease. The one line that strikes like a bolt of +lightning is the height of absurdity. We have all laughed, afterward +of course, at that--single--naked--foot--print. It could not have +been there without others, unless Friday were a one legged man, or was +playing the good old Scots game of “hop-scotch!” + +But the foot-print is not a circumstance to the cannibals. All the stage +burlesques of Robinson Crusoe combined could not produce such funny +cannibals as he discovered. Crusoe's cannibals ate no flesh but that +of men! He had no great trouble contriving how to induce Friday to eat +goat's flesh! They took all the trouble to come to his island to indulge +in picnics, during which they ate up folks, danced and then went home +before night. When the big party of 31 arrived, they had with them one +other cannibal of Friday's tribe, a Spaniard, and Friday's father. It +appears they always carefully unbound a victim before despatching him. +They brought Friday pere for lunch, although he was old, decrepit and +thin--a condition that always unfits a man among all known cannibals +for serving as food. They reject them as we do stringy old roosters for +spring chickens in the best society. Then Friday, born a cannibal and +converted to Crusoe's peculiar religion, shows that in three years he +has acquired all the emotions of filial affection prevalent at that time +among Yorkshire folk who attended dissenting chapels. More wonderful +still! old Friday pere, immersed in age and cannibalism, has the +corresponding paternal feeling. Crusoe never says exactly where these +cannibals came from, but my own belief is that they came from that +little Swiss town whence the little wooden animals for toy Noah's Arks +also came. + +A German savant--one of the patient sort that spend half a life writing +a monograph on the variation of spots on the butterfly's wings--could +get a philosophical dissertation on Doubt out of Crusoe's troubles with +pens, ink and paper; also clothes. In the volume I am using, on page 86, +third paragraph, he says: “I should lose my reckoning of time for want +of books, and pen and ink.” So he kept it by notches in wood, he tells +in the fourth paragraph. In paragraph 5, same page, he says: “We are +to observe that among the many things I brought out of the ship, I +got several of less value, etc., which I omitted setting down as in +particular pens, ink and paper!” Same paragraph, lower down: “I shall +show that while my ink lasted I kept things very exact, but after that +was gone I could not make any ink by any means that I could devise.” + Page 87, second paragraph: “I wanted many things, notwithstanding all +the many things that I had amassed together, and of these ink was one!” + Page 88, first paragraph: “I drew up my affairs in writing!” Now, by +George! did you ever hear of more appearing and disappearing pens, ink +and paper? + +The adventures of his clothes were as remarkable as his own. On his very +first trip to the wreck, after landing, he went “rummaging for clothes, +of which I found enough,” but took no more than he wanted for present +use. On the second trip he “took all the men's clothes” (and there were +fifteen souls on board when she sailed). Yet in his famous debit and +credit calculations between good and evil he sets these down, page 88: + + EVIL | GOOD + -------------------------------------------------- + I have no clothes to | But I am in a hot climate, + cover me. | where, if I had + | clothes (!) I could hardly + | wear them. + +On page 147, bewailing his lack of a sieve, he says: “Linen, I had none +but what was mere rags.” + +Page 158 (one year later): “My clothes, too, began to decay; as to +linen, I had had none a good while, except some checkered shirts, which +I carefully preserved, because many times I could bear no other clothes +on. I had almost three dozen of shirts, several thick watch coats, too +hot to wear.” + +So he tried to make jackets out of the watch coats. Then this ingenious +gentleman, who had nothing to wear and was glad of it on account of the +heat, which kept him from wearing anything but a shirt, and rendered +watch coats unendurable, actually made himself a coat, waistcoat, +breeches, cap and umbrella of skins with the hair on and wore them in +great comfort! Page 175 he goes hunting, wearing this suit, belted by +two heavy skin belts, carrying hatchet, saw, powder, shot, his heavy +fowling piece and the goatskin umbrella--total weight of baggage and +clothes about ninety pounds. It must have been a cold day! + +Yet the first thing he does for the naked Friday thirteen years later +is to give him a pair--of--LINEN--trousers! Poor Robin Crusoe--what a +colossal liar was wasted on a desert island! + + * * * * * + +Of course, no boy sees the blemishes in “Robinson Crusoe;” those are +left to the Infallible Critic. The book is as ludicrous as “Hamlet” from +one aspect and as profound as “Don Quixote” from another. In its pages +the wonder tales and wonder facts meet and resolve; realism and idealism +are joined--above all, there is a mystery no critic may solve. It is +useless to criticize genius or a miracle, except to increase its wonder. +Who remembers anything in “Crusoe” but the touch of the wizard's hand? +Who associates the Duke of Athens, Hermia and Helena, with Bottom and +Snug, Titania, Oberon and Puck? Any literary master mechanic might real +off ten thousand yards of the Greek folks or of “Pericles,” but when you +want something that runs thus: + + “I know a bank whereon the wild thyme blows! + Where oxlip and the nodding violet grows--.” + +why, then, my masters, you must put up the price and employ a genius to +work the miracle. + +Take all miracles without question. Whether work of genius or miracle of +accident, “Robinson Crusoe” gives you a generous run for your money. + + + + +V. THE OPEN POLAR SEA OF NOVELS + +WITH HIGHLY INCENDIARY ADVICE TO BOYS AND SOME MORE ANCIENT HISTORY + + +After the first novel has been read, somewhere under the seasoned age +of fourteen years, the beginner equipped with inherent genius for novel +reading is afloat upon an open sea of literature, a master mariner of +his own craft, having ports to make, to leave, to take, so splendid +of variety and wonder as to make the voyages of Sinbad sing small by +comparison. It may be proper and even a duty here to suggest to the +young novel reader that the Ten Commandments and all governmental +statutes authorize the instant killing, without pity or remorse, of +any heavy-headed and intrusive person who presumes to map out for him +a symmetrical and well-digested course of novel reading. The murder of +such folks is universally excused as self-defense and secretly applauded +as a public service. The born novel reader needs no guide, counsellor +or friend. He is his own “master.” He can with perfect safety and +indescribable delight shut his eyes, reach out his hand, pull down any +plum of a book and never make a mistake. Novel reading is the only +one of the splendid occupations of life calling for no instruction or +advice. All that is necessary is to bite the apple with the largest +freedom possible to the intellectual and imaginative jaws, and let the +taste of it squander itself all the way down from the front teeth until +it is lost in the digestive joys of memory. There is no miserable quail +limit to novels--you can read thirty novels in thirty days or 365 novels +in 365 days for thirty years, and the last one will always have the +delicious taste of the pies of childhood. + +If any honest-minded boy chances to read these lines, let him charge +his mind with full contempt for any misguided elders who have designs of +“choosing only the best accepted novels” for his reading. There are no +“best” novels except by the grace of the poor ones, and, if you don't +read the poor ones, the “best” will be as tasteless as unsalted rice. +I say to boys that are worth growing up: don't let anybody give you +patronizing advice about novels. If your pastors and masters try +oppression, there is the orchard, the creek bank, the attic room, the +roof of the woodshed (under the peach tree), and a thousand other places +where you may hide and maintain your natural independence. Don't let +elderly and officious persons explain novels to you. They can not +honestly do so; so don't waste time. Every boy of fourteen, with the +genius to read 'em, is just as good a judge of novels and can understand +them quite as well as any gentleman of brains of any old age. Because +novels mean entirely different things to every blessed reader. + + * * * * * + +The main thing at the beginning is to be in the neighborhood of a good +“novel orchard” and to nibble and eat, and even “gormandize,” as your +fancy leads you. Only--as you value your soul and your honor as a +gentleman--bear in mind that what you read in every novel that pleases +you is sacred truth. There are busy-bodies, pretenders to “culture,” and +sticklers for the multiplication table and Euclid's pestiferous theorem, +who will tell you that novel reading is merely for entertainment and +light accomplishment, and that the histories of fiction are purely +imaginary and not to be taken seriously. That is pure falsehood. The +truth of all humanity, as well as all its untruth, flows in a noble +stream through the pages of fiction. Do not allow the elders to persuade +you that pirate stories, battles, sieges, murders and sudden deaths, the +road to transgression and the face of dishonesty are not good for you. +They are 90 per cent. pure nutriment to a healthy boy's mind, and any +other sort of boy ought particularly to read them and so learn the +shortest cut to the penitentiary for the good of the world. Whenever you +get hold of a novel that preaches and preaches and preaches, and can't +give a poor ticket-of-leave man or the decentest sort of a villain +credit for one good trait--Gee, Whizz! how tiresome they are--lose it, +you young scamp, at once, if you respect yourself. If you are pushed you +can say that Bill Jones took it away from you and threw it in the creek. +The great Victor Hugo and the authors of that noble drama “The Two +Orphans,” are my authorities for the statement that some fibs--not all +fibs, but some proper fibs--are entered in heaven on both debit and +credit sides of the book of fate. + +There is one book, the Book of Books, swelling rich and full with +the wisdom and beauty and joy and sorrow of humanity--a book that set +humility like a diamond in the forehead of virtue; that found mercy and +charity outcasts among the minds of men and left them radiant queens in +the world's heart; that stickled not to describe the gorgeous esotery of +corroding passion and shamed it with the purity of Mary Magdelen; that +dragged from the despair of old Job the uttermost poison-drop of doubt +and answered it with the noble problem of organized existence; that +teems with murder and mistake and glows with all goodness and honest +aspiration--that is the Book of Books. There hasn't been one written +since that has crossed the boundary of its scope. What would that +book be after some goody-goody had expurgated it of evil and left it +sterilized in butter and sugar? Let no ignorant paternal Czar, ruling +over cottage or mansion, presume to keep from the mind and heart of +youth the vigorous knowledge and observation of evil and good, crime and +virtue together. No chaff, no wheat; no dross, no gold; no human faults +and weaknesses, no heavenly hope. And if any gentleman does not like +the sentiment, he can find me at my usual place of residence, unless he +intends violence--and be hanged, also, to him! + + * * * * * + +A novel is a novel, and there are no bad ones in the world, except those +you do not happen to like. Suppose a boy started with Robinson Crusoe +and was scientifically and criminally steered by the hand of misguided +“culture” to Scott and Dickens and Cooper and Hawthorne--all the +classics, in fact, so that he would escape the vulgar thousands? Answer +a straight question, ye old rooters between a thousand miles of muslin +lids--would you have been willing to miss “The Gunmaker of Moscow” back +yonder in the green days of say forty years ago? What do you think of +Prof. William Henry Peck's “Cryptogram?” Were not Sylvanus Cobb, Jr., +and Emerson Bennett authors of renown--honor to their dust, wherever it +lies! Didn't you read Mrs. Southworth's “Capitola” or the “Hidden Hand” + long before “Vashti” was dreamed of? Don't you remember that No. 52 +of Beadle's Dime Library (light yellowish red paper covers) was +“Silverheels, the Delaware,” and that No. 77 was “Schinderhannes, +the Outlaw of the Black Forest?” I yield to no man in affection and +reverence for M. Dumas, Mr. Thackeray and others of the higher circles, +but what's the matter with Ned Buntline, honest, breezy, vigorous, +swinging old Ned? Put the “Three Guardsmen” where you will, but there is +also room for “Buffalo Bill, the Scout.” When I first saw Col. Cody, an +ornament to the theatre and a painful trial to the drama, and realized +that he was Buffalo Bill in the flesh--why, I was glad I had also read +“Buffalo Bill's Last Shot”--(may he never shoot it). The day has passed +forever, probably, when Buffalo Bill shall shout to his other scouts, +“You set fire to the girl while I take care of the house!” or vice +versa, and so saying, bear the fainting heroine triumphantly off from +the treacherous redskins. But the story has lived. + + * * * * * + +It was a happy and honored custom in the old days for subscribers to +the New York Ledger and the New York Weekly to unite in requests for +the serial republication of favorite stories in those great fireside +luminaries. They were the old-fashioned, broadside sheets and, of +course, there were insuperable difficulties against preserving the +numbers. After a year or two, therefore, there would awaken a general +hunger among the loyal hosts to “read the story over,” and when the +demand was sufficiently strong the publishers would repeat it, cuts, +divisions, and all, just as at first. How many times the “Gunmaker +of Moscow” was repeated in the Ledger, heaven knows. I remember I +petitioned repeatedly for “Buffalo Bill” in the Weekly, and we got +it, too, and waded through it again. By wading, I don't mean pushing +laboriously and tediously through, but, by George! half immersion in the +joy. It was a week between numbers, and a studious and appreciative boy +made no bones of reading the current weekly chapters half a dozen times +over while waiting for the next. + +It must have been ten years later that I felt a thrill at the coming of +Buffalo Bill himself in his first play. I had risen to the dignity of +dramatic critic upon a journal of limited civilization and boundless +politics, and was privileged to go behind the scenes at the theatre and +actually speak to the actors. (I interviewed Mary Anderson during her +first season, in the parlor of the local hotel, where honest George +Bristow--who kept the cigar stand and could not keep a healthy +appetite--always gave a Thanksgiving order for “two-whole-roast turkeys +and a piece of breast,” and they were served, too, the whole ones going +to some near-by hospital, and the piece of breast to George's honest +stomach--good, kind soul that he was. And Miss Anderson chewed gum +during the whole period of the interview to the intense amusement of +my elder and brother dramatic critic, who has since become the honored +governor of his adopted state, and toward whom I beg to look with +affectionate memory of those days.) Now, when a man has known novels +intimately, has been dramatic critic, and has traveled with a circus, it +seems to me in all reason he can not fairly have any other earthly +joys to desire. At fifteen I was walking on tip-toe about the house +on Sundays, and going off to the end of the garden to softly whistle +“weekday” tunes, and at twenty I stood off the wings L. U. E., and had +twenty “Black Crook” coryphees in silk tights and tarletan squeeze +past in line, and nod and say, “Is it going all right in front?” + They--knew--I--was--the--Critic! When you can do that you can laugh at +Byron, roosting around upon inaccessible mountain crags and formulating +solitude and indigestion into poetry! + +I waited for Buffalo Bill's coming with feelings that can not be +described. It was impossible to expect to meet Sir William Wallace +in the flesh, or Sir Wilfred of Ivanhoe, or Capt. D'Artagnan, or +Umslopogaas, or any one of a thousand great fighting heroes; but here +was Buffalo Bill, just as great and glorious and dashing and handsome +as any of them, and my right hand tingled to be grasped in that of the +Bayard of the Prairies. And that hand's desire was attained. In his +dressing-room between acts I sat nervously on a chair while the splendid +Apollo of frontiersmen, in buckskin and beads, sat on his trunk, with +his long, shapely legs sprawled gracefully out, his head thrown back so +that the mane of brown hair should hang behind. It was glistening with +oil and redolent of barber's perfume. And we talked there as one man +to another, each apparently without fear. I was certainly nervous and +timid, but he did not notice it, and I am frank to say he did not appear +to feel the slightest personal fear of me. Thus, face to face, I saw the +man with whom I had trod Ned Buntline's boundless plains and had seen +and encountered a thousand perils and redskins. When the act call came, +and I rose to go, a man stopped at the door and said to him: + +“What shall it be to-night, Colonel?” + +“A big beef-steak and a bottle of Bass!” answered Buffalo Bill heartily, +“and tell 'ern to have it hot and ready at 11:15.” + +The beef-steak and Bass' ale were the watchwords of true heroism. +The real hero requires substantial filling. He must have a head and a +heart--but no less a good, healthy and impatient stomach. + +In the daily paper the morning I write this I see the announcement of +Buffalo Bill's “Wild West Show” coming two week's hence. Good luck to +him! He can't charge prices too steep for me, and there are six seats +necessary--the best in the amphitheater. And I wish I could be sure the +vigorous spirit of Ned Buntline would be looking down from the blue sky +overhead to see his hero charge the hill of San Juan at the head of the +Rough Riders. + + * * * * * + +This digression may be wide of the subject of novel reading, but +the real novel reader is at home anywhere. He has thoughts, dreams, +reveries, fancies. All the world is his novel and all actions are +stories and all the actors are characters. When Lucile Western, the +excellent American actress, was at the height of her powers, not long +before her last appearances, she had as her leading man a big, slouchy +and careless person, who was advertised as “the talented young English +actor, William Whally.” In the intimacies of private association he +was known as Bill Whally, and his descent was straight down from “Mount +Sinai's awful height.” He was a Hebrew and no better or more uneven and +reckless actor ever played melodramatic “heavies.” He had a love for +Shakespeare, but could not play him; he had a love of drink and could +gratify it. His vigorous talents purchased for him much forbearance. +I've seen Mr. Whally play the fastidious and elegant “Sir Archibald +Levison” in shiny black doe-skin trousers and old-fashioned cloth +gaiters, because his condition rendered the problem of dressing somewhat +doubtful, though it could not obscure his acting. He was the only +walking embodiment of “Bill Sykes” I ever saw, and I contracted the +habit of going to see him kill Miss Western as “Nancy” because he +butchered that young woman with a broken chair more satisfactorily than +anybody else I ever saw. There was a murderer for you--Bill +Sykes! Bad as he was in most things, let us not forget +that--he--killed--Nancy--and--killed--her--well and--thoroughly. If that +young woman didn't snivel herself under a just sentence of death, I'm no +fit householder to serve on a jury. Every time Miss Western came around +it was my custom to read up fresh on “Oliver Twist” and hurry around and +enjoy Bill Whally's happy application of retribution with the aid of +the old property chair. There were six other persons whom I succeeded in +persuading to applaud the scene with me every time it was acted. + +But there's a separate chapter for villains. + + * * * * * + +Let us return to the old novels. What curious pranks time plays with +tastes and vogues. Forty years ago N. P. Willis was just faded. Yet he +was long a great comet of literary glitter and obscured many men of much +greater ability. Everybody read him; the annuals hung upon his name; the +ladies regarded him as a finer and more dashing Byron than Byron. +The place he filled was much like that of Congreve, before whom +Shakespeare's great nose was out of joint for a long time; Congreve, who +was the margarita aluminata major of English poesy and drama and public +life, and is now found in junk stores and in the back line on book +shelves and whom nobody reads now. Willis had his languid affectations, +his superficial cynicism and added to them ostentatious sentimentality. + +Does anybody read William Gilmore Simm's elaborate rhetoric disguised +as novels? He must have written two dozen of them, the Richardson of the +United States. Lovers of delicious wit and intellectual humor still +read Dr. Holmes' essays, but it would probably take a physician's +prescription to make them swallow the novels. In what dark corners of +the library are Bayard Taylor's novels and travels hidden? Will you come +into the garden, Maud, and read Chancellor Walworth's mighty tragedies +and Miss Mulock's Swiss-toy historical novels, or will you beg off, +like the honest girl you are, and take a nap? Your sleepiness, dear Miss +Maud, does you credit. By the way, what the deuce is the name of anyone +of these novels? I can recall “Elsie Vernier,” by Dr. Holmes and then +there is a blank. + +But what classics they were--then! In the thick of them had appeared a +newspaper story that struggled through and was printed in book form. Old +friends have told me how they waited at the country post-offices to +get a copy, delayed for weeks. It was a scandal to read it in some +localities. It was fiercely attacked as an outrageous exaggeration +produced by temporary excitement and hostile feeling, or praised as a +new gospel. It has been translated into every tongue having a printing +press, and has sold by millions of copies. It was “Uncle Tom's Cabin.” + It was not a classic, but what a vigorous immortal mongrel of human +sentiment it was! What a row was kicked up over Miss Braddon's +“Octoroon,” and what an impossible yellowback it was! The toughest piece +of fiction I met with as a boy was “Sanford and Merton,” and I've been +aching to say so for four pages. If this world were full of Sanfords +and Mertons, then give me Jupiter or some other comfortable planet at a +secure sanitary distance removed. + +I can't even remember the writers who were grammatically and +rhetorically perfect forty years ago, and also very dull with it all. +Is there a bookshelf that holds “Leni Leoti, or The Flower of the +Prairies?” There are “Jane Eyre,” “Lady Audley's Secret,” and “John +Halifax, Gentleman,” which will go with many and are all well worth the +reading, too. Are Mrs. Eliza A. Dupuy, Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth, +Mrs. Caroline Lee Hentz and Augusta J. Evans dead? Their novels still +live--look at the book stores. “Linda, or the Young Pilot of the Belle +Creole,” “India, the Pearl of Pearl River,” “The Planter's Northern +Bride,” “St. Elmo”--they were fiction for you! A boy old enough to have +a first sweetheart could swallow them by the mile. + +You remember, when we were boys, the circus acrobats always--always, +remember--rubbed young children with snake-oil and walloped them with a +rawhide to educate them in tumbling and contortion? Well, if I could get +the snake-oil for the joints and a curly young wig, I'd like to get back +at five hundred of those books and devour them again--“as of yore!” + + + + +VI. RASCALS + +BEING A DISCOURSE UPON GOOD, HONEST SCOUNDRELISM AND VILLAINS. + + +The people that inhabit novels are like other peoples of the earth--if +they are peaceful, they have no history. So that, therefore, in novels, +as in nations, it is the great restless heights of society that are to +be approached with greatest awe and that engage admiration and regard. +Everybody is interested in Nero, but not one person in ten thousand can +tell you anything definite about Constantine or even Marcus Aurelius. If +you should speak off-handedly about Amelia Sedley in the presence of a +thousand average readers you would probably miss 85 per cent. of effect; +if you said Becky Sharp the whole thousand would understand. + +There is this to be said of disreputable folk, that they are clever and +picturesque and interesting, at least. + +An elderly jeweler in New York City was arrested several years ago +upon the charge of receiving stolen gold and silver plate, watches and +jewelry from well-known thieves. For forty years he had been a +respected merchant, a church officer, a husband, father, and citizen, of +irreproachable reputation, with enduring friendships. He was charitable, +liberal and kindly. For decade after decade he was the experienced, wise +and fatherly “fence” of professional burglars and thieves. Why, it would +be an education in itself to know that man, to shake his honest hand, +fresh from charity or concealment, and smoke a pipe with him and +hear him talk about things frankly. When he gave to the missionary +collection, rest assured he gave sincerely; when he “covered swag,” + into the melting pot for an industrious burglar, he did so only in the +regular course of business. + +Strange as it may seem, even criminals have human feelings in common +with all of us. The old Thug who stepped aside into the bushes and +prayed earnestly while his son was throwing his first strangling +cloth around the throat of the English traveler--prayed for that son's +honorable, successful beginning in his life devotion--was a good father. +And when he was told that the son had acted with unusual skill, who +can doubt that his tears of joy were sincere and humble tears of +thankfulness? At least Bowanee knew. Can you not imagine a kind-hearted +Chinese matron saying to her neighbor over the bamboo fence, “Yes, +we sent the baby down to the beach (or the river bank or the forest) +yesterday. We couldn't afford to keep it. I hope the gods have taken its +little soul. At any rate it is sure of salvation hereafter.” + + * * * * * + +Some twenty years ago I took the night train from Pineville to +Barbourville, in the Kentucky mountains, reaching the latter place +about 11 o'clock of a cold, rainy, dark November night. Only one other +passenger alighted. There was an express wagon to take us to the town, +a mile or so distant, and the wagon was already heavy with freight +packages. The road was through a narrow lane, hub-deep with mud, and +what, with stalling and resting, we were more than half an hour getting +to the hotel. My fellow passenger was about my age, and was a shrewd, +well-informed native of the vicinity. He knew the mineral, timber and +agricultural resources, was evidently an enterprising business man and +an intelligent but not voluble talker. He accepted a cigar, and advised +me to see the house in Barbourville where the late Justice Samuel Miller +was born. At the hotel he registered first, and, as he was going to +leave next day and I was to remain several days, he told the clerk to +give me the better of the two rooms vacant. It was a very pleasant act +of thoughtfulness. The name on the register was “A. Johnson.” The next +day I asked the clerk about Mr. Johnson. My fellow passenger was Andy +Johnson, whose fame as a feud-fighter and slayer of men has never been +exceeded in the history of mountain feuds. He then had three or four men +to his credit, definitely, and several doubtful ascriptions. He added a +few more, I believe, before he met the inevitable. + +Now, while Mr. Johnson, in all matters where killing seemed to him to be +appropriate, was a most prompt and accurate man in accomplishing it, yet +he was not the murderer that ignorant and isolated folks conceive such +persons to be. The cigar I had given him was a very bad, cheap cigar, +and, if he had merely wanted murder, he had every reason to kill me for +giving it to him, and he had a perfect night for the deed. But he smoked +it to the stub without a complaint or remark and saw that I got the best +room in the hotel. Johnson was a cautious and considerate fellow-man, +whose murders were doubtless private hobbies and exercises growing out +of his environment and heredity. + +One of the houses I most delight to enter in a certain town is one where +I am always sure to see a devoted and happy wife and beautiful, +playful children clustering around the armchair in which sits a man who +committed one of the most cold-blooded assassinations you can imagine. +He is an honored, esteemed and model citizen. His acquittal was a +miracle in a million chances. He has justified it. It is beautiful to +see those happy children clinging to the hand that-- + +Well, dear friends, the dentist is not a cruel man in his social +capacity, and you can get delicious viands instead of nauseous medicines +at the doctor's private table. + +That is why beginning novel readers should take no advice. Strike out +alone through the highways and lanes of story, character and experience. +The best novelist is the one who fears not to tell you the truth, which +is more wonderful than fiction. It is always the best hearts that bend +to mistakes. Absolute virtue is as sterile as granite rock; absolute +vice is as poisonous as a stagnant pond. No healthy interest or +speculation can linger about either. Enter into the struggle and know +human nature; don't stay outside and try to appear superior. + +For, which of us has not his crimes of thought to account for? Think +not, because Andy Johnson or William Sykes or Dr. Webster actually +killed his man, that you are guiltless, because you haven't. Have you +never wanted to? Answer that, in your conscience and in solitude--not to +me. Speak up to yourself and then say whether the difference between you +and the recorded criminal is not merely the difference between the overt +act and the faltering wish. It is a matter of courage or of custom. +Speaking for one gentleman, who knows himself and is not afraid to +confess, I can say that, while he could not kill a mouse with his own +hand, he has often murdered men in his heart. It may have been in fiery +youth over the wrong name on a dancing card, or, later, when a rival +got the better of him in discussion, or, when the dreary bore came and +wouldn't go, or, when misdirected goodness insisted on thrusting upon +him intended kindness that was wormwood and poison to the soul. Are +we not covetous (not confessedly, of course, but actually)? Is not +covetousness the thwarted desire of theft without courage? How many +of us, now--speaking man to man--can open up our veiled thoughts and +desires and then look the Ten Commandments in the eye without blushing? + + * * * * * + +The bravest, noblest, gentlest gentleman I have ever known was the Count +de la Fere, whom we at the Hotel de Troisville, in old Paris, called +“Athos.” He was not merely sans peur et sans reproche as Bayard, but was +positive in his virtues. He fought for his friends without even asking +the cause of the fray. Yet, what a prig he seemed to be at first, with +his eternal gentle melancholy, his irreproachable courtesy, unvarying +kindness and complete unselfishness. You cannot--quite--warm--to--a--man +--who--is--so--perfectly--right--that--he--embarrasses--everybody--but--the--angels. + +But, when he ordered the gloomy and awful death of the treacherous +Miladi, woman though she was, and thus as a perfect gentleman took on +human frailty also, ah! how attractively noble and strong he became I In +that respect he was the antithetical corollary of William Sykes, who was +a purposeless, useless and uninterestingly regular scoundrel, thief and +brute, until he redeemed himself by becoming the instrument of social +justice and pounding that unendurable lady, Miss Nancy, of his name, +into absence from the world. Perhaps I have remarked before--and even if +I have it is pleasant to repeat it--that Bill Sykes had his faults, as +also have most of us, but it was given to him to earn forgiveness by the +aid of a cheap chair and the providential propinquity of Miss Nancy. I +never think of it without regretting that poor Bill Whally is dead. He +did it--so--much--to--my--taste! + +Who shall we say is the most loved and respected criminal in fiction? +Not Monsignor Rodin, of “The Wandering Jew;” not Thenardier in “Les +Miserables.” These are really not criminals; they are allegorical +figures of perfect crime. They are solar centers, so far off and fixed +that one may regard them only with awe, reverence and fear. They are +types of fate, desire, temptation and chastisement. Let us turn to our +own flesh and blood and speak gratefully of them. + + * * * * * + +Who says Count Fosco? Now there is a criminal worthy of affection and +confidence. What an expansive nature, with kindness presented on every +side. Even the dogs fawned upon him and the birds came at his call. +An accomplished gentleman, considerately mannered--queer, as becomes a +foreigner, yet possessing the touchstone of universal sympathy. Another +man with crime to commit almost certainly would have dispatched it with +ruthless coldness; but how kindly and gently Count Fosco administered +the cord of necessity. With what delicacy he concealed the bowstring +and spoke of the Bosphorus only as a place for moonlight excursions. He +could have presented prussic acid and sherry to a lady in such a manner +as to render the results a grateful sacrifice to his courtesy. It was +all due to his corpulence; a “lean and hungry” villain lacks repose, +patience and the tact of good humor. In almost every small social and +individual attitude Count Fosco was human. He was exceedingly attentive +to his wife in society and bullied her only in private and when +necessary. He struck no dramatic attitudes. “The world is mine oyster!” + is not said by real men bent on terrible deeds. Count Fosco is the +perfect villain, and also the perfect criminal, inasmuch as he not only +acts naturally, but deliberately determines the action instead of being +drawn into it or having it forced upon him. + +He was a highly cultivated type of Andy Johnson, inasmuch as crime +with him was not a life purpose, but what is called in business a +“side-line.” All of us have our hobbies; the closely confined clerk +goes home and roots up his yard to plant flower bulbs or cabbage plants; +another fancies fowls; another man collects pewter pots and old brass +and the millionaire takes to priceless horses; others of us turn from +useful statistics and go broke on novels or poetry or music. Count Fosco +was an educated gentleman and the pleasure of life was his purpose; +crime and intrigue were his recreations. Andy Johnson was a good +business man and wealth producer; murder was the direction in which +his private understanding of personal disagreements was exercised and +vented. Some men turn to poker playing, which is as wasteful as murder +and not half as dignified. Count Fosco is the villain par excellence of +novels. I do not remember what he did, because “The Woman in White” is +the best novel in the world to read gluttonously at a sitting and then +forget absolutely. It is nearly always a new book if you use it that +way. When the world is dark, the fates bilious, the appetite dead +and the infernal twinges of pain or sickness seem beyond reach of the +doctor, “The Woman in White” is a friend indeed. + + * * * * * + +But the man of men for villains, not necessarily criminals; but the +ordinary, every-day, picturesque worthies of good, honest scoundrelism +and disreputableness is Sir Robert Louis Stevenson. You can afford +conscientiously to stuff ballot boxes in order that his election may be +secured as Poet Laureate of Rascals. Leaving out John Silver and Billy +Bones and Alan Breck, whom every privately shriven rascal of us simply +must honor and revere as giants of courage, cunning and controlled, +conscience, Stevenson turned from singles and pairs, and in “The Ebb +Tide,” drove, by turns, tandem and abreast, a four-in-hand of scoundrels +so buoyant, natural, strong, and yet each so totally unlike the others, +that every honest novel reader may well be excused for shedding tears +when he reflects that the marvelous hand and heart that created them are +gone forever from the haunts of the interestingly wicked. No novelist +ever exposed the human nature of rascals as Stevenson did. + +Now, lago was not a villain; he was a venomous toad, a scorpion, a +mad-dog, a poisonous plant in a fair meadow. There was nobody lago +loved, no weakness he concealed, no point of contact with any human +being. His sister was Pandora, his brother made the shirt of Nessus, +himself dealt in Black Plagues and the Leprosy. The old Serpent was +permitted to rise from his belly and walk upright on the tip of his tail +when he met Iago, as a demonstration of moral superiority. But think +of those three Babes-in-the-Wood villains, skipper Davis, the Yankee +swashbuckler and ship scuttler; Herrick, the dreamy poet, ruined by +commerce and early love, with his days of remorse and his days of +compensatary liquor; and Huish, the great-hearted Scotch ruffian, who +chafed at the conventional concealments of trade among pals and never +could--as a true Scotchman--understand why you should wait to use a +knife upon a victim when promptness lay in the club right at hand--think +of them sailing out of Honolulu harbor on the Farallone. + +Let who will prefer to have sailed with Jason or Aeneas or Sinbad; but +the Farallone and its precious freight of rascality gets my money every +time. Think of the three incomparable reprobates afloat, with one case +of smallpox and a cargo of champagne, daring to make no port, with over +a hundred million square miles of ocean around them, every ten lookout +knots of it containing a possible peril! It was simply grand--not +pirates, shipwrecks or mutinies could beat that problem. And the pathos +of the sixth day, when, with every man Jack of them looking delirium +tremens in the face and suspecting each the other, Mr. Huish opened a +new case of champagne and--found clear spring water under the French +label! The honest scoundrels had been laid by the heels by a common wine +merchant in the regular way of business! Oh, gentlemen, there should be +honor in business; so that gallant villains can be free of betrayal. + +The keynote of these gentlemen is struck in the second chapter, where +all three of them writing lies home--Davis and Herrick, sentimental +equivocations, Huish the strongest of brag with nobody to send it to. +In a burst of weakness Davis tells Herrick what a villain he has been, +through rum, and how he can not let his daughter, “little Adar,” know +it. “Yes, there was a woman on board,” he said, describing the ship +he had scuttled. “Guess I sent her to hell, if there's such a place. +I never dared go home again, and I don't know,” he added, bitterly, +“what's come to them.” + +“Thank you, Captain,” said Herrick, “I never liked you better!” + +Is it not in human nature to cuddle to a great sheepish murderer like +that, who groans in secret for his little girl--if even the girl was +truth? I think she turned out a myth, but he had the sentiment. + +Was there ever a more melancholy, remorse-stricken wretch than Cap'n +Davis? Or a gentler and seedier poet than Herrick? Or a more finely +sodden and soaked old rum sport than Huish (not--Whish!) But it was not +until they fell in with Attwater that their weakness as scoundrels was +exposed. Attwater was so splendidly religious! He was determined to have +things right if he had to have them so by bloodshed; he saved souls by +bullets. Things were right when they were as he thought they should +be. And believing so, with Torquemada, Alexander Sixtus and other most +religious brethren, he was ready to set up the stake and fagot and +cauterize sin with fire. One thing you can say about the religious folks +that are big with cocksureness and a mission--they may make mistakes, +but the mistake doesn't talk and criticise. + + * * * * * + +The only rascal worthy to travel in company with Stevenson's rascals +is the Chevalier Balibari, of Castle Barry, in Ireland, whose admirable +memoirs have been so well told by Mr. Thackeray. The Baron de la Motte +in “Denis Duval,” was advantageously born to ornament the purple and +fine linen of picturesque unrighteousness--but his was a brief star that +fell unfinished from its place amidst the Pleiades. Thackeray's genius +ran more to disreputable men than to actual villains. But he drew two +scoundrels that will serve as beacon lights to any clean-souled youth +with the instinct to take warning. One was Lord Steyne, the other, Dr. +George Brand Firmin; one the aristocratic, class-bred, cynical brute, +the other the cold, tuft-hunting trained hypocrite. What encouragement +of self-respect Judas Iscariot might have received if he had met Dr. +Firmin! + +Dr. Chadband, Mr. Pecksniff, Bill Sykes, Fagin, Mr. Murdstone, of +Dickens' family--they are all strong in impression, but wholly unreal; +mere stage villains and caricatures. A villain who has no good traits, +no hobbies of kindness and affection, is never born into the world; he +is always created by grotesque novel writers. + +The villains of Dumas, Hugo, Balzac, Daudet are French. There may have +been, or may be now such prototypes alive in France--because the Dreyfus +case occurred in France, and no doubt much can happen in that fine, +fertile country which translators cannot fully convey over the +frontiers; but they have always seemed to me first cousins to my +friends, the ogres, the evil magicians and the werewolves, and, in that +much, not quite natural. + +For heroes of the genuine cavalleria type, plumed, doubleted, pumpt and +magnificent, give me Dumas; for good folks and true, the great American +Fenimore Cooper; but for the blessed company of blooming, breathing +rascals, Stevenson and Thackeray all the time. + + + + +VII. HEROES + +THE NATURE AND THE FLOWER OF THEM--THE GALLANT D'ARTAGNAN OR THE +GLORIOUS BUSSY. + + +Let us agree at the start that no perfect hero can be entirely mortal. +The nearer the element of mortality in him corresponds to the heel +measure of Achilles, the better his chance as hero. The Egyptian and +Greek heroes were invariably demi-gods on the paternal or maternal side. +Few actual historic heroes have escaped popular scandal concerning their +origin, because the savage logic in us demands lions from a lion; that +Theseus shall trace to Mars; that courage shall spring from courage. + +Another most excellent thing about the ideal hero is that the immortal +quality enables him to go about the business of his heroism without +bothering his head with the rights or wrongs of it, except as the +prevailing sentiment of social honor (as distinguished from the inborn +sentiment of honesty) requires at the time. Of course, there is a lower +grade of measly, “moral heroes,” who (thank heaven and the innate sense +of human justice!) are usually well peppered with sorrow and punishment. +The hero of romance is a different stripe; Hyperion to a Satyr. He +doesn't go around groaning page after page of top-heavy debates as to +the inherent justice of his cause or his moral right to thrust a tallow +candle between the particular ribs behind which the heart of his enemy +is to be found--balancing his pros and cons, seeking a quo for each +quid, and conscientiously prowling for final authorities. When you +invade the chiropodical secret of the real hero's fine boot, or brush +him in passing--if you have looked once too often at a certain lady, or +have stood between him and the sun, or even twiddled your thumbs at him +in an indecorous or careless manner--look to it that you be prepared +to draw and mayhap to be spitted upon his sword's point, with honor. +Sdeath! A gentlemen of courage carries his life lightly at the needle +end of his rapier, as that wonderful Japanese, Samsori, used to make the +flimsiest feather preside in miraculous equilibration upon the tip of +his handsome nose. + +No hero who does more or less than is demanded by the best practical +opinion of the society of his time is worth more than thirty cents as +a hero. Boys are literary and dramatic critics so far above the critics +formed by strained formulas of the schools that you can trust them. +They have an unerring distrust of the fellow who moves around with his +confounded conscientious scruples, as if the well-settled opinion of the +breathing world were not good enough for him! Who the deuce has got any +business setting everybody else right? + +Some of these days I believe it is going to be discovered that the +atmosphere and the encompassing radiance and sweetness of Heaven are +composed of the dear sighs and loving aspirations of earthly motherhood. +If it turns out otherwise, rest assured Heaven will not have reached +its perfect point of evolution. Why is it, then, that mothers +will--will--will--try, so mistakenly, to extirpate the jewel of honest, +manly savagery from the breasts of their boys? I wonder if they know +that when grown men see one of these “pretty-mannered boys,” cocksure +as a Swiss toy new painted and directed by watch spring, they feel an +unholy impulse to empty an ink-bottle over the young calf? Fauntleroy +kids are a reproach to our civilization. Men, women and children, all of +us, crowd around the grimy Deignan of the Merrimac crew, and shout and +cheer for Bill Smith, the Rough Rider, who carried his mate out of the +ruck at San Juan and twirls his hat awkwardly and explains: “Ef I hadn't +a saw him fall he would 'a' laid thar yit!”--and go straight home and +pretend to be proud of a snug little poodle of a man who doesn't play +for fear of soiling his picture-clothes, and who says: “Yes, sir, thank +you,” and “No, thank you, ma'am,” like a French doll before it has had +the sawdust kicked out of it! + + * * * * * + +Now, when a hero tries to stamp his acts with the precise quality of +exact justice--why, he performs no acts. He is no better than that poor +tongue-loose Hamlet, who argues you the right of everything, and then, +by the great Jingo! piles in and messes it all by doing the wrong thing +at the wrong time and in the wrong manner. It is permitted of course to +be a great moral light and correct the errors of all the dust of earth +that has been blown into life these ages; but human justice has been +measured out unerringly with poetry and irony to such folk. They are +admitted to be saints, but about the time they have got too good for +their earthly setting, they have been tied to stakes and lighted up +with oil and faggots; or a soda phosphate with a pinch of cyanide of +potassium inserted has been handed to them, as in the case of our old +friend, Socrates. And it's right. When a man gets too wise and good +for his fellows and is embarrassed by the healthful scent of good human +nature, send him to heaven for relief, where he can have the goodly +fellowship of the prophets, the company of the noble army of martyrs, +and amuse himself suggesting improvements upon the vocal selections +of cherubim and seraphim! Impress the idea upon these gentry with +warmth--and--with--oil! + + * * * * * + +The ideal hero of fiction, you say, is Capt. D'Artagnan, first name +unknown, one time cadet in the Reserves of M. de Troisville's company +of the King's Guards, intrusted with the care of the honor and safety of +His Majesty, Louis XIV. Very well; he is a noble gentleman; the +choice does honor to your heart, mind and soul; take him and hold the +remembrance of his courage, loyalty, adroitness and splendid endurance +with hooks of steel. For myself, while yielding to none who honor +the great D'Artagnan, yet I march under the flag of the Sieur Bussy +d'Amboise, a proud Clermont, of blood royal in the reign of Henry +III., who shed luster upon a court that was edified by the wisdom of M. +Chicot, the “King's Brother,” the incomparable jester and philosopher, +who would have himself exceeded all heroes except that he despised the +actors and the audience of the world's theater and performed valiant +feats only that he might hang his cap and bells upon the achievements in +ridicule. + +Can it be improper to compare D'Artagnan and Bussy--when the intention +is wholly respectful and the motive pure? If a single protest is +heard, there will be an end to this paper now--at once. There are some +comparisons that strengthen both candidates. For, we must consider the +extent of the theater and the stage, the space of time covering the +achievements, the varying conditions, lights and complexities. As, +for instance, the very atmosphere in which these two heroes moved, the +accompaniment of manner which we call the “air” of the histories, and +which are markedly different. The contrast of breeding, quality and +refinement between Bussy and D'Artagnan is as great as that which +distinguishes Mercutio from the keen M. Chicot. Yet each was his own +ideal type. Birth and the superior privileges of the haute noblesse +conferred upon the Sieur Bussy the splendid air of its own sufficient +prestige; the lack of these require of D'Artagnan that his intelligence, +courage and loyal devotion should yet seem to yield something of their +greatness in the submission that the man was compelled to pay to +the master. True, this attitude was atoned for on occasion by blunt +boldness, but the abased position and the lack of subtle distinction of +air and mind of the noble, forbade to the Fourth Mousquetaire the last +gracious touch of a Bayard of heroism. But the vulgarity was itself +heroic. + + * * * * * + +Compare the first appearance of the great Gascon at the Hotel de +Troisville, or even his manner and attitude toward the King when he +sought to warn that monarch against forgetfulness of loyalty proved, +with the haughty insolence of indomitable spirit in which Bussy threw +back to Henry the shuttle of disfavor on the night of that remarkable +wedding of St. Luc with the piquant little page soubrette, Jeanne de +Brissac. + +D'Artagnan's air to his King has its pathos. It seems to say: “I speak +bluntly, sire, knowing that my life is yours and yet feeling that it is +too obscure to provoke your vengeance.” A very hard draught for a man +of fire and fearlessness to take without a gulp. But into Bussy's manner +toward his King there was this flash of lightning from Olympus: “My +life, sire, is yours, as my King, to take or leave; but not even you +may dare to think of taking the life of Bussy with the dust of least +reproach upon it. My life you may blow out; my honor you do not dare +approach to question!” + +There are advantages in being a gentleman, which can not be denied. +One is that it commands credit in the King's presence as well as at the +tailor's. + +It is interesting to compare both these attitudes with that of +“Athos,” the Count de la Fere, toward the King. He was lacking in +the irresistibly fierce insolence of Bussy and in the abasement of +D'Artagnan; it was melancholy, patient, persistent and terrible in its +restrained calmness. How narrowly he just escaped true greatness. I +would no more cast reproaches upon that noble gentleman than I would +upon my grandmother; but he--was--a--trifle--serous, wasn't he? He was +brave, prompt, resourceful, splendid, and, at need, gingerish as the +best colt in the paddock. It is the deuce's own pity for a man to be +born to too much seriousness. Do you know--and as I love my country, I +mean it in honest respect--that I sometimes think that the gentleness +and melancholy of Athos somehow suggests a bit of distrust. One is +almost terrified at times lest he may begin the Hamlet controversies. +You feel that if he committed a murder by mistake you are not absolutely +sure he wouldn't take a turn with Remorse. Not so Bussy; he would throw +the mistake in with good will and not create worry about it. Hang it +all, if the necessary business of murder is to halt upon the shuffling +accident of mistake, we may as well sell out the hero business and rent +the shop. It would be down to the level of Hamlet in no time. Unless, of +course, the hero took the view of it that Nero adopted. It is improbable +that Nero inherited the gift of natural remorse; but he cultivated one +and seemed to do well with it. He used to reflect upon his mother and +his wife, both of whom he had affectionately murdered, and justified +himself by declaring that a great artist, who was also the Roman +Emperor, would be lacking in breadth of emotional experience and +retrospective wisdom, unless he knew the melancholy of a two-pronged +family remorse. And from Nero's standpoint it was one of the best +thoughts that he ever formulated into language. + +To return to Bussy and D'Artagnan. In courage they were Hector and +Achilles. You remember the champagne picnic before the bastion St. +Gervais at the siege of St. Rochelle? What light-hearted gayety amid the +flying missiles of the arquebusiers! Yet, do not forget that--ignoring +the lacquey--there were four of them, and that his Eminence, the +Cardinal Duke, had said the four of them were equal to a thousand men! +If you have enough knowledge of human nature to understand the fine +game of baseball, and have at any time scraped acquaintance with the +interesting mathematical doctrine of progressive permutations, you will +see, when four men equal to a thousand are under the eyes of each other, +and of the garrison in the fort, that the whole arsenal of logarithms +would give out before you could compute the permutative possibilities +of the courage that would be refracted, reflected, compounded and +concentrated by all there, each giving courage to and receiving courage +from each and all the others. It makes my head ache to think of it. I +feel as if I could be brave myself. + +Certainly they were that day. To the bitter end of finishing the meal; +and they confessed the added courage by gamboling like boys amid awful +thunders of the arquebuses, which made a rumble in their time like their +successors, the omnibuses, still make to this day on the granite streets +of cities populated by deaf folks. + +There never was more of a gay, lilting, impudent courage than those four +mousquetaires displayed with such splendid coolness and spirit. + +But compare it with the fight which Bussy made, single-handed, against +the assassins hired by Monsereau and authorized by that effeminate +fop, the Due D'Anjou. Of course you remember it. Let me pay you the +affectionate compliment of presuming that you have read “La Dame de +Monsereau,” often translated under the English title, “Chicot, the +Jester,” that almost incomparable novel of historical romance, by M. +Dumas. If, through some accident or even through lack of culture, you +have failed to do so, pray do not admit it. Conceal your blemish +and remedy the matter at once. At least, seem to deserve respect and +confidence, and appear to be a worthy novel-reader if actually you are +not. There is a novel that, I assure you on my honor, is as good as +the “Three Guardsmen;” but--oh!--so--much--shorter; the pity of it, +too!--oh, the pity of it! On the second reading--now, let us speak with +frank conservatism--on the second reading of it, I give you my word, man +to man, I dreaded to turn every page, because it brought the end nearer. +If it had been granted to me to have one wish fulfilled that fine winter +night, I should have said with humility: “Beneficent Power, string it +out by nine more volumes, presto me here a fresh box of cigars, and the +account of your kindness, and my gratitude is closed.” + + * * * * * + +If the publisher of this series did not have such absurd sensitiveness +about the value of space and such pitifully small ideas about the +nobility of novels, I should like to write at least twenty pages about +“Chicot.” There are books that none of us ever put down in our lists of +great books, and yet which we think more of and delight more in than all +the great guns. Not one of the friends I've loved so long and well has +been President of the United States, but I wouldn't give one of them for +all the Presidents. Just across the hall at this minute I can hear the +frightful din of war--shells whistling and moaning, bullets s-e-o-uing, +the shrieks of the dying and wounded--Merciful Heaven! the “Don Juan +of Asturia” has just blown up in Manila Bay with an awful roar--again! +Again, as I'm a living man, just as she has blown up every day, and +several times every day, since May 1, 1898. There are two warriors over +in the play-room, drenched with imaginary gore, immersed in the tender +grace of bestowing chastening death and destruction upon the Spanish +foe. Don't I know that they rank somewhat below Admiral Dewey as heroes? +But do you suppose that their father would swap them for Admiral Dewey +and all the rainbow glories that fine old Yankee sea-dog ever will +enjoy--long may he live to enjoy them all!--do you think so? Of course +not! You know perfectly well that his--wife--wouldn't--let--him! + +I would not wound the susceptibilities of any reader; but speaking for +myself--“Chicot” being beloved of my heart--if there was a mean +man, living in a mean street, who had the last volume of “Chicot” in +existence, I would pour out my library's last heart's blood to get +it. He could have all of Scott but “Ivanhoe,” all of Dickens but +“Copperfield,” all of Hugo but “Les Miserables,” cords of Fielding, +Marryat, Richardson, Reynolds, Eliot, Smollet, a whole ton of German +translations--by George! he could leave me a poor old despoiled, +destitute and ruined book-owner in things that folks buy in costly +bindings for the sake of vanity and the deception of those who also +deceive them in turn. + +Brother, “Chicot” is a book you lend only to your dearest friend, and +then remind him next day that he hasn't sent it back. + + * * * * * + +Now, as to Bussy's great fight. He had gone to the house of Madame Diana +de Monsereau. I am not au fait upon French social customs, but let us +presume his being there was entirely proper, because that excellent lady +was glad to see him. He was set upon by her husband, M. de Monsereau, +with fifteen hired assassins. Outside, the Due D'Anjou and some others +of assassins were in hiding to make sure that Monsereau killed Bussy, +and that somebody killed Monsereau! There's a “situation” for you, +double-edged treachery against--love and innocence, let us say. Bussy +is in the house with Madame. His friend, St. Luc, is with him; also +his lacquey and body-physician, the faithful Rely. Bang! the doors are +broken in, and the assassins penetrate up the stairway. The brave Bussy +confides Diana to St. Luc and Rely, and, hastily throwing up a barricade +of tables and chairs near the door of the apartment, draws his sword. +Then, ye friends of sudden death and valorous exercise, began a surfeit +of joy. Monsereau and his assassins numbered sixteen. In less than three +moderate paragraphs Bessy's sword, playing like avenging lightning, +had struck fatality to seven. Even then, with every wrist going, he +reflected, with sublime calculation: “I can kill five more, because I +can fight with all my vigor ten minutes longer!” After that? Bessy could +see no further--there spoke fate!--you feel he is to die. Once more the +leaping steel point, the shrill death cry, the miraculous parry. The +villain, Monsereau, draws his pistol. Bessy, who is fighting half +a dozen swordsmen, can even see the cowardly purpose; he watches; +he--dodges--the--bullets!--by watching the aim-- + + “Ye sons of France, behold the glory!” + +He thrusts, parries and swings the sword as a falchion. Suddenly a +pistol ball snaps the blade off six inches from the hilt. +Bessy picks up the blade and in an instant +splices--it--to--the--hilt--with--his--handkerchief! Oh, good sword +of the good swordsman! it drinks the blood of three more before +it--bends--and--loosens--under--the--strain! Bessy is shot in the thigh; +Monsereau is upon him; the good Rely, lying almost lifeless from a +bullet wound received at the outset, thrusts a rapier to Bessy's grasp +with a last effort. Bessy springs upon Monsereau with the great bound +of a panther and +pins--the--son--of--a--gun--to--the--floor--with--the--rapier--and--watches--him--die! + +You can feel faint for joy at that passage for a good dozen readings, if +you are appreciative. Poor Bessy, faint from wounds and blood-letting, +retreats valiantly to a closet window step by step and drops out, +leaving Monsereau spitted, like a black spider, dead on the floor. +Here hope and expectation are drawn out in your breast like chewing +gum stretched to the last shred of tenuation. At this point I firmly +believed that Bessy would escape. I feel sorry for the reader who does +not. You just naturally argue that the faithful Rely will surely reach +him and rub him with the balsam. That balsam of Dumas! The same that +D'Artagnan's mother gave him when he rode away on the yellow horse, +and which cured so many heroes hurt to the last gasp. That miraculous +balsam, which would make doctors and surgeons sing small today if they +had not suppressed it from the materia medica. May be they can silence +their consciences by the reflection that they suppressed it to enhance +the value and necessity of their own personal services. But let them +look at the death rate and shudder. I had confidence in Rely and the +balsam, but he could not get there in time. Then, it was forgone that +Bessy must die. Like Mercutio, he was too brilliant to live. Depend upon +it, these wizards of story tellers know when the knell of fate rings +much sooner than we halting readers do. + +Bessy drops from the closet window upon an iron fence that surrounded +the park and was impaled upon the dreadful pickets! Even then for +another moment you can cherish a hope that he may escape after all. +Suspended there and growing weaker, he hears footsteps approaching. Is +it a rescuing friend? He calls out--and a dagger stroke from the hand of +D'Anjou, his Judas master, finds his heart. That's the way Bessy died. +No man is proof against the dagger stroke of treachery. Bessy was +powerful and the due jealous. + +Diana has been carried off safely by the trustworthy St. Luc. She must +have died of grief if she had not been kept alive to be the instrument +of retributive justice. (In the sequel you will find that this Queen of +Hearts descended upon the ignoble due at the proper time like a thousand +of brick and took the last trick of justice.) + + * * * * * + +The extraordinary description of Bussy's fight is beyond everything. You +gallop along as if in a whirlwind, and it is only in cooler moments that +you discover he killed about twelve rascals with his own good arm. It +seems impossible; the scientific, careful readers have been known to +declare it impossible and sneer at it with laughter. I trust every +novel reader respects scientific folks as he should; but science is not +everything. Our scientific friends have contended that the whale did not +engulf Jonah; that the sun did not pause over the vale of Askelon; that +Baron Munchausen's horse did not hang to the steeple by his bridle; +that the beanstalk could not have supported a stout lad like Jack; that +General Monk was not sent to Holland in a cage; that Remus and Romulus +had not a devoted lady wolf for a step-mother; in fact, that loads of +things, of which the most undeniable proof exists in plain print all +over the world, never were done or never happened. Bessy was killed, +Rely was killed later, Diana died in performing her destiny, St. Luc was +killed. Nobody left to make affidavits, except M. Dumas; in his lifetime +nobody questioned it; he is now dead and unable to depose; whereupon the +scientists sniff scornfully and deny. I hope I shall always continue to +respect science in its true offices, but, brethren, are there not times +when--science--makes--you--just--a--little--tired? + +Heroes! D'Artagnan or Bessy? Choose, good friends, freely; as freely let +me have my Bessy. + + + + +VIII. HEROINES + +A SUBJECT ALMOST WITHOUT AN OBJECT--WHY THERE ARE FEW HEROINES FOR MEN. + + +Notwithstanding the subject, there are almost no heroines in novels. +There are impossibly good women, absurdly patient and brave women, but +few heroines as the convention of worldly thinking demands heroines. +There is an endless train of what Thackeray so aptly described as “pale, +pious, and pulmonary ladies” who snivel and snuffle and sigh and +linger irresolutely under many trials which a little common sense would +dissolve; but they are pathological heroines. “Little Nell,” “Little +Eva,” and their married sisters are unquestionable in morals, purpose +and faith; but oh! how--they--do--try--the--nerves! How brave and noble +was Jennie Deans, but how thick-headed was the dear lass! + +These women who are merely good, and enforce it by turning on the faucet +of tears, or by old-fashioned obstinacy, or stupidity of purpose, can +scarcely be called heroines by the canons of understood definition. +On the other hand, the conventions do not permit us to describe as a +heroine any lady who has what is nowadays technically called “a past.” + The very best men in the world find splendid heroism and virtue in Tess +l'Durbeyfield. There is nowhere an honest, strong, good man, full of +weakness, though he may be, scarred so much, however with fault, who +does not read St. John vii., 3-11, with sympathy, reverence and Amen! +The infallible critics can prove to a hair that this passage is an +interpolation. An interpolation in that sense means something inserted +to deceive or defraud; a forgery. How can you defraud or deceive anybody +by the interpolation of pure gold with pure gold? How can that be a +forgery which hurts nobody, but gives to everybody more value in the +thing uttered? If John vii., 3-11, is an interpolation let us hope +Heaven has long ago blessed the interpolator. Does anybody--even the +infallible critic--contend that Jesus would not have so said and done +if the woman had been brought to Him? Was that not the very flower and +savor and soul of His teaching? Would He have said or done otherwise? +If the Ten Commandments were lost utterly from among men there would yet +remain these four greater: + +“Do unto others as ye would they should do unto you.” + +“Suffer little children to come unto me.” + +“Go and sin no more.” + +“Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” + +My lords and ladies, men and women, the Ten Commandments, by the side of +these sighs of gentleness, are the Police Court and the Criminal Code, +which are intended to pay cruelty off in punishment. These Four are +the tears with which sympathy soothes the wounds of suffering. Blessed +interpolator of St. John! + +There are three marvelous novels in the Bible--not Novels in the sense +of fiction, but in the sense of vivid, living narratives of human +emotions and of events. A million Novels rest on those nine verses in +John, and the nine verses are better than the million books. The story +of David and Uriah's wife is in a similar catalogue as regards quality +and usefulness; the story of Esther is a pearl of great beauty. + + * * * * * + +But to return to heroines, let us make a volte face. There is an old +story of the lady who wrote rather irritably to Thackeray, asking, +curtly, why all the good women he created were fools and the bright +women all bad. “The same complaint,” he answered, “has been made, +Madame, of God and Shakespeare, and as neither has given explanation I +can not presume to attempt one.” It was curt and severe, and, of course, +Thackeray did not write it as it would appear, even though he may have +said as much jestingly to some intimate who understood the epigram; +but was not the question rather impudently intrusive? Thackeray, you +remember, was the “seared cynic” who created Caroline Gann, the gentle, +beautiful, glorious “Little Sister,” the staunch, pure-hearted woman +whose character not even the perfect scoundrelism of Dr. George Brand +Firmin could tarnish or disturb. If there are heroines, surely she has +her place high amid the noble group! + +There are plenty of intelligent persons sacramentally wedded to mere +conventions of good and bad. You could never persuade them that Rebecca +Sharp--that most perfect daughter of Thackeray's mind--was a heroine. +But of course she was. In that world wherein she was cast to live she +was indubitably, incomparably, the very best of all the inhabitants +to whom you are intimately introduced. Capt. Dobbin? Oh, no, I am not +forgetting good Old Dob. Of all the social door mats that ever I +wiped my feet upon Old Dob is certainly the cleanest, most patient, +serviceable and unrevolutionary. But, just a door mat, with the virtues +and attractions of that useful article of furniture--the sublime, +immortal prig of all the ages, or you can take the head of any +novel-reader under thirty for a football. You may have known many women, +from Bernadettes of Massavielle to Borgias of scant neighborhoods, but +you know you never knew one who would marry Old Dob, except as that +emotional dishrag, Amelia, married him--as the Last Chance on the +stretching high-road of uncertain years. No girl ever willingly marries +door mats. She just wipes her feet on them and passes on into the +drawing room looking for the Prince. It seems to me one of the +triumphant proofs of Becky as a heroine that she did not marry Captain +Dobbin. She might have done it any day by crooking her little finger at +him--but she didn't. + +Madame Becky, that smart daughter of an alcoholic gentleman artist +and of his lady of the French ballet, inherited the perfect non-moral +morality of the artist blood that sang mercurially through her veins. +How could she, therefore, how could she, being non-moral, be immoral? It +is clear nonsense. But she did possess the instinctive artist +morality of unerring taste for selection in choice. Examine the facts +meticulously--meticulously--and observe how carefully she selected that +best in all that worst she moved among. + +In the will I shall some day leave behind me there will be devised, in +primogenitural trust forever, the priceless treasure of conviction that +Becky was innocent of Lord Steyne. I leave it to any gentleman who has +had the great opportunity to look in familiarly upon the outer and upper +fringes of the world of unclassed and predatory women and the noble +lords that abound thereamong. Let him read over again that famous scene +where Becky writes her scorn upon Steyne's forehead in the noble blood +of that aristocratic wolf. Then let him give his decision, as an honest +juryman upon his oath, whether he is convinced that the most noble +Marquis was raging because he was losing a woman, or from the discovery +that he was one of two dupes facing each other, and that he was the fool +who had paid for both and had had “no run for his money!” Marquises of +Steyne do not resent sentimental losses--they can be hurt only in their +sportsmanship. + +You may begin with the Misses Pinkerton (in whose select school Becky +absorbed the intricate hypocrisies and saturated snobbery of the highest +English society) and follow her through all the little and big turmoils +of her life, meeting on the way of it all the elaborated differentials +of the country-gentleman and lady tribe of Crawley, the line officers +and bemedalled generals of the army (except honest O'Dowd and his lady), +the most noble Marquis and his shadowy and resigned Marchioness, the +R--y--l P--rs--n--ge himself--even down to the tuft-hunters Punter and +Loder--and if Becky is not superior to every man and woman of them in +every personal trait and grace that calls for admiration--then, why, by +George! do you take such an interest, such an undying interest, in her? +You invariably take the greatest interest in the best character in a +story--unless it's too good and gets “sweety” and “sticky” and so sours +on your philosophical stomach. You can't possibly take any interest in +Dobbin--you just naturally, emphatically, and in the most unreflecting +way in the world, say “Oh, d--n Dobbin!” and go right ahead after +somebody else. I don't say Becky was all that a perfect Sunday School +teacher should have been, but in the group in which she was born to move +she smells cleaner than the whole raft of them--to me. + + * * * * * + +Thackeray was, next to Shakespeare, the writer most wonderfully combined +of instinct and reason that English literature of grace has produced. He +has been compared with the Frenchman, Balzac. Since I have no desire to +provoke squabbles about favorite authors, let us merely definitely agree +that such a comparison is absurd and pass on. Because you must have +noticed that Balzac was often feeble in his reason and couldn't make it +keep step with his instinct, while in Thackeray they both step together +like the Siamese twins. It is a very striking fact, indeed, that during +all Becky's intense early experiences with the great world, Thackeray +does not make her guilty. All the circumstances of that world were +guilty and she is placed amidst the circumstances; but that is all. + +“The ladies in the drawing room,” said one lady to Thackeray, when +“Vanity Fair” in monthly parts publishing had just reached the +catastrophe of Rawdon, Rebecca, old Steyne and the bracelet--“The +ladies have been discussing Becky Sharpe and they all agree that she was +guilty. May I ask if we guessed rightly?” + +“I am sure I don't know,” replied the “seared cynic,” mischievously. “I +am only a man and I haven't been able to make up my mind on that point. +But if the ladies agree I fear it may be true--you must understand your +sex much better than we men!” + +That is proof that she was not guilty with Steyne. But straightway then, +Thackeray starts out to make her guilty with others. It is so much the +more proof of her previous innocence that, incomparable artist as he +was in showing human character, he recognized that he could convince +the reader of her guilt only by disintegrating her, whipping himself +meanwhile into a ceaseless rage of vulgar abuse of her, a thing of which +Thackeray was seldom guilty. But it was not really Becky that +became guilty--it was the woman that English society and Thackeray +remorselessly made of her. I wouldn't be a lawyer for a wagon load of +diamonds, but if I had had to be a lawyer I should have preferred to +be a solicitor at the London bar in 1817 to write the brief for the +respondent in the celebrated divorce case of Crawley vs. Crawley. +Against the back-ground of the world she lived in Becky could have been +painted as meekly white and beautiful as that lovely old picture of St. +Cecilia at the Choir Organ. + +Perhaps Becky was not strictly a heroine; but she was a honey. + + * * * * * + +Men can not “create” heroines in the sense of shadowing forth what +they conceive to be the glory, beauty, courage and splendor of womanly +character. It is the indescribable sum of womanhood corresponding to the +unutterable name of God. The true man's love of woman is a spirit sense +attending upon the actual senses of seeing, hearing, feeling, tasting +and smelling. The woman he loves enters into every one of these senses +and thus is impounded five-fold upon that union of all of them, which, +together with the miracle of mind, composes what we call the human soul +as a divine essence. She is attached to every religion, yet enters with +authority into none. She is first at its birth, the last to stay +weeping at its death. In every great novel a heroine, unnamed, unspoken, +undescribed, hovers throughout like an essence. The heroism of woman +is her privacy. There is to me no more wonderful, philosophical, +psychological and delicate triumph of literary art in existence than the +few chapters in “Quo Vadis” in which that great introspective genius, +Sienkiewicz, sets forth the growth of the spell of love with which Lygia +has encompassed Vinicius, and the singular development and progress of +the emotion through which Vinicius is finally immersed in human love of +Lygia and in the Christian reverence of her spiritual purity at the same +time. It is the miracle of soul in sex. + +Every clean-hearted youth that has had the happiness to marry a good +woman--and, thank Heaven, clean youths and good women are thick as +leaves in Vallambrosa in this sturdy old world of ours--every such youth +has had his day of holy conversion, his touch of the wand conferring +upon him the miracle of love, and he has been a better and wiser man +for it. Not sense love, not the instinctive, restless love of matter for +matter, but the love that descends like the dove amid radiance. + + * * * * * + +We've all seen that bridal couple; she is as pretty as peaches; he is as +proud of her as if she were a splendid race horse; he glories in knowing +she is lovely and accepts the admiration offered to her as a tribute to +his own judgment, his own taste and even his merit, which obtained her. +There is a certain amount of silliness in her which he soon detects, +a touch of helplessness, and unsophistication in knowledge of worldly +things that he yet feels is mysteriously guarded against intrusion +upon and which makes companionship with her sometimes irksome. He feels +superior and uncompensated; from the superb isolation of his greater +knowledge, courage and independence, he grants to her a certain tender +pity and protection; he admits her faith and purity and--er--but--you +see, he is sorry she is not quite the well poised and noble creature he +is! Mr. Youngwed is at this time passing through the mental digestive +process of feeling his oats. He is all right, though, if he is half as +good as he thinks he is. He has not been touched by the live wire of +experience--yet; that's all. + +Well, in the course of human events, there comes a time when he is +frightened to death, then greatly relieved and for a few weeks becomes +as proud as if he had actually provided the last census of the United +States with most of the material contained in it. A few months later, +when the feeble whines and howls have found increased vigor of utterance +and more frequency of expression; when they don't know whether Master +Jack or Miss Jill has merely a howling spell or is threatened with fatal +convulsions; when they don't know whether they want a dog-muzzle or a +doctor; when Mr. Youngwed has lost his sleep and his temper, together, +and has displayed himself with spectacular effect as a brute, selfish, +irritable, helpless, resourceless and conquered--then--then, my dear +madame, you have doubtless observed him decrease in self-estimated size +like a balloon into which a pin has been introduced, until he looks, in +fact, like Master Frog reduced in bulk from the bull-size, to which he +aspired, to his original degree. + +At that time Mrs. Youngwed is very busy with little Jack or Jill, as the +case may be. Her husband's conduct she probably regards with resignation +as the first heavy burden of the cross she is expected to bear. She +does not reproach him, it is useless; she has perhaps suspected that +his assumed superiority would not stand the real strain. But, he is the +father of the dear baby and, for that precious darling's sake, she will +be patient. I wonder if she feels that way? She has every right to, and, +for one, I say that I'll be hanged if I find any fault with her if she +does. That is the way she must keep human, and so balance the little +open accounts that married folks ought to run between themselves for +the purpose of keeping cobwebs and mildew off, or rather of maintaining +their lives as a running stream instead of a stagnant pond. A little +good talking back now and then is good for wives and married men. +Don't be afraid, Mrs. Youngwed; and when the very worst has come, why +cry--at--him! One tear weighs more and will hit him harder than an ax. +In the lachrymal ducts with which heaven has blessed you, you are more +surely protected against the fires of your honest indignation than you +are by the fire department against a blaze in the house. And be +patient, also; remember, dear sister, that, though you can cry, he has +a gift--that--enables--him--to--swear! You and other wedded wives very +properly object to swearing, but you will doubtless admit that there +is compensation in that when he does swear in his usual good form +you--never--feel--any--apprehension--about--the--state--of--his--health! + +This natural outburst of resentment has not lasted three minutes. Mr. +Y. has returned to his couch, sulky and ashamed. He pretends to sleep +ostentatiously; he--does--not! He is thinking with remarkable intensity +and has an eye open. He sees the slender figure in the dim light, +hanging over the crib, he hears the crooning, he begins to suspect that +there is an alloy in his godlikeness. He looks to earth, listens to the +thin, wailing cries, wonders, regrets, wearies, sleeps. At that moment +Mrs. Y. should fall on her knees and rejoice. She would if she could +leave young Jack or Jill; but she can't--she--never--can. That's +what sent Mr. Y. to sleep. It is just as well perhaps that Mrs. Y. is +unobservant. + +A miracle is happening to Mr. Y. In an hour or two, let us say, there +is a new vocal alarm from the crib. Almost with the first suspicion +of fretfulness or pain the mother has heard it. Heaven's mysterious +telepathy of instinct has operated. Between angels, babies and mothers +the distance is no longer than your arm can reach. They understand, feel +and hear each other, and are linked in one chain. So, that, when Mr. +Y. has struggled laboriously awake and wonders +if--that--child--is--going--to--howl--all----. Well, he goes no further. +In the dim light he sees again the slender figure hanging over the crib, +he hears the crooning and the retreating sobs. It is just as he saw +and heard before he fell asleep. No complaints, no reproaches, no +irritation. Oh, what a brute he feels! He battles with his reason and +his bewilderment. Had he fallen asleep and left her to bear that strain; +or has she gone anew to the rescue, while he slept without thought? Up +out of his heart the tenderness wells; down into his mind the revelation +comes. The miracle works. He looks and listens. In the figure hanging +there so patiently and tenderly he sees for the first time the wonderful +vision of the sweetheart wife, not lost, but enveloped in the mystery of +motherhood; he hears in the crooning voice a tone he never before knew. +Mother and child are united in mysterious converse. Where did that girl +whom he thought so unsophisticated of the world learn that marvel of +acquaintance with that babe, so far removed from his ability to reach? +It must be that while he knew the world, she understood the secret of +heaven. She is so patient. What a brute he is to grow impatient, when +she endures day and night in rapt patience and the joy of content! She +can enter a world from which he is barred. And, that is his wife! +That was his sweetheart, and is now--ah, what is she? He feels somehow +abashed; he knows that if he were ten times better than he is he might +still feel unworthy to touch the latchet of her shoes; he feels that +reverence and awe have enveloped her, and that the first happy love and +longing are springing afresh in his heart. It is his wife and his +child; apart from him unless he can note and understand that miracle +of nature's secret. Can he? Well, he will try--oh, what a brute! And he +watches the bending figure, he hears the blending of soft crooning and +retreating sobs--and, listening, he is lost in the wonder and falls +under the spell asleep. + +Mrs. Y., you are happy henceforth, if you will disregard certain small +matters, such as whether chairs or hat-racks are for hats, or whether +the marble mantelpiece or the floor is intended for polishing boot +heels. + + * * * * * + +Of course, such an incident as has been suggested is but one of +thousands of golden moments when to the husband comes the sudden +dazzling recognition of the mergence of that half-sweetheart, +half-mistress, he has admired and a little tired of, into the +reverential glory and loveliness of wifehood, motherhood, companionhood, +through all life and on through the eternity of inheritance they shall +leave to Jacks and Jills and their little sisters and brothers. In +that lies the priceless secret of Christianity and its influence. +The unspeakably immoral Greeks reared a temple to Pity; the grossest +mythologies of Babylon, Greece, Rome and Carthage could not change +human nature. There have been always persons whose temperament made +them sympathize with grief and pity the suffering; who, caring none +for wealth, had no desire to steal; who purchased a little pleasure for +vanity in the thanks received for kindness given. But Christianity saw +the jewel underneath the passing emotion and gave it value by +cleansing and cutting it. In lust-love is the instinctive secret of the +preservation of the race; but the race is not worth preserving that it +may be preserved only for lust. Upon that animal foundation is to be +built the radiant home of confident, enduring and exchanging love +in which all the senses, tastes, hopes, aspirations and delights of +friendship, companionship and human society shall find hospitality +and comfort. When it has been achieved it is beautiful, a twin to the +delicate rose that lies in its own delicious fragrance, happy on the +pure bosom of a lovely girl--the rose that is finest and most exquisite +because it has sprung from the horrid heat of the compost; but who shall +think of the one in the presence of the pure beauty of the other? + +Nature and art are entirely unlike each other, though the one simulates +the other. The art of beauty in writing, said Balzac, is to be able +to construct a palace upon the point of a needle; the art of beauty +in living and loving is to build all the beauty of social life and +aspiration upon the sordid yet solid and persisting instincts of +savagery that lie deep at the bottom of our gross natures. + + * * * * * + +Now, it is in this tender sacred atmosphere, such as Mr. and Mrs. +Youngwed always pass through, that the man worthy of a woman's +confidence finds the radiant ideal of his heroine. He may with propriety +speak of these transfigured personalities to his intimates or write of +them with kindly pleasantry and suggestion as, perhaps, this will be +considered. But, there is a monitor within that restrains him from +analyzing and describing and dragging into the glare of publicity the +sacred details that give to life all its secret happiness, faith and +delight. To do so would be ten times worse offense against the ethics +of unwritten and unspoken things than describing with pitiless precision +the death beds of children, as Little Nell, Paul Dombey, Dora, Little +Eva, and, thank heaven! only a few others. + +How can anybody bear to read such pages without feeling that he is +an intruder where angels should veil their faces as they await the +transformation? + +“It is not permitted to do evil,” says the philosopher, “that good may +result.” + +There are some things that should remain unspoken and undescribed. Have +you never listened to some great brute of a sincere preacher of the +gospel, as he warned his congregation against the terrible dangers +attending the omission of purely theological rites upon infants? Have +you thought of the mothers of those children, listening, whose little +ones were sick or delicate, and who felt each word of that hard, ominous +warning as an agonizing terror? And haven't you wanted to kick the +minister out of the pulpit, through the reredos and into the middle +of next week? How can anybody harrow up such tender feelings? How can +anybody like to believe that a little child will be held to account? +Many of us do so believe, perhaps, whether or no; but is it not cruel +to shake the rod of terror over us in public? “Suffer little children +to come unto Me,” said the Master; He did not instruct us to drive them +with fear and terror and trembling. Whenever I have heard such sermons I +have wanted to get up and stalk out of the church with ostentatiousness +of contempt, as if to say to the preacher that his conduct +did--not--meet--with--my--approval. But I didn't; the philosopher has +his cowardice not less than the preacher. + +But there is something meretricious and cheap in the use of material +and subjects that lie warm against the very secret heart of nature. The +mystery of love and the sanctity of death are to be used by writers and +artists only in their ennobling aspect of results. A certain class of +French writers have sickened the world by invading the sacredness of +passion and giving prostitution the semblance of self-abnegated love; a +certain class of English and American writers have purchased popularity +by the meretricious parade of the scenes of death-beds. Both are +violations of the ethics of art as they are of nature. True love as +true sorrow shrinks from exhibition and should be permitted to enjoy +the sacredness of privacy. The famous women of the world, Herodias, +Semiramis, Aspasia, Thais, Cleopatra, Sapho, Messalina, Marie de +Medici, Catherine of Russia, Elizabeth of England--all of them have been +immoral. Publicity to women is like handling to peaches--the bloom comes +off, whether or not any other harm occurs. In literature, the great +feminine figures, George Sand, Madame de Sevigne, Madame de Stael, +George Eliot--all were banned and at least one--the first--was out of +the pale. Creative thought has in it the germ of masculinity. Genius in +a woman, as we usually describe genius, means masculinity, which, of all +things, to real men is abhorrent in woman. True genius in woman is the +antithesis of the qualities that make genius in man; so is her heroism, +her beauty, her virtue, her destiny and her duty. + +Let this be said--even though it be only a jest--one of those smart +attempts at epigram, which, ladies, a man has no more power to resist +than a baby to resist the desire to improve his thumb by sucking +it--that: whenever you find a woman who looks real--that is, who +produces upon a real man the impression of being endowed with +the splendid gifts for united and patient companionship in +marriage--whenever you find her advocating equal suffrage, equal rights, +equal independence with men in all things, you may properly run away. +Equality means so much, dear sisters. No man can be your equal; you can +not be his, without laying down the very jewels of the womanliness +that men love. Be thankful you have not this strength and daring; +he possesses those in order that he many stand between you and more +powerful brutes. Now, let us try for a smart epigram: But no! hang the +epigram, let it go. This, however, may be said: That, whenever you find +a woman wanting all rights with man; wanting his morals to be judged +by hers, or willing to throw hers in with his, or itching to enter his +employments and labors and willing that he shall--of course--nurse the +children and patch the small trousers and dresses, depend upon it that +some weak and timid man has been neglecting the old manly, savage duty +of applying quiet home murder as society approves now and then. + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Delicious Vice, by Young E. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Delicious Vice + +Author: Young E. Allison + + +Release Date: August, 2005 [EBook #8686] +This file was first posted on August 1, 2003 +Last Updated: May 13, 2013 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DELICIOUS VICE *** + + + + +Produced by Ted Garvin, Charles Franks and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + + + + + + + + +THE DELICIOUS VICE + +Pipe Dreams and Fond Adventures of an Habitual Novel-Reader Among Some +Great Books and Their People + +By Young E. Allison + +_Second Edition_ + +(Revised and containing new material) + +CHICAGO THE PRAIRIELAND PUBLISHING CO. 1918 Printed originally in the +Louisville Courier-Journal. Reprinted by courtesy. + +First edition, Cleveland, Burrows Bros., 1907. + +Copyright 1907-1918 + + + + + +I. A RHAPSODY ON THE NOBLE PROFESSION OF NOVEL READING + +It must have been at about the good-bye age of forty that Thomas Moore, +that choleric and pompous yet genial little Irish gentleman, turned a +sigh into good marketable "copy" for Grub Street and with shrewd economy +got two full pecuniary bites out of one melancholy apple of reflection: + + "Kind friends around me fall + Like leaves in wintry weather," + + --he sang of his own dead heart in the stilly night. + + "Thus kindly I scatter thy leaves on the bed + Where thy mates of the garden lie scentless and dead." +--he sang to the dying rose. In the red month of October the rose is +forty years old, as roses go. How small the world has grown to a man of +forty, if he has put his eyes, his ears and his brain to the uses for +which they are adapted. And as for time--why, it is no longer than a +kite string. At about the age of forty everything that can happen to a +man, death excepted, has happened; happiness has gone to the devil or +is a mere habit; the blessing of poverty has been permanently secured +or you are exhausted with the cares of wealth; you can see around +the corner or you do not care to see around it; in a word--that is, +considering mental existence--the bell has rung on you and you are up +against a steady grind for the remainder of your life. It is then there +comes to the habitual novel reader the inevitable day when, in anguish +of heart, looking back over his life, he--wishes he hadn't; then he asks +himself the bitter question if there are not things he has done that he +wishes he hadn't. Melancholy marks him for its own. He sits in his room +some winter evening, the lamp swarming shadowy seductions, the grate +glowing with siren invitation, the cigar box within easy reach for that +moment when the pending sacrifice between his teeth shall be burned out; +his feet upon the familiar corner of the mantel at that automatically +calculated altitude which permits the weight of the upper part of the +body to fall exactly upon the second joint from the lower end of the +vertebral column as it rests in the comfortable depression created by +continuous wear in the cushion of that particular chair to which every +honest man who has acquired the library vice sooner or later gets +attached with a love no misfortune can destroy. As he sits thus, +having closed the lids of, say, some old favorite of his youth, he will +inevitably ask himself if it would not have been better for him if he +hadn't. And the question once asked must be answered; and it will be an +honest answer, too. For no scoundrel was ever addicted to the delicious +vice of novel-reading. It is too tame for him. "There is no money in +it." + + * * * * * + +And every habitual novel-reader will answer that question he has asked +himself, after a sigh. A sigh that will echo from the tropic deserted +island of Juan Fernandez to that utmost ice-bound point of Siberia where +by chance or destiny the seven nails in the sole of a certain mysterious +person's shoe, in the month of October, 1831, formed a cross--thus: + + * + * * * + * + * + * + +while on the American promontory opposite, "a young and handsome woman +replied to the man's despairing gesture by silently pointing to heaven." +The Wandering Jew may be gone, but the theater of that appalling +prologue still exists unchanged. That sigh will penetrate the gloomy +cell of the Abbe Faria, the frightful dungeons of the Inquisition, the +gilded halls of Vanity Fair, the deep forests of Brahmin and fakir, the +jousting list, the audience halls and the petits cabinets of kings of +France, sound over the trackless and storm-beaten ocean--will echo, in +short, wherever warm blood has jumped in the veins of honest men and +wherever vice has sooner or later been stretched groveling in the dust +at the feet of triumphant virtue. + +And so, sighing to the uttermost ends of the earth, the old novel-reader +will confess that he wishes he hadn't. Had not read all those novels +that troop through his memory. Because, if he hadn't--and it is the +impossibility of the alternative that chills his soul with the despair +of cruel realization--if he hadn't, you see, he could begin at the very +first, right then and there, and read the whole blessed business through +for the first time. For the FIRST TIME, mark you! Is there anywhere in +this great round world a novel reader of true genius who would not do +that with the joy of a child and the thankfulness of a sage? + +Such a dream would be the foundation of the story of a really noble Dr. +Faustus. How contemptible is the man who, having staked his life freely +upon a career, whines at the close and begs for another chance; just +one more--and a different career! It is no more than Mr. Jack Hamlin, a +friend from Calaveras County, California, would call "the baby act," +or his compeer, Mr. John Oakhurst, would denominate "a squeal." How +glorious, on the other hand, is the man who has spent his life in his +own way, and, at its eventide, waves his hand to the sinking sun and +cries out: "Goodbye; but if I could do so, I should be glad to go over +it all again with you--just as it was!" If honesty is rated in heaven +as we have been taught to believe, depend upon it the novel-reader +who sighs to eat the apple he has just devoured, will have no trouble +hereafter. + +What a great flutter was created a few years ago when a blind +multi-millionaire of New York offered to pay a million dollars in cash +to any scientist, savant or surgeon in the world who would restore +his sight. Of course he would! It was no price at all to offer for the +service--considering the millions remaining. It was no more to him than +it would be to me to offer ten dollars for a peep at Paradise. Poor as I +am I will give any man in the world one hundred dollars in cash who will +enable me to remove every trace of memory of M. Alexandre Dumas' "Three +Guardsmen," so that I may open that glorious book with the virgin +capacity of youth to enjoy its full delight. More; I will duplicate the +same offer for any one or all of the following: + +"Les Miserables," of M. Hugo. + +"Don Quixote," of Senor Cervantes. + +"Vanity Fair," of Mr. Thackeray. + +"David Copperfield," of Mr. Dickens. + +"The Cloister and the Hearth," of Mr. Reade. + +And if my good friend, Isaac of York, is lending money at the old +stand and will take pianos, pictures, furniture, dress suits and plain +household plate as collateral, upon even moderate valuation, I will go +fifty dollars each upon the following: + +"The Count of Monte Cristo," of M. Dumas. + +"The Wandering Jew," of M. Sue. + +"The Memoirs of Barry Lyndon, Esq.," of Mr. Thackeray. + +"Treasure Island," of Mr. Robbie Stevenson. + +"The Vicar of Wakefield," of Mr. Goldsmith. + +"Pere Goriot," of M. de Balzac. + +"Ivanhoe," of Baronet Scott. + +(Any one previously unnamed of the whole layout of M. Dumas, excepting +only a paretic volume entitled "The Conspirators.") + +Now, the man who can do the trick for one novel can do it for all--and +there's a thousand dollars waiting to be earned, and a blessing also. +It's a bald "bluff," of course, because it can't be done as we all know. +I might offer a million with safety. If it ever could have been done the +noble intellectual aristocracy of novel-readers would have been reduced +to a condition of penury and distress centuries ago. + +For, who can put fetters upon even the smallest second of eternity? Who +can repeat a joy or duplicate a sweet sorrow? Who has ever had more than +one first sweetheart, or more than one first kiss under the honeysuckle? +Or has ever seen his name in print for the first time, ever again? Is it +any wonder that all these inexplicable longings, these hopeless hopes, +were summed up in the heart-cry of Faust-- + +"Stay, yet awhile, O moment of beauty." + + * * * * * + +Yet, I maintain, Dr. Faustus was a weak creature. He begged to be given +another and wholly different chance to linger with beauty. How much +nobler the magnificent courage of the veteran novel-reader, who in the +old age of his service, asks only that he may be permitted to do again +all that he has done, blindly, humbly, loyally, as before. + +Don't I know? Have I not been there? It is no child's play, the life of +a man who--paraphrasing the language of Spartacus, the much neglected +hero of the ages--has met upon the printed page every shape of perilous +adventure and dangerous character that the broad empire of fiction could +furnish, and never yet lowered his arm. Believe me it is no carpet duty +to have served on the British privateers in Guiana, under Commodore +Kingsley, alongside of Salvation Yeo; to have been a loyal member of +Thuggee and cast the scarf for Bowanee; to have watched the tortures of +Beatrice Cenci (pronounced as written in honest English, and I spit upon +the weaklings of the service who imagine that any freak of woman called +Bee-ah-treech-y Chon-chy could have endured the agonies related of that +sainted lady)--to have watched those tortures, I say, without breaking +down; to have fought under the walls of Acre with Richard Coeur de Lion; +to have crawled, amid rats and noxious vapors, with Jean Valjean through +the sewers of Paris; to have dragged weary miles through the snow with +Uncas, Chief of the Mohicans; to have lived among wild beasts with Morok +the lion tamer; to have charged with the impis of Umslopogaas; to have +sailed before the mast with Vanderdecken, spent fourteen gloomy years +in the next cell to Edmund Dantes, ferreted out the murders in the Rue +Morgue, advised Monsieur Le Cocq and given years of life's prime in +tedious professional assistance to that anointed idiot and pestiferous +scoundrel, Tittlebat Titmouse! Equally, of course, it has not been all +horror and despair. Life averages up fairly, as any novel-reader +will admit, and there has been much of delight--even luxury and +idleness--between the carnage hours of battle. Is it not so? Ask that +boyish-hearted old scamp whom you have seen scuttling away from the +circulating library with M. St. Pierre's memoirs of young Paul and his +beloved Virginia under his arm; or stepping briskly out of the book +store hugging to his left side a carefully wrapped biography of Lady +Diana Vernon, Mlle. de la Valliere, or Madame Margaret Woffington; or +in fact any of a thousand charming ladies whom it is certain he had met +before. Ladies too, who, born whensoever, are not one day older since +he last saw them. Nearly a hundred years of Parisian residence have not +served to induce the Princess Haydee of Yanina to forego her picturesque +Greek gowns and coiffures, or to alter the somewhat embarrassing status +of her relations with her striking but gloomy protector, the Count of +Monte Cristo. + +The old memories are crowded with pleasures. Those delicious mornings in +the allee of the park, where you were permitted to see Cosette with her +old grandfather, M. Fauchelevent; those hours of sweet pain when it was +impossible to determine whether it was Rebecca or Rowena who seemed to +give most light to the day; the flirtations with Blanche Amory, and the +notes placed in the hollow tree; the idyllic devotion of Little Emily, +dating from the morning when you saw her dress fluttering on the beam as +she ran along it, lightly, above the flowing tide--(devotion that is yet +tender, for, God forgive you Steerforth as I do, you could not smirch +that pure heart;) the melancholy, yet sweet sorrow, with which you +saw the loved and lost Little Eva borne to her grave over which the +mocking-bird now sings his liquid requiem. Has it not been sweet +good fortune to love Maggie Tulliver, Margot of Savoy, Dora Spenlow +(undeclared because she was an honest wife--even though of a most +conceited and commonplace jackass, totally undeserving of her); Agnes +Wicklow (a passion quickly cured when she took Dora's pitiful leavings), +and poor ill-fated Marie Antoinette? You can name dozens if you have +been brought up in good literary society. + + * * * * * + +These love affairs may be owned freely, as being perfectly honorable, +even if hopeless. And, of course, there have been gallantries--mere +affaires du jour--such as every man occasionally engages in. Sometimes +they seemed serious, but only for a moment. There was Beatrix Esmond, +for whom I could certainly have challenged His Grace of Hamilton, had +not Lord Mohun done the work for me. Wandering down the street in London +one night, in a moment of weak admiration for her unrivalled nerve +and aplomb, I was hesitating--whether to call on Mrs. Rawdon Crawley, +knowing that her thick-headed husband was in hoc for debt--when the +door of her house crashed open and that old scoundrel, Lord Steyne, came +wildly down the steps, his livid face blood-streaked, his topcoat on +his arm and a dreadful look in his eye. The world knows the rest as I +learned it half an hour later at the greengrocer's, where the Crawleys +owed an inexcusably large bill. Then the Duchess de Langeais--but all +this is really private. + +After all, a man never truly loves but once. And somewhere in Scotland +there is a mound above the gentle, tender and heroic Helen Mar, where +lies buried the first love of my soul. That mound, O lovely and loyal +Helen, was watered by the first blinding and unselfish tears that +ever sprang from my eyes. You were my first love; others may come and +inevitably they go, but you are still here, under the pencil pocket of +my waistcoat. + +Who can write in such a state? It is only fair to take a rest and brace +up. [Blank Page] + + + + +II. NOVEL-READERS + +AS DISTINGUISHED FROM WOMEN AND NIBBLERS AND AMATEURS + + +There is, of course, but one sort of novel-reader who is of any +importance He is the man who began under the age of fourteen and +is still sticking to it--at whatever age he may be--and full of +a terrifying anxiety lest he may be called away in the midst of +preliminary announcements of some pet author's "next forthcoming." For +my own part I cannot conceive dying with resignation knowing that the +publishers were binding up at the time anything of Henryk Sienckiewicz's +or Thomas Hardy's. So it is important that a man begin early, because he +will have to quit all too soon. + +There are no women novel-readers. There are women who read novels, of +course; but it is a far cry from reading novels to being a novel-reader. +It is not in the nature of a woman. The crown of woman's character is +her devotion, which incarnate delicacy and tenderness exalt into +perfect beauty of sacrifice. Those qualities could no more live amid the +clashings of indiscriminate human passions than a butterfly wing could +go between the mill rollers untorn. Women utterly refuse to go on with a +book if the subject goes against their settled opinions. They despise a +novel--howsoever fine and stirring it may be--if there is any taint of +unhappiness to the favorite at the close. But the most flagrant of all +their incapacities in respect to fiction is the inability to appreciate +the admirable achievements of heroes, unless the achievements are solely +in behalf of women. And even in that event they complacently consider +them to be a matter of course, and attach no particular importance to +the perils or the hardships undergone. "Why shouldn't he?" they argue, +with triumphant trust in ideals; "surely he loved her!" + +There are many women who nibble at novels as they nibble at +luncheon--there are also some hearty eaters; but 98 per cent of them +detest Thackeray and refuse resolutely to open a second book of Robert +Louis Stevenson. They scent an enemy of the sex in Thackeray, who never +seems to be in earnest, and whose indignant sarcasm and melancholy +truthfulness they shrink from. "It's only a story, anyhow," they argue +again; "he might, at least write a pleasant one, instead of bringing in +all sorts of disagreeable people--some of them positively disreputable." +As for Stevenson, whom men read with the thrill of boyhood rising new +in their veins, I believe in my soul women would tear leaves out of his +novels to tie over the tops of preserve jars, and never dream of the +sacrilege. + +Now I hold Thackeray and Stevenson to be the absolute test of capacity +for earnest novel-reading. Neither cares a snap of his fingers for +anybody's prejudices, but goes the way of stern truth by the light of +genius that shines within him. + +If you could ever pin a woman down to tell you what she thought, instead +of telling you what she thinks it is proper to tell you, or what she +thinks will please you, you would find she has a religious conviction +that Dot Perrybingle in "The Cricket of the Hearth," and Ouida's Lord +Chandos were actually a materializable an and a reasonable gentleman, +either of whom might be met with anywhere in their proper circles, I +would be willing to stand trial for perjury on the statement that I've +known admirable women--far above the average, really showing signs of +moral discrimination--who have sniveled pitifully over Nancy Sykes and +sniffed scornfully at Mrs. Tess Durbeyfield Clare. It is due to their +constitution and social heredity. Women do not strive and yearn and +stalk abroad for the glorious pot of intellectual gold at the end of the +rainbow; they pick and choose and, having chosen, sit down straightway +and become content. And a state of contentment is an abomination in the +sight of man. Contentment is to be sought for by great masculine minds +only with the purpose of being sure never quite to find it. + + * * * * * + +For all practical purposes, therefore--except perhaps as object lessons +of "the incorrect method" in reading novels--women, as novel-readers, +must be considered as not existing. And, of course, no offense is +intended. But if there be any weak-kneed readers who prefer the +gilt-wash of pretty politeness to the solid gold of truth, let them +understand that I am not to be frightened away from plain facts by any +charge of bad manners. + +On the contrary, now that this disagreeable interruption has been forced +upon me--certainly not through any seeking of mine--it may be better to +speak out and settle the matter. Men who have the happiness of being in +the married state know that nothing is to be gained by failing to settle +instantly with women who contradict and oppose them. Who was that mellow +philosopher in one of Trollope's tiresomely clever novels who said: "My +word for it, John, a husband ought not to take a cane to his wife +too soon. He should fairly wait till they are half-way home from the +church--but not longer, not longer." Of course every man with a spark +of intelligence and gallantry wishes that women COULD rise to real +novel-reading Think what courtship would be! Every true man wishes to +heaven there was nothing more to be said against women than that they +are not novel-readers. But can mere forgetting remove the canker? Do not +all of us know that the abstract good of the very existence of woman is +itself open to grave doubt--with no immediate hope of clearing up? Woman +has certainly been thrust upon us. Is there any scrap of record to show +that Adam asked for her? He was doing very well, was happy, prosperous +and healthy. There was no certainty that her creation was one of that +unquestionably wonderful series that occupied the six great days. +We cannot conceal that her creation caused a great pain in Adam's +side--undoubtedly the left side, in the region of the heart. She +has been described by young and dauntless poets as "God's best +afterthought;" but, now, really--and I advance the suggestion with +no intention to be brutal but solely as a conscientious duty to the +ascertainment of truth--why is it, that--. But let me try to present the +matter in the most unobjectionable manner possible. + +In reading over that marvelous account of creation I find frequent +explicit declaration that God pronounced everything good after he had +created it--except heaven and woman. I have maintained sometimes to +stern, elderly ladies that this might have been an error of omission by +early copyists, perpetuated and so become fixed in our translations. To +other ladies, of other age and condition, to whom such propositions +of scholarship might appear to be dull pedantry, I have ventured the +gentlemanlike explanation that, as woman was the only living thing +created that was good beyond doubt, perhaps God had paid her the +special compliment of leaving the approval unspoken, as being in a sense +supererogatory. At best, either of these dispositions of the matter is, +of course, far-fetched, maybe even frivolous. The fact still remains +by the record. And it is beyond doubt awkward and embarrassing, because +ill-natured men can refer to it in moments of hatefulness--moments +unfortunately too frequent. + +Is it possible that this last creation was a mistake of Infinite Charity +and Eternal Truth? That Charity forbore to acknowledge that it was a +mistake and that Truth, in the very nature of its eternal essence, could +not say it was good? It is so grave a matter that one wonders Helvetius +did not betray it, as he did that other secret about which the +philosophers had agreed to keep mum, so that Herr Schopenhauer could +write about it as he did about that other. Herr Schopenhauer certainly +had the courage to speak with philosophical asperity of the gentle +sex. It may be because he was never married. And then his mother wrote +novels! I have been surprised that he was not accused of prejudice. + +But if all these everyday obstacles were absent there would yet remain +insurmountable reasons why women can never be novel-readers in the sense +that men are. Your wife, for instance, or the impenetrable mystery +of womanhood that you contemplate making your wife some day--can you, +honestly, now, as a self-respecting husband of either de facto or in +futuro, quite agree to the spectacle of that adored lady sitting over +across the hearth from you in the snug room, evening after evening, with +her feet--however small and well-shaped--cocked up on the other end of +the mantel and one of your own big colorado maduros between her teeth! +We men, and particularly novel-readers, are liberal even generous, in +our views; but it is not in human nature to stand that! + +Now, if a woman can not put her feet up and smoke, how in the name +of heaven, can she seriously read novels? Certainly not sitting bolt +upright, in order to prevent the back of her new gown from rubbing the +chair; certainly not reclining upon a couch or in a hammock. A boy, yet +too young to smoke may properly lie on his stomach on the floor and read +novels, but the mature veteran will fight for his end of the mantel as +for his wife and children. It is physiological necessity, inasmuch as +the blood that would naturally go to the lower extremities, is thus +measurably lessened in quantity and goes instead to the head, where a +state of gentle congestion ensues, exciting the brain cells, setting +free the imagination to roam hand in hand with intelligence under the +spell of the wizard. There may be novel-readers who do not smoke at the +game, but surely they cannot be quite earnest or honest--you had better +put in writing all business agreements with this sort. + + * * * * * + +No boy can ever hope to become a really great or celebrated novel-reader +who does not begin his apprenticeship under the age of fourteen, and, as +I said before, stick to it as long as he lives. He must learn to scorn +those frivolous, vacillating and purposeless ones who, after beginning +properly, turn aside and whiling away their time on mere history, or +science, or philosophy. In a sense these departments of literature are +useful enough. They enable you often to perceive the most cunning and +profoundly interesting touches in fiction. Then I have no doubt that, +merely as mental exercise, they do some good in keeping the mind in +training for the serious work of novel-reading. I have always been +grateful to Carlyle's "French Revolution," if for nothing more than that +its criss-cross, confusing and impressive dullness enabled me to find +more pleasure in "A Tale of Two Cities" than was to be extracted from +any merit or interest in that unreal novel. + +This much however, may be said of history, that it is looking up in +these days as a result of studying the spirit of the novel. It was +not many years ago that the ponderous gentlemen who write criticisms +(chiefly because it has been forgotten how to stop that ancient waste +of paper and ink) could find nothing more biting to say of Macaulay's +"England" than that it was "a splendid work of imagination," of Froude's +"Caesar" that it was "magnificent political fiction," and of Taine's +"France" that "it was so fine it should have been history instead +of fiction." And ever since then the world has read only these three +writers upon these three epochs--and many other men have been writing +history upon the same model. No good novel-reader need be ashamed to +read them, in fact. They are so like the real thing we find in the +greatest novels, instead of being the usual pompous official lies of +old-time history, that there are flesh, blood and warmth in them. + +In 1877, after the railway riots, legislative halls heard the French +Revolution rehearsed from all points of view. In one capital, where I +was reporting the debate, Old Oracle, with every fact at hand from "In +the beginning" to the exact popular vote in 1876, talked two hours of +accurate historical data from all the French histories, after which +a young lawyer replied in fifteen minutes with a vivid picture of the +popular conditions, the revolt and the result. Will it be allowable, in +the interest of conveying exact impression, to say that Old Oracle was +"swiped" off the earth? No other word will relieve my conscience. +After it was all over I asked the young lawyer where he got his French +history. + +"From Dumas," he answered, "and from critical reviews of his novels. +He's short on dates and documents, but he's long on the general facts." + +Why not? Are not novels history? + +Book for book, is not a novel by a competent conscientious novelist +just as truthful a record of typical men, manners and motives as formal +history is of official men, events and motives? + +There are persons created out of the dreams of genius so real, so +actual, so burnt into the heart and mind of the world that they have +become historical. Do they not show you, in the old Ursuline Convent at +New Orleans, the cell where poor Manon Lescaut sat alone in tears? And +do they not show you her very grave on the banks of the lake? Have I +not stood by the simple grave at Richmond, Virginia, where never lay the +body of Pocahontas and listened to the story of her burial there? One +of the loveliest women I ever knew admits that every time she visits +relatives at Salem she goes out to look at the mound over the broken +heart of Hester Prynne, that dream daughter of genius who never actually +lived or died, but who was and is and ever will be. Her grave can be +easily pointed out, but where is that of Alexander, of Themistocles, of +Aristotle, even of the first figure of history--Adam? Mark Twain found +it for a joke. Dr. Hale was finally forced to write a preface to "The +Man Without a Country" to declare that his hero was pure fiction and +that the pathetic punishment so marvelously described was not only +imaginary, but legally and actually impossible. It was because Philip +Nolan had passed into history. I myself have met old men who knew sea +captains that had met this melancholy prisoner at sea and looked upon +him, had even spoken to him upon subjects not prohibited. And these old +men did not hesitate to declare that Dr. Hale had lied in his denial and +had repudiated the facts through cowardice or under compulsion from the +War Department. + + * * * * * + +Indeed, so flexible, adaptable and penetrable is the style, and so +admirably has the use and proper direction of the imagination been +developed by the school of fiction, that every branch of literature has +gained from it power, beauty and clearness. Nothing has aided more in +the spread of liberal Christianity than the remarkable series of "Lives +of Christ," from Straus to Farrar, not omitting particular mention of +the singularly beautiful treatment of the subject by Renan. In all of +these conscientious imagination has been used, as it is used in the +highest works of fiction, to give to known facts the atmosphere and +vividness of truth in order that the spirit and personality of the +surroundings of the Savior of Mankind might be newly understood by and +made fresh to modern perception. + +Of all books it is to be said--of novels as well--that none is great +that is not true, and that cannot be true which does not carry inherence +of truth. Now every book is true to some reader. The "Arabian Nights" +tales do not seem impossible to a little child, the only delight him. +The novels of "The Duchess" seem true to a certain class of readers, if +only because they treat of a society to which those readers are entirely +unaccustomed. "Robinson Crusoe" is a gospel to the world, and yet it is +the most palpably and innocently impossible of books. It is so plausible +because the author has ingeniously or accidentally set aside the usual +earmarks of plausibility. When an author plainly and easily knows +what the reader does not know and enough more to continue the chain of +seeming reality of truth a little further, he convinces the reader of +his truth and ability. Those men, therefore, who have been endowed with +the genius almost unconsciously to absorb, classify, combine, arrange +and dispense vast knowledge in a bold, striking or noble manner, are the +recognized greatest men of genius for the simple reason that the readers +of the world who know most recognize all they know in these writers, +together with that spirit of sublime imagination that suggests still +greater realms of truth and beauty. What Shakesepare was to the +intellectual leaders of his day, "The Duchess" was to countless immature +young folks of her day who were looking for "something to read." + +All truth is history, but all history is not truth. Written history is +notoriously no well-cleaner. + + + + +III. READING THE FIRST NOVEL + +BEING MOSTLY REMINISCENCES OF EARLY CRIMES AND JOYS + + +Once more and for all, the career of a novel reader should be entered +upon, if at all, under the age of fourteen. As much earlier as possible. +The life of the intellect, as of its shadowy twin, imagination, begins +early and develops miraculously. The inbred strains of nature lie +exposed to influence as a mirror to reflections, and as open to +impression as sensitized paper, upon which pictures may be printed +and from which they may also fade out. The greater the variety of +impressions that fall upon the young mind the more certain it is that +the greatest strength of natural tendency will be touched and revealed. +Good or bad, whichever it may be, let it come out as quickly as +possible. How many men have never developed their fatal weaknesses until +success was within reach and the edifice fell upon other innocent ones. +Believe me, no innate scoundrel or brute will be much helped or hindered +by stories. These have no turn or leisure for dreaming. They are eager +for the actual touch of life. What would a dull-eyed glutton, famishing, +not with hunger but with the cravings of digestive ferocity, find in +Thackeray's "Memorials of Gormandizing" or "Barmecidal Feasts?" Such +banquets are spread for the frugal, not one of whom would swap that +immortal cook-book review for a dinner with Lucullus. Rascals will not +read. Men of action do not read. They look upon it as the gambler does +upon the game where "no money passes." It may almost be said that the +capacity for novel-reading is the patent of just and noble minds. You +never heard of a great novel-reader who was notorious as a criminal. +There have been literary criminals, I grant you--Eugene Aram Dr. Dodd, +Prof. Webster, who murdered Parkmaan, and others. But they were writers, +not readers And they did not write novels. Mr. Aram wrote scientific and +school books, as did Prof. Webster, and Dr. Wainwright wrote beautiful +sermons. We never do sufficiently consider the evil that lies behind +writing sermons. The nearest you can come to a writer of fiction who +has been steeped in crime is in Benvenuto Cellini, whose marvelous +autobiographical memoir certainly contains some fiction, though it is +classed under the suspect department of History. + +How many men actually have been saved from a criminal career by the +miraculous influence of novels? Let who will deny, but at the age of +six I myself was absolutely committed to the abandoned purpose of riding +barebacked horses in a circus. Secretly, of course, because there were +some vague speculations in the family concerning what seemed to be +special adaptability to the work of preaching. Shortly after I gave that +up to enlist in the Continental Army, under Gen. Francis Marion, and no +other soldier slew more Britons. After discharge I at once volunteered +in an Indiana regiment quartered in my native town in Kentucky, and beat +the snare drum at the head of that fine body of men for a long time. But +the tendency was downward. For three months I was chief of a of robbers +that ravaged the backyards of the vicinity. Successively I became a spy +for Washington, an Indian fighter, a tragic actor. + +With character seared, abandoned and dissolute in habit through and +by the hearing and seeing and reading of history, there was but one +desperate step left So I entered upon the career of a pirate in my ninth +year. The Spanish Main, as no doubt you remember, was at that time upon +an open common across the street from our house, and it was a hundred +feet long, half as wide and would average two feet in depth. I have +often since thanked Heaven that they filled up that pathless ocean in +order to build an iron foundry upon the spot. Suppose they had excavated +for a cellar! Why during the time that Capt. Kidd, Lafitte and I +infested the coast thereabout, sailing three "low, black-hulled +schooners with long rakish masts," I forced hundreds of merchant seamen +to walk the plank--even helpless women and children. Unless the sharks +devoured them, their bones are yet about three feet under the floor of +that iron foundry. Under the lee of the Northernmost promontory, near +a rock marked with peculiar crosses made by the point of the stiletto +which I constantly carried in my red silk sash, I buried tons of plate, +and doubloons, pieces of eight, pistoles, Louis d'ors, and galleons by +the chest. At that time galleons somehow meant to me money pieces in +use, though since then the name has been given to a species of boat. The +rich brocades, Damascus and Indian stuffs, laces, mantles, shawls and +finery were piled in riotous profusion in our cave where--let the whole +truth be told if it must--I lived with a bold, black-eyed and coquettish +Spanish girl, who loved me with ungovernable jealousy that occasionally +led to bitter and terrible scenes of rage and despair. At last when I +brought home a white and red English girl whose life I spared because +she had begged me her knees by the memory of my sainted mother to spare +her for her old father, who was waiting her coming, Joquita passed all +bounds. I killed her--with a single knife thrust I remember. She was +buried right on the spot where the Tilden and Hendricks flag pole +afterwards stood in the campaign of 1876. It was with bitter melancholy +that I fancied the red stripes on the flag had their color from the +blood of the poor, foolish jealous girl below. + + * * * * * + +Ah, well-- + +Let us all own up--we men of above forty who aspire to respectability +and do actually live orderly lives and achieve even the odor of +sanctity--have we not been stained with murder?--aye worse! What man has +not his Bluebeard closet, full of early crimes and villainies? A certain +boy in whom I take a particular interest, who goes to Sunday-school and +whose life is outwardly proper--is he not now on week days a robber of +great renown? A week ago, masked and armed, he held up his own father in +a secluded corner of the library and relieved the old man of swag of +a value beyond the dreams--not of avarice, but--of successful, +respectable, modern speculation. He purposes to be a pirate whenever +there is a convenient sheet of water near the house. God speed him. +Better a pirate at six than at sixty. + +Give them work to do and good novels to read and they will get over it. +History breeds queer ideas in children. They read of military heroes, +kings and statesmen who commit awful deeds and are yet monuments of +public honor. What a sweet hero is Raleigh, who was a farmer of piracy; +what a grand Admiral was Drake; what demi-gods the fighting Americans +who murdered Indians for the crime of wanting their own! History hath +charms to move an infant breast to savagery. Good strong novels are the +best pabulum to nourish difference between virtue and vice. + +Don't I know? I have felt the miracle and learned the difference so well +that even now at an advanced age I can tell the difference and indulge +in either. It was not a week after the killing of Joquita that I read +the first novel of my life. It was "Scottish Chiefs." The dead bodies of +ten thousand novels lie between me and that first one. I have not read +it since. Ten Incas of Peru with ten rooms full of solid gold could +not tempt me to read it again. Have I not a clear cinch on a delicious +memory, compared with which gold is only Robinson Crusoe's "drug?" After +a lapse of all these years the content of that one tremendous, noble +chapter of heroic climax is as deeply burned into my memory as if it had +been read yesterday. + +A sister, old enough to receive "beaux" and addicted to the piano-forte +accomplishment, was at that time practicing across the hall an +instrumental composition, entitled, "La Rve." Under the title, printed +in very small letters, was the English translation; but I never thought +to look at it. An elocutionist had shortly before recited Poe's Raven +at a church entertainment, and that gloomy bird flapped its wings in my +young emotional vicinity when the firelight threw vague "shadows on +the floor." When the piece of music was spoken as "La Rve," its sad +cadences, suffering, of course, under practice, were instantly wedded in +my mind to Mr. Poe's wonderful bird and for years it meant the "Raven" +to me. How curious are childish impressions. Years afterward when I +saw a copy of the music and read the translation, "The Dream" under the +title, I felt a distinct shock of resentment as if the French language +had been treacherous to my sacred ideas. Then there was the romantic +name of "Ellerslie," which, notwithstanding considerable precocity in +reading and spelling I carried off as "Elleressie" Yeas afterward when +the actual syllables confronted me in a historical sketch of Wallace, +the truth entered like a stab and I closed the book. O sacred first +illusions of childhood, you are sweeter than a thousand year of fame! It +is God's providence that hardens us to endure the throwing of them down +to our eyes and strengthens us to keep their memory sweet in our hearts. + + + * * * * * + +It would be an affront then, not to assume that every reputable novel +reader has read "Scottish Chiefs." If there is any descendant or any +personal friend of that admirable lady, Miss Jane Porter, who may now be +in pecuniary distress, let that descendant call upon me privately with +perfect confidence. There are obligations that a glacial evolutionary +period can not lessen. I make no conditions but the simple proof of +proper identity. I am not rich but I am grateful. + +It was a Saturday evening when I became aware, as by prescience, that +there hung over Sir William Wallice and Helen Mar some terrible shadow +of fate. And the piano-forte across the hall played "La Rve." My heart +failed me and I closed the book. If you can't do that, my friend, then +you waste your time trying to be a novel reader. You have not the true +touch of genius for it. It is the miracle of eating your cake and having +it, too. It must have been the unconscious moving of novel reading +genius in me. For I forgot, as clearly as if it were not a possibility, +that the next day was Sunday. And so hurried off, before time, to bed, +to be alone with the burden on my heart. + + "Backward, turn backward, O Time in your flight-- + Make me a child again just for tonight." + +There are two or three novels I should love to take to bed as of +yore--not to read, but to suffer over and to contemplate and to seek +calmness and courage with which to face the inevitable. Could there be +men base enough to do to death the noble Wallace? Or to break the heart +of Helen Mar with grief? No argument could remove the presentiment, but +facing the matter gave courage. "Let tomorrow answer," I thought, as the +piano-forte in the next room played "La Rve." Then fell asleep. + +And when I awoke next morning to the full knowledge that it was Sunday, +I could have murdered the calendar. For Sunday was Dies Irae. After +Sunday-school, at least. There is a certain amount of fun to be to +extracted from Sunday-school. The remainder of those early Sundays +was confined to reading the Bible or storybooks from the Sunday-school +library--books, by the Lord Harry, that seem to be contrived especially +to make out of healthy children life-long enemies of the church, and to +bind hypocrites to the altar with hooks of steel. There was no whistling +at all permitted; singing of hymns was encouraged; no "playing"--playing +on Sunday was a distinct source of displeasure to Heaven! Are free-born +men nine years of age to endure such tyranny with resignation? Ask +the kids of today--and with one voice, as true men and free, they will +answer you, "Nit!" In the dark days of my youth liberty was in chains, +and so Sunday was passed in dreadful suspense as to what was doing in +Scotland. + + * * * * * + +Monday night after supper I rejoined Sir William in his captivity and +soon saw that my worst fears were to be realized. My father sat on the +opposite side of the table reading politics; my mother was effecting the +restoration of socks; my brother was engaged in unraveling mathematical +tangles, and in the parlor across the hall my sister sat alone with +her piano patiently debating "La Rve." Under these circumstances I +encountered the first great miracle of intellectual emotion in the +chapter describing the execution of William Wallace on Tower Hill. No +other incident of life has left upon me such a profound impression. +It was as if I had sprung at one bound into the arena of heroism. +I remember it all. How Wallace delivered himself of theological and +Christian precepts to Helen Mar after which they both knelt before the +officiating priest. That she thought or said, "My life will expire with +yours!" It was the keynote of death and life devotion. It was worthy to +usher Wallace up the scaffold steps where he stood with his hands bound, +"his noble head uncovered." There was much Christian edification, but +the presence of such a hero as he with "noble Head uncovered" would +enable any man nine years old with a spark of honor and sympathy in him +to endure agonizing amounts of edification. Then suddenly there was a +frightful shudder in my heart. The hangman approached with the rope, and +Helen Mar, with a shriek, threw herself upon Wallace's breast. Then the +great moment. If I live a thousand years these lines will always be +with me: "Wallace, with a mighty strength, burst the bonds asunder that +confined his arms and clasped her to his heart!" + + * * * * * + +In reading some critical or pretended text books on construction since +that time I came across this sentence used to illustrate tautology. It +was pointed out that the bonds couldn't be "burst" without necessarily +being asunder. The confoundedest outrages in this world are the capers +that precisionists cut upon the bodies of the noble dead. And with +impunity too. Think of a village surveyor measuring the forest of Arden +to discover the exact acreage! Or a horse-doctor elevating his eye-brow +with a contemptuous smile and turning away, as from an innocent, when +you speak of the wings of that fine horse, Pegasus! Any idiot knows +that bonds couldn't be burst without being burst asunder. But, let the +impregnable Jackass think--what would become of the noble rhythm and the +majestic roll of sound? Shakespeare was an ignorant dunce also when +he characterized the ingratitude that involves the principle of public +honor as "the unkindest cut of all." Every school child knows that it is +ungrammatical; but only those who have any sense learn after awhile +the esoteric secret that it sometimes requires a tragedy of language to +provide fitting sacrifice to the manes of despair. There never was yet +a man of genius who wrote grammatically and under the scourge of +rhetorical rules. Anthony Trollope is a most perfect example of the +exact correctness that sterilizes in its own immaculate chastity. +Thackeray would knock a qualifying adverb across the street, or thrust +it under your nose to make room for the vivid force of an idea. Trollope +would give the idea a decent funeral for the sake of having his adverb +appear at the grave above reproach from grammatical gossip. Whenever I +have risen from the splendid psychological perspective of old Job, the +solemn introspective howls of Ecclesiasticus and the generous living +philosophy of Shakespeare it has always been with the desire--of course +it is undignified, but it is human--to go and get an English grammar +for the pleasure of spitting upon it. Let us be honest. I understand +everything about grammar except what it means; but if you will give me +the living substance and the proper spirit any gentleman who desires the +grammatical rules may have them, and be hanged to him! And, while it +may appear presumptuous, I can conscientiously say that it will not be +agreeable to me to settle down in heaven with a class of persons who +demand the rules of grammar for the intellectual reason that corresponds +to the call for crutches by one-legged men. + + * * * * * + +If the foregoing appear ill-tempered pray forget it. Remember rather +that I have sought to leave my friend Sir William Wallace, holding Helen +Mar on his breast as long as possible. And yet, I also loved her! Can +human nature go farther than that? + +"Helen," he said to her, "life's cord is cut by God's own hand." He +stooped, he fell, and the fall shook the scaffold. Helen--that glorified +heroine--raised his head to her lap. The noble Earl of Gloucester +stepped forward, took the head in his hands. + +"There," he cried in a burst of grief, letting it fall again upon the +insensible bosom of Helen, "there broke the noblest heart that ever beat +in the breast of man!" + +That page or two of description I read with difficulty and agony through +blinding tears, and when Gloucester spoke his splendid eulogy my head +fell on the table and I broke into such wild sobbing that the little +family sprang up in astonishment. I could not explain until my mother, +having led me to my room, succeeded in soothing me into calmness and +I told her the cause of it. And she saw me to bed with sympathetic +caresses and, after she left, it all broke out afresh and I cried myself +to sleep in utter desolation and wretchedness. Of course the matter +got out and my father began the book. He was sixty years old, not an +indiscriminate reader, but a man of kind and boyish heart. I felt a sort +of fascinated curiosity to watch him when he reached the chapter that +had broken me. And, as if it were yesterday, I can see him under the +lamplight compressing his lips, or puffing like a smoker through them, +taking off his spectacles, and blowing his nose with great ceremony and +carelessly allowing the handkerchief to reach his eyes. Then another +paragraph and he would complain of the glasses and wipe them carefully, +also his eyes, and replace the spectacles. But he never looked at me, +and when he suddenly banged the lids together and, turning away, sat +staring into the fire with his head bent forward, making unconcealed use +of the handkerchief, I felt a sudden sympathy for him and sneaked out. +He would have made a great novel reader if he had had the heart. But he +couldn't stand sorrow and pain. The novel reader must have a heart +for every fate. For a week or more I read that great chapter and its +approaches over and over, weeping less and less, until I had worn out +that first grief, and could look with dry eyes upon my dead. And never +since have I dared to return to it. Let who will speak freely in other +tones of "Scottish Chiefs"--opinions are sacred liberties--but as for +me I know it changed my career from one of ruthless piracy to better +purposes, and certain boys of my private acquaintance are introduced to +Miss Jane Porter as soon as they show similar bent. + + + + +IV. THE FIRST NOVEL TO READ + +CONTAINING SOME SCANDALOUS REMARKS ABOUT "ROBINSON CRUSOE" + + +The very best First-Novel-To-Read in all fiction is "Robinson Crusoe." +There is no dogmatism in the declaration; it is the announcement of a +fact as well ascertained as the accuracy of the multiplication table. +It is one of the delights of novel reading that you may have any opinion +you please and fire it off with confidence, without gainsay. Those who +differ with you merely have another opinion, which is not sacred and +cannot be proved any more than yours. All of the elements of supreme +test of imaginative interest are in "Robinson Crusoe." Love is absent, +but that is not a test; love appeals to persons who cannot read or +write--it is universal, as hunger and thirst. + +The book-reading boy is easily discovered; you always catch him reading +books. But the novel-reading boy has a system of his own, a sort of +instinctive way of getting the greatest excitement out of the story, the +very best run for his money. This sort of boy soon learns to sit with +his feet drawn up on the upper rung of a chair, so that from the knees +to the thighs there is a gentle declivity of about thirty degrees; +the knees are nicely separated that the book may lie on them without +holding. That involves one of the most cunning of psychological secrets; +because, if the boy is not a novel reader, he does not want the book to +lie open, since every time it closes he gains just that much relief +in finding the place again. The novel-reading boy knows the trick of +immortal wisdom; he can go through the old book cases and pick the +treasures of novels by the way they lie open; if he gets hold of a new +or especially fine edition of his father's he need not be told to wrench +it open in the middle and break the back of the binding--he does it +instinctively. + +There are other symptoms of the born novel reader to be observed in him. +If he reads at night he is careful to so place his chair that the light +will fall on the page from a direction that will ultimately ruin the +eyes--but it does not interfere with the light. He humps himself over +the open volume and begins to display that unerring curvalinearity of +the spine that compels his mother to study braces and to fear that he +will develop consumption. Yet you can study the world's health records +and never find a line to prove that any man with "occupation or +profession--novel reading" is recorded as dying of consumption. The +humped-over attitude promotes compression of the lungs, telescoping of +the diaphragm, atrophy of the abdominal abracadabra and other +things (see Physiological Slush, p. 179, et seq.); +but--it--never--hurts--the--boy! + +To a novel reading boy the position is one of instinct, like that of +the bicycle racer. His eyes are strained, his nerves and muscles at +tension--everything ready for excitement--and the book, lying open, +leaves his hands perfectly free to drum on the sides of the chair, slap +his legs and knees, fumble in his pockets or even scratch his head as +emotion or interest demand. Does anybody deny that the highest proof of +special genius is the possession of the instinct to adapt itself to the +matter in hand? Nothing more need be said. + + * * * * * + +Now, if you will observe carefully such a boy when he comes to a certain +point in "Robinson Crusoe" you may recognize the stroke of fate in his +destiny. If he's the right sort, he will read gayly along; he drums, +he slaps himself, he beats his breast, he scratches his head. Suddenly +there will come the shock. He is reading rapidly and gloriously. +He finds his knife in his pocket, as usual, and puts it back; the +top-string is there; he drums the devil's tattoo, he wets his finger +and smears the margin of the page as he whirls it over and then--he +finds--"The--Print--of--a--Man's--Naked--Foot--on--the--Shore!!!" + +Oh, Crackey! At this tremendous moment the novel reader who has genius +drums no more. His hands have seized the upper edges of the muslin lids, +he presses the lower edges against his stomach, his back takes an +added intensity of hump, his eyes bulge, his heart thumps--he is +landed--landed! + +Terror, surprise, sympathy, hope, skepticism, doubt--come all ye +trooping emotions to threaten or console; but an end has come to fairy +stories and wonder tales--Master Studious is in the awful presence of +Human Nature. + + * * * * * + +For many years I have believed that that +Print--of--a--Man's--Naked--Foot was set in italic type in all editions +of "Robinson Crusoe." But a patient search of many editions has +convinced me that I must have been mistaken. + +The passage comes sneaking along in the midst of a paragraph in common +Roman letters and by the living jingo! you discover it just as Mr. +Crusoe discovered the footprint itself! + +No story ever written exhibits so profoundly either the perfect +design of supreme genius or the curious accidental result of slovenly +carelessness in a hack-writer. This is not said in any critical spirit, +because, Robinson Crusoe, in one sense, is above criticism, and +in another it permits the freest analysis without suffering in the +estimation of any reader. + +But for Robinson Crusoe, De Foe would never have ranked above the level +of his time. It is customary for critics to speak in awe of the "Journal +of the Plague" and it is gravely recited that that book deceived the +great Dr. Meade. Dr. Meade must have been a poor doctor if De Foe's +accuracy of description of the symptoms and effects of disease is not +vastly superior to the detail he supplies as a sailor and solitaire upon +a desert island. I have never been able to finish the "Journal." +The only books in which his descriptions smack of reality are "Moll +Flanders" and "Roxana," which will barely stand reading these days. + +In what may be called its literary manner, Robinson Crusoe is entirely +like the others. It convinces you by its own conviction of sincerity. +It is simple, wandering yet direct; there is no making of "points" or +moving to climaxes. De Foe did unquestionably possess the capacity to +put into his story the appearance of sincerity that persuades belief at +a glance. In that much he had the spark of genius; yet that same case +has not availed to make the "Journal" of the Plague anything more than +a curious and laborious conceit, while Robinson Crusoe stands among +the first books of the world--a marvelous gleam of living interest, +inextinguishably fresh and heartening to the imagination of every reader +who has sensibility two removes above a toad. + +The question arises, then, is "Robinson Crusoe" the calculated triumph +of deliberate genius, or the accidental stroke of a hack who fell upon a +golden suggestion in the account of Alexander Selkirk and increased +its value ten thousand fold by an unintentional but rather perfect +marshaling of incidents in order, and by a slovenly ignorance of +character treatment that enhanced the interest to perfect intensity? +This question may be discussed without undervaluing the book, the +extraordinary merit of which is shown in the fact that, while its idea +has been paraphrased, it has never been equalled. The "Swiss Family +Robinson," the "Schonberg-Cotta Family" for children are full of merit +and far better and more carefully written, but there are only the desert +island and the ingenious shifts introduced. Charles Reade in "Hard +Cash," Mr. Mallock in his "Nineteenth Century Romance," Clark Russel in +"Marooned," and Mayne Reid, besides others, have used the same theater. +But only in that one great book is the theater used to display the +simple, yearning, natural, resolute, yet doubting, soul and heart of man +in profound solitude, awaiting in armed terror, but not without purpose, +the unknown and masked intentions of nature and savagery. It seems +to me--and I have been tied to Crusoe's chariot wheels for a dozen +readings, I suppose--that it is the pressing in upon your emotions of +the immensity of the great castaway's solitude, in which he appears like +some tremendous Job of abandonment, fighting an unseen world, which is +the innate note of its power. + + * * * * * + +The very moment Friday becomes a loyal subject, the suspense relaxes +into pleased interest, and after Friday's funny father and the Spaniard +and others appear it becomes a common book. As for the second part of +the adventures I do not believe any matured man ever read it a second +time unless for curious or literary purposes. If he did he must be one +of that curious but simple family that have read the second part of +"Faust," "Paradise Regained," and the "Odyssey," and who now peruse +"Clarissa Harlowe" and go carefully over the catalogue of ships in +the "Iliad" as a preparation for enjoying the excitements of the city +directory. + +Every particle of greatness in "Robinson Crusoe" is compressed within +two hundred pages, the other four hundred being about as mediocre trash +as you could purchase anywhere between cloth lids. + + * * * * * + +It is interesting to apply subjective analysis to Robinson Crusoe. The +book in its very greatness has turned more critical swans into geese +than almost any other. They have praised the marvelous ingenuity with +which De Foe described how the castaway overcame single-handed, the +deprivations of all civilized conveniences; they have marveled at the +simple method in which all his labors are marshaled so as to render his +conversion of the island into a home the type of industrial and even of +social progress and theory; they have rhapsodized over the perfection +of De Foe's style as a model of literary strength and artistic +verisemblance. Only a short time ago a mighty critic of a great +London paper said seriously that "Robinson Crusoe and Gulliver appeal +infinitely more to the literary reader than to the boy, who does +not want a classic but a book written by a contemporary." What an +extraordinary boy that must be! It is probable that few boys care for +Gulliver beyond his adventures in Lilliput and Brobdignag, but they +devour that much, together with Robinson Crusoe, with just as much +avidity now as they did a century ago. Your clear-headed, healthy boy is +the first best critic of what constitutes the very liver and lights of +a novel. Nothing but the primitive problems of courage meeting peril, +virtue meeting vice, love, hatred, ambition for power and glory, will +go down with him. The grown man is more capable of dealing with social +subtleties and the problems of conscience, but those sorts of books do +not last unless they have also "action--action--action." + +Will the New Zealander, sitting amidst the prophetic ruins of St. +Paul's, invite his soul reading Robert Elsmere? Of course you can't say +what a New Zealander of that period might actually do; but what would +you think of him if you caught him at it? The greatest stories of the +world are the Bible stories, and I never saw a boy--intractable of +acquiring the Sunday-school habit though he may have been--who wouldn't +lay his savage head on his paws and quietly listen to the good old tales +of wonder out of that book of treasures. + + * * * * * + +So let us look into the interior of our faithful old friend, Robinson +Crusoe, and examine his composition as a literary whole. From the moment +that Crusoe is washed ashore on the island until after the release of +Friday's father and the Spaniard from the hands of the cannibals, there +is no book in print, perhaps, that can surpass it in interest and the +strained impression it makes upon the unsophisticated mind. It is +all comprised in about 200 pages, but to a boy to whom the world is +a theater of crowded action, to whom everything seems to have come +ready-made, to whom the necessity of obedience and accommodation to +others has been conveyed by constant friction--here he finds himself +for the first time face to face with the problem of solitude. He can +appreciate the danger from wild animals, genii, ghosts, battles, sieges +and sudden death, but in no other book before, did he ever come upon a +human being left solitary, with all these possible dangers to face. + +The voyages on the raft, the house-building, contriving, fearing, +praying, arguing--all these are full of plaintive pathos and yet of +encouragement. He witnesses despair turned into comfortable resignation +as the result of industry. It has required about twelve years. Virtue is +apparently fattening upon its own reward, when--Smash! Bang!--our young +reader runs upon "the--print--of--a--man's--naked--foot!" and security +and happiness, like startled birds, are flown forever. For twelve more +years this new unseen terror hangs over the poor solitary. Then we +have Friday, the funny cannibals later and it is all over. But the vast +solitude of that poor castaway has entered the imagination of the youth +and dominates it. + +These two hundred pages are crowded with suggestions that set a boy's +mind on fire, yet every page contains evidence of obvious slovenliness, +indolence and ignorance of human nature and common things, half of which +faults seem directly to contribute to the result, while the other half +are never noticed by the reader. + +How many of you, who sniff at this, know Crusoe's real name? Yet it +stares right out of the very first paragraphs in the book--a clean, +perhaps accidental, proof of good scholarship, which De Foe possessed. +Crusoe tells us his father was a German from Bremen, who married an +Englishwoman, from whose family name of Robinson came the son's name +which was properly Robinson Kreutznaer. This latter name, he explains, +became corrupted in the common English speech into Crusoe. That is an +excellent touch. The German pronunciation of Kreutznaer would sound like +Krites-nare, and a mere dry scholar would have evolved Crysoe out of the +name. But the English-speaking people everywhere, until within the past +twenty years or so, have given the German "eu" the sound of "oo" or "u." +Robinson's father therefore was called Crootsner until it was shaved +into Crootsno and thence smoothed to Crusoe. + +But what was the Christian name of the elder Kreutznaer? Or of the boy's +mother? Or of his brothers or sisters? Or of the first ship captain +under whom he sailed; or any of them; or even of the ship he commanded, +and in which he was wrecked; or of the dog that he carried to the +island; or of the two cats; or of the first and all the other tame +goats; or of the inlet; or of Friday's father; or of the Spaniard he +saved; or of the ship captain; or of the ship that finally saved him? +Who knows? The book is a desert as far as nomenclature goes--the only +blossoms being his own name; that of Wells, a Brazilian neighbor; Xury, +the Moorish boy; Friday, Poll, the parrot; and Will Atkins. + + * * * * * + +You may retort that all this doesn't matter. That is very true--and be +hanged to you!--but those facts prove by every canon of literary art +that Robinson Crusoe is either a coldly calculated flight of consummate +genius or an accidental freak of hack literature. When De Foe wrote, it +was only a century after Drake and his companions in authorized +piracy had made the British privateer the scourge of the seas and had +demonstrated that naval supremacy meant the control of the world. The +seafaring life was one of peril, but it carried with it honor, glory and +envy. Forty years later Nelson was born to crown British navalry with +deathless Glory. Even the commonest sailor spoke his ship's name--if it +were a fine vessel--with the same affection that he spoke his wife's +and cursed a bad ship by its name as if to tag its vileness with +proverbiality. + +When De Foe wrote Alexander Selkirk, able seaman, was alive end had +told his story of shipwreck to Sir Richard Steele, editor of the English +Gentleman and of the Tattler, who wrote it up well--but not half as well +as any one of ten thousand newspaper men of today could do under similar +circumstances. + +Now who that has read of Selkirk and Dampierre and Stradling does not +remember the two famous ships, the "Cinque Ports" and the "St. George?" +In every actvial book of the times, ship's names were sprinkled over the +page as if they had been shaken out of the pepper box. But you inquire +in vain the name of the slaver that wrecked "poor Robinson Crusoe"--a +name that would have been printed on his memory beyond forgetting +because of the very misfortune itself. Now the book is the autobiography +of a man whose only years of active life between eighteen and twenty-six +were passed as a sailor. It was written apparently after he was +seventy-two years old, at the period when every trifling incident and +name of youth would survive most brightly; yet he names no ships, no +sailor mates, carefully avoids all knowledge of or advantage attaching +to any parts of ships. It is out of character as a sailor's tale, +showing that the author either did not understand the value of or was +too indolent to acquire the ship knowledge that would give to his work +the natural smell of salt water and the bilge. It is a landlubber's sea +yarn. + +Is it in character as a revelation of human nature? No man like unto +Robinson Crusoe ever did live, does live, or ever will live, unless as a +freak deprived of human emotions. The Robinson Crusoe of Despair Island +was not a castaway, but the mature politician. Daniel Defoe of Newgate +Prison. The castaway would have melted into loving recollections; the +imprisoned lampoonist would have busied himself with schemes, ideas, +arguments and combinations for getting out, and getting on. This poor +Robin on the island weeps over nothing but his own sorrows, and, +while pretending to bewail his solitude, turns aside coldly from +companionships next only in affection to those of men. He has a dog, two +ship's cats (of whose "eminent history" he promises something that is +never related), tame goats and parrots. He gives none of them a name, +he does not occupy his yearning for companionship and love by preparing +comforts for them or by teaching them tricks of intelligence or +amusement; and when he does make a stagger at teaching Poll to talk it +is for the sole purpose of hearing her repeat "Poor Robin Crusoe!" +The dog is dragged in to work for him, but not to be rewarded. He dies +without notice, as do the cats, and not even a billet of wood marks +their graves. + +Could any being, with a drop of human blood in his veins, do that? He +thinks of his father with tears in his eyes--because he did not escape +the present solitude by taking the old man's advice! Does he recall his +mother or any of the childish things that lie so long and deep in +the heart of every natural man? Does he ever wonder what his old +school-fellows, Bob Freckles and Pete Baker, are doing these solitary +evenings when he sits under the tropics and hopes--could he not at +least hope it?--that they are, thank God, alive and happy at York? He +discourses like a parson of the utterly impossible affection that +Friday had for his cannibal sire and tells you how noble, Christian and +beautiful it was--as if, by Jove! a little of that virtue wouldn't have +ornamented his own cold, emotionless, fishy heart! + +He had no sentimental side. Think of those dreary, egotistic, awful +evenings, when, for more than twenty years this infernal hypocrite kept +himself company and tried patiently to deceive God by flattering Him +about religion! It is impossible. Why thought turns as certainly to +revery and recollection as grass turns to seed. He married. What was his +wife's name? We know how much property she had. What were the names of +the honest Portuguese Captain and the London woman who kept his money? +The cold selfishness and gloomy egotism of this creature mark him as a +monster and not as a man. + + * * * * * + +So the book is not in character as an autobiography, nor does it contain +a single softening emotion to create sympathy. Let us see whether it +be scholarly in its ease. The one line that strikes like a bolt of +lightning is the height of absurdity. We have all laughed, afterward +of course, at that--single--naked--foot--print. It could not have +been there without others, unless Friday were a one legged man, or was +playing the good old Scots game of "hop-scotch!" + +But the foot-print is not a circumstance to the cannibals. All the stage +burlesques of Robinson Crusoe combined could not produce such funny +cannibals as he discovered. Crusoe's cannibals ate no flesh but that +of men! He had no great trouble contriving how to induce Friday to eat +goat's flesh! They took all the trouble to come to his island to indulge +in picnics, during which they ate up folks, danced and then went home +before night. When the big party of 31 arrived, they had with them one +other cannibal of Friday's tribe, a Spaniard, and Friday's father. It +appears they always carefully unbound a victim before despatching him. +They brought Friday pere for lunch, although he was old, decrepit and +thin--a condition that always unfits a man among all known cannibals +for serving as food. They reject them as we do stringy old roosters for +spring chickens in the best society. Then Friday, born a cannibal and +converted to Crusoe's peculiar religion, shows that in three years he +has acquired all the emotions of filial affection prevalent at that time +among Yorkshire folk who attended dissenting chapels. More wonderful +still! old Friday pere, immersed in age and cannibalism, has the +corresponding paternal feeling. Crusoe never says exactly where these +cannibals came from, but my own belief is that they came from that +little Swiss town whence the little wooden animals for toy Noah's Arks +also came. + +A German savant--one of the patient sort that spend half a life writing +a monograph on the variation of spots on the butterfly's wings--could +get a philosophical dissertation on Doubt out of Crusoe's troubles with +pens, ink and paper; also clothes. In the volume I am using, on page 86, +third paragraph, he says: "I should lose my reckoning of time for want +of books, and pen and ink." So he kept it by notches in wood, he tells +in the fourth paragraph. In paragraph 5, same page, he says: "We are +to observe that among the many things I brought out of the ship, I +got several of less value, etc., which I omitted setting down as in +particular pens, ink and paper!" Same paragraph, lower down: "I shall +show that while my ink lasted I kept things very exact, but after that +was gone I could not make any ink by any means that I could devise." +Page 87, second paragraph: "I wanted many things, notwithstanding all +the many things that I had amassed together, and of these ink was one!" +Page 88, first paragraph: "I drew up my affairs in writing!" Now, by +George! did you ever hear of more appearing and disappearing pens, ink +and paper? + +The adventures of his clothes were as remarkable as his own. On his very +first trip to the wreck, after landing, he went "rummaging for clothes, +of which I found enough," but took no more than he wanted for present +use. On the second trip he "took all the men's clothes" (and there were +fifteen souls on board when she sailed). Yet in his famous debit and +credit calculations between good and evil he sets these down, page 88: + + EVIL | GOOD + -------------------------------------------------- + I have no clothes to | But I am in a hot climate, + cover me. | where, if I had + | clothes (!) I could hardly + | wear them. + +On page 147, bewailing his lack of a sieve, he says: "Linen, I had none +but what was mere rags." + +Page 158 (one year later): "My clothes, too, began to decay; as to +linen, I had had none a good while, except some checkered shirts, which +I carefully preserved, because many times I could bear no other clothes +on. I had almost three dozen of shirts, several thick watch coats, too +hot to wear." + +So he tried to make jackets out of the watch coats. Then this ingenious +gentleman, who had nothing to wear and was glad of it on account of the +heat, which kept him from wearing anything but a shirt, and rendered +watch coats unendurable, actually made himself a coat, waistcoat, +breeches, cap and umbrella of skins with the hair on and wore them in +great comfort! Page 175 he goes hunting, wearing this suit, belted by +two heavy skin belts, carrying hatchet, saw, powder, shot, his heavy +fowling piece and the goatskin umbrella--total weight of baggage and +clothes about ninety pounds. It must have been a cold day! + +Yet the first thing he does for the naked Friday thirteen years later +is to give him a pair--of--LINEN--trousers! Poor Robin Crusoe--what a +colossal liar was wasted on a desert island! + + * * * * * + +Of course, no boy sees the blemishes in "Robinson Crusoe;" those are +left to the Infallible Critic. The book is as ludicrous as "Hamlet" from +one aspect and as profound as "Don Quixote" from another. In its pages +the wonder tales and wonder facts meet and resolve; realism and idealism +are joined--above all, there is a mystery no critic may solve. It is +useless to criticize genius or a miracle, except to increase its wonder. +Who remembers anything in "Crusoe" but the touch of the wizard's hand? +Who associates the Duke of Athens, Hermia and Helena, with Bottom and +Snug, Titania, Oberon and Puck? Any literary master mechanic might real +off ten thousand yards of the Greek folks or of "Pericles," but when you +want something that runs thus: + + "I know a bank whereon the wild thyme blows! + Where oxlip and the nodding violet grows--." + +why, then, my masters, you must put up the price and employ a genius to +work the miracle. + +Take all miracles without question. Whether work of genius or miracle of +accident, "Robinson Crusoe" gives you a generous run for your money. + + + + +V. THE OPEN POLAR SEA OF NOVELS + +WITH HIGHLY INCENDIARY ADVICE TO BOYS AND SOME MORE ANCIENT HISTORY + + +After the first novel has been read, somewhere under the seasoned age +of fourteen years, the beginner equipped with inherent genius for novel +reading is afloat upon an open sea of literature, a master mariner of +his own craft, having ports to make, to leave, to take, so splendid +of variety and wonder as to make the voyages of Sinbad sing small by +comparison. It may be proper and even a duty here to suggest to the +young novel reader that the Ten Commandments and all governmental +statutes authorize the instant killing, without pity or remorse, of +any heavy-headed and intrusive person who presumes to map out for him +a symmetrical and well-digested course of novel reading. The murder of +such folks is universally excused as self-defense and secretly applauded +as a public service. The born novel reader needs no guide, counsellor +or friend. He is his own "master." He can with perfect safety and +indescribable delight shut his eyes, reach out his hand, pull down any +plum of a book and never make a mistake. Novel reading is the only +one of the splendid occupations of life calling for no instruction or +advice. All that is necessary is to bite the apple with the largest +freedom possible to the intellectual and imaginative jaws, and let the +taste of it squander itself all the way down from the front teeth until +it is lost in the digestive joys of memory. There is no miserable quail +limit to novels--you can read thirty novels in thirty days or 365 novels +in 365 days for thirty years, and the last one will always have the +delicious taste of the pies of childhood. + +If any honest-minded boy chances to read these lines, let him charge +his mind with full contempt for any misguided elders who have designs of +"choosing only the best accepted novels" for his reading. There are no +"best" novels except by the grace of the poor ones, and, if you don't +read the poor ones, the "best" will be as tasteless as unsalted rice. +I say to boys that are worth growing up: don't let anybody give you +patronizing advice about novels. If your pastors and masters try +oppression, there is the orchard, the creek bank, the attic room, the +roof of the woodshed (under the peach tree), and a thousand other places +where you may hide and maintain your natural independence. Don't let +elderly and officious persons explain novels to you. They can not +honestly do so; so don't waste time. Every boy of fourteen, with the +genius to read 'em, is just as good a judge of novels and can understand +them quite as well as any gentleman of brains of any old age. Because +novels mean entirely different things to every blessed reader. + + * * * * * + +The main thing at the beginning is to be in the neighborhood of a good +"novel orchard" and to nibble and eat, and even "gormandize," as your +fancy leads you. Only--as you value your soul and your honor as a +gentleman--bear in mind that what you read in every novel that pleases +you is sacred truth. There are busy-bodies, pretenders to "culture," and +sticklers for the multiplication table and Euclid's pestiferous theorem, +who will tell you that novel reading is merely for entertainment and +light accomplishment, and that the histories of fiction are purely +imaginary and not to be taken seriously. That is pure falsehood. The +truth of all humanity, as well as all its untruth, flows in a noble +stream through the pages of fiction. Do not allow the elders to persuade +you that pirate stories, battles, sieges, murders and sudden deaths, the +road to transgression and the face of dishonesty are not good for you. +They are 90 per cent. pure nutriment to a healthy boy's mind, and any +other sort of boy ought particularly to read them and so learn the +shortest cut to the penitentiary for the good of the world. Whenever you +get hold of a novel that preaches and preaches and preaches, and can't +give a poor ticket-of-leave man or the decentest sort of a villain +credit for one good trait--Gee, Whizz! how tiresome they are--lose it, +you young scamp, at once, if you respect yourself. If you are pushed you +can say that Bill Jones took it away from you and threw it in the creek. +The great Victor Hugo and the authors of that noble drama "The Two +Orphans," are my authorities for the statement that some fibs--not all +fibs, but some proper fibs--are entered in heaven on both debit and +credit sides of the book of fate. + +There is one book, the Book of Books, swelling rich and full with +the wisdom and beauty and joy and sorrow of humanity--a book that set +humility like a diamond in the forehead of virtue; that found mercy and +charity outcasts among the minds of men and left them radiant queens in +the world's heart; that stickled not to describe the gorgeous esotery of +corroding passion and shamed it with the purity of Mary Magdelen; that +dragged from the despair of old Job the uttermost poison-drop of doubt +and answered it with the noble problem of organized existence; that +teems with murder and mistake and glows with all goodness and honest +aspiration--that is the Book of Books. There hasn't been one written +since that has crossed the boundary of its scope. What would that +book be after some goody-goody had expurgated it of evil and left it +sterilized in butter and sugar? Let no ignorant paternal Czar, ruling +over cottage or mansion, presume to keep from the mind and heart of +youth the vigorous knowledge and observation of evil and good, crime and +virtue together. No chaff, no wheat; no dross, no gold; no human faults +and weaknesses, no heavenly hope. And if any gentleman does not like +the sentiment, he can find me at my usual place of residence, unless he +intends violence--and be hanged, also, to him! + + * * * * * + +A novel is a novel, and there are no bad ones in the world, except those +you do not happen to like. Suppose a boy started with Robinson Crusoe +and was scientifically and criminally steered by the hand of misguided +"culture" to Scott and Dickens and Cooper and Hawthorne--all the +classics, in fact, so that he would escape the vulgar thousands? Answer +a straight question, ye old rooters between a thousand miles of muslin +lids--would you have been willing to miss "The Gunmaker of Moscow" back +yonder in the green days of say forty years ago? What do you think of +Prof. William Henry Peck's "Cryptogram?" Were not Sylvanus Cobb, Jr., +and Emerson Bennett authors of renown--honor to their dust, wherever it +lies! Didn't you read Mrs. Southworth's "Capitola" or the "Hidden Hand" +long before "Vashti" was dreamed of? Don't you remember that No. 52 +of Beadle's Dime Library (light yellowish red paper covers) was +"Silverheels, the Delaware," and that No. 77 was "Schinderhannes, +the Outlaw of the Black Forest?" I yield to no man in affection and +reverence for M. Dumas, Mr. Thackeray and others of the higher circles, +but what's the matter with Ned Buntline, honest, breezy, vigorous, +swinging old Ned? Put the "Three Guardsmen" where you will, but there is +also room for "Buffalo Bill, the Scout." When I first saw Col. Cody, an +ornament to the theatre and a painful trial to the drama, and realized +that he was Buffalo Bill in the flesh--why, I was glad I had also read +"Buffalo Bill's Last Shot"--(may he never shoot it). The day has passed +forever, probably, when Buffalo Bill shall shout to his other scouts, +"You set fire to the girl while I take care of the house!" or vice +versa, and so saying, bear the fainting heroine triumphantly off from +the treacherous redskins. But the story has lived. + + * * * * * + +It was a happy and honored custom in the old days for subscribers to +the New York Ledger and the New York Weekly to unite in requests for +the serial republication of favorite stories in those great fireside +luminaries. They were the old-fashioned, broadside sheets and, of +course, there were insuperable difficulties against preserving the +numbers. After a year or two, therefore, there would awaken a general +hunger among the loyal hosts to "read the story over," and when the +demand was sufficiently strong the publishers would repeat it, cuts, +divisions, and all, just as at first. How many times the "Gunmaker +of Moscow" was repeated in the Ledger, heaven knows. I remember I +petitioned repeatedly for "Buffalo Bill" in the Weekly, and we got +it, too, and waded through it again. By wading, I don't mean pushing +laboriously and tediously through, but, by George! half immersion in the +joy. It was a week between numbers, and a studious and appreciative boy +made no bones of reading the current weekly chapters half a dozen times +over while waiting for the next. + +It must have been ten years later that I felt a thrill at the coming of +Buffalo Bill himself in his first play. I had risen to the dignity of +dramatic critic upon a journal of limited civilization and boundless +politics, and was privileged to go behind the scenes at the theatre and +actually speak to the actors. (I interviewed Mary Anderson during her +first season, in the parlor of the local hotel, where honest George +Bristow--who kept the cigar stand and could not keep a healthy +appetite--always gave a Thanksgiving order for "two-whole-roast turkeys +and a piece of breast," and they were served, too, the whole ones going +to some near-by hospital, and the piece of breast to George's honest +stomach--good, kind soul that he was. And Miss Anderson chewed gum +during the whole period of the interview to the intense amusement of +my elder and brother dramatic critic, who has since become the honored +governor of his adopted state, and toward whom I beg to look with +affectionate memory of those days.) Now, when a man has known novels +intimately, has been dramatic critic, and has traveled with a circus, it +seems to me in all reason he can not fairly have any other earthly +joys to desire. At fifteen I was walking on tip-toe about the house +on Sundays, and going off to the end of the garden to softly whistle +"weekday" tunes, and at twenty I stood off the wings L. U. E., and had +twenty "Black Crook" coryphees in silk tights and tarletan squeeze +past in line, and nod and say, "Is it going all right in front?" +They--knew--I--was--the--Critic! When you can do that you can laugh at +Byron, roosting around upon inaccessible mountain crags and formulating +solitude and indigestion into poetry! + +I waited for Buffalo Bill's coming with feelings that can not be +described. It was impossible to expect to meet Sir William Wallace +in the flesh, or Sir Wilfred of Ivanhoe, or Capt. D'Artagnan, or +Umslopogaas, or any one of a thousand great fighting heroes; but here +was Buffalo Bill, just as great and glorious and dashing and handsome +as any of them, and my right hand tingled to be grasped in that of the +Bayard of the Prairies. And that hand's desire was attained. In his +dressing-room between acts I sat nervously on a chair while the splendid +Apollo of frontiersmen, in buckskin and beads, sat on his trunk, with +his long, shapely legs sprawled gracefully out, his head thrown back so +that the mane of brown hair should hang behind. It was glistening with +oil and redolent of barber's perfume. And we talked there as one man +to another, each apparently without fear. I was certainly nervous and +timid, but he did not notice it, and I am frank to say he did not appear +to feel the slightest personal fear of me. Thus, face to face, I saw the +man with whom I had trod Ned Buntline's boundless plains and had seen +and encountered a thousand perils and redskins. When the act call came, +and I rose to go, a man stopped at the door and said to him: + +"What shall it be to-night, Colonel?" + +"A big beef-steak and a bottle of Bass!" answered Buffalo Bill heartily, +"and tell 'ern to have it hot and ready at 11:15." + +The beef-steak and Bass' ale were the watchwords of true heroism. +The real hero requires substantial filling. He must have a head and a +heart--but no less a good, healthy and impatient stomach. + +In the daily paper the morning I write this I see the announcement of +Buffalo Bill's "Wild West Show" coming two week's hence. Good luck to +him! He can't charge prices too steep for me, and there are six seats +necessary--the best in the amphitheater. And I wish I could be sure the +vigorous spirit of Ned Buntline would be looking down from the blue sky +overhead to see his hero charge the hill of San Juan at the head of the +Rough Riders. + + * * * * * + +This digression may be wide of the subject of novel reading, but +the real novel reader is at home anywhere. He has thoughts, dreams, +reveries, fancies. All the world is his novel and all actions are +stories and all the actors are characters. When Lucile Western, the +excellent American actress, was at the height of her powers, not long +before her last appearances, she had as her leading man a big, slouchy +and careless person, who was advertised as "the talented young English +actor, William Whally." In the intimacies of private association he +was known as Bill Whally, and his descent was straight down from "Mount +Sinai's awful height." He was a Hebrew and no better or more uneven and +reckless actor ever played melodramatic "heavies." He had a love for +Shakespeare, but could not play him; he had a love of drink and could +gratify it. His vigorous talents purchased for him much forbearance. +I've seen Mr. Whally play the fastidious and elegant "Sir Archibald +Levison" in shiny black doe-skin trousers and old-fashioned cloth +gaiters, because his condition rendered the problem of dressing somewhat +doubtful, though it could not obscure his acting. He was the only +walking embodiment of "Bill Sykes" I ever saw, and I contracted the +habit of going to see him kill Miss Western as "Nancy" because he +butchered that young woman with a broken chair more satisfactorily than +anybody else I ever saw. There was a murderer for you--Bill +Sykes! Bad as he was in most things, let us not forget +that--he--killed--Nancy--and--killed--her--well and--thoroughly. If that +young woman didn't snivel herself under a just sentence of death, I'm no +fit householder to serve on a jury. Every time Miss Western came around +it was my custom to read up fresh on "Oliver Twist" and hurry around and +enjoy Bill Whally's happy application of retribution with the aid of +the old property chair. There were six other persons whom I succeeded in +persuading to applaud the scene with me every time it was acted. + +But there's a separate chapter for villains. + + * * * * * + +Let us return to the old novels. What curious pranks time plays with +tastes and vogues. Forty years ago N. P. Willis was just faded. Yet he +was long a great comet of literary glitter and obscured many men of much +greater ability. Everybody read him; the annuals hung upon his name; the +ladies regarded him as a finer and more dashing Byron than Byron. +The place he filled was much like that of Congreve, before whom +Shakespeare's great nose was out of joint for a long time; Congreve, who +was the margarita aluminata major of English poesy and drama and public +life, and is now found in junk stores and in the back line on book +shelves and whom nobody reads now. Willis had his languid affectations, +his superficial cynicism and added to them ostentatious sentimentality. + +Does anybody read William Gilmore Simm's elaborate rhetoric disguised +as novels? He must have written two dozen of them, the Richardson of the +United States. Lovers of delicious wit and intellectual humor still +read Dr. Holmes' essays, but it would probably take a physician's +prescription to make them swallow the novels. In what dark corners of +the library are Bayard Taylor's novels and travels hidden? Will you come +into the garden, Maud, and read Chancellor Walworth's mighty tragedies +and Miss Mulock's Swiss-toy historical novels, or will you beg off, +like the honest girl you are, and take a nap? Your sleepiness, dear Miss +Maud, does you credit. By the way, what the deuce is the name of anyone +of these novels? I can recall "Elsie Vernier," by Dr. Holmes and then +there is a blank. + +But what classics they were--then! In the thick of them had appeared a +newspaper story that struggled through and was printed in book form. Old +friends have told me how they waited at the country post-offices to +get a copy, delayed for weeks. It was a scandal to read it in some +localities. It was fiercely attacked as an outrageous exaggeration +produced by temporary excitement and hostile feeling, or praised as a +new gospel. It has been translated into every tongue having a printing +press, and has sold by millions of copies. It was "Uncle Tom's Cabin." +It was not a classic, but what a vigorous immortal mongrel of human +sentiment it was! What a row was kicked up over Miss Braddon's +"Octoroon," and what an impossible yellowback it was! The toughest piece +of fiction I met with as a boy was "Sanford and Merton," and I've been +aching to say so for four pages. If this world were full of Sanfords +and Mertons, then give me Jupiter or some other comfortable planet at a +secure sanitary distance removed. + +I can't even remember the writers who were grammatically and +rhetorically perfect forty years ago, and also very dull with it all. +Is there a bookshelf that holds "Leni Leoti, or The Flower of the +Prairies?" There are "Jane Eyre," "Lady Audley's Secret," and "John +Halifax, Gentleman," which will go with many and are all well worth the +reading, too. Are Mrs. Eliza A. Dupuy, Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth, +Mrs. Caroline Lee Hentz and Augusta J. Evans dead? Their novels still +live--look at the book stores. "Linda, or the Young Pilot of the Belle +Creole," "India, the Pearl of Pearl River," "The Planter's Northern +Bride," "St. Elmo"--they were fiction for you! A boy old enough to have +a first sweetheart could swallow them by the mile. + +You remember, when we were boys, the circus acrobats always--always, +remember--rubbed young children with snake-oil and walloped them with a +rawhide to educate them in tumbling and contortion? Well, if I could get +the snake-oil for the joints and a curly young wig, I'd like to get back +at five hundred of those books and devour them again--"as of yore!" + + + + +VI. RASCALS + +BEING A DISCOURSE UPON GOOD, HONEST SCOUNDRELISM AND VILLAINS. + + +The people that inhabit novels are like other peoples of the earth--if +they are peaceful, they have no history. So that, therefore, in novels, +as in nations, it is the great restless heights of society that are to +be approached with greatest awe and that engage admiration and regard. +Everybody is interested in Nero, but not one person in ten thousand can +tell you anything definite about Constantine or even Marcus Aurelius. If +you should speak off-handedly about Amelia Sedley in the presence of a +thousand average readers you would probably miss 85 per cent. of effect; +if you said Becky Sharp the whole thousand would understand. + +There is this to be said of disreputable folk, that they are clever and +picturesque and interesting, at least. + +An elderly jeweler in New York City was arrested several years ago +upon the charge of receiving stolen gold and silver plate, watches and +jewelry from well-known thieves. For forty years he had been a +respected merchant, a church officer, a husband, father, and citizen, of +irreproachable reputation, with enduring friendships. He was charitable, +liberal and kindly. For decade after decade he was the experienced, wise +and fatherly "fence" of professional burglars and thieves. Why, it would +be an education in itself to know that man, to shake his honest hand, +fresh from charity or concealment, and smoke a pipe with him and +hear him talk about things frankly. When he gave to the missionary +collection, rest assured he gave sincerely; when he "covered swag," +into the melting pot for an industrious burglar, he did so only in the +regular course of business. + +Strange as it may seem, even criminals have human feelings in common +with all of us. The old Thug who stepped aside into the bushes and +prayed earnestly while his son was throwing his first strangling +cloth around the throat of the English traveler--prayed for that son's +honorable, successful beginning in his life devotion--was a good father. +And when he was told that the son had acted with unusual skill, who +can doubt that his tears of joy were sincere and humble tears of +thankfulness? At least Bowanee knew. Can you not imagine a kind-hearted +Chinese matron saying to her neighbor over the bamboo fence, "Yes, +we sent the baby down to the beach (or the river bank or the forest) +yesterday. We couldn't afford to keep it. I hope the gods have taken its +little soul. At any rate it is sure of salvation hereafter." + + * * * * * + +Some twenty years ago I took the night train from Pineville to +Barbourville, in the Kentucky mountains, reaching the latter place +about 11 o'clock of a cold, rainy, dark November night. Only one other +passenger alighted. There was an express wagon to take us to the town, +a mile or so distant, and the wagon was already heavy with freight +packages. The road was through a narrow lane, hub-deep with mud, and +what, with stalling and resting, we were more than half an hour getting +to the hotel. My fellow passenger was about my age, and was a shrewd, +well-informed native of the vicinity. He knew the mineral, timber and +agricultural resources, was evidently an enterprising business man and +an intelligent but not voluble talker. He accepted a cigar, and advised +me to see the house in Barbourville where the late Justice Samuel Miller +was born. At the hotel he registered first, and, as he was going to +leave next day and I was to remain several days, he told the clerk to +give me the better of the two rooms vacant. It was a very pleasant act +of thoughtfulness. The name on the register was "A. Johnson." The next +day I asked the clerk about Mr. Johnson. My fellow passenger was Andy +Johnson, whose fame as a feud-fighter and slayer of men has never been +exceeded in the history of mountain feuds. He then had three or four men +to his credit, definitely, and several doubtful ascriptions. He added a +few more, I believe, before he met the inevitable. + +Now, while Mr. Johnson, in all matters where killing seemed to him to be +appropriate, was a most prompt and accurate man in accomplishing it, yet +he was not the murderer that ignorant and isolated folks conceive such +persons to be. The cigar I had given him was a very bad, cheap cigar, +and, if he had merely wanted murder, he had every reason to kill me for +giving it to him, and he had a perfect night for the deed. But he smoked +it to the stub without a complaint or remark and saw that I got the best +room in the hotel. Johnson was a cautious and considerate fellow-man, +whose murders were doubtless private hobbies and exercises growing out +of his environment and heredity. + +One of the houses I most delight to enter in a certain town is one where +I am always sure to see a devoted and happy wife and beautiful, +playful children clustering around the armchair in which sits a man who +committed one of the most cold-blooded assassinations you can imagine. +He is an honored, esteemed and model citizen. His acquittal was a +miracle in a million chances. He has justified it. It is beautiful to +see those happy children clinging to the hand that-- + +Well, dear friends, the dentist is not a cruel man in his social +capacity, and you can get delicious viands instead of nauseous medicines +at the doctor's private table. + +That is why beginning novel readers should take no advice. Strike out +alone through the highways and lanes of story, character and experience. +The best novelist is the one who fears not to tell you the truth, which +is more wonderful than fiction. It is always the best hearts that bend +to mistakes. Absolute virtue is as sterile as granite rock; absolute +vice is as poisonous as a stagnant pond. No healthy interest or +speculation can linger about either. Enter into the struggle and know +human nature; don't stay outside and try to appear superior. + +For, which of us has not his crimes of thought to account for? Think +not, because Andy Johnson or William Sykes or Dr. Webster actually +killed his man, that you are guiltless, because you haven't. Have you +never wanted to? Answer that, in your conscience and in solitude--not to +me. Speak up to yourself and then say whether the difference between you +and the recorded criminal is not merely the difference between the overt +act and the faltering wish. It is a matter of courage or of custom. +Speaking for one gentleman, who knows himself and is not afraid to +confess, I can say that, while he could not kill a mouse with his own +hand, he has often murdered men in his heart. It may have been in fiery +youth over the wrong name on a dancing card, or, later, when a rival +got the better of him in discussion, or, when the dreary bore came and +wouldn't go, or, when misdirected goodness insisted on thrusting upon +him intended kindness that was wormwood and poison to the soul. Are +we not covetous (not confessedly, of course, but actually)? Is not +covetousness the thwarted desire of theft without courage? How many +of us, now--speaking man to man--can open up our veiled thoughts and +desires and then look the Ten Commandments in the eye without blushing? + + * * * * * + +The bravest, noblest, gentlest gentleman I have ever known was the Count +de la Fere, whom we at the Hotel de Troisville, in old Paris, called +"Athos." He was not merely sans peur et sans reproche as Bayard, but was +positive in his virtues. He fought for his friends without even asking +the cause of the fray. Yet, what a prig he seemed to be at first, with +his eternal gentle melancholy, his irreproachable courtesy, unvarying +kindness and complete unselfishness. You cannot--quite--warm--to--a--man +--who--is--so--perfectly--right--that--he--embarrasses--everybody--but--the--angels. + +But, when he ordered the gloomy and awful death of the treacherous +Miladi, woman though she was, and thus as a perfect gentleman took on +human frailty also, ah! how attractively noble and strong he became I In +that respect he was the antithetical corollary of William Sykes, who was +a purposeless, useless and uninterestingly regular scoundrel, thief and +brute, until he redeemed himself by becoming the instrument of social +justice and pounding that unendurable lady, Miss Nancy, of his name, +into absence from the world. Perhaps I have remarked before--and even if +I have it is pleasant to repeat it--that Bill Sykes had his faults, as +also have most of us, but it was given to him to earn forgiveness by the +aid of a cheap chair and the providential propinquity of Miss Nancy. I +never think of it without regretting that poor Bill Whally is dead. He +did it--so--much--to--my--taste! + +Who shall we say is the most loved and respected criminal in fiction? +Not Monsignor Rodin, of "The Wandering Jew;" not Thenardier in "Les +Miserables." These are really not criminals; they are allegorical +figures of perfect crime. They are solar centers, so far off and fixed +that one may regard them only with awe, reverence and fear. They are +types of fate, desire, temptation and chastisement. Let us turn to our +own flesh and blood and speak gratefully of them. + + * * * * * + +Who says Count Fosco? Now there is a criminal worthy of affection and +confidence. What an expansive nature, with kindness presented on every +side. Even the dogs fawned upon him and the birds came at his call. +An accomplished gentleman, considerately mannered--queer, as becomes a +foreigner, yet possessing the touchstone of universal sympathy. Another +man with crime to commit almost certainly would have dispatched it with +ruthless coldness; but how kindly and gently Count Fosco administered +the cord of necessity. With what delicacy he concealed the bowstring +and spoke of the Bosphorus only as a place for moonlight excursions. He +could have presented prussic acid and sherry to a lady in such a manner +as to render the results a grateful sacrifice to his courtesy. It was +all due to his corpulence; a "lean and hungry" villain lacks repose, +patience and the tact of good humor. In almost every small social and +individual attitude Count Fosco was human. He was exceedingly attentive +to his wife in society and bullied her only in private and when +necessary. He struck no dramatic attitudes. "The world is mine oyster!" +is not said by real men bent on terrible deeds. Count Fosco is the +perfect villain, and also the perfect criminal, inasmuch as he not only +acts naturally, but deliberately determines the action instead of being +drawn into it or having it forced upon him. + +He was a highly cultivated type of Andy Johnson, inasmuch as crime +with him was not a life purpose, but what is called in business a +"side-line." All of us have our hobbies; the closely confined clerk +goes home and roots up his yard to plant flower bulbs or cabbage plants; +another fancies fowls; another man collects pewter pots and old brass +and the millionaire takes to priceless horses; others of us turn from +useful statistics and go broke on novels or poetry or music. Count Fosco +was an educated gentleman and the pleasure of life was his purpose; +crime and intrigue were his recreations. Andy Johnson was a good +business man and wealth producer; murder was the direction in which +his private understanding of personal disagreements was exercised and +vented. Some men turn to poker playing, which is as wasteful as murder +and not half as dignified. Count Fosco is the villain par excellence of +novels. I do not remember what he did, because "The Woman in White" is +the best novel in the world to read gluttonously at a sitting and then +forget absolutely. It is nearly always a new book if you use it that +way. When the world is dark, the fates bilious, the appetite dead +and the infernal twinges of pain or sickness seem beyond reach of the +doctor, "The Woman in White" is a friend indeed. + + * * * * * + +But the man of men for villains, not necessarily criminals; but the +ordinary, every-day, picturesque worthies of good, honest scoundrelism +and disreputableness is Sir Robert Louis Stevenson. You can afford +conscientiously to stuff ballot boxes in order that his election may be +secured as Poet Laureate of Rascals. Leaving out John Silver and Billy +Bones and Alan Breck, whom every privately shriven rascal of us simply +must honor and revere as giants of courage, cunning and controlled, +conscience, Stevenson turned from singles and pairs, and in "The Ebb +Tide," drove, by turns, tandem and abreast, a four-in-hand of scoundrels +so buoyant, natural, strong, and yet each so totally unlike the others, +that every honest novel reader may well be excused for shedding tears +when he reflects that the marvelous hand and heart that created them are +gone forever from the haunts of the interestingly wicked. No novelist +ever exposed the human nature of rascals as Stevenson did. + +Now, lago was not a villain; he was a venomous toad, a scorpion, a +mad-dog, a poisonous plant in a fair meadow. There was nobody lago +loved, no weakness he concealed, no point of contact with any human +being. His sister was Pandora, his brother made the shirt of Nessus, +himself dealt in Black Plagues and the Leprosy. The old Serpent was +permitted to rise from his belly and walk upright on the tip of his tail +when he met Iago, as a demonstration of moral superiority. But think +of those three Babes-in-the-Wood villains, skipper Davis, the Yankee +swashbuckler and ship scuttler; Herrick, the dreamy poet, ruined by +commerce and early love, with his days of remorse and his days of +compensatary liquor; and Huish, the great-hearted Scotch ruffian, who +chafed at the conventional concealments of trade among pals and never +could--as a true Scotchman--understand why you should wait to use a +knife upon a victim when promptness lay in the club right at hand--think +of them sailing out of Honolulu harbor on the Farallone. + +Let who will prefer to have sailed with Jason or Aeneas or Sinbad; but +the Farallone and its precious freight of rascality gets my money every +time. Think of the three incomparable reprobates afloat, with one case +of smallpox and a cargo of champagne, daring to make no port, with over +a hundred million square miles of ocean around them, every ten lookout +knots of it containing a possible peril! It was simply grand--not +pirates, shipwrecks or mutinies could beat that problem. And the pathos +of the sixth day, when, with every man Jack of them looking delirium +tremens in the face and suspecting each the other, Mr. Huish opened a +new case of champagne and--found clear spring water under the French +label! The honest scoundrels had been laid by the heels by a common wine +merchant in the regular way of business! Oh, gentlemen, there should be +honor in business; so that gallant villains can be free of betrayal. + +The keynote of these gentlemen is struck in the second chapter, where +all three of them writing lies home--Davis and Herrick, sentimental +equivocations, Huish the strongest of brag with nobody to send it to. +In a burst of weakness Davis tells Herrick what a villain he has been, +through rum, and how he can not let his daughter, "little Adar," know +it. "Yes, there was a woman on board," he said, describing the ship +he had scuttled. "Guess I sent her to hell, if there's such a place. +I never dared go home again, and I don't know," he added, bitterly, +"what's come to them." + +"Thank you, Captain," said Herrick, "I never liked you better!" + +Is it not in human nature to cuddle to a great sheepish murderer like +that, who groans in secret for his little girl--if even the girl was +truth? I think she turned out a myth, but he had the sentiment. + +Was there ever a more melancholy, remorse-stricken wretch than Cap'n +Davis? Or a gentler and seedier poet than Herrick? Or a more finely +sodden and soaked old rum sport than Huish (not--Whish!) But it was not +until they fell in with Attwater that their weakness as scoundrels was +exposed. Attwater was so splendidly religious! He was determined to have +things right if he had to have them so by bloodshed; he saved souls by +bullets. Things were right when they were as he thought they should +be. And believing so, with Torquemada, Alexander Sixtus and other most +religious brethren, he was ready to set up the stake and fagot and +cauterize sin with fire. One thing you can say about the religious folks +that are big with cocksureness and a mission--they may make mistakes, +but the mistake doesn't talk and criticise. + + * * * * * + +The only rascal worthy to travel in company with Stevenson's rascals +is the Chevalier Balibari, of Castle Barry, in Ireland, whose admirable +memoirs have been so well told by Mr. Thackeray. The Baron de la Motte +in "Denis Duval," was advantageously born to ornament the purple and +fine linen of picturesque unrighteousness--but his was a brief star that +fell unfinished from its place amidst the Pleiades. Thackeray's genius +ran more to disreputable men than to actual villains. But he drew two +scoundrels that will serve as beacon lights to any clean-souled youth +with the instinct to take warning. One was Lord Steyne, the other, Dr. +George Brand Firmin; one the aristocratic, class-bred, cynical brute, +the other the cold, tuft-hunting trained hypocrite. What encouragement +of self-respect Judas Iscariot might have received if he had met Dr. +Firmin! + +Dr. Chadband, Mr. Pecksniff, Bill Sykes, Fagin, Mr. Murdstone, of +Dickens' family--they are all strong in impression, but wholly unreal; +mere stage villains and caricatures. A villain who has no good traits, +no hobbies of kindness and affection, is never born into the world; he +is always created by grotesque novel writers. + +The villains of Dumas, Hugo, Balzac, Daudet are French. There may have +been, or may be now such prototypes alive in France--because the Dreyfus +case occurred in France, and no doubt much can happen in that fine, +fertile country which translators cannot fully convey over the +frontiers; but they have always seemed to me first cousins to my +friends, the ogres, the evil magicians and the werewolves, and, in that +much, not quite natural. + +For heroes of the genuine cavalleria type, plumed, doubleted, pumpt and +magnificent, give me Dumas; for good folks and true, the great American +Fenimore Cooper; but for the blessed company of blooming, breathing +rascals, Stevenson and Thackeray all the time. + + + + +VII. HEROES + +THE NATURE AND THE FLOWER OF THEM--THE GALLANT D'ARTAGNAN OR THE +GLORIOUS BUSSY. + + +Let us agree at the start that no perfect hero can be entirely mortal. +The nearer the element of mortality in him corresponds to the heel +measure of Achilles, the better his chance as hero. The Egyptian and +Greek heroes were invariably demi-gods on the paternal or maternal side. +Few actual historic heroes have escaped popular scandal concerning their +origin, because the savage logic in us demands lions from a lion; that +Theseus shall trace to Mars; that courage shall spring from courage. + +Another most excellent thing about the ideal hero is that the immortal +quality enables him to go about the business of his heroism without +bothering his head with the rights or wrongs of it, except as the +prevailing sentiment of social honor (as distinguished from the inborn +sentiment of honesty) requires at the time. Of course, there is a lower +grade of measly, "moral heroes," who (thank heaven and the innate sense +of human justice!) are usually well peppered with sorrow and punishment. +The hero of romance is a different stripe; Hyperion to a Satyr. He +doesn't go around groaning page after page of top-heavy debates as to +the inherent justice of his cause or his moral right to thrust a tallow +candle between the particular ribs behind which the heart of his enemy +is to be found--balancing his pros and cons, seeking a quo for each +quid, and conscientiously prowling for final authorities. When you +invade the chiropodical secret of the real hero's fine boot, or brush +him in passing--if you have looked once too often at a certain lady, or +have stood between him and the sun, or even twiddled your thumbs at him +in an indecorous or careless manner--look to it that you be prepared +to draw and mayhap to be spitted upon his sword's point, with honor. +Sdeath! A gentlemen of courage carries his life lightly at the needle +end of his rapier, as that wonderful Japanese, Samsori, used to make the +flimsiest feather preside in miraculous equilibration upon the tip of +his handsome nose. + +No hero who does more or less than is demanded by the best practical +opinion of the society of his time is worth more than thirty cents as +a hero. Boys are literary and dramatic critics so far above the critics +formed by strained formulas of the schools that you can trust them. +They have an unerring distrust of the fellow who moves around with his +confounded conscientious scruples, as if the well-settled opinion of the +breathing world were not good enough for him! Who the deuce has got any +business setting everybody else right? + +Some of these days I believe it is going to be discovered that the +atmosphere and the encompassing radiance and sweetness of Heaven are +composed of the dear sighs and loving aspirations of earthly motherhood. +If it turns out otherwise, rest assured Heaven will not have reached +its perfect point of evolution. Why is it, then, that mothers +will--will--will--try, so mistakenly, to extirpate the jewel of honest, +manly savagery from the breasts of their boys? I wonder if they know +that when grown men see one of these "pretty-mannered boys," cocksure +as a Swiss toy new painted and directed by watch spring, they feel an +unholy impulse to empty an ink-bottle over the young calf? Fauntleroy +kids are a reproach to our civilization. Men, women and children, all of +us, crowd around the grimy Deignan of the Merrimac crew, and shout and +cheer for Bill Smith, the Rough Rider, who carried his mate out of the +ruck at San Juan and twirls his hat awkwardly and explains: "Ef I hadn't +a saw him fall he would 'a' laid thar yit!"--and go straight home and +pretend to be proud of a snug little poodle of a man who doesn't play +for fear of soiling his picture-clothes, and who says: "Yes, sir, thank +you," and "No, thank you, ma'am," like a French doll before it has had +the sawdust kicked out of it! + + * * * * * + +Now, when a hero tries to stamp his acts with the precise quality of +exact justice--why, he performs no acts. He is no better than that poor +tongue-loose Hamlet, who argues you the right of everything, and then, +by the great Jingo! piles in and messes it all by doing the wrong thing +at the wrong time and in the wrong manner. It is permitted of course to +be a great moral light and correct the errors of all the dust of earth +that has been blown into life these ages; but human justice has been +measured out unerringly with poetry and irony to such folk. They are +admitted to be saints, but about the time they have got too good for +their earthly setting, they have been tied to stakes and lighted up +with oil and faggots; or a soda phosphate with a pinch of cyanide of +potassium inserted has been handed to them, as in the case of our old +friend, Socrates. And it's right. When a man gets too wise and good +for his fellows and is embarrassed by the healthful scent of good human +nature, send him to heaven for relief, where he can have the goodly +fellowship of the prophets, the company of the noble army of martyrs, +and amuse himself suggesting improvements upon the vocal selections +of cherubim and seraphim! Impress the idea upon these gentry with +warmth--and--with--oil! + + * * * * * + +The ideal hero of fiction, you say, is Capt. D'Artagnan, first name +unknown, one time cadet in the Reserves of M. de Troisville's company +of the King's Guards, intrusted with the care of the honor and safety of +His Majesty, Louis XIV. Very well; he is a noble gentleman; the +choice does honor to your heart, mind and soul; take him and hold the +remembrance of his courage, loyalty, adroitness and splendid endurance +with hooks of steel. For myself, while yielding to none who honor +the great D'Artagnan, yet I march under the flag of the Sieur Bussy +d'Amboise, a proud Clermont, of blood royal in the reign of Henry +III., who shed luster upon a court that was edified by the wisdom of M. +Chicot, the "King's Brother," the incomparable jester and philosopher, +who would have himself exceeded all heroes except that he despised the +actors and the audience of the world's theater and performed valiant +feats only that he might hang his cap and bells upon the achievements in +ridicule. + +Can it be improper to compare D'Artagnan and Bussy--when the intention +is wholly respectful and the motive pure? If a single protest is +heard, there will be an end to this paper now--at once. There are some +comparisons that strengthen both candidates. For, we must consider the +extent of the theater and the stage, the space of time covering the +achievements, the varying conditions, lights and complexities. As, +for instance, the very atmosphere in which these two heroes moved, the +accompaniment of manner which we call the "air" of the histories, and +which are markedly different. The contrast of breeding, quality and +refinement between Bussy and D'Artagnan is as great as that which +distinguishes Mercutio from the keen M. Chicot. Yet each was his own +ideal type. Birth and the superior privileges of the haute noblesse +conferred upon the Sieur Bussy the splendid air of its own sufficient +prestige; the lack of these require of D'Artagnan that his intelligence, +courage and loyal devotion should yet seem to yield something of their +greatness in the submission that the man was compelled to pay to +the master. True, this attitude was atoned for on occasion by blunt +boldness, but the abased position and the lack of subtle distinction of +air and mind of the noble, forbade to the Fourth Mousquetaire the last +gracious touch of a Bayard of heroism. But the vulgarity was itself +heroic. + + * * * * * + +Compare the first appearance of the great Gascon at the Hotel de +Troisville, or even his manner and attitude toward the King when he +sought to warn that monarch against forgetfulness of loyalty proved, +with the haughty insolence of indomitable spirit in which Bussy threw +back to Henry the shuttle of disfavor on the night of that remarkable +wedding of St. Luc with the piquant little page soubrette, Jeanne de +Brissac. + +D'Artagnan's air to his King has its pathos. It seems to say: "I speak +bluntly, sire, knowing that my life is yours and yet feeling that it is +too obscure to provoke your vengeance." A very hard draught for a man +of fire and fearlessness to take without a gulp. But into Bussy's manner +toward his King there was this flash of lightning from Olympus: "My +life, sire, is yours, as my King, to take or leave; but not even you +may dare to think of taking the life of Bussy with the dust of least +reproach upon it. My life you may blow out; my honor you do not dare +approach to question!" + +There are advantages in being a gentleman, which can not be denied. +One is that it commands credit in the King's presence as well as at the +tailor's. + +It is interesting to compare both these attitudes with that of +"Athos," the Count de la Fere, toward the King. He was lacking in +the irresistibly fierce insolence of Bussy and in the abasement of +D'Artagnan; it was melancholy, patient, persistent and terrible in its +restrained calmness. How narrowly he just escaped true greatness. I +would no more cast reproaches upon that noble gentleman than I would +upon my grandmother; but he--was--a--trifle--serous, wasn't he? He was +brave, prompt, resourceful, splendid, and, at need, gingerish as the +best colt in the paddock. It is the deuce's own pity for a man to be +born to too much seriousness. Do you know--and as I love my country, I +mean it in honest respect--that I sometimes think that the gentleness +and melancholy of Athos somehow suggests a bit of distrust. One is +almost terrified at times lest he may begin the Hamlet controversies. +You feel that if he committed a murder by mistake you are not absolutely +sure he wouldn't take a turn with Remorse. Not so Bussy; he would throw +the mistake in with good will and not create worry about it. Hang it +all, if the necessary business of murder is to halt upon the shuffling +accident of mistake, we may as well sell out the hero business and rent +the shop. It would be down to the level of Hamlet in no time. Unless, of +course, the hero took the view of it that Nero adopted. It is improbable +that Nero inherited the gift of natural remorse; but he cultivated one +and seemed to do well with it. He used to reflect upon his mother and +his wife, both of whom he had affectionately murdered, and justified +himself by declaring that a great artist, who was also the Roman +Emperor, would be lacking in breadth of emotional experience and +retrospective wisdom, unless he knew the melancholy of a two-pronged +family remorse. And from Nero's standpoint it was one of the best +thoughts that he ever formulated into language. + +To return to Bussy and D'Artagnan. In courage they were Hector and +Achilles. You remember the champagne picnic before the bastion St. +Gervais at the siege of St. Rochelle? What light-hearted gayety amid the +flying missiles of the arquebusiers! Yet, do not forget that--ignoring +the lacquey--there were four of them, and that his Eminence, the +Cardinal Duke, had said the four of them were equal to a thousand men! +If you have enough knowledge of human nature to understand the fine +game of baseball, and have at any time scraped acquaintance with the +interesting mathematical doctrine of progressive permutations, you will +see, when four men equal to a thousand are under the eyes of each other, +and of the garrison in the fort, that the whole arsenal of logarithms +would give out before you could compute the permutative possibilities +of the courage that would be refracted, reflected, compounded and +concentrated by all there, each giving courage to and receiving courage +from each and all the others. It makes my head ache to think of it. I +feel as if I could be brave myself. + +Certainly they were that day. To the bitter end of finishing the meal; +and they confessed the added courage by gamboling like boys amid awful +thunders of the arquebuses, which made a rumble in their time like their +successors, the omnibuses, still make to this day on the granite streets +of cities populated by deaf folks. + +There never was more of a gay, lilting, impudent courage than those four +mousquetaires displayed with such splendid coolness and spirit. + +But compare it with the fight which Bussy made, single-handed, against +the assassins hired by Monsereau and authorized by that effeminate +fop, the Due D'Anjou. Of course you remember it. Let me pay you the +affectionate compliment of presuming that you have read "La Dame de +Monsereau," often translated under the English title, "Chicot, the +Jester," that almost incomparable novel of historical romance, by M. +Dumas. If, through some accident or even through lack of culture, you +have failed to do so, pray do not admit it. Conceal your blemish +and remedy the matter at once. At least, seem to deserve respect and +confidence, and appear to be a worthy novel-reader if actually you are +not. There is a novel that, I assure you on my honor, is as good as +the "Three Guardsmen;" but--oh!--so--much--shorter; the pity of it, +too!--oh, the pity of it! On the second reading--now, let us speak with +frank conservatism--on the second reading of it, I give you my word, man +to man, I dreaded to turn every page, because it brought the end nearer. +If it had been granted to me to have one wish fulfilled that fine winter +night, I should have said with humility: "Beneficent Power, string it +out by nine more volumes, presto me here a fresh box of cigars, and the +account of your kindness, and my gratitude is closed." + + * * * * * + +If the publisher of this series did not have such absurd sensitiveness +about the value of space and such pitifully small ideas about the +nobility of novels, I should like to write at least twenty pages about +"Chicot." There are books that none of us ever put down in our lists of +great books, and yet which we think more of and delight more in than all +the great guns. Not one of the friends I've loved so long and well has +been President of the United States, but I wouldn't give one of them for +all the Presidents. Just across the hall at this minute I can hear the +frightful din of war--shells whistling and moaning, bullets s-e-o-uing, +the shrieks of the dying and wounded--Merciful Heaven! the "Don Juan +of Asturia" has just blown up in Manila Bay with an awful roar--again! +Again, as I'm a living man, just as she has blown up every day, and +several times every day, since May 1, 1898. There are two warriors over +in the play-room, drenched with imaginary gore, immersed in the tender +grace of bestowing chastening death and destruction upon the Spanish +foe. Don't I know that they rank somewhat below Admiral Dewey as heroes? +But do you suppose that their father would swap them for Admiral Dewey +and all the rainbow glories that fine old Yankee sea-dog ever will +enjoy--long may he live to enjoy them all!--do you think so? Of course +not! You know perfectly well that his--wife--wouldn't--let--him! + +I would not wound the susceptibilities of any reader; but speaking for +myself--"Chicot" being beloved of my heart--if there was a mean +man, living in a mean street, who had the last volume of "Chicot" in +existence, I would pour out my library's last heart's blood to get +it. He could have all of Scott but "Ivanhoe," all of Dickens but +"Copperfield," all of Hugo but "Les Miserables," cords of Fielding, +Marryat, Richardson, Reynolds, Eliot, Smollet, a whole ton of German +translations--by George! he could leave me a poor old despoiled, +destitute and ruined book-owner in things that folks buy in costly +bindings for the sake of vanity and the deception of those who also +deceive them in turn. + +Brother, "Chicot" is a book you lend only to your dearest friend, and +then remind him next day that he hasn't sent it back. + + * * * * * + +Now, as to Bussy's great fight. He had gone to the house of Madame Diana +de Monsereau. I am not au fait upon French social customs, but let us +presume his being there was entirely proper, because that excellent lady +was glad to see him. He was set upon by her husband, M. de Monsereau, +with fifteen hired assassins. Outside, the Due D'Anjou and some others +of assassins were in hiding to make sure that Monsereau killed Bussy, +and that somebody killed Monsereau! There's a "situation" for you, +double-edged treachery against--love and innocence, let us say. Bussy +is in the house with Madame. His friend, St. Luc, is with him; also +his lacquey and body-physician, the faithful Rely. Bang! the doors are +broken in, and the assassins penetrate up the stairway. The brave Bussy +confides Diana to St. Luc and Rely, and, hastily throwing up a barricade +of tables and chairs near the door of the apartment, draws his sword. +Then, ye friends of sudden death and valorous exercise, began a surfeit +of joy. Monsereau and his assassins numbered sixteen. In less than three +moderate paragraphs Bessy's sword, playing like avenging lightning, +had struck fatality to seven. Even then, with every wrist going, he +reflected, with sublime calculation: "I can kill five more, because I +can fight with all my vigor ten minutes longer!" After that? Bessy could +see no further--there spoke fate!--you feel he is to die. Once more the +leaping steel point, the shrill death cry, the miraculous parry. The +villain, Monsereau, draws his pistol. Bessy, who is fighting half +a dozen swordsmen, can even see the cowardly purpose; he watches; +he--dodges--the--bullets!--by watching the aim-- + + "Ye sons of France, behold the glory!" + +He thrusts, parries and swings the sword as a falchion. Suddenly a +pistol ball snaps the blade off six inches from the hilt. +Bessy picks up the blade and in an instant +splices--it--to--the--hilt--with--his--handkerchief! Oh, good sword +of the good swordsman! it drinks the blood of three more before +it--bends--and--loosens--under--the--strain! Bessy is shot in the thigh; +Monsereau is upon him; the good Rely, lying almost lifeless from a +bullet wound received at the outset, thrusts a rapier to Bessy's grasp +with a last effort. Bessy springs upon Monsereau with the great bound +of a panther and +pins--the--son--of--a--gun--to--the--floor--with--the--rapier--and--watches--him--die! + +You can feel faint for joy at that passage for a good dozen readings, if +you are appreciative. Poor Bessy, faint from wounds and blood-letting, +retreats valiantly to a closet window step by step and drops out, +leaving Monsereau spitted, like a black spider, dead on the floor. +Here hope and expectation are drawn out in your breast like chewing +gum stretched to the last shred of tenuation. At this point I firmly +believed that Bessy would escape. I feel sorry for the reader who does +not. You just naturally argue that the faithful Rely will surely reach +him and rub him with the balsam. That balsam of Dumas! The same that +D'Artagnan's mother gave him when he rode away on the yellow horse, +and which cured so many heroes hurt to the last gasp. That miraculous +balsam, which would make doctors and surgeons sing small today if they +had not suppressed it from the materia medica. May be they can silence +their consciences by the reflection that they suppressed it to enhance +the value and necessity of their own personal services. But let them +look at the death rate and shudder. I had confidence in Rely and the +balsam, but he could not get there in time. Then, it was forgone that +Bessy must die. Like Mercutio, he was too brilliant to live. Depend upon +it, these wizards of story tellers know when the knell of fate rings +much sooner than we halting readers do. + +Bessy drops from the closet window upon an iron fence that surrounded +the park and was impaled upon the dreadful pickets! Even then for +another moment you can cherish a hope that he may escape after all. +Suspended there and growing weaker, he hears footsteps approaching. Is +it a rescuing friend? He calls out--and a dagger stroke from the hand of +D'Anjou, his Judas master, finds his heart. That's the way Bessy died. +No man is proof against the dagger stroke of treachery. Bessy was +powerful and the due jealous. + +Diana has been carried off safely by the trustworthy St. Luc. She must +have died of grief if she had not been kept alive to be the instrument +of retributive justice. (In the sequel you will find that this Queen of +Hearts descended upon the ignoble due at the proper time like a thousand +of brick and took the last trick of justice.) + + * * * * * + +The extraordinary description of Bussy's fight is beyond everything. You +gallop along as if in a whirlwind, and it is only in cooler moments that +you discover he killed about twelve rascals with his own good arm. It +seems impossible; the scientific, careful readers have been known to +declare it impossible and sneer at it with laughter. I trust every +novel reader respects scientific folks as he should; but science is not +everything. Our scientific friends have contended that the whale did not +engulf Jonah; that the sun did not pause over the vale of Askelon; that +Baron Munchausen's horse did not hang to the steeple by his bridle; +that the beanstalk could not have supported a stout lad like Jack; that +General Monk was not sent to Holland in a cage; that Remus and Romulus +had not a devoted lady wolf for a step-mother; in fact, that loads of +things, of which the most undeniable proof exists in plain print all +over the world, never were done or never happened. Bessy was killed, +Rely was killed later, Diana died in performing her destiny, St. Luc was +killed. Nobody left to make affidavits, except M. Dumas; in his lifetime +nobody questioned it; he is now dead and unable to depose; whereupon the +scientists sniff scornfully and deny. I hope I shall always continue to +respect science in its true offices, but, brethren, are there not times +when--science--makes--you--just--a--little--tired? + +Heroes! D'Artagnan or Bessy? Choose, good friends, freely; as freely let +me have my Bessy. + + + + +VIII. HEROINES + +A SUBJECT ALMOST WITHOUT AN OBJECT--WHY THERE ARE FEW HEROINES FOR MEN. + + +Notwithstanding the subject, there are almost no heroines in novels. +There are impossibly good women, absurdly patient and brave women, but +few heroines as the convention of worldly thinking demands heroines. +There is an endless train of what Thackeray so aptly described as "pale, +pious, and pulmonary ladies" who snivel and snuffle and sigh and +linger irresolutely under many trials which a little common sense would +dissolve; but they are pathological heroines. "Little Nell," "Little +Eva," and their married sisters are unquestionable in morals, purpose +and faith; but oh! how--they--do--try--the--nerves! How brave and noble +was Jennie Deans, but how thick-headed was the dear lass! + +These women who are merely good, and enforce it by turning on the faucet +of tears, or by old-fashioned obstinacy, or stupidity of purpose, can +scarcely be called heroines by the canons of understood definition. +On the other hand, the conventions do not permit us to describe as a +heroine any lady who has what is nowadays technically called "a past." +The very best men in the world find splendid heroism and virtue in Tess +l'Durbeyfield. There is nowhere an honest, strong, good man, full of +weakness, though he may be, scarred so much, however with fault, who +does not read St. John vii., 3-11, with sympathy, reverence and Amen! +The infallible critics can prove to a hair that this passage is an +interpolation. An interpolation in that sense means something inserted +to deceive or defraud; a forgery. How can you defraud or deceive anybody +by the interpolation of pure gold with pure gold? How can that be a +forgery which hurts nobody, but gives to everybody more value in the +thing uttered? If John vii., 3-11, is an interpolation let us hope +Heaven has long ago blessed the interpolator. Does anybody--even the +infallible critic--contend that Jesus would not have so said and done +if the woman had been brought to Him? Was that not the very flower and +savor and soul of His teaching? Would He have said or done otherwise? +If the Ten Commandments were lost utterly from among men there would yet +remain these four greater: + +"Do unto others as ye would they should do unto you." + +"Suffer little children to come unto me." + +"Go and sin no more." + +"Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." + +My lords and ladies, men and women, the Ten Commandments, by the side of +these sighs of gentleness, are the Police Court and the Criminal Code, +which are intended to pay cruelty off in punishment. These Four are +the tears with which sympathy soothes the wounds of suffering. Blessed +interpolator of St. John! + +There are three marvelous novels in the Bible--not Novels in the sense +of fiction, but in the sense of vivid, living narratives of human +emotions and of events. A million Novels rest on those nine verses in +John, and the nine verses are better than the million books. The story +of David and Uriah's wife is in a similar catalogue as regards quality +and usefulness; the story of Esther is a pearl of great beauty. + + * * * * * + +But to return to heroines, let us make a volte face. There is an old +story of the lady who wrote rather irritably to Thackeray, asking, +curtly, why all the good women he created were fools and the bright +women all bad. "The same complaint," he answered, "has been made, +Madame, of God and Shakespeare, and as neither has given explanation I +can not presume to attempt one." It was curt and severe, and, of course, +Thackeray did not write it as it would appear, even though he may have +said as much jestingly to some intimate who understood the epigram; +but was not the question rather impudently intrusive? Thackeray, you +remember, was the "seared cynic" who created Caroline Gann, the gentle, +beautiful, glorious "Little Sister," the staunch, pure-hearted woman +whose character not even the perfect scoundrelism of Dr. George Brand +Firmin could tarnish or disturb. If there are heroines, surely she has +her place high amid the noble group! + +There are plenty of intelligent persons sacramentally wedded to mere +conventions of good and bad. You could never persuade them that Rebecca +Sharp--that most perfect daughter of Thackeray's mind--was a heroine. +But of course she was. In that world wherein she was cast to live she +was indubitably, incomparably, the very best of all the inhabitants +to whom you are intimately introduced. Capt. Dobbin? Oh, no, I am not +forgetting good Old Dob. Of all the social door mats that ever I +wiped my feet upon Old Dob is certainly the cleanest, most patient, +serviceable and unrevolutionary. But, just a door mat, with the virtues +and attractions of that useful article of furniture--the sublime, +immortal prig of all the ages, or you can take the head of any +novel-reader under thirty for a football. You may have known many women, +from Bernadettes of Massavielle to Borgias of scant neighborhoods, but +you know you never knew one who would marry Old Dob, except as that +emotional dishrag, Amelia, married him--as the Last Chance on the +stretching high-road of uncertain years. No girl ever willingly marries +door mats. She just wipes her feet on them and passes on into the +drawing room looking for the Prince. It seems to me one of the +triumphant proofs of Becky as a heroine that she did not marry Captain +Dobbin. She might have done it any day by crooking her little finger at +him--but she didn't. + +Madame Becky, that smart daughter of an alcoholic gentleman artist +and of his lady of the French ballet, inherited the perfect non-moral +morality of the artist blood that sang mercurially through her veins. +How could she, therefore, how could she, being non-moral, be immoral? It +is clear nonsense. But she did possess the instinctive artist +morality of unerring taste for selection in choice. Examine the facts +meticulously--meticulously--and observe how carefully she selected that +best in all that worst she moved among. + +In the will I shall some day leave behind me there will be devised, in +primogenitural trust forever, the priceless treasure of conviction that +Becky was innocent of Lord Steyne. I leave it to any gentleman who has +had the great opportunity to look in familiarly upon the outer and upper +fringes of the world of unclassed and predatory women and the noble +lords that abound thereamong. Let him read over again that famous scene +where Becky writes her scorn upon Steyne's forehead in the noble blood +of that aristocratic wolf. Then let him give his decision, as an honest +juryman upon his oath, whether he is convinced that the most noble +Marquis was raging because he was losing a woman, or from the discovery +that he was one of two dupes facing each other, and that he was the fool +who had paid for both and had had "no run for his money!" Marquises of +Steyne do not resent sentimental losses--they can be hurt only in their +sportsmanship. + +You may begin with the Misses Pinkerton (in whose select school Becky +absorbed the intricate hypocrisies and saturated snobbery of the highest +English society) and follow her through all the little and big turmoils +of her life, meeting on the way of it all the elaborated differentials +of the country-gentleman and lady tribe of Crawley, the line officers +and bemedalled generals of the army (except honest O'Dowd and his lady), +the most noble Marquis and his shadowy and resigned Marchioness, the +R--y--l P--rs--n--ge himself--even down to the tuft-hunters Punter and +Loder--and if Becky is not superior to every man and woman of them in +every personal trait and grace that calls for admiration--then, why, by +George! do you take such an interest, such an undying interest, in her? +You invariably take the greatest interest in the best character in a +story--unless it's too good and gets "sweety" and "sticky" and so sours +on your philosophical stomach. You can't possibly take any interest in +Dobbin--you just naturally, emphatically, and in the most unreflecting +way in the world, say "Oh, d--n Dobbin!" and go right ahead after +somebody else. I don't say Becky was all that a perfect Sunday School +teacher should have been, but in the group in which she was born to move +she smells cleaner than the whole raft of them--to me. + + * * * * * + +Thackeray was, next to Shakespeare, the writer most wonderfully combined +of instinct and reason that English literature of grace has produced. He +has been compared with the Frenchman, Balzac. Since I have no desire to +provoke squabbles about favorite authors, let us merely definitely agree +that such a comparison is absurd and pass on. Because you must have +noticed that Balzac was often feeble in his reason and couldn't make it +keep step with his instinct, while in Thackeray they both step together +like the Siamese twins. It is a very striking fact, indeed, that during +all Becky's intense early experiences with the great world, Thackeray +does not make her guilty. All the circumstances of that world were +guilty and she is placed amidst the circumstances; but that is all. + +"The ladies in the drawing room," said one lady to Thackeray, when +"Vanity Fair" in monthly parts publishing had just reached the +catastrophe of Rawdon, Rebecca, old Steyne and the bracelet--"The +ladies have been discussing Becky Sharpe and they all agree that she was +guilty. May I ask if we guessed rightly?" + +"I am sure I don't know," replied the "seared cynic," mischievously. "I +am only a man and I haven't been able to make up my mind on that point. +But if the ladies agree I fear it may be true--you must understand your +sex much better than we men!" + +That is proof that she was not guilty with Steyne. But straightway then, +Thackeray starts out to make her guilty with others. It is so much the +more proof of her previous innocence that, incomparable artist as he +was in showing human character, he recognized that he could convince +the reader of her guilt only by disintegrating her, whipping himself +meanwhile into a ceaseless rage of vulgar abuse of her, a thing of which +Thackeray was seldom guilty. But it was not really Becky that +became guilty--it was the woman that English society and Thackeray +remorselessly made of her. I wouldn't be a lawyer for a wagon load of +diamonds, but if I had had to be a lawyer I should have preferred to +be a solicitor at the London bar in 1817 to write the brief for the +respondent in the celebrated divorce case of Crawley vs. Crawley. +Against the back-ground of the world she lived in Becky could have been +painted as meekly white and beautiful as that lovely old picture of St. +Cecilia at the Choir Organ. + +Perhaps Becky was not strictly a heroine; but she was a honey. + + * * * * * + +Men can not "create" heroines in the sense of shadowing forth what +they conceive to be the glory, beauty, courage and splendor of womanly +character. It is the indescribable sum of womanhood corresponding to the +unutterable name of God. The true man's love of woman is a spirit sense +attending upon the actual senses of seeing, hearing, feeling, tasting +and smelling. The woman he loves enters into every one of these senses +and thus is impounded five-fold upon that union of all of them, which, +together with the miracle of mind, composes what we call the human soul +as a divine essence. She is attached to every religion, yet enters with +authority into none. She is first at its birth, the last to stay +weeping at its death. In every great novel a heroine, unnamed, unspoken, +undescribed, hovers throughout like an essence. The heroism of woman +is her privacy. There is to me no more wonderful, philosophical, +psychological and delicate triumph of literary art in existence than the +few chapters in "Quo Vadis" in which that great introspective genius, +Sienkiewicz, sets forth the growth of the spell of love with which Lygia +has encompassed Vinicius, and the singular development and progress of +the emotion through which Vinicius is finally immersed in human love of +Lygia and in the Christian reverence of her spiritual purity at the same +time. It is the miracle of soul in sex. + +Every clean-hearted youth that has had the happiness to marry a good +woman--and, thank Heaven, clean youths and good women are thick as +leaves in Vallambrosa in this sturdy old world of ours--every such youth +has had his day of holy conversion, his touch of the wand conferring +upon him the miracle of love, and he has been a better and wiser man +for it. Not sense love, not the instinctive, restless love of matter for +matter, but the love that descends like the dove amid radiance. + + * * * * * + +We've all seen that bridal couple; she is as pretty as peaches; he is as +proud of her as if she were a splendid race horse; he glories in knowing +she is lovely and accepts the admiration offered to her as a tribute to +his own judgment, his own taste and even his merit, which obtained her. +There is a certain amount of silliness in her which he soon detects, +a touch of helplessness, and unsophistication in knowledge of worldly +things that he yet feels is mysteriously guarded against intrusion +upon and which makes companionship with her sometimes irksome. He feels +superior and uncompensated; from the superb isolation of his greater +knowledge, courage and independence, he grants to her a certain tender +pity and protection; he admits her faith and purity and--er--but--you +see, he is sorry she is not quite the well poised and noble creature he +is! Mr. Youngwed is at this time passing through the mental digestive +process of feeling his oats. He is all right, though, if he is half as +good as he thinks he is. He has not been touched by the live wire of +experience--yet; that's all. + +Well, in the course of human events, there comes a time when he is +frightened to death, then greatly relieved and for a few weeks becomes +as proud as if he had actually provided the last census of the United +States with most of the material contained in it. A few months later, +when the feeble whines and howls have found increased vigor of utterance +and more frequency of expression; when they don't know whether Master +Jack or Miss Jill has merely a howling spell or is threatened with fatal +convulsions; when they don't know whether they want a dog-muzzle or a +doctor; when Mr. Youngwed has lost his sleep and his temper, together, +and has displayed himself with spectacular effect as a brute, selfish, +irritable, helpless, resourceless and conquered--then--then, my dear +madame, you have doubtless observed him decrease in self-estimated size +like a balloon into which a pin has been introduced, until he looks, in +fact, like Master Frog reduced in bulk from the bull-size, to which he +aspired, to his original degree. + +At that time Mrs. Youngwed is very busy with little Jack or Jill, as the +case may be. Her husband's conduct she probably regards with resignation +as the first heavy burden of the cross she is expected to bear. She +does not reproach him, it is useless; she has perhaps suspected that +his assumed superiority would not stand the real strain. But, he is the +father of the dear baby and, for that precious darling's sake, she will +be patient. I wonder if she feels that way? She has every right to, and, +for one, I say that I'll be hanged if I find any fault with her if she +does. That is the way she must keep human, and so balance the little +open accounts that married folks ought to run between themselves for +the purpose of keeping cobwebs and mildew off, or rather of maintaining +their lives as a running stream instead of a stagnant pond. A little +good talking back now and then is good for wives and married men. +Don't be afraid, Mrs. Youngwed; and when the very worst has come, why +cry--at--him! One tear weighs more and will hit him harder than an ax. +In the lachrymal ducts with which heaven has blessed you, you are more +surely protected against the fires of your honest indignation than you +are by the fire department against a blaze in the house. And be +patient, also; remember, dear sister, that, though you can cry, he has +a gift--that--enables--him--to--swear! You and other wedded wives very +properly object to swearing, but you will doubtless admit that there +is compensation in that when he does swear in his usual good form +you--never--feel--any--apprehension--about--the--state--of--his--health! + +This natural outburst of resentment has not lasted three minutes. Mr. +Y. has returned to his couch, sulky and ashamed. He pretends to sleep +ostentatiously; he--does--not! He is thinking with remarkable intensity +and has an eye open. He sees the slender figure in the dim light, +hanging over the crib, he hears the crooning, he begins to suspect that +there is an alloy in his godlikeness. He looks to earth, listens to the +thin, wailing cries, wonders, regrets, wearies, sleeps. At that moment +Mrs. Y. should fall on her knees and rejoice. She would if she could +leave young Jack or Jill; but she can't--she--never--can. That's +what sent Mr. Y. to sleep. It is just as well perhaps that Mrs. Y. is +unobservant. + +A miracle is happening to Mr. Y. In an hour or two, let us say, there +is a new vocal alarm from the crib. Almost with the first suspicion +of fretfulness or pain the mother has heard it. Heaven's mysterious +telepathy of instinct has operated. Between angels, babies and mothers +the distance is no longer than your arm can reach. They understand, feel +and hear each other, and are linked in one chain. So, that, when Mr. +Y. has struggled laboriously awake and wonders +if--that--child--is--going--to--howl--all----. Well, he goes no further. +In the dim light he sees again the slender figure hanging over the crib, +he hears the crooning and the retreating sobs. It is just as he saw +and heard before he fell asleep. No complaints, no reproaches, no +irritation. Oh, what a brute he feels! He battles with his reason and +his bewilderment. Had he fallen asleep and left her to bear that strain; +or has she gone anew to the rescue, while he slept without thought? Up +out of his heart the tenderness wells; down into his mind the revelation +comes. The miracle works. He looks and listens. In the figure hanging +there so patiently and tenderly he sees for the first time the wonderful +vision of the sweetheart wife, not lost, but enveloped in the mystery of +motherhood; he hears in the crooning voice a tone he never before knew. +Mother and child are united in mysterious converse. Where did that girl +whom he thought so unsophisticated of the world learn that marvel of +acquaintance with that babe, so far removed from his ability to reach? +It must be that while he knew the world, she understood the secret of +heaven. She is so patient. What a brute he is to grow impatient, when +she endures day and night in rapt patience and the joy of content! She +can enter a world from which he is barred. And, that is his wife! +That was his sweetheart, and is now--ah, what is she? He feels somehow +abashed; he knows that if he were ten times better than he is he might +still feel unworthy to touch the latchet of her shoes; he feels that +reverence and awe have enveloped her, and that the first happy love and +longing are springing afresh in his heart. It is his wife and his +child; apart from him unless he can note and understand that miracle +of nature's secret. Can he? Well, he will try--oh, what a brute! And he +watches the bending figure, he hears the blending of soft crooning and +retreating sobs--and, listening, he is lost in the wonder and falls +under the spell asleep. + +Mrs. Y., you are happy henceforth, if you will disregard certain small +matters, such as whether chairs or hat-racks are for hats, or whether +the marble mantelpiece or the floor is intended for polishing boot +heels. + + * * * * * + +Of course, such an incident as has been suggested is but one of +thousands of golden moments when to the husband comes the sudden +dazzling recognition of the mergence of that half-sweetheart, +half-mistress, he has admired and a little tired of, into the +reverential glory and loveliness of wifehood, motherhood, companionhood, +through all life and on through the eternity of inheritance they shall +leave to Jacks and Jills and their little sisters and brothers. In +that lies the priceless secret of Christianity and its influence. +The unspeakably immoral Greeks reared a temple to Pity; the grossest +mythologies of Babylon, Greece, Rome and Carthage could not change +human nature. There have been always persons whose temperament made +them sympathize with grief and pity the suffering; who, caring none +for wealth, had no desire to steal; who purchased a little pleasure for +vanity in the thanks received for kindness given. But Christianity saw +the jewel underneath the passing emotion and gave it value by +cleansing and cutting it. In lust-love is the instinctive secret of the +preservation of the race; but the race is not worth preserving that it +may be preserved only for lust. Upon that animal foundation is to be +built the radiant home of confident, enduring and exchanging love +in which all the senses, tastes, hopes, aspirations and delights of +friendship, companionship and human society shall find hospitality +and comfort. When it has been achieved it is beautiful, a twin to the +delicate rose that lies in its own delicious fragrance, happy on the +pure bosom of a lovely girl--the rose that is finest and most exquisite +because it has sprung from the horrid heat of the compost; but who shall +think of the one in the presence of the pure beauty of the other? + +Nature and art are entirely unlike each other, though the one simulates +the other. The art of beauty in writing, said Balzac, is to be able +to construct a palace upon the point of a needle; the art of beauty +in living and loving is to build all the beauty of social life and +aspiration upon the sordid yet solid and persisting instincts of +savagery that lie deep at the bottom of our gross natures. + + * * * * * + +Now, it is in this tender sacred atmosphere, such as Mr. and Mrs. +Youngwed always pass through, that the man worthy of a woman's +confidence finds the radiant ideal of his heroine. He may with propriety +speak of these transfigured personalities to his intimates or write of +them with kindly pleasantry and suggestion as, perhaps, this will be +considered. But, there is a monitor within that restrains him from +analyzing and describing and dragging into the glare of publicity the +sacred details that give to life all its secret happiness, faith and +delight. To do so would be ten times worse offense against the ethics +of unwritten and unspoken things than describing with pitiless precision +the death beds of children, as Little Nell, Paul Dombey, Dora, Little +Eva, and, thank heaven! only a few others. + +How can anybody bear to read such pages without feeling that he is +an intruder where angels should veil their faces as they await the +transformation? + +"It is not permitted to do evil," says the philosopher, "that good may +result." + +There are some things that should remain unspoken and undescribed. Have +you never listened to some great brute of a sincere preacher of the +gospel, as he warned his congregation against the terrible dangers +attending the omission of purely theological rites upon infants? Have +you thought of the mothers of those children, listening, whose little +ones were sick or delicate, and who felt each word of that hard, ominous +warning as an agonizing terror? And haven't you wanted to kick the +minister out of the pulpit, through the reredos and into the middle +of next week? How can anybody harrow up such tender feelings? How can +anybody like to believe that a little child will be held to account? +Many of us do so believe, perhaps, whether or no; but is it not cruel +to shake the rod of terror over us in public? "Suffer little children +to come unto Me," said the Master; He did not instruct us to drive them +with fear and terror and trembling. Whenever I have heard such sermons I +have wanted to get up and stalk out of the church with ostentatiousness +of contempt, as if to say to the preacher that his conduct +did--not--meet--with--my--approval. But I didn't; the philosopher has +his cowardice not less than the preacher. + +But there is something meretricious and cheap in the use of material +and subjects that lie warm against the very secret heart of nature. The +mystery of love and the sanctity of death are to be used by writers and +artists only in their ennobling aspect of results. A certain class of +French writers have sickened the world by invading the sacredness of +passion and giving prostitution the semblance of self-abnegated love; a +certain class of English and American writers have purchased popularity +by the meretricious parade of the scenes of death-beds. Both are +violations of the ethics of art as they are of nature. True love as +true sorrow shrinks from exhibition and should be permitted to enjoy +the sacredness of privacy. The famous women of the world, Herodias, +Semiramis, Aspasia, Thais, Cleopatra, Sapho, Messalina, Marie de +Medici, Catherine of Russia, Elizabeth of England--all of them have been +immoral. Publicity to women is like handling to peaches--the bloom comes +off, whether or not any other harm occurs. In literature, the great +feminine figures, George Sand, Madame de Sevigne, Madame de Stael, +George Eliot--all were banned and at least one--the first--was out of +the pale. Creative thought has in it the germ of masculinity. Genius in +a woman, as we usually describe genius, means masculinity, which, of all +things, to real men is abhorrent in woman. True genius in woman is the +antithesis of the qualities that make genius in man; so is her heroism, +her beauty, her virtue, her destiny and her duty. + +Let this be said--even though it be only a jest--one of those smart +attempts at epigram, which, ladies, a man has no more power to resist +than a baby to resist the desire to improve his thumb by sucking +it--that: whenever you find a woman who looks real--that is, who +produces upon a real man the impression of being endowed with +the splendid gifts for united and patient companionship in +marriage--whenever you find her advocating equal suffrage, equal rights, +equal independence with men in all things, you may properly run away. +Equality means so much, dear sisters. No man can be your equal; you can +not be his, without laying down the very jewels of the womanliness +that men love. Be thankful you have not this strength and daring; +he possesses those in order that he many stand between you and more +powerful brutes. Now, let us try for a smart epigram: But no! hang the +epigram, let it go. This, however, may be said: That, whenever you find +a woman wanting all rights with man; wanting his morals to be judged +by hers, or willing to throw hers in with his, or itching to enter his +employments and labors and willing that he shall--of course--nurse the +children and patch the small trousers and dresses, depend upon it that +some weak and timid man has been neglecting the old manly, savage duty +of applying quiet home murder as society approves now and then. + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Delicious Vice, by Young E. 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Allison + </title> + <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> + + body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify} + P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } + hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} + .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; } + blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} + .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} + .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} + div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } + div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; } + .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} + .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} + .pagenum {display:inline; font-size: 70%; font-style:normal; + margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%; + text-align: right;} + .side { float: right; font-size: 75%; width: 25%; padding-left: 0.8em; + border-left: dashed thin; margin-left: 0.8em; text-align: left; + text-indent: 0; font-weight: bold; font-style: italic; + font-weight: bold; color: black; background: #eeeeee; border: solid 1px;} + pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} + +</style> + </head> + <body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Delicious Vice, by Young E. Allison + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Delicious Vice + +Author: Young E. Allison + + +Release Date: August, 2005 [EBook #8686] +This file was first posted on August 1, 2003 +Last Updated: March 14, 2018 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DELICIOUS VICE *** + + + + +Text file produced by Ted Garvin, Charles Franks and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + +HTML file produced by David Widger + + + + +</pre> + + <div style="height: 8em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h1> + THE DELICIOUS VICE + </h1> + <h4> + Pipe Dreams and Fond Adventures of an<br /> Habitual Novel-Reader Among + Some<br /> Great Books and Their People + </h4> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h2> + By Young E. Allison + </h2> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h5> + <i>Second Edition</i> <br /> <br /> (Revised and containing new material) + </h5> + <h6> + CHICAGO THE PRAIRIELAND PUBLISHING CO. 1918 <br /> Printed originally in + the Louisville Courier-Journal. <br /> Reprinted by courtesy. <br /> <br /> + First edition, Cleveland, Burrows Bros., 1907. <br /> <br /> Copyright + 1907-1918 + </h6> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + <b>CONTENTS</b> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0001"> I. A RHAPSODY ON THE NOBLE PROFESSION OF NOVEL + READING </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0002"> II. NOVEL-READERS </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0003"> III. READING THE FIRST NOVEL </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0004"> IV. THE FIRST NOVEL TO READ </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0005"> V. THE OPEN POLAR SEA OF NOVELS </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0006"> VI. RASCALS </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0007"> VII. HEROES </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0008"> VIII. HEROINES </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + I. A RHAPSODY ON THE NOBLE PROFESSION OF NOVEL READING + </h2> + <p> + It must have been at about the good-bye age of forty that Thomas Moore, + that choleric and pompous yet genial little Irish gentleman, turned a sigh + into good marketable “copy” for Grub Street and with shrewd economy got + two full pecuniary bites out of one melancholy apple of reflection: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “Kind friends around me fall + Like leaves in wintry weather,” + + —he sang of his own dead heart in the stilly night. + + “Thus kindly I scatter thy leaves on the bed + Where thy mates of the garden lie scentless and dead.” + —he sang to the dying rose. In the red month of October the rose is +forty years old, as roses go. How small the world has grown to a man of +forty, if he has put his eyes, his ears and his brain to the uses for +which they are adapted. And as for time—why, it is no longer than a +kite string. At about the age of forty everything that can happen to a +man, death excepted, has happened; happiness has gone to the devil or +is a mere habit; the blessing of poverty has been permanently secured +or you are exhausted with the cares of wealth; you can see around +the corner or you do not care to see around it; in a word—that is, +considering mental existence—the bell has rung on you and you are up +against a steady grind for the remainder of your life. It is then there +comes to the habitual novel reader the inevitable day when, in anguish +of heart, looking back over his life, he—wishes he hadn't; then he asks +himself the bitter question if there are not things he has done that he +wishes he hadn't. Melancholy marks him for its own. He sits in his room +some winter evening, the lamp swarming shadowy seductions, the grate +glowing with siren invitation, the cigar box within easy reach for that +moment when the pending sacrifice between his teeth shall be burned out; +his feet upon the familiar corner of the mantel at that automatically +calculated altitude which permits the weight of the upper part of the +body to fall exactly upon the second joint from the lower end of the +vertebral column as it rests in the comfortable depression created by +continuous wear in the cushion of that particular chair to which every +honest man who has acquired the library vice sooner or later gets +attached with a love no misfortune can destroy. As he sits thus, +having closed the lids of, say, some old favorite of his youth, he will +inevitably ask himself if it would not have been better for him if he +hadn't. And the question once asked must be answered; and it will be an +honest answer, too. For no scoundrel was ever addicted to the delicious +vice of novel-reading. It is too tame for him. “There is no money in +it.” + +</pre> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + And every habitual novel-reader will answer that question he has asked + himself, after a sigh. A sigh that will echo from the tropic deserted + island of Juan Fernandez to that utmost ice-bound point of Siberia where + by chance or destiny the seven nails in the sole of a certain mysterious + person's shoe, in the month of October, 1831, formed a cross—thus: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + * + * * * + * + * + * +</pre> + <p> + while on the American promontory opposite, “a young and handsome woman + replied to the man's despairing gesture by silently pointing to heaven.” + The Wandering Jew may be gone, but the theater of that appalling prologue + still exists unchanged. That sigh will penetrate the gloomy cell of the + Abbe Faria, the frightful dungeons of the Inquisition, the gilded halls of + Vanity Fair, the deep forests of Brahmin and fakir, the jousting list, the + audience halls and the petits cabinets of kings of France, sound over the + trackless and storm-beaten ocean—will echo, in short, wherever warm + blood has jumped in the veins of honest men and wherever vice has sooner + or later been stretched groveling in the dust at the feet of triumphant + virtue. + </p> + <p> + And so, sighing to the uttermost ends of the earth, the old novel-reader + will confess that he wishes he hadn't. Had not read all those novels that + troop through his memory. Because, if he hadn't—and it is the + impossibility of the alternative that chills his soul with the despair of + cruel realization—if he hadn't, you see, he could begin at the very + first, right then and there, and read the whole blessed business through + for the first time. For the FIRST TIME, mark you! Is there anywhere in + this great round world a novel reader of true genius who would not do that + with the joy of a child and the thankfulness of a sage? + </p> + <p> + Such a dream would be the foundation of the story of a really noble Dr. + Faustus. How contemptible is the man who, having staked his life freely + upon a career, whines at the close and begs for another chance; just one + more—and a different career! It is no more than Mr. Jack Hamlin, a + friend from Calaveras County, California, would call “the baby act,” or + his compeer, Mr. John Oakhurst, would denominate “a squeal.” How glorious, + on the other hand, is the man who has spent his life in his own way, and, + at its eventide, waves his hand to the sinking sun and cries out: + “Goodbye; but if I could do so, I should be glad to go over it all again + with you—just as it was!” If honesty is rated in heaven as we have + been taught to believe, depend upon it the novel-reader who sighs to eat + the apple he has just devoured, will have no trouble hereafter. + </p> + <p> + What a great flutter was created a few years ago when a blind + multi-millionaire of New York offered to pay a million dollars in cash to + any scientist, savant or surgeon in the world who would restore his sight. + Of course he would! It was no price at all to offer for the service—considering + the millions remaining. It was no more to him than it would be to me to + offer ten dollars for a peep at Paradise. Poor as I am I will give any man + in the world one hundred dollars in cash who will enable me to remove + every trace of memory of M. Alexandre Dumas' “Three Guardsmen,” so that I + may open that glorious book with the virgin capacity of youth to enjoy its + full delight. More; I will duplicate the same offer for any one or all of + the following: + </p> + <p> + “Les Miserables,” of M. Hugo. + </p> + <p> + “Don Quixote,” of Senor Cervantes. + </p> + <p> + “Vanity Fair,” of Mr. Thackeray. + </p> + <p> + “David Copperfield,” of Mr. Dickens. + </p> + <p> + “The Cloister and the Hearth,” of Mr. Reade. + </p> + <p> + And if my good friend, Isaac of York, is lending money at the old stand + and will take pianos, pictures, furniture, dress suits and plain household + plate as collateral, upon even moderate valuation, I will go fifty dollars + each upon the following: + </p> + <p> + “The Count of Monte Cristo,” of M. Dumas. + </p> + <p> + “The Wandering Jew,” of M. Sue. + </p> + <p> + “The Memoirs of Barry Lyndon, Esq.,” of Mr. Thackeray. + </p> + <p> + “Treasure Island,” of Mr. Robbie Stevenson. + </p> + <p> + “The Vicar of Wakefield,” of Mr. Goldsmith. + </p> + <p> + “Pere Goriot,” of M. de Balzac. + </p> + <p> + “Ivanhoe,” of Baronet Scott. + </p> + <p> + (Any one previously unnamed of the whole layout of M. Dumas, excepting + only a paretic volume entitled “The Conspirators.”) + </p> + <p> + Now, the man who can do the trick for one novel can do it for all—and + there's a thousand dollars waiting to be earned, and a blessing also. It's + a bald “bluff,” of course, because it can't be done as we all know. I + might offer a million with safety. If it ever could have been done the + noble intellectual aristocracy of novel-readers would have been reduced to + a condition of penury and distress centuries ago. + </p> + <p> + For, who can put fetters upon even the smallest second of eternity? Who + can repeat a joy or duplicate a sweet sorrow? Who has ever had more than + one first sweetheart, or more than one first kiss under the honeysuckle? + Or has ever seen his name in print for the first time, ever again? Is it + any wonder that all these inexplicable longings, these hopeless hopes, + were summed up in the heart-cry of Faust— + </p> + <p> + “Stay, yet awhile, O moment of beauty.” + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Yet, I maintain, Dr. Faustus was a weak creature. He begged to be given + another and wholly different chance to linger with beauty. How much nobler + the magnificent courage of the veteran novel-reader, who in the old age of + his service, asks only that he may be permitted to do again all that he + has done, blindly, humbly, loyally, as before. + </p> + <p> + Don't I know? Have I not been there? It is no child's play, the life of a + man who—paraphrasing the language of Spartacus, the much neglected + hero of the ages—has met upon the printed page every shape of + perilous adventure and dangerous character that the broad empire of + fiction could furnish, and never yet lowered his arm. Believe me it is no + carpet duty to have served on the British privateers in Guiana, under + Commodore Kingsley, alongside of Salvation Yeo; to have been a loyal + member of Thuggee and cast the scarf for Bowanee; to have watched the + tortures of Beatrice Cenci (pronounced as written in honest English, and I + spit upon the weaklings of the service who imagine that any freak of woman + called Bee-ah-treech-y Chon-chy could have endured the agonies related of + that sainted lady)—to have watched those tortures, I say, without + breaking down; to have fought under the walls of Acre with Richard Coeur + de Lion; to have crawled, amid rats and noxious vapors, with Jean Valjean + through the sewers of Paris; to have dragged weary miles through the snow + with Uncas, Chief of the Mohicans; to have lived among wild beasts with + Morok the lion tamer; to have charged with the impis of Umslopogaas; to + have sailed before the mast with Vanderdecken, spent fourteen gloomy years + in the next cell to Edmund Dantes, ferreted out the murders in the Rue + Morgue, advised Monsieur Le Cocq and given years of life's prime in + tedious professional assistance to that anointed idiot and pestiferous + scoundrel, Tittlebat Titmouse! Equally, of course, it has not been all + horror and despair. Life averages up fairly, as any novel-reader will + admit, and there has been much of delight—even luxury and idleness—between + the carnage hours of battle. Is it not so? Ask that boyish-hearted old + scamp whom you have seen scuttling away from the circulating library with + M. St. Pierre's memoirs of young Paul and his beloved Virginia under his + arm; or stepping briskly out of the book store hugging to his left side a + carefully wrapped biography of Lady Diana Vernon, Mlle. de la Valliere, or + Madame Margaret Woffington; or in fact any of a thousand charming ladies + whom it is certain he had met before. Ladies too, who, born whensoever, + are not one day older since he last saw them. Nearly a hundred years of + Parisian residence have not served to induce the Princess Haydee of Yanina + to forego her picturesque Greek gowns and coiffures, or to alter the + somewhat embarrassing status of her relations with her striking but gloomy + protector, the Count of Monte Cristo. + </p> + <p> + The old memories are crowded with pleasures. Those delicious mornings in + the allee of the park, where you were permitted to see Cosette with her + old grandfather, M. Fauchelevent; those hours of sweet pain when it was + impossible to determine whether it was Rebecca or Rowena who seemed to + give most light to the day; the flirtations with Blanche Amory, and the + notes placed in the hollow tree; the idyllic devotion of Little Emily, + dating from the morning when you saw her dress fluttering on the beam as + she ran along it, lightly, above the flowing tide—(devotion that is + yet tender, for, God forgive you Steerforth as I do, you could not smirch + that pure heart;) the melancholy, yet sweet sorrow, with which you saw the + loved and lost Little Eva borne to her grave over which the mocking-bird + now sings his liquid requiem. Has it not been sweet good fortune to love + Maggie Tulliver, Margot of Savoy, Dora Spenlow (undeclared because she was + an honest wife—even though of a most conceited and commonplace + jackass, totally undeserving of her); Agnes Wicklow (a passion quickly + cured when she took Dora's pitiful leavings), and poor ill-fated Marie + Antoinette? You can name dozens if you have been brought up in good + literary society. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + These love affairs may be owned freely, as being perfectly honorable, even + if hopeless. And, of course, there have been gallantries—mere + affaires du jour—such as every man occasionally engages in. + Sometimes they seemed serious, but only for a moment. There was Beatrix + Esmond, for whom I could certainly have challenged His Grace of Hamilton, + had not Lord Mohun done the work for me. Wandering down the street in + London one night, in a moment of weak admiration for her unrivalled nerve + and aplomb, I was hesitating—whether to call on Mrs. Rawdon Crawley, + knowing that her thick-headed husband was in hoc for debt—when the + door of her house crashed open and that old scoundrel, Lord Steyne, came + wildly down the steps, his livid face blood-streaked, his topcoat on his + arm and a dreadful look in his eye. The world knows the rest as I learned + it half an hour later at the greengrocer's, where the Crawleys owed an + inexcusably large bill. Then the Duchess de Langeais—but all this is + really private. + </p> + <p> + After all, a man never truly loves but once. And somewhere in Scotland + there is a mound above the gentle, tender and heroic Helen Mar, where lies + buried the first love of my soul. That mound, O lovely and loyal Helen, + was watered by the first blinding and unselfish tears that ever sprang + from my eyes. You were my first love; others may come and inevitably they + go, but you are still here, under the pencil pocket of my waistcoat. + </p> + <p> + Who can write in such a state? It is only fair to take a rest and brace + up. [Blank Page] + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + II. NOVEL-READERS + </h2> + <h3> + AS DISTINGUISHED FROM WOMEN AND NIBBLERS AND AMATEURS + </h3> + <p> + There is, of course, but one sort of novel-reader who is of any importance + He is the man who began under the age of fourteen and is still sticking to + it—at whatever age he may be—and full of a terrifying anxiety + lest he may be called away in the midst of preliminary announcements of + some pet author's “next forthcoming.” For my own part I cannot conceive + dying with resignation knowing that the publishers were binding up at the + time anything of Henryk Sienckiewicz's or Thomas Hardy's. So it is + important that a man begin early, because he will have to quit all too + soon. + </p> + <p> + There are no women novel-readers. There are women who read novels, of + course; but it is a far cry from reading novels to being a novel-reader. + It is not in the nature of a woman. The crown of woman's character is her + devotion, which incarnate delicacy and tenderness exalt into perfect + beauty of sacrifice. Those qualities could no more live amid the clashings + of indiscriminate human passions than a butterfly wing could go between + the mill rollers untorn. Women utterly refuse to go on with a book if the + subject goes against their settled opinions. They despise a novel—howsoever + fine and stirring it may be—if there is any taint of unhappiness to + the favorite at the close. But the most flagrant of all their incapacities + in respect to fiction is the inability to appreciate the admirable + achievements of heroes, unless the achievements are solely in behalf of + women. And even in that event they complacently consider them to be a + matter of course, and attach no particular importance to the perils or the + hardships undergone. “Why shouldn't he?” they argue, with triumphant trust + in ideals; “surely he loved her!” + </p> + <p> + There are many women who nibble at novels as they nibble at luncheon—there + are also some hearty eaters; but 98 per cent of them detest Thackeray and + refuse resolutely to open a second book of Robert Louis Stevenson. They + scent an enemy of the sex in Thackeray, who never seems to be in earnest, + and whose indignant sarcasm and melancholy truthfulness they shrink from. + “It's only a story, anyhow,” they argue again; “he might, at least write a + pleasant one, instead of bringing in all sorts of disagreeable people—some + of them positively disreputable.” As for Stevenson, whom men read with the + thrill of boyhood rising new in their veins, I believe in my soul women + would tear leaves out of his novels to tie over the tops of preserve jars, + and never dream of the sacrilege. + </p> + <p> + Now I hold Thackeray and Stevenson to be the absolute test of capacity for + earnest novel-reading. Neither cares a snap of his fingers for anybody's + prejudices, but goes the way of stern truth by the light of genius that + shines within him. + </p> + <p> + If you could ever pin a woman down to tell you what she thought, instead + of telling you what she thinks it is proper to tell you, or what she + thinks will please you, you would find she has a religious conviction that + Dot Perrybingle in “The Cricket of the Hearth,” and Ouida's Lord Chandos + were actually a materializable an and a reasonable gentleman, either of + whom might be met with anywhere in their proper circles, I would be + willing to stand trial for perjury on the statement that I've known + admirable women—far above the average, really showing signs of moral + discrimination—who have sniveled pitifully over Nancy Sykes and + sniffed scornfully at Mrs. Tess Durbeyfield Clare. It is due to their + constitution and social heredity. Women do not strive and yearn and stalk + abroad for the glorious pot of intellectual gold at the end of the + rainbow; they pick and choose and, having chosen, sit down straightway and + become content. And a state of contentment is an abomination in the sight + of man. Contentment is to be sought for by great masculine minds only with + the purpose of being sure never quite to find it. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + For all practical purposes, therefore—except perhaps as object + lessons of “the incorrect method” in reading novels—women, as + novel-readers, must be considered as not existing. And, of course, no + offense is intended. But if there be any weak-kneed readers who prefer the + gilt-wash of pretty politeness to the solid gold of truth, let them + understand that I am not to be frightened away from plain facts by any + charge of bad manners. + </p> + <p> + On the contrary, now that this disagreeable interruption has been forced + upon me—certainly not through any seeking of mine—it may be + better to speak out and settle the matter. Men who have the happiness of + being in the married state know that nothing is to be gained by failing to + settle instantly with women who contradict and oppose them. Who was that + mellow philosopher in one of Trollope's tiresomely clever novels who said: + “My word for it, John, a husband ought not to take a cane to his wife too + soon. He should fairly wait till they are half-way home from the church—but + not longer, not longer.” Of course every man with a spark of intelligence + and gallantry wishes that women COULD rise to real novel-reading Think + what courtship would be! Every true man wishes to heaven there was nothing + more to be said against women than that they are not novel-readers. But + can mere forgetting remove the canker? Do not all of us know that the + abstract good of the very existence of woman is itself open to grave doubt—with + no immediate hope of clearing up? Woman has certainly been thrust upon us. + Is there any scrap of record to show that Adam asked for her? He was doing + very well, was happy, prosperous and healthy. There was no certainty that + her creation was one of that unquestionably wonderful series that occupied + the six great days. We cannot conceal that her creation caused a great + pain in Adam's side—undoubtedly the left side, in the region of the + heart. She has been described by young and dauntless poets as “God's best + afterthought;” but, now, really—and I advance the suggestion with no + intention to be brutal but solely as a conscientious duty to the + ascertainment of truth—why is it, that—. But let me try to + present the matter in the most unobjectionable manner possible. + </p> + <p> + In reading over that marvelous account of creation I find frequent + explicit declaration that God pronounced everything good after he had + created it—except heaven and woman. I have maintained sometimes to + stern, elderly ladies that this might have been an error of omission by + early copyists, perpetuated and so become fixed in our translations. To + other ladies, of other age and condition, to whom such propositions of + scholarship might appear to be dull pedantry, I have ventured the + gentlemanlike explanation that, as woman was the only living thing created + that was good beyond doubt, perhaps God had paid her the special + compliment of leaving the approval unspoken, as being in a sense + supererogatory. At best, either of these dispositions of the matter is, of + course, far-fetched, maybe even frivolous. The fact still remains by the + record. And it is beyond doubt awkward and embarrassing, because + ill-natured men can refer to it in moments of hatefulness—moments + unfortunately too frequent. + </p> + <p> + Is it possible that this last creation was a mistake of Infinite Charity + and Eternal Truth? That Charity forbore to acknowledge that it was a + mistake and that Truth, in the very nature of its eternal essence, could + not say it was good? It is so grave a matter that one wonders Helvetius + did not betray it, as he did that other secret about which the + philosophers had agreed to keep mum, so that Herr Schopenhauer could write + about it as he did about that other. Herr Schopenhauer certainly had the + courage to speak with philosophical asperity of the gentle sex. It may be + because he was never married. And then his mother wrote novels! I have + been surprised that he was not accused of prejudice. + </p> + <p> + But if all these everyday obstacles were absent there would yet remain + insurmountable reasons why women can never be novel-readers in the sense + that men are. Your wife, for instance, or the impenetrable mystery of + womanhood that you contemplate making your wife some day—can you, + honestly, now, as a self-respecting husband of either de facto or in + futuro, quite agree to the spectacle of that adored lady sitting over + across the hearth from you in the snug room, evening after evening, with + her feet—however small and well-shaped—cocked up on the other + end of the mantel and one of your own big colorado maduros between her + teeth! We men, and particularly novel-readers, are liberal even generous, + in our views; but it is not in human nature to stand that! + </p> + <p> + Now, if a woman can not put her feet up and smoke, how in the name of + heaven, can she seriously read novels? Certainly not sitting bolt upright, + in order to prevent the back of her new gown from rubbing the chair; + certainly not reclining upon a couch or in a hammock. A boy, yet too young + to smoke may properly lie on his stomach on the floor and read novels, but + the mature veteran will fight for his end of the mantel as for his wife + and children. It is physiological necessity, inasmuch as the blood that + would naturally go to the lower extremities, is thus measurably lessened + in quantity and goes instead to the head, where a state of gentle + congestion ensues, exciting the brain cells, setting free the imagination + to roam hand in hand with intelligence under the spell of the wizard. + There may be novel-readers who do not smoke at the game, but surely they + cannot be quite earnest or honest—you had better put in writing all + business agreements with this sort. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + No boy can ever hope to become a really great or celebrated novel-reader + who does not begin his apprenticeship under the age of fourteen, and, as I + said before, stick to it as long as he lives. He must learn to scorn those + frivolous, vacillating and purposeless ones who, after beginning properly, + turn aside and whiling away their time on mere history, or science, or + philosophy. In a sense these departments of literature are useful enough. + They enable you often to perceive the most cunning and profoundly + interesting touches in fiction. Then I have no doubt that, merely as + mental exercise, they do some good in keeping the mind in training for the + serious work of novel-reading. I have always been grateful to Carlyle's + “French Revolution,” if for nothing more than that its criss-cross, + confusing and impressive dullness enabled me to find more pleasure in “A + Tale of Two Cities” than was to be extracted from any merit or interest in + that unreal novel. + </p> + <p> + This much however, may be said of history, that it is looking up in these + days as a result of studying the spirit of the novel. It was not many + years ago that the ponderous gentlemen who write criticisms (chiefly + because it has been forgotten how to stop that ancient waste of paper and + ink) could find nothing more biting to say of Macaulay's “England” than + that it was “a splendid work of imagination,” of Froude's “Caesar” that it + was “magnificent political fiction,” and of Taine's “France” that “it was + so fine it should have been history instead of fiction.” And ever since + then the world has read only these three writers upon these three epochs—and + many other men have been writing history upon the same model. No good + novel-reader need be ashamed to read them, in fact. They are so like the + real thing we find in the greatest novels, instead of being the usual + pompous official lies of old-time history, that there are flesh, blood and + warmth in them. + </p> + <p> + In 1877, after the railway riots, legislative halls heard the French + Revolution rehearsed from all points of view. In one capital, where I was + reporting the debate, Old Oracle, with every fact at hand from “In the + beginning” to the exact popular vote in 1876, talked two hours of accurate + historical data from all the French histories, after which a young lawyer + replied in fifteen minutes with a vivid picture of the popular conditions, + the revolt and the result. Will it be allowable, in the interest of + conveying exact impression, to say that Old Oracle was “swiped” off the + earth? No other word will relieve my conscience. After it was all over I + asked the young lawyer where he got his French history. + </p> + <p> + “From Dumas,” he answered, “and from critical reviews of his novels. He's + short on dates and documents, but he's long on the general facts.” + </p> + <p> + Why not? Are not novels history? + </p> + <p> + Book for book, is not a novel by a competent conscientious novelist just + as truthful a record of typical men, manners and motives as formal history + is of official men, events and motives? + </p> + <p> + There are persons created out of the dreams of genius so real, so actual, + so burnt into the heart and mind of the world that they have become + historical. Do they not show you, in the old Ursuline Convent at New + Orleans, the cell where poor Manon Lescaut sat alone in tears? And do they + not show you her very grave on the banks of the lake? Have I not stood by + the simple grave at Richmond, Virginia, where never lay the body of + Pocahontas and listened to the story of her burial there? One of the + loveliest women I ever knew admits that every time she visits relatives at + Salem she goes out to look at the mound over the broken heart of Hester + Prynne, that dream daughter of genius who never actually lived or died, + but who was and is and ever will be. Her grave can be easily pointed out, + but where is that of Alexander, of Themistocles, of Aristotle, even of the + first figure of history—Adam? Mark Twain found it for a joke. Dr. + Hale was finally forced to write a preface to “The Man Without a Country” + to declare that his hero was pure fiction and that the pathetic punishment + so marvelously described was not only imaginary, but legally and actually + impossible. It was because Philip Nolan had passed into history. I myself + have met old men who knew sea captains that had met this melancholy + prisoner at sea and looked upon him, had even spoken to him upon subjects + not prohibited. And these old men did not hesitate to declare that Dr. + Hale had lied in his denial and had repudiated the facts through cowardice + or under compulsion from the War Department. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Indeed, so flexible, adaptable and penetrable is the style, and so + admirably has the use and proper direction of the imagination been + developed by the school of fiction, that every branch of literature has + gained from it power, beauty and clearness. Nothing has aided more in the + spread of liberal Christianity than the remarkable series of “Lives of + Christ,” from Straus to Farrar, not omitting particular mention of the + singularly beautiful treatment of the subject by Renan. In all of these + conscientious imagination has been used, as it is used in the highest + works of fiction, to give to known facts the atmosphere and vividness of + truth in order that the spirit and personality of the surroundings of the + Savior of Mankind might be newly understood by and made fresh to modern + perception. + </p> + <p> + Of all books it is to be said—of novels as well—that none is + great that is not true, and that cannot be true which does not carry + inherence of truth. Now every book is true to some reader. The “Arabian + Nights” tales do not seem impossible to a little child, the only delight + him. The novels of “The Duchess” seem true to a certain class of readers, + if only because they treat of a society to which those readers are + entirely unaccustomed. “Robinson Crusoe” is a gospel to the world, and yet + it is the most palpably and innocently impossible of books. It is so + plausible because the author has ingeniously or accidentally set aside the + usual earmarks of plausibility. When an author plainly and easily knows + what the reader does not know and enough more to continue the chain of + seeming reality of truth a little further, he convinces the reader of his + truth and ability. Those men, therefore, who have been endowed with the + genius almost unconsciously to absorb, classify, combine, arrange and + dispense vast knowledge in a bold, striking or noble manner, are the + recognized greatest men of genius for the simple reason that the readers + of the world who know most recognize all they know in these writers, + together with that spirit of sublime imagination that suggests still + greater realms of truth and beauty. What Shakesepare was to the + intellectual leaders of his day, “The Duchess” was to countless immature + young folks of her day who were looking for “something to read.” + </p> + <p> + All truth is history, but all history is not truth. Written history is + notoriously no well-cleaner. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0003" id="link2H_4_0003"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + III. READING THE FIRST NOVEL + </h2> + <h3> + BEING MOSTLY REMINISCENCES OF EARLY CRIMES AND JOYS + </h3> + <p> + Once more and for all, the career of a novel reader should be entered + upon, if at all, under the age of fourteen. As much earlier as possible. + The life of the intellect, as of its shadowy twin, imagination, begins + early and develops miraculously. The inbred strains of nature lie exposed + to influence as a mirror to reflections, and as open to impression as + sensitized paper, upon which pictures may be printed and from which they + may also fade out. The greater the variety of impressions that fall upon + the young mind the more certain it is that the greatest strength of + natural tendency will be touched and revealed. Good or bad, whichever it + may be, let it come out as quickly as possible. How many men have never + developed their fatal weaknesses until success was within reach and the + edifice fell upon other innocent ones. Believe me, no innate scoundrel or + brute will be much helped or hindered by stories. These have no turn or + leisure for dreaming. They are eager for the actual touch of life. What + would a dull-eyed glutton, famishing, not with hunger but with the + cravings of digestive ferocity, find in Thackeray's “Memorials of + Gormandizing” or “Barmecidal Feasts?” Such banquets are spread for the + frugal, not one of whom would swap that immortal cook-book review for a + dinner with Lucullus. Rascals will not read. Men of action do not read. + They look upon it as the gambler does upon the game where “no money + passes.” It may almost be said that the capacity for novel-reading is the + patent of just and noble minds. You never heard of a great novel-reader + who was notorious as a criminal. There have been literary criminals, I + grant you—Eugene Aram Dr. Dodd, Prof. Webster, who murdered + Parkmaan, and others. But they were writers, not readers And they did not + write novels. Mr. Aram wrote scientific and school books, as did Prof. + Webster, and Dr. Wainwright wrote beautiful sermons. We never do + sufficiently consider the evil that lies behind writing sermons. The + nearest you can come to a writer of fiction who has been steeped in crime + is in Benvenuto Cellini, whose marvelous autobiographical memoir certainly + contains some fiction, though it is classed under the suspect department + of History. + </p> + <p> + How many men actually have been saved from a criminal career by the + miraculous influence of novels? Let who will deny, but at the age of six I + myself was absolutely committed to the abandoned purpose of riding + barebacked horses in a circus. Secretly, of course, because there were + some vague speculations in the family concerning what seemed to be special + adaptability to the work of preaching. Shortly after I gave that up to + enlist in the Continental Army, under Gen. Francis Marion, and no other + soldier slew more Britons. After discharge I at once volunteered in an + Indiana regiment quartered in my native town in Kentucky, and beat the + snare drum at the head of that fine body of men for a long time. But the + tendency was downward. For three months I was chief of a of robbers that + ravaged the backyards of the vicinity. Successively I became a spy for + Washington, an Indian fighter, a tragic actor. + </p> + <p> + With character seared, abandoned and dissolute in habit through and by the + hearing and seeing and reading of history, there was but one desperate + step left So I entered upon the career of a pirate in my ninth year. The + Spanish Main, as no doubt you remember, was at that time upon an open + common across the street from our house, and it was a hundred feet long, + half as wide and would average two feet in depth. I have often since + thanked Heaven that they filled up that pathless ocean in order to build + an iron foundry upon the spot. Suppose they had excavated for a cellar! + Why during the time that Capt. Kidd, Lafitte and I infested the coast + thereabout, sailing three “low, black-hulled schooners with long rakish + masts,” I forced hundreds of merchant seamen to walk the plank—even + helpless women and children. Unless the sharks devoured them, their bones + are yet about three feet under the floor of that iron foundry. Under the + lee of the Northernmost promontory, near a rock marked with peculiar + crosses made by the point of the stiletto which I constantly carried in my + red silk sash, I buried tons of plate, and doubloons, pieces of eight, + pistoles, Louis d'ors, and galleons by the chest. At that time galleons + somehow meant to me money pieces in use, though since then the name has + been given to a species of boat. The rich brocades, Damascus and Indian + stuffs, laces, mantles, shawls and finery were piled in riotous profusion + in our cave where—let the whole truth be told if it must—I + lived with a bold, black-eyed and coquettish Spanish girl, who loved me + with ungovernable jealousy that occasionally led to bitter and terrible + scenes of rage and despair. At last when I brought home a white and red + English girl whose life I spared because she had begged me her knees by + the memory of my sainted mother to spare her for her old father, who was + waiting her coming, Joquita passed all bounds. I killed her—with a + single knife thrust I remember. She was buried right on the spot where the + Tilden and Hendricks flag pole afterwards stood in the campaign of 1876. + It was with bitter melancholy that I fancied the red stripes on the flag + had their color from the blood of the poor, foolish jealous girl below. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Ah, well— + </p> + <p> + Let us all own up—we men of above forty who aspire to respectability + and do actually live orderly lives and achieve even the odor of sanctity—have + we not been stained with murder?—aye worse! What man has not his + Bluebeard closet, full of early crimes and villainies? A certain boy in + whom I take a particular interest, who goes to Sunday-school and whose + life is outwardly proper—is he not now on week days a robber of + great renown? A week ago, masked and armed, he held up his own father in a + secluded corner of the library and relieved the old man of swag of a value + beyond the dreams—not of avarice, but—of successful, + respectable, modern speculation. He purposes to be a pirate whenever there + is a convenient sheet of water near the house. God speed him. Better a + pirate at six than at sixty. + </p> + <p> + Give them work to do and good novels to read and they will get over it. + History breeds queer ideas in children. They read of military heroes, + kings and statesmen who commit awful deeds and are yet monuments of public + honor. What a sweet hero is Raleigh, who was a farmer of piracy; what a + grand Admiral was Drake; what demi-gods the fighting Americans who + murdered Indians for the crime of wanting their own! History hath charms + to move an infant breast to savagery. Good strong novels are the best + pabulum to nourish difference between virtue and vice. + </p> + <p> + Don't I know? I have felt the miracle and learned the difference so well + that even now at an advanced age I can tell the difference and indulge in + either. It was not a week after the killing of Joquita that I read the + first novel of my life. It was “Scottish Chiefs.” The dead bodies of ten + thousand novels lie between me and that first one. I have not read it + since. Ten Incas of Peru with ten rooms full of solid gold could not tempt + me to read it again. Have I not a clear cinch on a delicious memory, + compared with which gold is only Robinson Crusoe's “drug?” After a lapse + of all these years the content of that one tremendous, noble chapter of + heroic climax is as deeply burned into my memory as if it had been read + yesterday. + </p> + <p> + A sister, old enough to receive “beaux” and addicted to the piano-forte + accomplishment, was at that time practicing across the hall an + instrumental composition, entitled, “La Rève.” Under the title, printed in + very small letters, was the English translation; but I never thought to + look at it. An elocutionist had shortly before recited Poe's Raven at a + church entertainment, and that gloomy bird flapped its wings in my young + emotional vicinity when the firelight threw vague “shadows on the floor.” + When the piece of music was spoken as “La Rève,” its sad cadences, + suffering, of course, under practice, were instantly wedded in my mind to + Mr. Poe's wonderful bird and for years it meant the “Raven” to me. How + curious are childish impressions. Years afterward when I saw a copy of the + music and read the translation, “The Dream” under the title, I felt a + distinct shock of resentment as if the French language had been + treacherous to my sacred ideas. Then there was the romantic name of + “Ellerslie,” which, notwithstanding considerable precocity in reading and + spelling I carried off as “Elleressie” Yeas afterward when the actual + syllables confronted me in a historical sketch of Wallace, the truth + entered like a stab and I closed the book. O sacred first illusions of + childhood, you are sweeter than a thousand year of fame! It is God's + providence that hardens us to endure the throwing of them down to our eyes + and strengthens us to keep their memory sweet in our hearts. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + It would be an affront then, not to assume that every reputable novel + reader has read “Scottish Chiefs.” If there is any descendant or any + personal friend of that admirable lady, Miss Jane Porter, who may now be + in pecuniary distress, let that descendant call upon me privately with + perfect confidence. There are obligations that a glacial evolutionary + period can not lessen. I make no conditions but the simple proof of proper + identity. I am not rich but I am grateful. + </p> + <p> + It was a Saturday evening when I became aware, as by prescience, that + there hung over Sir William Wallice and Helen Mar some terrible shadow of + fate. And the piano-forte across the hall played “La Rève.” My heart + failed me and I closed the book. If you can't do that, my friend, then you + waste your time trying to be a novel reader. You have not the true touch + of genius for it. It is the miracle of eating your cake and having it, + too. It must have been the unconscious moving of novel reading genius in + me. For I forgot, as clearly as if it were not a possibility, that the + next day was Sunday. And so hurried off, before time, to bed, to be alone + with the burden on my heart. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “Backward, turn backward, O Time in your flight— + Make me a child again just for tonight.” + </pre> + <p> + There are two or three novels I should love to take to bed as of yore—not + to read, but to suffer over and to contemplate and to seek calmness and + courage with which to face the inevitable. Could there be men base enough + to do to death the noble Wallace? Or to break the heart of Helen Mar with + grief? No argument could remove the presentiment, but facing the matter + gave courage. “Let tomorrow answer,” I thought, as the piano-forte in the + next room played “La Rève.” Then fell asleep. + </p> + <p> + And when I awoke next morning to the full knowledge that it was Sunday, I + could have murdered the calendar. For Sunday was Dies Irae. After + Sunday-school, at least. There is a certain amount of fun to be to + extracted from Sunday-school. The remainder of those early Sundays was + confined to reading the Bible or storybooks from the Sunday-school library—books, + by the Lord Harry, that seem to be contrived especially to make out of + healthy children life-long enemies of the church, and to bind hypocrites + to the altar with hooks of steel. There was no whistling at all permitted; + singing of hymns was encouraged; no “playing”—playing on Sunday was + a distinct source of displeasure to Heaven! Are free-born men nine years + of age to endure such tyranny with resignation? Ask the kids of today—and + with one voice, as true men and free, they will answer you, “Nit!” In the + dark days of my youth liberty was in chains, and so Sunday was passed in + dreadful suspense as to what was doing in Scotland. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Monday night after supper I rejoined Sir William in his captivity and soon + saw that my worst fears were to be realized. My father sat on the opposite + side of the table reading politics; my mother was effecting the + restoration of socks; my brother was engaged in unraveling mathematical + tangles, and in the parlor across the hall my sister sat alone with her + piano patiently debating “La Rève.” Under these circumstances I + encountered the first great miracle of intellectual emotion in the chapter + describing the execution of William Wallace on Tower Hill. No other + incident of life has left upon me such a profound impression. It was as if + I had sprung at one bound into the arena of heroism. I remember it all. + How Wallace delivered himself of theological and Christian precepts to + Helen Mar after which they both knelt before the officiating priest. That + she thought or said, “My life will expire with yours!” It was the keynote + of death and life devotion. It was worthy to usher Wallace up the scaffold + steps where he stood with his hands bound, “his noble head uncovered.” + There was much Christian edification, but the presence of such a hero as + he with “noble Head uncovered” would enable any man nine years old with a + spark of honor and sympathy in him to endure agonizing amounts of + edification. Then suddenly there was a frightful shudder in my heart. The + hangman approached with the rope, and Helen Mar, with a shriek, threw + herself upon Wallace's breast. Then the great moment. If I live a thousand + years these lines will always be with me: “Wallace, with a mighty + strength, burst the bonds asunder that confined his arms and clasped her + to his heart!” + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + In reading some critical or pretended text books on construction since + that time I came across this sentence used to illustrate tautology. It was + pointed out that the bonds couldn't be “burst” without necessarily being + asunder. The confoundedest outrages in this world are the capers that + precisionists cut upon the bodies of the noble dead. And with impunity + too. Think of a village surveyor measuring the forest of Arden to discover + the exact acreage! Or a horse-doctor elevating his eye-brow with a + contemptuous smile and turning away, as from an innocent, when you speak + of the wings of that fine horse, Pegasus! Any idiot knows that bonds + couldn't be burst without being burst asunder. But, let the impregnable + Jackass think—what would become of the noble rhythm and the majestic + roll of sound? Shakespeare was an ignorant dunce also when he + characterized the ingratitude that involves the principle of public honor + as “the unkindest cut of all.” Every school child knows that it is + ungrammatical; but only those who have any sense learn after awhile the + esoteric secret that it sometimes requires a tragedy of language to + provide fitting sacrifice to the manes of despair. There never was yet a + man of genius who wrote grammatically and under the scourge of rhetorical + rules. Anthony Trollope is a most perfect example of the exact correctness + that sterilizes in its own immaculate chastity. Thackeray would knock a + qualifying adverb across the street, or thrust it under your nose to make + room for the vivid force of an idea. Trollope would give the idea a decent + funeral for the sake of having his adverb appear at the grave above + reproach from grammatical gossip. Whenever I have risen from the splendid + psychological perspective of old Job, the solemn introspective howls of + Ecclesiasticus and the generous living philosophy of Shakespeare it has + always been with the desire—of course it is undignified, but it is + human—to go and get an English grammar for the pleasure of spitting + upon it. Let us be honest. I understand everything about grammar except + what it means; but if you will give me the living substance and the proper + spirit any gentleman who desires the grammatical rules may have them, and + be hanged to him! And, while it may appear presumptuous, I can + conscientiously say that it will not be agreeable to me to settle down in + heaven with a class of persons who demand the rules of grammar for the + intellectual reason that corresponds to the call for crutches by + one-legged men. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + If the foregoing appear ill-tempered pray forget it. Remember rather that + I have sought to leave my friend Sir William Wallace, holding Helen Mar on + his breast as long as possible. And yet, I also loved her! Can human + nature go farther than that? + </p> + <p> + “Helen,” he said to her, “life's cord is cut by God's own hand.” He + stooped, he fell, and the fall shook the scaffold. Helen—that + glorified heroine—raised his head to her lap. The noble Earl of + Gloucester stepped forward, took the head in his hands. + </p> + <p> + “There,” he cried in a burst of grief, letting it fall again upon the + insensible bosom of Helen, “there broke the noblest heart that ever beat + in the breast of man!” + </p> + <p> + That page or two of description I read with difficulty and agony through + blinding tears, and when Gloucester spoke his splendid eulogy my head fell + on the table and I broke into such wild sobbing that the little family + sprang up in astonishment. I could not explain until my mother, having led + me to my room, succeeded in soothing me into calmness and I told her the + cause of it. And she saw me to bed with sympathetic caresses and, after + she left, it all broke out afresh and I cried myself to sleep in utter + desolation and wretchedness. Of course the matter got out and my father + began the book. He was sixty years old, not an indiscriminate reader, but + a man of kind and boyish heart. I felt a sort of fascinated curiosity to + watch him when he reached the chapter that had broken me. And, as if it + were yesterday, I can see him under the lamplight compressing his lips, or + puffing like a smoker through them, taking off his spectacles, and blowing + his nose with great ceremony and carelessly allowing the handkerchief to + reach his eyes. Then another paragraph and he would complain of the + glasses and wipe them carefully, also his eyes, and replace the + spectacles. But he never looked at me, and when he suddenly banged the + lids together and, turning away, sat staring into the fire with his head + bent forward, making unconcealed use of the handkerchief, I felt a sudden + sympathy for him and sneaked out. He would have made a great novel reader + if he had had the heart. But he couldn't stand sorrow and pain. The novel + reader must have a heart for every fate. For a week or more I read that + great chapter and its approaches over and over, weeping less and less, + until I had worn out that first grief, and could look with dry eyes upon + my dead. And never since have I dared to return to it. Let who will speak + freely in other tones of “Scottish Chiefs”—opinions are sacred + liberties—but as for me I know it changed my career from one of + ruthless piracy to better purposes, and certain boys of my private + acquaintance are introduced to Miss Jane Porter as soon as they show + similar bent. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0004" id="link2H_4_0004"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + IV. THE FIRST NOVEL TO READ + </h2> + <h3> + CONTAINING SOME SCANDALOUS REMARKS ABOUT “ROBINSON CRUSOE” + </h3> + <p> + The very best First-Novel-To-Read in all fiction is “Robinson Crusoe.” + There is no dogmatism in the declaration; it is the announcement of a fact + as well ascertained as the accuracy of the multiplication table. It is one + of the delights of novel reading that you may have any opinion you please + and fire it off with confidence, without gainsay. Those who differ with + you merely have another opinion, which is not sacred and cannot be proved + any more than yours. All of the elements of supreme test of imaginative + interest are in “Robinson Crusoe.” Love is absent, but that is not a test; + love appeals to persons who cannot read or write—it is universal, as + hunger and thirst. + </p> + <p> + The book-reading boy is easily discovered; you always catch him reading + books. But the novel-reading boy has a system of his own, a sort of + instinctive way of getting the greatest excitement out of the story, the + very best run for his money. This sort of boy soon learns to sit with his + feet drawn up on the upper rung of a chair, so that from the knees to the + thighs there is a gentle declivity of about thirty degrees; the knees are + nicely separated that the book may lie on them without holding. That + involves one of the most cunning of psychological secrets; because, if the + boy is not a novel reader, he does not want the book to lie open, since + every time it closes he gains just that much relief in finding the place + again. The novel-reading boy knows the trick of immortal wisdom; he can go + through the old book cases and pick the treasures of novels by the way + they lie open; if he gets hold of a new or especially fine edition of his + father's he need not be told to wrench it open in the middle and break the + back of the binding—he does it instinctively. + </p> + <p> + There are other symptoms of the born novel reader to be observed in him. + If he reads at night he is careful to so place his chair that the light + will fall on the page from a direction that will ultimately ruin the eyes—but + it does not interfere with the light. He humps himself over the open + volume and begins to display that unerring curvalinearity of the spine + that compels his mother to study braces and to fear that he will develop + consumption. Yet you can study the world's health records and never find a + line to prove that any man with “occupation or profession—novel + reading” is recorded as dying of consumption. The humped-over attitude + promotes compression of the lungs, telescoping of the diaphragm, atrophy + of the abdominal abracadabra and other things (see Physiological Slush, p. + 179, et seq.); but—it—never—hurts—the—boy! + </p> + <p> + To a novel reading boy the position is one of instinct, like that of the + bicycle racer. His eyes are strained, his nerves and muscles at tension—everything + ready for excitement—and the book, lying open, leaves his hands + perfectly free to drum on the sides of the chair, slap his legs and knees, + fumble in his pockets or even scratch his head as emotion or interest + demand. Does anybody deny that the highest proof of special genius is the + possession of the instinct to adapt itself to the matter in hand? Nothing + more need be said. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Now, if you will observe carefully such a boy when he comes to a certain + point in “Robinson Crusoe” you may recognize the stroke of fate in his + destiny. If he's the right sort, he will read gayly along; he drums, he + slaps himself, he beats his breast, he scratches his head. Suddenly there + will come the shock. He is reading rapidly and gloriously. He finds his + knife in his pocket, as usual, and puts it back; the top-string is there; + he drums the devil's tattoo, he wets his finger and smears the margin of + the page as he whirls it over and then—he finds—“The—Print—of—a—Man's—Naked—Foot—on—the—Shore!!!” + </p> + <p> + Oh, Crackey! At this tremendous moment the novel reader who has genius + drums no more. His hands have seized the upper edges of the muslin lids, + he presses the lower edges against his stomach, his back takes an added + intensity of hump, his eyes bulge, his heart thumps—he is landed—landed! + </p> + <p> + Terror, surprise, sympathy, hope, skepticism, doubt—come all ye + trooping emotions to threaten or console; but an end has come to fairy + stories and wonder tales—Master Studious is in the awful presence of + Human Nature. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + For many years I have believed that that Print—of—a—Man's—Naked—Foot + was set in italic type in all editions of “Robinson Crusoe.” But a patient + search of many editions has convinced me that I must have been mistaken. + </p> + <p> + The passage comes sneaking along in the midst of a paragraph in common + Roman letters and by the living jingo! you discover it just as Mr. Crusoe + discovered the footprint itself! + </p> + <p> + No story ever written exhibits so profoundly either the perfect design of + supreme genius or the curious accidental result of slovenly carelessness + in a hack-writer. This is not said in any critical spirit, because, + Robinson Crusoe, in one sense, is above criticism, and in another it + permits the freest analysis without suffering in the estimation of any + reader. + </p> + <p> + But for Robinson Crusoe, De Foe would never have ranked above the level of + his time. It is customary for critics to speak in awe of the “Journal of + the Plague” and it is gravely recited that that book deceived the great + Dr. Meade. Dr. Meade must have been a poor doctor if De Foe's accuracy of + description of the symptoms and effects of disease is not vastly superior + to the detail he supplies as a sailor and solitaire upon a desert island. + I have never been able to finish the “Journal.” The only books in which + his descriptions smack of reality are “Moll Flanders” and “Roxana,” which + will barely stand reading these days. + </p> + <p> + In what may be called its literary manner, Robinson Crusoe is entirely + like the others. It convinces you by its own conviction of sincerity. It + is simple, wandering yet direct; there is no making of “points” or moving + to climaxes. De Foe did unquestionably possess the capacity to put into + his story the appearance of sincerity that persuades belief at a glance. + In that much he had the spark of genius; yet that same case has not + availed to make the “Journal” of the Plague anything more than a curious + and laborious conceit, while Robinson Crusoe stands among the first books + of the world—a marvelous gleam of living interest, inextinguishably + fresh and heartening to the imagination of every reader who has + sensibility two removes above a toad. + </p> + <p> + The question arises, then, is “Robinson Crusoe” the calculated triumph of + deliberate genius, or the accidental stroke of a hack who fell upon a + golden suggestion in the account of Alexander Selkirk and increased its + value ten thousand fold by an unintentional but rather perfect marshaling + of incidents in order, and by a slovenly ignorance of character treatment + that enhanced the interest to perfect intensity? This question may be + discussed without undervaluing the book, the extraordinary merit of which + is shown in the fact that, while its idea has been paraphrased, it has + never been equalled. The “Swiss Family Robinson,” the “Schonberg-Cotta + Family” for children are full of merit and far better and more carefully + written, but there are only the desert island and the ingenious shifts + introduced. Charles Reade in “Hard Cash,” Mr. Mallock in his “Nineteenth + Century Romance,” Clark Russel in “Marooned,” and Mayne Reid, besides + others, have used the same theater. But only in that one great book is the + theater used to display the simple, yearning, natural, resolute, yet + doubting, soul and heart of man in profound solitude, awaiting in armed + terror, but not without purpose, the unknown and masked intentions of + nature and savagery. It seems to me—and I have been tied to Crusoe's + chariot wheels for a dozen readings, I suppose—that it is the + pressing in upon your emotions of the immensity of the great castaway's + solitude, in which he appears like some tremendous Job of abandonment, + fighting an unseen world, which is the innate note of its power. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + The very moment Friday becomes a loyal subject, the suspense relaxes into + pleased interest, and after Friday's funny father and the Spaniard and + others appear it becomes a common book. As for the second part of the + adventures I do not believe any matured man ever read it a second time + unless for curious or literary purposes. If he did he must be one of that + curious but simple family that have read the second part of “Faust,” + “Paradise Regained,” and the “Odyssey,” and who now peruse “Clarissa + Harlowe” and go carefully over the catalogue of ships in the “Iliad” as a + preparation for enjoying the excitements of the city directory. + </p> + <p> + Every particle of greatness in “Robinson Crusoe” is compressed within two + hundred pages, the other four hundred being about as mediocre trash as you + could purchase anywhere between cloth lids. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + It is interesting to apply subjective analysis to Robinson Crusoe. The + book in its very greatness has turned more critical swans into geese than + almost any other. They have praised the marvelous ingenuity with which De + Foe described how the castaway overcame single-handed, the deprivations of + all civilized conveniences; they have marveled at the simple method in + which all his labors are marshaled so as to render his conversion of the + island into a home the type of industrial and even of social progress and + theory; they have rhapsodized over the perfection of De Foe's style as a + model of literary strength and artistic verisemblance. Only a short time + ago a mighty critic of a great London paper said seriously that “Robinson + Crusoe and Gulliver appeal infinitely more to the literary reader than to + the boy, who does not want a classic but a book written by a + contemporary.” What an extraordinary boy that must be! It is probable that + few boys care for Gulliver beyond his adventures in Lilliput and + Brobdignag, but they devour that much, together with Robinson Crusoe, with + just as much avidity now as they did a century ago. Your clear-headed, + healthy boy is the first best critic of what constitutes the very liver + and lights of a novel. Nothing but the primitive problems of courage + meeting peril, virtue meeting vice, love, hatred, ambition for power and + glory, will go down with him. The grown man is more capable of dealing + with social subtleties and the problems of conscience, but those sorts of + books do not last unless they have also “action—action—action.” + </p> + <p> + Will the New Zealander, sitting amidst the prophetic ruins of St. Paul's, + invite his soul reading Robert Elsmere? Of course you can't say what a New + Zealander of that period might actually do; but what would you think of + him if you caught him at it? The greatest stories of the world are the + Bible stories, and I never saw a boy—intractable of acquiring the + Sunday-school habit though he may have been—who wouldn't lay his + savage head on his paws and quietly listen to the good old tales of wonder + out of that book of treasures. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + So let us look into the interior of our faithful old friend, Robinson + Crusoe, and examine his composition as a literary whole. From the moment + that Crusoe is washed ashore on the island until after the release of + Friday's father and the Spaniard from the hands of the cannibals, there is + no book in print, perhaps, that can surpass it in interest and the + strained impression it makes upon the unsophisticated mind. It is all + comprised in about 200 pages, but to a boy to whom the world is a theater + of crowded action, to whom everything seems to have come ready-made, to + whom the necessity of obedience and accommodation to others has been + conveyed by constant friction—here he finds himself for the first + time face to face with the problem of solitude. He can appreciate the + danger from wild animals, genii, ghosts, battles, sieges and sudden death, + but in no other book before, did he ever come upon a human being left + solitary, with all these possible dangers to face. + </p> + <p> + The voyages on the raft, the house-building, contriving, fearing, praying, + arguing—all these are full of plaintive pathos and yet of + encouragement. He witnesses despair turned into comfortable resignation as + the result of industry. It has required about twelve years. Virtue is + apparently fattening upon its own reward, when—Smash! Bang!—our + young reader runs upon “the—print—of—a—man's—naked—foot!” + and security and happiness, like startled birds, are flown forever. For + twelve more years this new unseen terror hangs over the poor solitary. + Then we have Friday, the funny cannibals later and it is all over. But the + vast solitude of that poor castaway has entered the imagination of the + youth and dominates it. + </p> + <p> + These two hundred pages are crowded with suggestions that set a boy's mind + on fire, yet every page contains evidence of obvious slovenliness, + indolence and ignorance of human nature and common things, half of which + faults seem directly to contribute to the result, while the other half are + never noticed by the reader. + </p> + <p> + How many of you, who sniff at this, know Crusoe's real name? Yet it stares + right out of the very first paragraphs in the book—a clean, perhaps + accidental, proof of good scholarship, which De Foe possessed. Crusoe + tells us his father was a German from Bremen, who married an Englishwoman, + from whose family name of Robinson came the son's name which was properly + Robinson Kreutznaer. This latter name, he explains, became corrupted in + the common English speech into Crusoe. That is an excellent touch. The + German pronunciation of Kreutznaer would sound like Krites-nare, and a + mere dry scholar would have evolved Crysoe out of the name. But the + English-speaking people everywhere, until within the past twenty years or + so, have given the German “eu” the sound of “oo” or “u.” Robinson's father + therefore was called Crootsner until it was shaved into Crootsno and + thence smoothed to Crusoe. + </p> + <p> + But what was the Christian name of the elder Kreutznaer? Or of the boy's + mother? Or of his brothers or sisters? Or of the first ship captain under + whom he sailed; or any of them; or even of the ship he commanded, and in + which he was wrecked; or of the dog that he carried to the island; or of + the two cats; or of the first and all the other tame goats; or of the + inlet; or of Friday's father; or of the Spaniard he saved; or of the ship + captain; or of the ship that finally saved him? Who knows? The book is a + desert as far as nomenclature goes—the only blossoms being his own + name; that of Wells, a Brazilian neighbor; Xury, the Moorish boy; Friday, + Poll, the parrot; and Will Atkins. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + You may retort that all this doesn't matter. That is very true—and + be hanged to you!—but those facts prove by every canon of literary + art that Robinson Crusoe is either a coldly calculated flight of + consummate genius or an accidental freak of hack literature. When De Foe + wrote, it was only a century after Drake and his companions in authorized + piracy had made the British privateer the scourge of the seas and had + demonstrated that naval supremacy meant the control of the world. The + seafaring life was one of peril, but it carried with it honor, glory and + envy. Forty years later Nelson was born to crown British navalry with + deathless Glory. Even the commonest sailor spoke his ship's name—if + it were a fine vessel—with the same affection that he spoke his + wife's and cursed a bad ship by its name as if to tag its vileness with + proverbiality. + </p> + <p> + When De Foe wrote Alexander Selkirk, able seaman, was alive end had told + his story of shipwreck to Sir Richard Steele, editor of the English + Gentleman and of the Tattler, who wrote it up well—but not half as + well as any one of ten thousand newspaper men of today could do under + similar circumstances. + </p> + <p> + Now who that has read of Selkirk and Dampierre and Stradling does not + remember the two famous ships, the “Cinque Ports” and the “St. George?” In + every actvial book of the times, ship's names were sprinkled over the page + as if they had been shaken out of the pepper box. But you inquire in vain + the name of the slaver that wrecked “poor Robinson Crusoe”—a name + that would have been printed on his memory beyond forgetting because of + the very misfortune itself. Now the book is the autobiography of a man + whose only years of active life between eighteen and twenty-six were + passed as a sailor. It was written apparently after he was seventy-two + years old, at the period when every trifling incident and name of youth + would survive most brightly; yet he names no ships, no sailor mates, + carefully avoids all knowledge of or advantage attaching to any parts of + ships. It is out of character as a sailor's tale, showing that the author + either did not understand the value of or was too indolent to acquire the + ship knowledge that would give to his work the natural smell of salt water + and the bilge. It is a landlubber's sea yarn. + </p> + <p> + Is it in character as a revelation of human nature? No man like unto + Robinson Crusoe ever did live, does live, or ever will live, unless as a + freak deprived of human emotions. The Robinson Crusoe of Despair Island + was not a castaway, but the mature politician. Daniel Defoe of Newgate + Prison. The castaway would have melted into loving recollections; the + imprisoned lampoonist would have busied himself with schemes, ideas, + arguments and combinations for getting out, and getting on. This poor + Robin on the island weeps over nothing but his own sorrows, and, while + pretending to bewail his solitude, turns aside coldly from companionships + next only in affection to those of men. He has a dog, two ship's cats (of + whose “eminent history” he promises something that is never related), tame + goats and parrots. He gives none of them a name, he does not occupy his + yearning for companionship and love by preparing comforts for them or by + teaching them tricks of intelligence or amusement; and when he does make a + stagger at teaching Poll to talk it is for the sole purpose of hearing her + repeat “Poor Robin Crusoe!” The dog is dragged in to work for him, but not + to be rewarded. He dies without notice, as do the cats, and not even a + billet of wood marks their graves. + </p> + <p> + Could any being, with a drop of human blood in his veins, do that? He + thinks of his father with tears in his eyes—because he did not + escape the present solitude by taking the old man's advice! Does he recall + his mother or any of the childish things that lie so long and deep in the + heart of every natural man? Does he ever wonder what his old + school-fellows, Bob Freckles and Pete Baker, are doing these solitary + evenings when he sits under the tropics and hopes—could he not at + least hope it?—that they are, thank God, alive and happy at York? He + discourses like a parson of the utterly impossible affection that Friday + had for his cannibal sire and tells you how noble, Christian and beautiful + it was—as if, by Jove! a little of that virtue wouldn't have + ornamented his own cold, emotionless, fishy heart! + </p> + <p> + He had no sentimental side. Think of those dreary, egotistic, awful + evenings, when, for more than twenty years this infernal hypocrite kept + himself company and tried patiently to deceive God by flattering Him about + religion! It is impossible. Why thought turns as certainly to revery and + recollection as grass turns to seed. He married. What was his wife's name? + We know how much property she had. What were the names of the honest + Portuguese Captain and the London woman who kept his money? The cold + selfishness and gloomy egotism of this creature mark him as a monster and + not as a man. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + So the book is not in character as an autobiography, nor does it contain a + single softening emotion to create sympathy. Let us see whether it be + scholarly in its ease. The one line that strikes like a bolt of lightning + is the height of absurdity. We have all laughed, afterward of course, at + that—single—naked—foot—print. It could not have + been there without others, unless Friday were a one legged man, or was + playing the good old Scots game of “hop-scotch!” + </p> + <p> + But the foot-print is not a circumstance to the cannibals. All the stage + burlesques of Robinson Crusoe combined could not produce such funny + cannibals as he discovered. Crusoe's cannibals ate no flesh but that of + men! He had no great trouble contriving how to induce Friday to eat goat's + flesh! They took all the trouble to come to his island to indulge in + picnics, during which they ate up folks, danced and then went home before + night. When the big party of 31 arrived, they had with them one other + cannibal of Friday's tribe, a Spaniard, and Friday's father. It appears + they always carefully unbound a victim before despatching him. They + brought Friday pere for lunch, although he was old, decrepit and thin—a + condition that always unfits a man among all known cannibals for serving + as food. They reject them as we do stringy old roosters for spring + chickens in the best society. Then Friday, born a cannibal and converted + to Crusoe's peculiar religion, shows that in three years he has acquired + all the emotions of filial affection prevalent at that time among + Yorkshire folk who attended dissenting chapels. More wonderful still! old + Friday pere, immersed in age and cannibalism, has the corresponding + paternal feeling. Crusoe never says exactly where these cannibals came + from, but my own belief is that they came from that little Swiss town + whence the little wooden animals for toy Noah's Arks also came. + </p> + <p> + A German savant—one of the patient sort that spend half a life + writing a monograph on the variation of spots on the butterfly's wings—could + get a philosophical dissertation on Doubt out of Crusoe's troubles with + pens, ink and paper; also clothes. In the volume I am using, on page 86, + third paragraph, he says: “I should lose my reckoning of time for want of + books, and pen and ink.” So he kept it by notches in wood, he tells in the + fourth paragraph. In paragraph 5, same page, he says: “We are to observe + that among the many things I brought out of the ship, I got several of + less value, etc., which I omitted setting down as in particular pens, ink + and paper!” Same paragraph, lower down: “I shall show that while my ink + lasted I kept things very exact, but after that was gone I could not make + any ink by any means that I could devise.” Page 87, second paragraph: “I + wanted many things, notwithstanding all the many things that I had amassed + together, and of these ink was one!” Page 88, first paragraph: “I drew up + my affairs in writing!” Now, by George! did you ever hear of more + appearing and disappearing pens, ink and paper? + </p> + <p> + The adventures of his clothes were as remarkable as his own. On his very + first trip to the wreck, after landing, he went “rummaging for clothes, of + which I found enough,” but took no more than he wanted for present use. On + the second trip he “took all the men's clothes” (and there were fifteen + souls on board when she sailed). Yet in his famous debit and credit + calculations between good and evil he sets these down, page 88: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + EVIL | GOOD + ————————————————————————— + I have no clothes to | But I am in a hot climate, + cover me. | where, if I had + | clothes (!) I could hardly + | wear them. +</pre> + <p> + On page 147, bewailing his lack of a sieve, he says: “Linen, I had none + but what was mere rags.” + </p> + <p> + Page 158 (one year later): “My clothes, too, began to decay; as to linen, + I had had none a good while, except some checkered shirts, which I + carefully preserved, because many times I could bear no other clothes on. + I had almost three dozen of shirts, several thick watch coats, too hot to + wear.” + </p> + <p> + So he tried to make jackets out of the watch coats. Then this ingenious + gentleman, who had nothing to wear and was glad of it on account of the + heat, which kept him from wearing anything but a shirt, and rendered watch + coats unendurable, actually made himself a coat, waistcoat, breeches, cap + and umbrella of skins with the hair on and wore them in great comfort! + Page 175 he goes hunting, wearing this suit, belted by two heavy skin + belts, carrying hatchet, saw, powder, shot, his heavy fowling piece and + the goatskin umbrella—total weight of baggage and clothes about + ninety pounds. It must have been a cold day! + </p> + <p> + Yet the first thing he does for the naked Friday thirteen years later is + to give him a pair—of—LINEN—trousers! Poor Robin Crusoe—what + a colossal liar was wasted on a desert island! + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Of course, no boy sees the blemishes in “Robinson Crusoe;” those are left + to the Infallible Critic. The book is as ludicrous as “Hamlet” from one + aspect and as profound as “Don Quixote” from another. In its pages the + wonder tales and wonder facts meet and resolve; realism and idealism are + joined—above all, there is a mystery no critic may solve. It is + useless to criticize genius or a miracle, except to increase its wonder. + Who remembers anything in “Crusoe” but the touch of the wizard's hand? Who + associates the Duke of Athens, Hermia and Helena, with Bottom and Snug, + Titania, Oberon and Puck? Any literary master mechanic might real off ten + thousand yards of the Greek folks or of “Pericles,” but when you want + something that runs thus: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “I know a bank whereon the wild thyme blows! + Where oxlip and the nodding violet grows—.” + </pre> + <p> + why, then, my masters, you must put up the price and employ a genius to + work the miracle. + </p> + <p> + Take all miracles without question. Whether work of genius or miracle of + accident, “Robinson Crusoe” gives you a generous run for your money. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0005" id="link2H_4_0005"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + V. THE OPEN POLAR SEA OF NOVELS + </h2> + <h3> + WITH HIGHLY INCENDIARY ADVICE TO BOYS AND SOME MORE ANCIENT HISTORY + </h3> + <p> + After the first novel has been read, somewhere under the seasoned age of + fourteen years, the beginner equipped with inherent genius for novel + reading is afloat upon an open sea of literature, a master mariner of his + own craft, having ports to make, to leave, to take, so splendid of variety + and wonder as to make the voyages of Sinbad sing small by comparison. It + may be proper and even a duty here to suggest to the young novel reader + that the Ten Commandments and all governmental statutes authorize the + instant killing, without pity or remorse, of any heavy-headed and + intrusive person who presumes to map out for him a symmetrical and + well-digested course of novel reading. The murder of such folks is + universally excused as self-defense and secretly applauded as a public + service. The born novel reader needs no guide, counsellor or friend. He is + his own “master.” He can with perfect safety and indescribable delight + shut his eyes, reach out his hand, pull down any plum of a book and never + make a mistake. Novel reading is the only one of the splendid occupations + of life calling for no instruction or advice. All that is necessary is to + bite the apple with the largest freedom possible to the intellectual and + imaginative jaws, and let the taste of it squander itself all the way down + from the front teeth until it is lost in the digestive joys of memory. + There is no miserable quail limit to novels—you can read thirty + novels in thirty days or 365 novels in 365 days for thirty years, and the + last one will always have the delicious taste of the pies of childhood. + </p> + <p> + If any honest-minded boy chances to read these lines, let him charge his + mind with full contempt for any misguided elders who have designs of + “choosing only the best accepted novels” for his reading. There are no + “best” novels except by the grace of the poor ones, and, if you don't read + the poor ones, the “best” will be as tasteless as unsalted rice. I say to + boys that are worth growing up: don't let anybody give you patronizing + advice about novels. If your pastors and masters try oppression, there is + the orchard, the creek bank, the attic room, the roof of the woodshed + (under the peach tree), and a thousand other places where you may hide and + maintain your natural independence. Don't let elderly and officious + persons explain novels to you. They can not honestly do so; so don't waste + time. Every boy of fourteen, with the genius to read 'em, is just as good + a judge of novels and can understand them quite as well as any gentleman + of brains of any old age. Because novels mean entirely different things to + every blessed reader. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + The main thing at the beginning is to be in the neighborhood of a good + “novel orchard” and to nibble and eat, and even “gormandize,” as your + fancy leads you. Only—as you value your soul and your honor as a + gentleman—bear in mind that what you read in every novel that + pleases you is sacred truth. There are busy-bodies, pretenders to + “culture,” and sticklers for the multiplication table and Euclid's + pestiferous theorem, who will tell you that novel reading is merely for + entertainment and light accomplishment, and that the histories of fiction + are purely imaginary and not to be taken seriously. That is pure + falsehood. The truth of all humanity, as well as all its untruth, flows in + a noble stream through the pages of fiction. Do not allow the elders to + persuade you that pirate stories, battles, sieges, murders and sudden + deaths, the road to transgression and the face of dishonesty are not good + for you. They are 90 per cent. pure nutriment to a healthy boy's mind, and + any other sort of boy ought particularly to read them and so learn the + shortest cut to the penitentiary for the good of the world. Whenever you + get hold of a novel that preaches and preaches and preaches, and can't + give a poor ticket-of-leave man or the decentest sort of a villain credit + for one good trait—Gee, Whizz! how tiresome they are—lose it, + you young scamp, at once, if you respect yourself. If you are pushed you + can say that Bill Jones took it away from you and threw it in the creek. + The great Victor Hugo and the authors of that noble drama “The Two + Orphans,” are my authorities for the statement that some fibs—not + all fibs, but some proper fibs—are entered in heaven on both debit + and credit sides of the book of fate. + </p> + <p> + There is one book, the Book of Books, swelling rich and full with the + wisdom and beauty and joy and sorrow of humanity—a book that set + humility like a diamond in the forehead of virtue; that found mercy and + charity outcasts among the minds of men and left them radiant queens in + the world's heart; that stickled not to describe the gorgeous esotery of + corroding passion and shamed it with the purity of Mary Magdelen; that + dragged from the despair of old Job the uttermost poison-drop of doubt and + answered it with the noble problem of organized existence; that teems with + murder and mistake and glows with all goodness and honest aspiration—that + is the Book of Books. There hasn't been one written since that has crossed + the boundary of its scope. What would that book be after some goody-goody + had expurgated it of evil and left it sterilized in butter and sugar? Let + no ignorant paternal Czar, ruling over cottage or mansion, presume to keep + from the mind and heart of youth the vigorous knowledge and observation of + evil and good, crime and virtue together. No chaff, no wheat; no dross, no + gold; no human faults and weaknesses, no heavenly hope. And if any + gentleman does not like the sentiment, he can find me at my usual place of + residence, unless he intends violence—and be hanged, also, to him! + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + A novel is a novel, and there are no bad ones in the world, except those + you do not happen to like. Suppose a boy started with Robinson Crusoe and + was scientifically and criminally steered by the hand of misguided + “culture” to Scott and Dickens and Cooper and Hawthorne—all the + classics, in fact, so that he would escape the vulgar thousands? Answer a + straight question, ye old rooters between a thousand miles of muslin lids—would + you have been willing to miss “The Gunmaker of Moscow” back yonder in the + green days of say forty years ago? What do you think of Prof. William + Henry Peck's “Cryptogram?” Were not Sylvanus Cobb, Jr., and Emerson + Bennett authors of renown—honor to their dust, wherever it lies! + Didn't you read Mrs. Southworth's “Capitola” or the “Hidden Hand” long + before “Vashti” was dreamed of? Don't you remember that No. 52 of Beadle's + Dime Library (light yellowish red paper covers) was “Silverheels, the + Delaware,” and that No. 77 was “Schinderhannes, the Outlaw of the Black + Forest?” I yield to no man in affection and reverence for M. Dumas, Mr. + Thackeray and others of the higher circles, but what's the matter with Ned + Buntline, honest, breezy, vigorous, swinging old Ned? Put the “Three + Guardsmen” where you will, but there is also room for “Buffalo Bill, the + Scout.” When I first saw Col. Cody, an ornament to the theatre and a + painful trial to the drama, and realized that he was Buffalo Bill in the + flesh—why, I was glad I had also read “Buffalo Bill's Last Shot”—(may + he never shoot it). The day has passed forever, probably, when Buffalo + Bill shall shout to his other scouts, “You set fire to the girl while I + take care of the house!” or vice versa, and so saying, bear the fainting + heroine triumphantly off from the treacherous redskins. But the story has + lived. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + It was a happy and honored custom in the old days for subscribers to the + New York Ledger and the New York Weekly to unite in requests for the + serial republication of favorite stories in those great fireside + luminaries. They were the old-fashioned, broadside sheets and, of course, + there were insuperable difficulties against preserving the numbers. After + a year or two, therefore, there would awaken a general hunger among the + loyal hosts to “read the story over,” and when the demand was sufficiently + strong the publishers would repeat it, cuts, divisions, and all, just as + at first. How many times the “Gunmaker of Moscow” was repeated in the + Ledger, heaven knows. I remember I petitioned repeatedly for “Buffalo + Bill” in the Weekly, and we got it, too, and waded through it again. By + wading, I don't mean pushing laboriously and tediously through, but, by + George! half immersion in the joy. It was a week between numbers, and a + studious and appreciative boy made no bones of reading the current weekly + chapters half a dozen times over while waiting for the next. + </p> + <p> + It must have been ten years later that I felt a thrill at the coming of + Buffalo Bill himself in his first play. I had risen to the dignity of + dramatic critic upon a journal of limited civilization and boundless + politics, and was privileged to go behind the scenes at the theatre and + actually speak to the actors. (I interviewed Mary Anderson during her + first season, in the parlor of the local hotel, where honest George + Bristow—who kept the cigar stand and could not keep a healthy + appetite—always gave a Thanksgiving order for “two-whole-roast + turkeys and a piece of breast,” and they were served, too, the whole ones + going to some near-by hospital, and the piece of breast to George's honest + stomach—good, kind soul that he was. And Miss Anderson chewed gum + during the whole period of the interview to the intense amusement of my + elder and brother dramatic critic, who has since become the honored + governor of his adopted state, and toward whom I beg to look with + affectionate memory of those days.) Now, when a man has known novels + intimately, has been dramatic critic, and has traveled with a circus, it + seems to me in all reason he can not fairly have any other earthly joys to + desire. At fifteen I was walking on tip-toe about the house on Sundays, + and going off to the end of the garden to softly whistle “weekday” tunes, + and at twenty I stood off the wings L. U. E., and had twenty “Black Crook” + coryphees in silk tights and tarletan squeeze past in line, and nod and + say, “Is it going all right in front?” They—knew—I—was—the—Critic! + When you can do that you can laugh at Byron, roosting around upon + inaccessible mountain crags and formulating solitude and indigestion into + poetry! + </p> + <p> + I waited for Buffalo Bill's coming with feelings that can not be + described. It was impossible to expect to meet Sir William Wallace in the + flesh, or Sir Wilfred of Ivanhoe, or Capt. D'Artagnan, or Umslopogaas, or + any one of a thousand great fighting heroes; but here was Buffalo Bill, + just as great and glorious and dashing and handsome as any of them, and my + right hand tingled to be grasped in that of the Bayard of the Prairies. + And that hand's desire was attained. In his dressing-room between acts I + sat nervously on a chair while the splendid Apollo of frontiersmen, in + buckskin and beads, sat on his trunk, with his long, shapely legs sprawled + gracefully out, his head thrown back so that the mane of brown hair should + hang behind. It was glistening with oil and redolent of barber's perfume. + And we talked there as one man to another, each apparently without fear. I + was certainly nervous and timid, but he did not notice it, and I am frank + to say he did not appear to feel the slightest personal fear of me. Thus, + face to face, I saw the man with whom I had trod Ned Buntline's boundless + plains and had seen and encountered a thousand perils and redskins. When + the act call came, and I rose to go, a man stopped at the door and said to + him: + </p> + <p> + “What shall it be to-night, Colonel?” + </p> + <p> + “A big beef-steak and a bottle of Bass!” answered Buffalo Bill heartily, + “and tell 'ern to have it hot and ready at 11:15.” + </p> + <p> + The beef-steak and Bass' ale were the watchwords of true heroism. The real + hero requires substantial filling. He must have a head and a heart—but + no less a good, healthy and impatient stomach. + </p> + <p> + In the daily paper the morning I write this I see the announcement of + Buffalo Bill's “Wild West Show” coming two week's hence. Good luck to him! + He can't charge prices too steep for me, and there are six seats necessary—the + best in the amphitheater. And I wish I could be sure the vigorous spirit + of Ned Buntline would be looking down from the blue sky overhead to see + his hero charge the hill of San Juan at the head of the Rough Riders. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + This digression may be wide of the subject of novel reading, but the real + novel reader is at home anywhere. He has thoughts, dreams, reveries, + fancies. All the world is his novel and all actions are stories and all + the actors are characters. When Lucile Western, the excellent American + actress, was at the height of her powers, not long before her last + appearances, she had as her leading man a big, slouchy and careless + person, who was advertised as “the talented young English actor, William + Whally.” In the intimacies of private association he was known as Bill + Whally, and his descent was straight down from “Mount Sinai's awful + height.” He was a Hebrew and no better or more uneven and reckless actor + ever played melodramatic “heavies.” He had a love for Shakespeare, but + could not play him; he had a love of drink and could gratify it. His + vigorous talents purchased for him much forbearance. I've seen Mr. Whally + play the fastidious and elegant “Sir Archibald Levison” in shiny black + doe-skin trousers and old-fashioned cloth gaiters, because his condition + rendered the problem of dressing somewhat doubtful, though it could not + obscure his acting. He was the only walking embodiment of “Bill Sykes” I + ever saw, and I contracted the habit of going to see him kill Miss Western + as “Nancy” because he butchered that young woman with a broken chair more + satisfactorily than anybody else I ever saw. There was a murderer for you—Bill + Sykes! Bad as he was in most things, let us not forget that—he—killed—Nancy—and—killed—her—well + and—thoroughly. If that young woman didn't snivel herself under a + just sentence of death, I'm no fit householder to serve on a jury. Every + time Miss Western came around it was my custom to read up fresh on “Oliver + Twist” and hurry around and enjoy Bill Whally's happy application of + retribution with the aid of the old property chair. There were six other + persons whom I succeeded in persuading to applaud the scene with me every + time it was acted. + </p> + <p> + But there's a separate chapter for villains. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Let us return to the old novels. What curious pranks time plays with + tastes and vogues. Forty years ago N. P. Willis was just faded. Yet he was + long a great comet of literary glitter and obscured many men of much + greater ability. Everybody read him; the annuals hung upon his name; the + ladies regarded him as a finer and more dashing Byron than Byron. The + place he filled was much like that of Congreve, before whom Shakespeare's + great nose was out of joint for a long time; Congreve, who was the + margarita aluminata major of English poesy and drama and public life, and + is now found in junk stores and in the back line on book shelves and whom + nobody reads now. Willis had his languid affectations, his superficial + cynicism and added to them ostentatious sentimentality. + </p> + <p> + Does anybody read William Gilmore Simm's elaborate rhetoric disguised as + novels? He must have written two dozen of them, the Richardson of the + United States. Lovers of delicious wit and intellectual humor still read + Dr. Holmes' essays, but it would probably take a physician's prescription + to make them swallow the novels. In what dark corners of the library are + Bayard Taylor's novels and travels hidden? Will you come into the garden, + Maud, and read Chancellor Walworth's mighty tragedies and Miss Mulock's + Swiss-toy historical novels, or will you beg off, like the honest girl you + are, and take a nap? Your sleepiness, dear Miss Maud, does you credit. By + the way, what the deuce is the name of anyone of these novels? I can + recall “Elsie Vernier,” by Dr. Holmes and then there is a blank. + </p> + <p> + But what classics they were—then! In the thick of them had appeared + a newspaper story that struggled through and was printed in book form. Old + friends have told me how they waited at the country post-offices to get a + copy, delayed for weeks. It was a scandal to read it in some localities. + It was fiercely attacked as an outrageous exaggeration produced by + temporary excitement and hostile feeling, or praised as a new gospel. It + has been translated into every tongue having a printing press, and has + sold by millions of copies. It was “Uncle Tom's Cabin.” It was not a + classic, but what a vigorous immortal mongrel of human sentiment it was! + What a row was kicked up over Miss Braddon's “Octoroon,” and what an + impossible yellowback it was! The toughest piece of fiction I met with as + a boy was “Sanford and Merton,” and I've been aching to say so for four + pages. If this world were full of Sanfords and Mertons, then give me + Jupiter or some other comfortable planet at a secure sanitary distance + removed. + </p> + <p> + I can't even remember the writers who were grammatically and rhetorically + perfect forty years ago, and also very dull with it all. Is there a + bookshelf that holds “Leni Leoti, or The Flower of the Prairies?” There + are “Jane Eyre,” “Lady Audley's Secret,” and “John Halifax, Gentleman,” + which will go with many and are all well worth the reading, too. Are Mrs. + Eliza A. Dupuy, Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth, Mrs. Caroline Lee Hentz and + Augusta J. Evans dead? Their novels still live—look at the book + stores. “Linda, or the Young Pilot of the Belle Creole,” “India, the Pearl + of Pearl River,” “The Planter's Northern Bride,” “St. Elmo”—they + were fiction for you! A boy old enough to have a first sweetheart could + swallow them by the mile. + </p> + <p> + You remember, when we were boys, the circus acrobats always—always, + remember—rubbed young children with snake-oil and walloped them with + a rawhide to educate them in tumbling and contortion? Well, if I could get + the snake-oil for the joints and a curly young wig, I'd like to get back + at five hundred of those books and devour them again—“as of yore!” + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0006" id="link2H_4_0006"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + VI. RASCALS + </h2> + <h3> + BEING A DISCOURSE UPON GOOD, HONEST SCOUNDRELISM AND VILLAINS. + </h3> + <p> + The people that inhabit novels are like other peoples of the earth—if + they are peaceful, they have no history. So that, therefore, in novels, as + in nations, it is the great restless heights of society that are to be + approached with greatest awe and that engage admiration and regard. + Everybody is interested in Nero, but not one person in ten thousand can + tell you anything definite about Constantine or even Marcus Aurelius. If + you should speak off-handedly about Amelia Sedley in the presence of a + thousand average readers you would probably miss 85 per cent. of effect; + if you said Becky Sharp the whole thousand would understand. + </p> + <p> + There is this to be said of disreputable folk, that they are clever and + picturesque and interesting, at least. + </p> + <p> + An elderly jeweler in New York City was arrested several years ago upon + the charge of receiving stolen gold and silver plate, watches and jewelry + from well-known thieves. For forty years he had been a respected merchant, + a church officer, a husband, father, and citizen, of irreproachable + reputation, with enduring friendships. He was charitable, liberal and + kindly. For decade after decade he was the experienced, wise and fatherly + “fence” of professional burglars and thieves. Why, it would be an + education in itself to know that man, to shake his honest hand, fresh from + charity or concealment, and smoke a pipe with him and hear him talk about + things frankly. When he gave to the missionary collection, rest assured he + gave sincerely; when he “covered swag,” into the melting pot for an + industrious burglar, he did so only in the regular course of business. + </p> + <p> + Strange as it may seem, even criminals have human feelings in common with + all of us. The old Thug who stepped aside into the bushes and prayed + earnestly while his son was throwing his first strangling cloth around the + throat of the English traveler—prayed for that son's honorable, + successful beginning in his life devotion—was a good father. And + when he was told that the son had acted with unusual skill, who can doubt + that his tears of joy were sincere and humble tears of thankfulness? At + least Bowanee knew. Can you not imagine a kind-hearted Chinese matron + saying to her neighbor over the bamboo fence, “Yes, we sent the baby down + to the beach (or the river bank or the forest) yesterday. We couldn't + afford to keep it. I hope the gods have taken its little soul. At any rate + it is sure of salvation hereafter.” + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Some twenty years ago I took the night train from Pineville to + Barbourville, in the Kentucky mountains, reaching the latter place about + 11 o'clock of a cold, rainy, dark November night. Only one other passenger + alighted. There was an express wagon to take us to the town, a mile or so + distant, and the wagon was already heavy with freight packages. The road + was through a narrow lane, hub-deep with mud, and what, with stalling and + resting, we were more than half an hour getting to the hotel. My fellow + passenger was about my age, and was a shrewd, well-informed native of the + vicinity. He knew the mineral, timber and agricultural resources, was + evidently an enterprising business man and an intelligent but not voluble + talker. He accepted a cigar, and advised me to see the house in + Barbourville where the late Justice Samuel Miller was born. At the hotel + he registered first, and, as he was going to leave next day and I was to + remain several days, he told the clerk to give me the better of the two + rooms vacant. It was a very pleasant act of thoughtfulness. The name on + the register was “A. Johnson.” The next day I asked the clerk about Mr. + Johnson. My fellow passenger was Andy Johnson, whose fame as a + feud-fighter and slayer of men has never been exceeded in the history of + mountain feuds. He then had three or four men to his credit, definitely, + and several doubtful ascriptions. He added a few more, I believe, before + he met the inevitable. + </p> + <p> + Now, while Mr. Johnson, in all matters where killing seemed to him to be + appropriate, was a most prompt and accurate man in accomplishing it, yet + he was not the murderer that ignorant and isolated folks conceive such + persons to be. The cigar I had given him was a very bad, cheap cigar, and, + if he had merely wanted murder, he had every reason to kill me for giving + it to him, and he had a perfect night for the deed. But he smoked it to + the stub without a complaint or remark and saw that I got the best room in + the hotel. Johnson was a cautious and considerate fellow-man, whose + murders were doubtless private hobbies and exercises growing out of his + environment and heredity. + </p> + <p> + One of the houses I most delight to enter in a certain town is one where I + am always sure to see a devoted and happy wife and beautiful, playful + children clustering around the armchair in which sits a man who committed + one of the most cold-blooded assassinations you can imagine. He is an + honored, esteemed and model citizen. His acquittal was a miracle in a + million chances. He has justified it. It is beautiful to see those happy + children clinging to the hand that— + </p> + <p> + Well, dear friends, the dentist is not a cruel man in his social capacity, + and you can get delicious viands instead of nauseous medicines at the + doctor's private table. + </p> + <p> + That is why beginning novel readers should take no advice. Strike out + alone through the highways and lanes of story, character and experience. + The best novelist is the one who fears not to tell you the truth, which is + more wonderful than fiction. It is always the best hearts that bend to + mistakes. Absolute virtue is as sterile as granite rock; absolute vice is + as poisonous as a stagnant pond. No healthy interest or speculation can + linger about either. Enter into the struggle and know human nature; don't + stay outside and try to appear superior. + </p> + <p> + For, which of us has not his crimes of thought to account for? Think not, + because Andy Johnson or William Sykes or Dr. Webster actually killed his + man, that you are guiltless, because you haven't. Have you never wanted + to? Answer that, in your conscience and in solitude—not to me. Speak + up to yourself and then say whether the difference between you and the + recorded criminal is not merely the difference between the overt act and + the faltering wish. It is a matter of courage or of custom. Speaking for + one gentleman, who knows himself and is not afraid to confess, I can say + that, while he could not kill a mouse with his own hand, he has often + murdered men in his heart. It may have been in fiery youth over the wrong + name on a dancing card, or, later, when a rival got the better of him in + discussion, or, when the dreary bore came and wouldn't go, or, when + misdirected goodness insisted on thrusting upon him intended kindness that + was wormwood and poison to the soul. Are we not covetous (not confessedly, + of course, but actually)? Is not covetousness the thwarted desire of theft + without courage? How many of us, now—speaking man to man—can + open up our veiled thoughts and desires and then look the Ten Commandments + in the eye without blushing? + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + The bravest, noblest, gentlest gentleman I have ever known was the Count + de la Fere, whom we at the Hotel de Troisville, in old Paris, called + “Athos.” He was not merely sans peur et sans reproche as Bayard, but was + positive in his virtues. He fought for his friends without even asking the + cause of the fray. Yet, what a prig he seemed to be at first, with his + eternal gentle melancholy, his irreproachable courtesy, unvarying kindness + and complete unselfishness. You cannot—quite—warm—to—a—man + —who—is—so—perfectly—right—that—he—embarrasses—everybody—but—the—angels. + </p> + <p> + But, when he ordered the gloomy and awful death of the treacherous Miladi, + woman though she was, and thus as a perfect gentleman took on human + frailty also, ah! how attractively noble and strong he became I In that + respect he was the antithetical corollary of William Sykes, who was a + purposeless, useless and uninterestingly regular scoundrel, thief and + brute, until he redeemed himself by becoming the instrument of social + justice and pounding that unendurable lady, Miss Nancy, of his name, into + absence from the world. Perhaps I have remarked before—and even if I + have it is pleasant to repeat it—that Bill Sykes had his faults, as + also have most of us, but it was given to him to earn forgiveness by the + aid of a cheap chair and the providential propinquity of Miss Nancy. I + never think of it without regretting that poor Bill Whally is dead. He did + it—so—much—to—my—taste! + </p> + <p> + Who shall we say is the most loved and respected criminal in fiction? Not + Monsignor Rodin, of “The Wandering Jew;” not Thenardier in “Les + Miserables.” These are really not criminals; they are allegorical figures + of perfect crime. They are solar centers, so far off and fixed that one + may regard them only with awe, reverence and fear. They are types of fate, + desire, temptation and chastisement. Let us turn to our own flesh and + blood and speak gratefully of them. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Who says Count Fosco? Now there is a criminal worthy of affection and + confidence. What an expansive nature, with kindness presented on every + side. Even the dogs fawned upon him and the birds came at his call. An + accomplished gentleman, considerately mannered—queer, as becomes a + foreigner, yet possessing the touchstone of universal sympathy. Another + man with crime to commit almost certainly would have dispatched it with + ruthless coldness; but how kindly and gently Count Fosco administered the + cord of necessity. With what delicacy he concealed the bowstring and spoke + of the Bosphorus only as a place for moonlight excursions. He could have + presented prussic acid and sherry to a lady in such a manner as to render + the results a grateful sacrifice to his courtesy. It was all due to his + corpulence; a “lean and hungry” villain lacks repose, patience and the + tact of good humor. In almost every small social and individual attitude + Count Fosco was human. He was exceedingly attentive to his wife in society + and bullied her only in private and when necessary. He struck no dramatic + attitudes. “The world is mine oyster!” is not said by real men bent on + terrible deeds. Count Fosco is the perfect villain, and also the perfect + criminal, inasmuch as he not only acts naturally, but deliberately + determines the action instead of being drawn into it or having it forced + upon him. + </p> + <p> + He was a highly cultivated type of Andy Johnson, inasmuch as crime with + him was not a life purpose, but what is called in business a “side-line.” + All of us have our hobbies; the closely confined clerk goes home and roots + up his yard to plant flower bulbs or cabbage plants; another fancies + fowls; another man collects pewter pots and old brass and the millionaire + takes to priceless horses; others of us turn from useful statistics and go + broke on novels or poetry or music. Count Fosco was an educated gentleman + and the pleasure of life was his purpose; crime and intrigue were his + recreations. Andy Johnson was a good business man and wealth producer; + murder was the direction in which his private understanding of personal + disagreements was exercised and vented. Some men turn to poker playing, + which is as wasteful as murder and not half as dignified. Count Fosco is + the villain par excellence of novels. I do not remember what he did, + because “The Woman in White” is the best novel in the world to read + gluttonously at a sitting and then forget absolutely. It is nearly always + a new book if you use it that way. When the world is dark, the fates + bilious, the appetite dead and the infernal twinges of pain or sickness + seem beyond reach of the doctor, “The Woman in White” is a friend indeed. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + But the man of men for villains, not necessarily criminals; but the + ordinary, every-day, picturesque worthies of good, honest scoundrelism and + disreputableness is Sir Robert Louis Stevenson. You can afford + conscientiously to stuff ballot boxes in order that his election may be + secured as Poet Laureate of Rascals. Leaving out John Silver and Billy + Bones and Alan Breck, whom every privately shriven rascal of us simply + must honor and revere as giants of courage, cunning and controlled, + conscience, Stevenson turned from singles and pairs, and in “The Ebb + Tide,” drove, by turns, tandem and abreast, a four-in-hand of scoundrels + so buoyant, natural, strong, and yet each so totally unlike the others, + that every honest novel reader may well be excused for shedding tears when + he reflects that the marvelous hand and heart that created them are gone + forever from the haunts of the interestingly wicked. No novelist ever + exposed the human nature of rascals as Stevenson did. + </p> + <p> + Now, lago was not a villain; he was a venomous toad, a scorpion, a + mad-dog, a poisonous plant in a fair meadow. There was nobody lago loved, + no weakness he concealed, no point of contact with any human being. His + sister was Pandora, his brother made the shirt of Nessus, himself dealt in + Black Plagues and the Leprosy. The old Serpent was permitted to rise from + his belly and walk upright on the tip of his tail when he met Iago, as a + demonstration of moral superiority. But think of those three + Babes-in-the-Wood villains, skipper Davis, the Yankee swashbuckler and + ship scuttler; Herrick, the dreamy poet, ruined by commerce and early + love, with his days of remorse and his days of compensatary liquor; and + Huish, the great-hearted Scotch ruffian, who chafed at the conventional + concealments of trade among pals and never could—as a true Scotchman—understand + why you should wait to use a knife upon a victim when promptness lay in + the club right at hand—think of them sailing out of Honolulu harbor + on the Farallone. + </p> + <p> + Let who will prefer to have sailed with Jason or Aeneas or Sinbad; but the + Farallone and its precious freight of rascality gets my money every time. + Think of the three incomparable reprobates afloat, with one case of + smallpox and a cargo of champagne, daring to make no port, with over a + hundred million square miles of ocean around them, every ten lookout knots + of it containing a possible peril! It was simply grand—not pirates, + shipwrecks or mutinies could beat that problem. And the pathos of the + sixth day, when, with every man Jack of them looking delirium tremens in + the face and suspecting each the other, Mr. Huish opened a new case of + champagne and—found clear spring water under the French label! The + honest scoundrels had been laid by the heels by a common wine merchant in + the regular way of business! Oh, gentlemen, there should be honor in + business; so that gallant villains can be free of betrayal. + </p> + <p> + The keynote of these gentlemen is struck in the second chapter, where all + three of them writing lies home—Davis and Herrick, sentimental + equivocations, Huish the strongest of brag with nobody to send it to. In a + burst of weakness Davis tells Herrick what a villain he has been, through + rum, and how he can not let his daughter, “little Adar,” know it. “Yes, + there was a woman on board,” he said, describing the ship he had scuttled. + “Guess I sent her to hell, if there's such a place. I never dared go home + again, and I don't know,” he added, bitterly, “what's come to them.” + </p> + <p> + “Thank you, Captain,” said Herrick, “I never liked you better!” + </p> + <p> + Is it not in human nature to cuddle to a great sheepish murderer like + that, who groans in secret for his little girl—if even the girl was + truth? I think she turned out a myth, but he had the sentiment. + </p> + <p> + Was there ever a more melancholy, remorse-stricken wretch than Cap'n + Davis? Or a gentler and seedier poet than Herrick? Or a more finely sodden + and soaked old rum sport than Huish (not—Whish!) But it was not + until they fell in with Attwater that their weakness as scoundrels was + exposed. Attwater was so splendidly religious! He was determined to have + things right if he had to have them so by bloodshed; he saved souls by + bullets. Things were right when they were as he thought they should be. + And believing so, with Torquemada, Alexander Sixtus and other most + religious brethren, he was ready to set up the stake and fagot and + cauterize sin with fire. One thing you can say about the religious folks + that are big with cocksureness and a mission—they may make mistakes, + but the mistake doesn't talk and criticise. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + The only rascal worthy to travel in company with Stevenson's rascals is + the Chevalier Balibari, of Castle Barry, in Ireland, whose admirable + memoirs have been so well told by Mr. Thackeray. The Baron de la Motte in + “Denis Duval,” was advantageously born to ornament the purple and fine + linen of picturesque unrighteousness—but his was a brief star that + fell unfinished from its place amidst the Pleiades. Thackeray's genius ran + more to disreputable men than to actual villains. But he drew two + scoundrels that will serve as beacon lights to any clean-souled youth with + the instinct to take warning. One was Lord Steyne, the other, Dr. George + Brand Firmin; one the aristocratic, class-bred, cynical brute, the other + the cold, tuft-hunting trained hypocrite. What encouragement of + self-respect Judas Iscariot might have received if he had met Dr. Firmin! + </p> + <p> + Dr. Chadband, Mr. Pecksniff, Bill Sykes, Fagin, Mr. Murdstone, of Dickens' + family—they are all strong in impression, but wholly unreal; mere + stage villains and caricatures. A villain who has no good traits, no + hobbies of kindness and affection, is never born into the world; he is + always created by grotesque novel writers. + </p> + <p> + The villains of Dumas, Hugo, Balzac, Daudet are French. There may have + been, or may be now such prototypes alive in France—because the + Dreyfus case occurred in France, and no doubt much can happen in that + fine, fertile country which translators cannot fully convey over the + frontiers; but they have always seemed to me first cousins to my friends, + the ogres, the evil magicians and the werewolves, and, in that much, not + quite natural. + </p> + <p> + For heroes of the genuine cavalleria type, plumed, doubleted, pumpt and + magnificent, give me Dumas; for good folks and true, the great American + Fenimore Cooper; but for the blessed company of blooming, breathing + rascals, Stevenson and Thackeray all the time. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0007" id="link2H_4_0007"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + VII. HEROES + </h2> + <p> + THE NATURE AND THE FLOWER OF THEM—THE GALLANT D'ARTAGNAN OR THE + GLORIOUS BUSSY. + </p> + <p> + Let us agree at the start that no perfect hero can be entirely mortal. The + nearer the element of mortality in him corresponds to the heel measure of + Achilles, the better his chance as hero. The Egyptian and Greek heroes + were invariably demi-gods on the paternal or maternal side. Few actual + historic heroes have escaped popular scandal concerning their origin, + because the savage logic in us demands lions from a lion; that Theseus + shall trace to Mars; that courage shall spring from courage. + </p> + <p> + Another most excellent thing about the ideal hero is that the immortal + quality enables him to go about the business of his heroism without + bothering his head with the rights or wrongs of it, except as the + prevailing sentiment of social honor (as distinguished from the inborn + sentiment of honesty) requires at the time. Of course, there is a lower + grade of measly, “moral heroes,” who (thank heaven and the innate sense of + human justice!) are usually well peppered with sorrow and punishment. The + hero of romance is a different stripe; Hyperion to a Satyr. He doesn't go + around groaning page after page of top-heavy debates as to the inherent + justice of his cause or his moral right to thrust a tallow candle between + the particular ribs behind which the heart of his enemy is to be found—balancing + his pros and cons, seeking a quo for each quid, and conscientiously + prowling for final authorities. When you invade the chiropodical secret of + the real hero's fine boot, or brush him in passing—if you have + looked once too often at a certain lady, or have stood between him and the + sun, or even twiddled your thumbs at him in an indecorous or careless + manner—look to it that you be prepared to draw and mayhap to be + spitted upon his sword's point, with honor. Sdeath! A gentlemen of courage + carries his life lightly at the needle end of his rapier, as that + wonderful Japanese, Samsori, used to make the flimsiest feather preside in + miraculous equilibration upon the tip of his handsome nose. + </p> + <p> + No hero who does more or less than is demanded by the best practical + opinion of the society of his time is worth more than thirty cents as a + hero. Boys are literary and dramatic critics so far above the critics + formed by strained formulas of the schools that you can trust them. They + have an unerring distrust of the fellow who moves around with his + confounded conscientious scruples, as if the well-settled opinion of the + breathing world were not good enough for him! Who the deuce has got any + business setting everybody else right? + </p> + <p> + Some of these days I believe it is going to be discovered that the + atmosphere and the encompassing radiance and sweetness of Heaven are + composed of the dear sighs and loving aspirations of earthly motherhood. + If it turns out otherwise, rest assured Heaven will not have reached its + perfect point of evolution. Why is it, then, that mothers will—will—will—try, + so mistakenly, to extirpate the jewel of honest, manly savagery from the + breasts of their boys? I wonder if they know that when grown men see one + of these “pretty-mannered boys,” cocksure as a Swiss toy new painted and + directed by watch spring, they feel an unholy impulse to empty an + ink-bottle over the young calf? Fauntleroy kids are a reproach to our + civilization. Men, women and children, all of us, crowd around the grimy + Deignan of the Merrimac crew, and shout and cheer for Bill Smith, the + Rough Rider, who carried his mate out of the ruck at San Juan and twirls + his hat awkwardly and explains: “Ef I hadn't a saw him fall he would 'a' + laid thar yit!”—and go straight home and pretend to be proud of a + snug little poodle of a man who doesn't play for fear of soiling his + picture-clothes, and who says: “Yes, sir, thank you,” and “No, thank you, + ma'am,” like a French doll before it has had the sawdust kicked out of it! + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Now, when a hero tries to stamp his acts with the precise quality of exact + justice—why, he performs no acts. He is no better than that poor + tongue-loose Hamlet, who argues you the right of everything, and then, by + the great Jingo! piles in and messes it all by doing the wrong thing at + the wrong time and in the wrong manner. It is permitted of course to be a + great moral light and correct the errors of all the dust of earth that has + been blown into life these ages; but human justice has been measured out + unerringly with poetry and irony to such folk. They are admitted to be + saints, but about the time they have got too good for their earthly + setting, they have been tied to stakes and lighted up with oil and + faggots; or a soda phosphate with a pinch of cyanide of potassium inserted + has been handed to them, as in the case of our old friend, Socrates. And + it's right. When a man gets too wise and good for his fellows and is + embarrassed by the healthful scent of good human nature, send him to + heaven for relief, where he can have the goodly fellowship of the + prophets, the company of the noble army of martyrs, and amuse himself + suggesting improvements upon the vocal selections of cherubim and + seraphim! Impress the idea upon these gentry with warmth—and—with—oil! + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + The ideal hero of fiction, you say, is Capt. D'Artagnan, first name + unknown, one time cadet in the Reserves of M. de Troisville's company of + the King's Guards, intrusted with the care of the honor and safety of His + Majesty, Louis XIV. Very well; he is a noble gentleman; the choice does + honor to your heart, mind and soul; take him and hold the remembrance of + his courage, loyalty, adroitness and splendid endurance with hooks of + steel. For myself, while yielding to none who honor the great D'Artagnan, + yet I march under the flag of the Sieur Bussy d'Amboise, a proud Clermont, + of blood royal in the reign of Henry III., who shed luster upon a court + that was edified by the wisdom of M. Chicot, the “King's Brother,” the + incomparable jester and philosopher, who would have himself exceeded all + heroes except that he despised the actors and the audience of the world's + theater and performed valiant feats only that he might hang his cap and + bells upon the achievements in ridicule. + </p> + <p> + Can it be improper to compare D'Artagnan and Bussy—when the + intention is wholly respectful and the motive pure? If a single protest is + heard, there will be an end to this paper now—at once. There are + some comparisons that strengthen both candidates. For, we must consider + the extent of the theater and the stage, the space of time covering the + achievements, the varying conditions, lights and complexities. As, for + instance, the very atmosphere in which these two heroes moved, the + accompaniment of manner which we call the “air” of the histories, and + which are markedly different. The contrast of breeding, quality and + refinement between Bussy and D'Artagnan is as great as that which + distinguishes Mercutio from the keen M. Chicot. Yet each was his own ideal + type. Birth and the superior privileges of the haute noblesse conferred + upon the Sieur Bussy the splendid air of its own sufficient prestige; the + lack of these require of D'Artagnan that his intelligence, courage and + loyal devotion should yet seem to yield something of their greatness in + the submission that the man was compelled to pay to the master. True, this + attitude was atoned for on occasion by blunt boldness, but the abased + position and the lack of subtle distinction of air and mind of the noble, + forbade to the Fourth Mousquetaire the last gracious touch of a Bayard of + heroism. But the vulgarity was itself heroic. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Compare the first appearance of the great Gascon at the Hotel de + Troisville, or even his manner and attitude toward the King when he sought + to warn that monarch against forgetfulness of loyalty proved, with the + haughty insolence of indomitable spirit in which Bussy threw back to Henry + the shuttle of disfavor on the night of that remarkable wedding of St. Luc + with the piquant little page soubrette, Jeanne de Brissac. + </p> + <p> + D'Artagnan's air to his King has its pathos. It seems to say: “I speak + bluntly, sire, knowing that my life is yours and yet feeling that it is + too obscure to provoke your vengeance.” A very hard draught for a man of + fire and fearlessness to take without a gulp. But into Bussy's manner + toward his King there was this flash of lightning from Olympus: “My life, + sire, is yours, as my King, to take or leave; but not even you may dare to + think of taking the life of Bussy with the dust of least reproach upon it. + My life you may blow out; my honor you do not dare approach to question!” + </p> + <p> + There are advantages in being a gentleman, which can not be denied. One is + that it commands credit in the King's presence as well as at the tailor's. + </p> + <p> + It is interesting to compare both these attitudes with that of “Athos,” + the Count de la Fere, toward the King. He was lacking in the irresistibly + fierce insolence of Bussy and in the abasement of D'Artagnan; it was + melancholy, patient, persistent and terrible in its restrained calmness. + How narrowly he just escaped true greatness. I would no more cast + reproaches upon that noble gentleman than I would upon my grandmother; but + he—was—a—trifle—serous, wasn't he? He was brave, + prompt, resourceful, splendid, and, at need, gingerish as the best colt in + the paddock. It is the deuce's own pity for a man to be born to too much + seriousness. Do you know—and as I love my country, I mean it in + honest respect—that I sometimes think that the gentleness and + melancholy of Athos somehow suggests a bit of distrust. One is almost + terrified at times lest he may begin the Hamlet controversies. You feel + that if he committed a murder by mistake you are not absolutely sure he + wouldn't take a turn with Remorse. Not so Bussy; he would throw the + mistake in with good will and not create worry about it. Hang it all, if + the necessary business of murder is to halt upon the shuffling accident of + mistake, we may as well sell out the hero business and rent the shop. It + would be down to the level of Hamlet in no time. Unless, of course, the + hero took the view of it that Nero adopted. It is improbable that Nero + inherited the gift of natural remorse; but he cultivated one and seemed to + do well with it. He used to reflect upon his mother and his wife, both of + whom he had affectionately murdered, and justified himself by declaring + that a great artist, who was also the Roman Emperor, would be lacking in + breadth of emotional experience and retrospective wisdom, unless he knew + the melancholy of a two-pronged family remorse. And from Nero's standpoint + it was one of the best thoughts that he ever formulated into language. + </p> + <p> + To return to Bussy and D'Artagnan. In courage they were Hector and + Achilles. You remember the champagne picnic before the bastion St. Gervais + at the siege of St. Rochelle? What light-hearted gayety amid the flying + missiles of the arquebusiers! Yet, do not forget that—ignoring the + lacquey—there were four of them, and that his Eminence, the Cardinal + Duke, had said the four of them were equal to a thousand men! If you have + enough knowledge of human nature to understand the fine game of baseball, + and have at any time scraped acquaintance with the interesting + mathematical doctrine of progressive permutations, you will see, when four + men equal to a thousand are under the eyes of each other, and of the + garrison in the fort, that the whole arsenal of logarithms would give out + before you could compute the permutative possibilities of the courage that + would be refracted, reflected, compounded and concentrated by all there, + each giving courage to and receiving courage from each and all the others. + It makes my head ache to think of it. I feel as if I could be brave + myself. + </p> + <p> + Certainly they were that day. To the bitter end of finishing the meal; and + they confessed the added courage by gamboling like boys amid awful + thunders of the arquebuses, which made a rumble in their time like their + successors, the omnibuses, still make to this day on the granite streets + of cities populated by deaf folks. + </p> + <p> + There never was more of a gay, lilting, impudent courage than those four + mousquetaires displayed with such splendid coolness and spirit. + </p> + <p> + But compare it with the fight which Bussy made, single-handed, against the + assassins hired by Monsereau and authorized by that effeminate fop, the + Due D'Anjou. Of course you remember it. Let me pay you the affectionate + compliment of presuming that you have read “La Dame de Monsereau,” often + translated under the English title, “Chicot, the Jester,” that almost + incomparable novel of historical romance, by M. Dumas. If, through some + accident or even through lack of culture, you have failed to do so, pray + do not admit it. Conceal your blemish and remedy the matter at once. At + least, seem to deserve respect and confidence, and appear to be a worthy + novel-reader if actually you are not. There is a novel that, I assure you + on my honor, is as good as the “Three Guardsmen;” but—oh!—so—much—shorter; + the pity of it, too!—oh, the pity of it! On the second reading—now, + let us speak with frank conservatism—on the second reading of it, I + give you my word, man to man, I dreaded to turn every page, because it + brought the end nearer. If it had been granted to me to have one wish + fulfilled that fine winter night, I should have said with humility: + “Beneficent Power, string it out by nine more volumes, presto me here a + fresh box of cigars, and the account of your kindness, and my gratitude is + closed.” + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + If the publisher of this series did not have such absurd sensitiveness + about the value of space and such pitifully small ideas about the nobility + of novels, I should like to write at least twenty pages about “Chicot.” + There are books that none of us ever put down in our lists of great books, + and yet which we think more of and delight more in than all the great + guns. Not one of the friends I've loved so long and well has been + President of the United States, but I wouldn't give one of them for all + the Presidents. Just across the hall at this minute I can hear the + frightful din of war—shells whistling and moaning, bullets + s-e-o-uing, the shrieks of the dying and wounded—Merciful Heaven! + the “Don Juan of Asturia” has just blown up in Manila Bay with an awful + roar—again! Again, as I'm a living man, just as she has blown up + every day, and several times every day, since May 1, 1898. There are two + warriors over in the play-room, drenched with imaginary gore, immersed in + the tender grace of bestowing chastening death and destruction upon the + Spanish foe. Don't I know that they rank somewhat below Admiral Dewey as + heroes? But do you suppose that their father would swap them for Admiral + Dewey and all the rainbow glories that fine old Yankee sea-dog ever will + enjoy—long may he live to enjoy them all!—do you think so? Of + course not! You know perfectly well that his—wife—wouldn't—let—him! + </p> + <p> + I would not wound the susceptibilities of any reader; but speaking for + myself—“Chicot” being beloved of my heart—if there was a mean + man, living in a mean street, who had the last volume of “Chicot” in + existence, I would pour out my library's last heart's blood to get it. He + could have all of Scott but “Ivanhoe,” all of Dickens but “Copperfield,” + all of Hugo but “Les Miserables,” cords of Fielding, Marryat, Richardson, + Reynolds, Eliot, Smollet, a whole ton of German translations—by + George! he could leave me a poor old despoiled, destitute and ruined + book-owner in things that folks buy in costly bindings for the sake of + vanity and the deception of those who also deceive them in turn. + </p> + <p> + Brother, “Chicot” is a book you lend only to your dearest friend, and then + remind him next day that he hasn't sent it back. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Now, as to Bussy's great fight. He had gone to the house of Madame Diana + de Monsereau. I am not au fait upon French social customs, but let us + presume his being there was entirely proper, because that excellent lady + was glad to see him. He was set upon by her husband, M. de Monsereau, with + fifteen hired assassins. Outside, the Due D'Anjou and some others of + assassins were in hiding to make sure that Monsereau killed Bussy, and + that somebody killed Monsereau! There's a “situation” for you, + double-edged treachery against—love and innocence, let us say. Bussy + is in the house with Madame. His friend, St. Luc, is with him; also his + lacquey and body-physician, the faithful Rely. Bang! the doors are broken + in, and the assassins penetrate up the stairway. The brave Bussy confides + Diana to St. Luc and Rely, and, hastily throwing up a barricade of tables + and chairs near the door of the apartment, draws his sword. Then, ye + friends of sudden death and valorous exercise, began a surfeit of joy. + Monsereau and his assassins numbered sixteen. In less than three moderate + paragraphs Bessy's sword, playing like avenging lightning, had struck + fatality to seven. Even then, with every wrist going, he reflected, with + sublime calculation: “I can kill five more, because I can fight with all + my vigor ten minutes longer!” After that? Bessy could see no further—there + spoke fate!—you feel he is to die. Once more the leaping steel + point, the shrill death cry, the miraculous parry. The villain, Monsereau, + draws his pistol. Bessy, who is fighting half a dozen swordsmen, can even + see the cowardly purpose; he watches; he—dodges—the—bullets!—by + watching the aim— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “Ye sons of France, behold the glory!” + </pre> + <p> + He thrusts, parries and swings the sword as a falchion. Suddenly a pistol + ball snaps the blade off six inches from the hilt. Bessy picks up the + blade and in an instant splices—it—to—the—hilt—with—his—handkerchief! + Oh, good sword of the good swordsman! it drinks the blood of three more + before it—bends—and—loosens—under—the—strain! + Bessy is shot in the thigh; Monsereau is upon him; the good Rely, lying + almost lifeless from a bullet wound received at the outset, thrusts a + rapier to Bessy's grasp with a last effort. Bessy springs upon Monsereau + with the great bound of a panther and pins—the—son—of—a—gun—to—the—floor—with—the—rapier—and—watches—him—die! + </p> + <p> + You can feel faint for joy at that passage for a good dozen readings, if + you are appreciative. Poor Bessy, faint from wounds and blood-letting, + retreats valiantly to a closet window step by step and drops out, leaving + Monsereau spitted, like a black spider, dead on the floor. Here hope and + expectation are drawn out in your breast like chewing gum stretched to the + last shred of tenuation. At this point I firmly believed that Bessy would + escape. I feel sorry for the reader who does not. You just naturally argue + that the faithful Rely will surely reach him and rub him with the balsam. + That balsam of Dumas! The same that D'Artagnan's mother gave him when he + rode away on the yellow horse, and which cured so many heroes hurt to the + last gasp. That miraculous balsam, which would make doctors and surgeons + sing small today if they had not suppressed it from the materia medica. + May be they can silence their consciences by the reflection that they + suppressed it to enhance the value and necessity of their own personal + services. But let them look at the death rate and shudder. I had + confidence in Rely and the balsam, but he could not get there in time. + Then, it was forgone that Bessy must die. Like Mercutio, he was too + brilliant to live. Depend upon it, these wizards of story tellers know + when the knell of fate rings much sooner than we halting readers do. + </p> + <p> + Bessy drops from the closet window upon an iron fence that surrounded the + park and was impaled upon the dreadful pickets! Even then for another + moment you can cherish a hope that he may escape after all. Suspended + there and growing weaker, he hears footsteps approaching. Is it a rescuing + friend? He calls out—and a dagger stroke from the hand of D'Anjou, + his Judas master, finds his heart. That's the way Bessy died. No man is + proof against the dagger stroke of treachery. Bessy was powerful and the + due jealous. + </p> + <p> + Diana has been carried off safely by the trustworthy St. Luc. She must + have died of grief if she had not been kept alive to be the instrument of + retributive justice. (In the sequel you will find that this Queen of + Hearts descended upon the ignoble due at the proper time like a thousand + of brick and took the last trick of justice.) + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + The extraordinary description of Bussy's fight is beyond everything. You + gallop along as if in a whirlwind, and it is only in cooler moments that + you discover he killed about twelve rascals with his own good arm. It + seems impossible; the scientific, careful readers have been known to + declare it impossible and sneer at it with laughter. I trust every novel + reader respects scientific folks as he should; but science is not + everything. Our scientific friends have contended that the whale did not + engulf Jonah; that the sun did not pause over the vale of Askelon; that + Baron Munchausen's horse did not hang to the steeple by his bridle; that + the beanstalk could not have supported a stout lad like Jack; that General + Monk was not sent to Holland in a cage; that Remus and Romulus had not a + devoted lady wolf for a step-mother; in fact, that loads of things, of + which the most undeniable proof exists in plain print all over the world, + never were done or never happened. Bessy was killed, Rely was killed + later, Diana died in performing her destiny, St. Luc was killed. Nobody + left to make affidavits, except M. Dumas; in his lifetime nobody + questioned it; he is now dead and unable to depose; whereupon the + scientists sniff scornfully and deny. I hope I shall always continue to + respect science in its true offices, but, brethren, are there not times + when—science—makes—you—just—a—little—tired? + </p> + <p> + Heroes! D'Artagnan or Bessy? Choose, good friends, freely; as freely let + me have my Bessy. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + VIII. HEROINES + </h2> + <h3> + A SUBJECT ALMOST WITHOUT AN OBJECT—WHY THERE ARE FEW HEROINES FOR + MEN. + </h3> + <p> + Notwithstanding the subject, there are almost no heroines in novels. There + are impossibly good women, absurdly patient and brave women, but few + heroines as the convention of worldly thinking demands heroines. There is + an endless train of what Thackeray so aptly described as “pale, pious, and + pulmonary ladies” who snivel and snuffle and sigh and linger irresolutely + under many trials which a little common sense would dissolve; but they are + pathological heroines. “Little Nell,” “Little Eva,” and their married + sisters are unquestionable in morals, purpose and faith; but oh! how—they—do—try—the—nerves! + How brave and noble was Jennie Deans, but how thick-headed was the dear + lass! + </p> + <p> + These women who are merely good, and enforce it by turning on the faucet + of tears, or by old-fashioned obstinacy, or stupidity of purpose, can + scarcely be called heroines by the canons of understood definition. On the + other hand, the conventions do not permit us to describe as a heroine any + lady who has what is nowadays technically called “a past.” The very best + men in the world find splendid heroism and virtue in Tess l'Durbeyfield. + There is nowhere an honest, strong, good man, full of weakness, though he + may be, scarred so much, however with fault, who does not read St. John + vii., 3-11, with sympathy, reverence and Amen! The infallible critics can + prove to a hair that this passage is an interpolation. An interpolation in + that sense means something inserted to deceive or defraud; a forgery. How + can you defraud or deceive anybody by the interpolation of pure gold with + pure gold? How can that be a forgery which hurts nobody, but gives to + everybody more value in the thing uttered? If John vii., 3-11, is an + interpolation let us hope Heaven has long ago blessed the interpolator. + Does anybody—even the infallible critic—contend that Jesus + would not have so said and done if the woman had been brought to Him? Was + that not the very flower and savor and soul of His teaching? Would He have + said or done otherwise? If the Ten Commandments were lost utterly from + among men there would yet remain these four greater: + </p> + <p> + “Do unto others as ye would they should do unto you.” + </p> + <p> + “Suffer little children to come unto me.” + </p> + <p> + “Go and sin no more.” + </p> + <p> + “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” + </p> + <p> + My lords and ladies, men and women, the Ten Commandments, by the side of + these sighs of gentleness, are the Police Court and the Criminal Code, + which are intended to pay cruelty off in punishment. These Four are the + tears with which sympathy soothes the wounds of suffering. Blessed + interpolator of St. John! + </p> + <p> + There are three marvelous novels in the Bible—not Novels in the + sense of fiction, but in the sense of vivid, living narratives of human + emotions and of events. A million Novels rest on those nine verses in + John, and the nine verses are better than the million books. The story of + David and Uriah's wife is in a similar catalogue as regards quality and + usefulness; the story of Esther is a pearl of great beauty. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + But to return to heroines, let us make a volte face. There is an old story + of the lady who wrote rather irritably to Thackeray, asking, curtly, why + all the good women he created were fools and the bright women all bad. + “The same complaint,” he answered, “has been made, Madame, of God and + Shakespeare, and as neither has given explanation I can not presume to + attempt one.” It was curt and severe, and, of course, Thackeray did not + write it as it would appear, even though he may have said as much + jestingly to some intimate who understood the epigram; but was not the + question rather impudently intrusive? Thackeray, you remember, was the + “seared cynic” who created Caroline Gann, the gentle, beautiful, glorious + “Little Sister,” the staunch, pure-hearted woman whose character not even + the perfect scoundrelism of Dr. George Brand Firmin could tarnish or + disturb. If there are heroines, surely she has her place high amid the + noble group! + </p> + <p> + There are plenty of intelligent persons sacramentally wedded to mere + conventions of good and bad. You could never persuade them that Rebecca + Sharp—that most perfect daughter of Thackeray's mind—was a + heroine. But of course she was. In that world wherein she was cast to live + she was indubitably, incomparably, the very best of all the inhabitants to + whom you are intimately introduced. Capt. Dobbin? Oh, no, I am not + forgetting good Old Dob. Of all the social door mats that ever I wiped my + feet upon Old Dob is certainly the cleanest, most patient, serviceable and + unrevolutionary. But, just a door mat, with the virtues and attractions of + that useful article of furniture—the sublime, immortal prig of all + the ages, or you can take the head of any novel-reader under thirty for a + football. You may have known many women, from Bernadettes of Massavielle + to Borgias of scant neighborhoods, but you know you never knew one who + would marry Old Dob, except as that emotional dishrag, Amelia, married him—as + the Last Chance on the stretching high-road of uncertain years. No girl + ever willingly marries door mats. She just wipes her feet on them and + passes on into the drawing room looking for the Prince. It seems to me one + of the triumphant proofs of Becky as a heroine that she did not marry + Captain Dobbin. She might have done it any day by crooking her little + finger at him—but she didn't. + </p> + <p> + Madame Becky, that smart daughter of an alcoholic gentleman artist and of + his lady of the French ballet, inherited the perfect non-moral morality of + the artist blood that sang mercurially through her veins. How could she, + therefore, how could she, being non-moral, be immoral? It is clear + nonsense. But she did possess the instinctive artist morality of unerring + taste for selection in choice. Examine the facts meticulously—meticulously—and + observe how carefully she selected that best in all that worst she moved + among. + </p> + <p> + In the will I shall some day leave behind me there will be devised, in + primogenitural trust forever, the priceless treasure of conviction that + Becky was innocent of Lord Steyne. I leave it to any gentleman who has had + the great opportunity to look in familiarly upon the outer and upper + fringes of the world of unclassed and predatory women and the noble lords + that abound thereamong. Let him read over again that famous scene where + Becky writes her scorn upon Steyne's forehead in the noble blood of that + aristocratic wolf. Then let him give his decision, as an honest juryman + upon his oath, whether he is convinced that the most noble Marquis was + raging because he was losing a woman, or from the discovery that he was + one of two dupes facing each other, and that he was the fool who had paid + for both and had had “no run for his money!” Marquises of Steyne do not + resent sentimental losses—they can be hurt only in their + sportsmanship. + </p> + <p> + You may begin with the Misses Pinkerton (in whose select school Becky + absorbed the intricate hypocrisies and saturated snobbery of the highest + English society) and follow her through all the little and big turmoils of + her life, meeting on the way of it all the elaborated differentials of the + country-gentleman and lady tribe of Crawley, the line officers and + bemedalled generals of the army (except honest O'Dowd and his lady), the + most noble Marquis and his shadowy and resigned Marchioness, the R—y—l + P—rs—n—ge himself—even down to the tuft-hunters + Punter and Loder—and if Becky is not superior to every man and woman + of them in every personal trait and grace that calls for admiration—then, + why, by George! do you take such an interest, such an undying interest, in + her? You invariably take the greatest interest in the best character in a + story—unless it's too good and gets “sweety” and “sticky” and so + sours on your philosophical stomach. You can't possibly take any interest + in Dobbin—you just naturally, emphatically, and in the most + unreflecting way in the world, say “Oh, d—n Dobbin!” and go right + ahead after somebody else. I don't say Becky was all that a perfect Sunday + School teacher should have been, but in the group in which she was born to + move she smells cleaner than the whole raft of them—to me. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Thackeray was, next to Shakespeare, the writer most wonderfully combined + of instinct and reason that English literature of grace has produced. He + has been compared with the Frenchman, Balzac. Since I have no desire to + provoke squabbles about favorite authors, let us merely definitely agree + that such a comparison is absurd and pass on. Because you must have + noticed that Balzac was often feeble in his reason and couldn't make it + keep step with his instinct, while in Thackeray they both step together + like the Siamese twins. It is a very striking fact, indeed, that during + all Becky's intense early experiences with the great world, Thackeray does + not make her guilty. All the circumstances of that world were guilty and + she is placed amidst the circumstances; but that is all. + </p> + <p> + “The ladies in the drawing room,” said one lady to Thackeray, when “Vanity + Fair” in monthly parts publishing had just reached the catastrophe of + Rawdon, Rebecca, old Steyne and the bracelet—“The ladies have been + discussing Becky Sharpe and they all agree that she was guilty. May I ask + if we guessed rightly?” + </p> + <p> + “I am sure I don't know,” replied the “seared cynic,” mischievously. “I am + only a man and I haven't been able to make up my mind on that point. But + if the ladies agree I fear it may be true—you must understand your + sex much better than we men!” + </p> + <p> + That is proof that she was not guilty with Steyne. But straightway then, + Thackeray starts out to make her guilty with others. It is so much the + more proof of her previous innocence that, incomparable artist as he was + in showing human character, he recognized that he could convince the + reader of her guilt only by disintegrating her, whipping himself meanwhile + into a ceaseless rage of vulgar abuse of her, a thing of which Thackeray + was seldom guilty. But it was not really Becky that became guilty—it + was the woman that English society and Thackeray remorselessly made of + her. I wouldn't be a lawyer for a wagon load of diamonds, but if I had had + to be a lawyer I should have preferred to be a solicitor at the London bar + in 1817 to write the brief for the respondent in the celebrated divorce + case of Crawley vs. Crawley. Against the back-ground of the world she + lived in Becky could have been painted as meekly white and beautiful as + that lovely old picture of St. Cecilia at the Choir Organ. + </p> + <p> + Perhaps Becky was not strictly a heroine; but she was a honey. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Men can not “create” heroines in the sense of shadowing forth what they + conceive to be the glory, beauty, courage and splendor of womanly + character. It is the indescribable sum of womanhood corresponding to the + unutterable name of God. The true man's love of woman is a spirit sense + attending upon the actual senses of seeing, hearing, feeling, tasting and + smelling. The woman he loves enters into every one of these senses and + thus is impounded five-fold upon that union of all of them, which, + together with the miracle of mind, composes what we call the human soul as + a divine essence. She is attached to every religion, yet enters with + authority into none. She is first at its birth, the last to stay weeping + at its death. In every great novel a heroine, unnamed, unspoken, + undescribed, hovers throughout like an essence. The heroism of woman is + her privacy. There is to me no more wonderful, philosophical, + psychological and delicate triumph of literary art in existence than the + few chapters in “Quo Vadis” in which that great introspective genius, + Sienkiewicz, sets forth the growth of the spell of love with which Lygia + has encompassed Vinicius, and the singular development and progress of the + emotion through which Vinicius is finally immersed in human love of Lygia + and in the Christian reverence of her spiritual purity at the same time. + It is the miracle of soul in sex. + </p> + <p> + Every clean-hearted youth that has had the happiness to marry a good woman—and, + thank Heaven, clean youths and good women are thick as leaves in + Vallambrosa in this sturdy old world of ours—every such youth has + had his day of holy conversion, his touch of the wand conferring upon him + the miracle of love, and he has been a better and wiser man for it. Not + sense love, not the instinctive, restless love of matter for matter, but + the love that descends like the dove amid radiance. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + We've all seen that bridal couple; she is as pretty as peaches; he is as + proud of her as if she were a splendid race horse; he glories in knowing + she is lovely and accepts the admiration offered to her as a tribute to + his own judgment, his own taste and even his merit, which obtained her. + There is a certain amount of silliness in her which he soon detects, a + touch of helplessness, and unsophistication in knowledge of worldly things + that he yet feels is mysteriously guarded against intrusion upon and which + makes companionship with her sometimes irksome. He feels superior and + uncompensated; from the superb isolation of his greater knowledge, courage + and independence, he grants to her a certain tender pity and protection; + he admits her faith and purity and—er—but—you see, he is + sorry she is not quite the well poised and noble creature he is! Mr. + Youngwed is at this time passing through the mental digestive process of + feeling his oats. He is all right, though, if he is half as good as he + thinks he is. He has not been touched by the live wire of experience—yet; + that's all. + </p> + <p> + Well, in the course of human events, there comes a time when he is + frightened to death, then greatly relieved and for a few weeks becomes as + proud as if he had actually provided the last census of the United States + with most of the material contained in it. A few months later, when the + feeble whines and howls have found increased vigor of utterance and more + frequency of expression; when they don't know whether Master Jack or Miss + Jill has merely a howling spell or is threatened with fatal convulsions; + when they don't know whether they want a dog-muzzle or a doctor; when Mr. + Youngwed has lost his sleep and his temper, together, and has displayed + himself with spectacular effect as a brute, selfish, irritable, helpless, + resourceless and conquered—then—then, my dear madame, you have + doubtless observed him decrease in self-estimated size like a balloon into + which a pin has been introduced, until he looks, in fact, like Master Frog + reduced in bulk from the bull-size, to which he aspired, to his original + degree. + </p> + <p> + At that time Mrs. Youngwed is very busy with little Jack or Jill, as the + case may be. Her husband's conduct she probably regards with resignation + as the first heavy burden of the cross she is expected to bear. She does + not reproach him, it is useless; she has perhaps suspected that his + assumed superiority would not stand the real strain. But, he is the father + of the dear baby and, for that precious darling's sake, she will be + patient. I wonder if she feels that way? She has every right to, and, for + one, I say that I'll be hanged if I find any fault with her if she does. + That is the way she must keep human, and so balance the little open + accounts that married folks ought to run between themselves for the + purpose of keeping cobwebs and mildew off, or rather of maintaining their + lives as a running stream instead of a stagnant pond. A little good + talking back now and then is good for wives and married men. Don't be + afraid, Mrs. Youngwed; and when the very worst has come, why cry—at—him! + One tear weighs more and will hit him harder than an ax. In the lachrymal + ducts with which heaven has blessed you, you are more surely protected + against the fires of your honest indignation than you are by the fire + department against a blaze in the house. And be patient, also; remember, + dear sister, that, though you can cry, he has a gift—that—enables—him—to—swear! + You and other wedded wives very properly object to swearing, but you will + doubtless admit that there is compensation in that when he does swear in + his usual good form you—never—feel—any—apprehension—about—the—state—of—his—health! + </p> + <p> + This natural outburst of resentment has not lasted three minutes. Mr. Y. + has returned to his couch, sulky and ashamed. He pretends to sleep + ostentatiously; he—does—not! He is thinking with remarkable + intensity and has an eye open. He sees the slender figure in the dim + light, hanging over the crib, he hears the crooning, he begins to suspect + that there is an alloy in his godlikeness. He looks to earth, listens to + the thin, wailing cries, wonders, regrets, wearies, sleeps. At that moment + Mrs. Y. should fall on her knees and rejoice. She would if she could leave + young Jack or Jill; but she can't—she—never—can. That's + what sent Mr. Y. to sleep. It is just as well perhaps that Mrs. Y. is + unobservant. + </p> + <p> + A miracle is happening to Mr. Y. In an hour or two, let us say, there is a + new vocal alarm from the crib. Almost with the first suspicion of + fretfulness or pain the mother has heard it. Heaven's mysterious telepathy + of instinct has operated. Between angels, babies and mothers the distance + is no longer than your arm can reach. They understand, feel and hear each + other, and are linked in one chain. So, that, when Mr. Y. has struggled + laboriously awake and wonders if—that—child—is—going—to—howl—all——. + Well, he goes no further. In the dim light he sees again the slender + figure hanging over the crib, he hears the crooning and the retreating + sobs. It is just as he saw and heard before he fell asleep. No complaints, + no reproaches, no irritation. Oh, what a brute he feels! He battles with + his reason and his bewilderment. Had he fallen asleep and left her to bear + that strain; or has she gone anew to the rescue, while he slept without + thought? Up out of his heart the tenderness wells; down into his mind the + revelation comes. The miracle works. He looks and listens. In the figure + hanging there so patiently and tenderly he sees for the first time the + wonderful vision of the sweetheart wife, not lost, but enveloped in the + mystery of motherhood; he hears in the crooning voice a tone he never + before knew. Mother and child are united in mysterious converse. Where did + that girl whom he thought so unsophisticated of the world learn that + marvel of acquaintance with that babe, so far removed from his ability to + reach? It must be that while he knew the world, she understood the secret + of heaven. She is so patient. What a brute he is to grow impatient, when + she endures day and night in rapt patience and the joy of content! She can + enter a world from which he is barred. And, that is his wife! That was his + sweetheart, and is now—ah, what is she? He feels somehow abashed; he + knows that if he were ten times better than he is he might still feel + unworthy to touch the latchet of her shoes; he feels that reverence and + awe have enveloped her, and that the first happy love and longing are + springing afresh in his heart. It is his wife and his child; apart from + him unless he can note and understand that miracle of nature's secret. Can + he? Well, he will try—oh, what a brute! And he watches the bending + figure, he hears the blending of soft crooning and retreating sobs—and, + listening, he is lost in the wonder and falls under the spell asleep. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Y., you are happy henceforth, if you will disregard certain small + matters, such as whether chairs or hat-racks are for hats, or whether the + marble mantelpiece or the floor is intended for polishing boot heels. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Of course, such an incident as has been suggested is but one of thousands + of golden moments when to the husband comes the sudden dazzling + recognition of the mergence of that half-sweetheart, half-mistress, he has + admired and a little tired of, into the reverential glory and loveliness + of wifehood, motherhood, companionhood, through all life and on through + the eternity of inheritance they shall leave to Jacks and Jills and their + little sisters and brothers. In that lies the priceless secret of + Christianity and its influence. The unspeakably immoral Greeks reared a + temple to Pity; the grossest mythologies of Babylon, Greece, Rome and + Carthage could not change human nature. There have been always persons + whose temperament made them sympathize with grief and pity the suffering; + who, caring none for wealth, had no desire to steal; who purchased a + little pleasure for vanity in the thanks received for kindness given. But + Christianity saw the jewel underneath the passing emotion and gave it + value by cleansing and cutting it. In lust-love is the instinctive secret + of the preservation of the race; but the race is not worth preserving that + it may be preserved only for lust. Upon that animal foundation is to be + built the radiant home of confident, enduring and exchanging love in which + all the senses, tastes, hopes, aspirations and delights of friendship, + companionship and human society shall find hospitality and comfort. When + it has been achieved it is beautiful, a twin to the delicate rose that + lies in its own delicious fragrance, happy on the pure bosom of a lovely + girl—the rose that is finest and most exquisite because it has + sprung from the horrid heat of the compost; but who shall think of the one + in the presence of the pure beauty of the other? + </p> + <p> + Nature and art are entirely unlike each other, though the one simulates + the other. The art of beauty in writing, said Balzac, is to be able to + construct a palace upon the point of a needle; the art of beauty in living + and loving is to build all the beauty of social life and aspiration upon + the sordid yet solid and persisting instincts of savagery that lie deep at + the bottom of our gross natures. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Now, it is in this tender sacred atmosphere, such as Mr. and Mrs. Youngwed + always pass through, that the man worthy of a woman's confidence finds the + radiant ideal of his heroine. He may with propriety speak of these + transfigured personalities to his intimates or write of them with kindly + pleasantry and suggestion as, perhaps, this will be considered. But, there + is a monitor within that restrains him from analyzing and describing and + dragging into the glare of publicity the sacred details that give to life + all its secret happiness, faith and delight. To do so would be ten times + worse offense against the ethics of unwritten and unspoken things than + describing with pitiless precision the death beds of children, as Little + Nell, Paul Dombey, Dora, Little Eva, and, thank heaven! only a few others. + </p> + <p> + How can anybody bear to read such pages without feeling that he is an + intruder where angels should veil their faces as they await the + transformation? + </p> + <p> + “It is not permitted to do evil,” says the philosopher, “that good may + result.” + </p> + <p> + There are some things that should remain unspoken and undescribed. Have + you never listened to some great brute of a sincere preacher of the + gospel, as he warned his congregation against the terrible dangers + attending the omission of purely theological rites upon infants? Have you + thought of the mothers of those children, listening, whose little ones + were sick or delicate, and who felt each word of that hard, ominous + warning as an agonizing terror? And haven't you wanted to kick the + minister out of the pulpit, through the reredos and into the middle of + next week? How can anybody harrow up such tender feelings? How can anybody + like to believe that a little child will be held to account? Many of us do + so believe, perhaps, whether or no; but is it not cruel to shake the rod + of terror over us in public? “Suffer little children to come unto Me,” + said the Master; He did not instruct us to drive them with fear and terror + and trembling. Whenever I have heard such sermons I have wanted to get up + and stalk out of the church with ostentatiousness of contempt, as if to + say to the preacher that his conduct did—not—meet—with—my—approval. + But I didn't; the philosopher has his cowardice not less than the + preacher. + </p> + <p> + But there is something meretricious and cheap in the use of material and + subjects that lie warm against the very secret heart of nature. The + mystery of love and the sanctity of death are to be used by writers and + artists only in their ennobling aspect of results. A certain class of + French writers have sickened the world by invading the sacredness of + passion and giving prostitution the semblance of self-abnegated love; a + certain class of English and American writers have purchased popularity by + the meretricious parade of the scenes of death-beds. Both are violations + of the ethics of art as they are of nature. True love as true sorrow + shrinks from exhibition and should be permitted to enjoy the sacredness of + privacy. The famous women of the world, Herodias, Semiramis, Aspasia, + Thais, Cleopatra, Sapho, Messalina, Marie de Medici, Catherine of Russia, + Elizabeth of England—all of them have been immoral. Publicity to + women is like handling to peaches—the bloom comes off, whether or + not any other harm occurs. In literature, the great feminine figures, + George Sand, Madame de Sevigne, Madame de Stael, George Eliot—all + were banned and at least one—the first—was out of the pale. + Creative thought has in it the germ of masculinity. Genius in a woman, as + we usually describe genius, means masculinity, which, of all things, to + real men is abhorrent in woman. True genius in woman is the antithesis of + the qualities that make genius in man; so is her heroism, her beauty, her + virtue, her destiny and her duty. + </p> + <p> + Let this be said—even though it be only a jest—one of those + smart attempts at epigram, which, ladies, a man has no more power to + resist than a baby to resist the desire to improve his thumb by sucking it—that: + whenever you find a woman who looks real—that is, who produces upon + a real man the impression of being endowed with the splendid gifts for + united and patient companionship in marriage—whenever you find her + advocating equal suffrage, equal rights, equal independence with men in + all things, you may properly run away. Equality means so much, dear + sisters. No man can be your equal; you can not be his, without laying down + the very jewels of the womanliness that men love. Be thankful you have not + this strength and daring; he possesses those in order that he many stand + between you and more powerful brutes. Now, let us try for a smart epigram: + But no! hang the epigram, let it go. This, however, may be said: That, + whenever you find a woman wanting all rights with man; wanting his morals + to be judged by hers, or willing to throw hers in with his, or itching to + enter his employments and labors and willing that he shall—of course—nurse + the children and patch the small trousers and dresses, depend upon it that + some weak and timid man has been neglecting the old manly, savage duty of + applying quiet home murder as society approves now and then. + </p> + <div style="height: 6em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Delicious Vice, by Young E. 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Allison + + +Release Date: August, 2005 [EBook #8686] +This file was first posted on August 1, 2003 +Last Updated: May 13, 2013 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DELICIOUS VICE *** + + + + +Produced by Ted Garvin, Charles Franks and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + + + + + + + + +THE DELICIOUS VICE + +Pipe Dreams and Fond Adventures of an Habitual Novel-Reader Among Some +Great Books and Their People + +By Young E. Allison + +_Second Edition_ + +(Revised and containing new material) + +CHICAGO THE PRAIRIELAND PUBLISHING CO. 1918 Printed originally in the +Louisville Courier-Journal. Reprinted by courtesy. + +First edition, Cleveland, Burrows Bros., 1907. + +Copyright 1907-1918 + + + + + +I. A RHAPSODY ON THE NOBLE PROFESSION OF NOVEL READING + +It must have been at about the good-bye age of forty that Thomas Moore, +that choleric and pompous yet genial little Irish gentleman, turned a +sigh into good marketable "copy" for Grub Street and with shrewd economy +got two full pecuniary bites out of one melancholy apple of reflection: + + "Kind friends around me fall + Like leaves in wintry weather," + + --he sang of his own dead heart in the stilly night. + + "Thus kindly I scatter thy leaves on the bed + Where thy mates of the garden lie scentless and dead." +--he sang to the dying rose. In the red month of October the rose is +forty years old, as roses go. How small the world has grown to a man of +forty, if he has put his eyes, his ears and his brain to the uses for +which they are adapted. And as for time--why, it is no longer than a +kite string. At about the age of forty everything that can happen to a +man, death excepted, has happened; happiness has gone to the devil or +is a mere habit; the blessing of poverty has been permanently secured +or you are exhausted with the cares of wealth; you can see around +the corner or you do not care to see around it; in a word--that is, +considering mental existence--the bell has rung on you and you are up +against a steady grind for the remainder of your life. It is then there +comes to the habitual novel reader the inevitable day when, in anguish +of heart, looking back over his life, he--wishes he hadn't; then he asks +himself the bitter question if there are not things he has done that he +wishes he hadn't. Melancholy marks him for its own. He sits in his room +some winter evening, the lamp swarming shadowy seductions, the grate +glowing with siren invitation, the cigar box within easy reach for that +moment when the pending sacrifice between his teeth shall be burned out; +his feet upon the familiar corner of the mantel at that automatically +calculated altitude which permits the weight of the upper part of the +body to fall exactly upon the second joint from the lower end of the +vertebral column as it rests in the comfortable depression created by +continuous wear in the cushion of that particular chair to which every +honest man who has acquired the library vice sooner or later gets +attached with a love no misfortune can destroy. As he sits thus, +having closed the lids of, say, some old favorite of his youth, he will +inevitably ask himself if it would not have been better for him if he +hadn't. And the question once asked must be answered; and it will be an +honest answer, too. For no scoundrel was ever addicted to the delicious +vice of novel-reading. It is too tame for him. "There is no money in +it." + + * * * * * + +And every habitual novel-reader will answer that question he has asked +himself, after a sigh. A sigh that will echo from the tropic deserted +island of Juan Fernandez to that utmost ice-bound point of Siberia where +by chance or destiny the seven nails in the sole of a certain mysterious +person's shoe, in the month of October, 1831, formed a cross--thus: + + * + * * * + * + * + * + +while on the American promontory opposite, "a young and handsome woman +replied to the man's despairing gesture by silently pointing to heaven." +The Wandering Jew may be gone, but the theater of that appalling +prologue still exists unchanged. That sigh will penetrate the gloomy +cell of the Abbe Faria, the frightful dungeons of the Inquisition, the +gilded halls of Vanity Fair, the deep forests of Brahmin and fakir, the +jousting list, the audience halls and the petits cabinets of kings of +France, sound over the trackless and storm-beaten ocean--will echo, in +short, wherever warm blood has jumped in the veins of honest men and +wherever vice has sooner or later been stretched groveling in the dust +at the feet of triumphant virtue. + +And so, sighing to the uttermost ends of the earth, the old novel-reader +will confess that he wishes he hadn't. Had not read all those novels +that troop through his memory. Because, if he hadn't--and it is the +impossibility of the alternative that chills his soul with the despair +of cruel realization--if he hadn't, you see, he could begin at the very +first, right then and there, and read the whole blessed business through +for the first time. For the FIRST TIME, mark you! Is there anywhere in +this great round world a novel reader of true genius who would not do +that with the joy of a child and the thankfulness of a sage? + +Such a dream would be the foundation of the story of a really noble Dr. +Faustus. How contemptible is the man who, having staked his life freely +upon a career, whines at the close and begs for another chance; just +one more--and a different career! It is no more than Mr. Jack Hamlin, a +friend from Calaveras County, California, would call "the baby act," +or his compeer, Mr. John Oakhurst, would denominate "a squeal." How +glorious, on the other hand, is the man who has spent his life in his +own way, and, at its eventide, waves his hand to the sinking sun and +cries out: "Goodbye; but if I could do so, I should be glad to go over +it all again with you--just as it was!" If honesty is rated in heaven +as we have been taught to believe, depend upon it the novel-reader +who sighs to eat the apple he has just devoured, will have no trouble +hereafter. + +What a great flutter was created a few years ago when a blind +multi-millionaire of New York offered to pay a million dollars in cash +to any scientist, savant or surgeon in the world who would restore +his sight. Of course he would! It was no price at all to offer for the +service--considering the millions remaining. It was no more to him than +it would be to me to offer ten dollars for a peep at Paradise. Poor as I +am I will give any man in the world one hundred dollars in cash who will +enable me to remove every trace of memory of M. Alexandre Dumas' "Three +Guardsmen," so that I may open that glorious book with the virgin +capacity of youth to enjoy its full delight. More; I will duplicate the +same offer for any one or all of the following: + +"Les Miserables," of M. Hugo. + +"Don Quixote," of Senor Cervantes. + +"Vanity Fair," of Mr. Thackeray. + +"David Copperfield," of Mr. Dickens. + +"The Cloister and the Hearth," of Mr. Reade. + +And if my good friend, Isaac of York, is lending money at the old +stand and will take pianos, pictures, furniture, dress suits and plain +household plate as collateral, upon even moderate valuation, I will go +fifty dollars each upon the following: + +"The Count of Monte Cristo," of M. Dumas. + +"The Wandering Jew," of M. Sue. + +"The Memoirs of Barry Lyndon, Esq.," of Mr. Thackeray. + +"Treasure Island," of Mr. Robbie Stevenson. + +"The Vicar of Wakefield," of Mr. Goldsmith. + +"Pere Goriot," of M. de Balzac. + +"Ivanhoe," of Baronet Scott. + +(Any one previously unnamed of the whole layout of M. Dumas, excepting +only a paretic volume entitled "The Conspirators.") + +Now, the man who can do the trick for one novel can do it for all--and +there's a thousand dollars waiting to be earned, and a blessing also. +It's a bald "bluff," of course, because it can't be done as we all know. +I might offer a million with safety. If it ever could have been done the +noble intellectual aristocracy of novel-readers would have been reduced +to a condition of penury and distress centuries ago. + +For, who can put fetters upon even the smallest second of eternity? Who +can repeat a joy or duplicate a sweet sorrow? Who has ever had more than +one first sweetheart, or more than one first kiss under the honeysuckle? +Or has ever seen his name in print for the first time, ever again? Is it +any wonder that all these inexplicable longings, these hopeless hopes, +were summed up in the heart-cry of Faust-- + +"Stay, yet awhile, O moment of beauty." + + * * * * * + +Yet, I maintain, Dr. Faustus was a weak creature. He begged to be given +another and wholly different chance to linger with beauty. How much +nobler the magnificent courage of the veteran novel-reader, who in the +old age of his service, asks only that he may be permitted to do again +all that he has done, blindly, humbly, loyally, as before. + +Don't I know? Have I not been there? It is no child's play, the life of +a man who--paraphrasing the language of Spartacus, the much neglected +hero of the ages--has met upon the printed page every shape of perilous +adventure and dangerous character that the broad empire of fiction could +furnish, and never yet lowered his arm. Believe me it is no carpet duty +to have served on the British privateers in Guiana, under Commodore +Kingsley, alongside of Salvation Yeo; to have been a loyal member of +Thuggee and cast the scarf for Bowanee; to have watched the tortures of +Beatrice Cenci (pronounced as written in honest English, and I spit upon +the weaklings of the service who imagine that any freak of woman called +Bee-ah-treech-y Chon-chy could have endured the agonies related of that +sainted lady)--to have watched those tortures, I say, without breaking +down; to have fought under the walls of Acre with Richard Coeur de Lion; +to have crawled, amid rats and noxious vapors, with Jean Valjean through +the sewers of Paris; to have dragged weary miles through the snow with +Uncas, Chief of the Mohicans; to have lived among wild beasts with Morok +the lion tamer; to have charged with the impis of Umslopogaas; to have +sailed before the mast with Vanderdecken, spent fourteen gloomy years +in the next cell to Edmund Dantes, ferreted out the murders in the Rue +Morgue, advised Monsieur Le Cocq and given years of life's prime in +tedious professional assistance to that anointed idiot and pestiferous +scoundrel, Tittlebat Titmouse! Equally, of course, it has not been all +horror and despair. Life averages up fairly, as any novel-reader +will admit, and there has been much of delight--even luxury and +idleness--between the carnage hours of battle. Is it not so? Ask that +boyish-hearted old scamp whom you have seen scuttling away from the +circulating library with M. St. Pierre's memoirs of young Paul and his +beloved Virginia under his arm; or stepping briskly out of the book +store hugging to his left side a carefully wrapped biography of Lady +Diana Vernon, Mlle. de la Valliere, or Madame Margaret Woffington; or +in fact any of a thousand charming ladies whom it is certain he had met +before. Ladies too, who, born whensoever, are not one day older since +he last saw them. Nearly a hundred years of Parisian residence have not +served to induce the Princess Haydee of Yanina to forego her picturesque +Greek gowns and coiffures, or to alter the somewhat embarrassing status +of her relations with her striking but gloomy protector, the Count of +Monte Cristo. + +The old memories are crowded with pleasures. Those delicious mornings in +the allee of the park, where you were permitted to see Cosette with her +old grandfather, M. Fauchelevent; those hours of sweet pain when it was +impossible to determine whether it was Rebecca or Rowena who seemed to +give most light to the day; the flirtations with Blanche Amory, and the +notes placed in the hollow tree; the idyllic devotion of Little Emily, +dating from the morning when you saw her dress fluttering on the beam as +she ran along it, lightly, above the flowing tide--(devotion that is yet +tender, for, God forgive you Steerforth as I do, you could not smirch +that pure heart;) the melancholy, yet sweet sorrow, with which you +saw the loved and lost Little Eva borne to her grave over which the +mocking-bird now sings his liquid requiem. Has it not been sweet +good fortune to love Maggie Tulliver, Margot of Savoy, Dora Spenlow +(undeclared because she was an honest wife--even though of a most +conceited and commonplace jackass, totally undeserving of her); Agnes +Wicklow (a passion quickly cured when she took Dora's pitiful leavings), +and poor ill-fated Marie Antoinette? You can name dozens if you have +been brought up in good literary society. + + * * * * * + +These love affairs may be owned freely, as being perfectly honorable, +even if hopeless. And, of course, there have been gallantries--mere +affaires du jour--such as every man occasionally engages in. Sometimes +they seemed serious, but only for a moment. There was Beatrix Esmond, +for whom I could certainly have challenged His Grace of Hamilton, had +not Lord Mohun done the work for me. Wandering down the street in London +one night, in a moment of weak admiration for her unrivalled nerve +and aplomb, I was hesitating--whether to call on Mrs. Rawdon Crawley, +knowing that her thick-headed husband was in hoc for debt--when the +door of her house crashed open and that old scoundrel, Lord Steyne, came +wildly down the steps, his livid face blood-streaked, his topcoat on +his arm and a dreadful look in his eye. The world knows the rest as I +learned it half an hour later at the greengrocer's, where the Crawleys +owed an inexcusably large bill. Then the Duchess de Langeais--but all +this is really private. + +After all, a man never truly loves but once. And somewhere in Scotland +there is a mound above the gentle, tender and heroic Helen Mar, where +lies buried the first love of my soul. That mound, O lovely and loyal +Helen, was watered by the first blinding and unselfish tears that +ever sprang from my eyes. You were my first love; others may come and +inevitably they go, but you are still here, under the pencil pocket of +my waistcoat. + +Who can write in such a state? It is only fair to take a rest and brace +up. [Blank Page] + + + + +II. NOVEL-READERS + +AS DISTINGUISHED FROM WOMEN AND NIBBLERS AND AMATEURS + + +There is, of course, but one sort of novel-reader who is of any +importance He is the man who began under the age of fourteen and +is still sticking to it--at whatever age he may be--and full of +a terrifying anxiety lest he may be called away in the midst of +preliminary announcements of some pet author's "next forthcoming." For +my own part I cannot conceive dying with resignation knowing that the +publishers were binding up at the time anything of Henryk Sienckiewicz's +or Thomas Hardy's. So it is important that a man begin early, because he +will have to quit all too soon. + +There are no women novel-readers. There are women who read novels, of +course; but it is a far cry from reading novels to being a novel-reader. +It is not in the nature of a woman. The crown of woman's character is +her devotion, which incarnate delicacy and tenderness exalt into +perfect beauty of sacrifice. Those qualities could no more live amid the +clashings of indiscriminate human passions than a butterfly wing could +go between the mill rollers untorn. Women utterly refuse to go on with a +book if the subject goes against their settled opinions. They despise a +novel--howsoever fine and stirring it may be--if there is any taint of +unhappiness to the favorite at the close. But the most flagrant of all +their incapacities in respect to fiction is the inability to appreciate +the admirable achievements of heroes, unless the achievements are solely +in behalf of women. And even in that event they complacently consider +them to be a matter of course, and attach no particular importance to +the perils or the hardships undergone. "Why shouldn't he?" they argue, +with triumphant trust in ideals; "surely he loved her!" + +There are many women who nibble at novels as they nibble at +luncheon--there are also some hearty eaters; but 98 per cent of them +detest Thackeray and refuse resolutely to open a second book of Robert +Louis Stevenson. They scent an enemy of the sex in Thackeray, who never +seems to be in earnest, and whose indignant sarcasm and melancholy +truthfulness they shrink from. "It's only a story, anyhow," they argue +again; "he might, at least write a pleasant one, instead of bringing in +all sorts of disagreeable people--some of them positively disreputable." +As for Stevenson, whom men read with the thrill of boyhood rising new +in their veins, I believe in my soul women would tear leaves out of his +novels to tie over the tops of preserve jars, and never dream of the +sacrilege. + +Now I hold Thackeray and Stevenson to be the absolute test of capacity +for earnest novel-reading. Neither cares a snap of his fingers for +anybody's prejudices, but goes the way of stern truth by the light of +genius that shines within him. + +If you could ever pin a woman down to tell you what she thought, instead +of telling you what she thinks it is proper to tell you, or what she +thinks will please you, you would find she has a religious conviction +that Dot Perrybingle in "The Cricket of the Hearth," and Ouida's Lord +Chandos were actually a materializable an and a reasonable gentleman, +either of whom might be met with anywhere in their proper circles, I +would be willing to stand trial for perjury on the statement that I've +known admirable women--far above the average, really showing signs of +moral discrimination--who have sniveled pitifully over Nancy Sykes and +sniffed scornfully at Mrs. Tess Durbeyfield Clare. It is due to their +constitution and social heredity. Women do not strive and yearn and +stalk abroad for the glorious pot of intellectual gold at the end of the +rainbow; they pick and choose and, having chosen, sit down straightway +and become content. And a state of contentment is an abomination in the +sight of man. Contentment is to be sought for by great masculine minds +only with the purpose of being sure never quite to find it. + + * * * * * + +For all practical purposes, therefore--except perhaps as object lessons +of "the incorrect method" in reading novels--women, as novel-readers, +must be considered as not existing. And, of course, no offense is +intended. But if there be any weak-kneed readers who prefer the +gilt-wash of pretty politeness to the solid gold of truth, let them +understand that I am not to be frightened away from plain facts by any +charge of bad manners. + +On the contrary, now that this disagreeable interruption has been forced +upon me--certainly not through any seeking of mine--it may be better to +speak out and settle the matter. Men who have the happiness of being in +the married state know that nothing is to be gained by failing to settle +instantly with women who contradict and oppose them. Who was that mellow +philosopher in one of Trollope's tiresomely clever novels who said: "My +word for it, John, a husband ought not to take a cane to his wife +too soon. He should fairly wait till they are half-way home from the +church--but not longer, not longer." Of course every man with a spark +of intelligence and gallantry wishes that women COULD rise to real +novel-reading Think what courtship would be! Every true man wishes to +heaven there was nothing more to be said against women than that they +are not novel-readers. But can mere forgetting remove the canker? Do not +all of us know that the abstract good of the very existence of woman is +itself open to grave doubt--with no immediate hope of clearing up? Woman +has certainly been thrust upon us. Is there any scrap of record to show +that Adam asked for her? He was doing very well, was happy, prosperous +and healthy. There was no certainty that her creation was one of that +unquestionably wonderful series that occupied the six great days. +We cannot conceal that her creation caused a great pain in Adam's +side--undoubtedly the left side, in the region of the heart. She +has been described by young and dauntless poets as "God's best +afterthought;" but, now, really--and I advance the suggestion with +no intention to be brutal but solely as a conscientious duty to the +ascertainment of truth--why is it, that--. But let me try to present the +matter in the most unobjectionable manner possible. + +In reading over that marvelous account of creation I find frequent +explicit declaration that God pronounced everything good after he had +created it--except heaven and woman. I have maintained sometimes to +stern, elderly ladies that this might have been an error of omission by +early copyists, perpetuated and so become fixed in our translations. To +other ladies, of other age and condition, to whom such propositions +of scholarship might appear to be dull pedantry, I have ventured the +gentlemanlike explanation that, as woman was the only living thing +created that was good beyond doubt, perhaps God had paid her the +special compliment of leaving the approval unspoken, as being in a sense +supererogatory. At best, either of these dispositions of the matter is, +of course, far-fetched, maybe even frivolous. The fact still remains +by the record. And it is beyond doubt awkward and embarrassing, because +ill-natured men can refer to it in moments of hatefulness--moments +unfortunately too frequent. + +Is it possible that this last creation was a mistake of Infinite Charity +and Eternal Truth? That Charity forbore to acknowledge that it was a +mistake and that Truth, in the very nature of its eternal essence, could +not say it was good? It is so grave a matter that one wonders Helvetius +did not betray it, as he did that other secret about which the +philosophers had agreed to keep mum, so that Herr Schopenhauer could +write about it as he did about that other. Herr Schopenhauer certainly +had the courage to speak with philosophical asperity of the gentle +sex. It may be because he was never married. And then his mother wrote +novels! I have been surprised that he was not accused of prejudice. + +But if all these everyday obstacles were absent there would yet remain +insurmountable reasons why women can never be novel-readers in the sense +that men are. Your wife, for instance, or the impenetrable mystery +of womanhood that you contemplate making your wife some day--can you, +honestly, now, as a self-respecting husband of either de facto or in +futuro, quite agree to the spectacle of that adored lady sitting over +across the hearth from you in the snug room, evening after evening, with +her feet--however small and well-shaped--cocked up on the other end of +the mantel and one of your own big colorado maduros between her teeth! +We men, and particularly novel-readers, are liberal even generous, in +our views; but it is not in human nature to stand that! + +Now, if a woman can not put her feet up and smoke, how in the name +of heaven, can she seriously read novels? Certainly not sitting bolt +upright, in order to prevent the back of her new gown from rubbing the +chair; certainly not reclining upon a couch or in a hammock. A boy, yet +too young to smoke may properly lie on his stomach on the floor and read +novels, but the mature veteran will fight for his end of the mantel as +for his wife and children. It is physiological necessity, inasmuch as +the blood that would naturally go to the lower extremities, is thus +measurably lessened in quantity and goes instead to the head, where a +state of gentle congestion ensues, exciting the brain cells, setting +free the imagination to roam hand in hand with intelligence under the +spell of the wizard. There may be novel-readers who do not smoke at the +game, but surely they cannot be quite earnest or honest--you had better +put in writing all business agreements with this sort. + + * * * * * + +No boy can ever hope to become a really great or celebrated novel-reader +who does not begin his apprenticeship under the age of fourteen, and, as +I said before, stick to it as long as he lives. He must learn to scorn +those frivolous, vacillating and purposeless ones who, after beginning +properly, turn aside and whiling away their time on mere history, or +science, or philosophy. In a sense these departments of literature are +useful enough. They enable you often to perceive the most cunning and +profoundly interesting touches in fiction. Then I have no doubt that, +merely as mental exercise, they do some good in keeping the mind in +training for the serious work of novel-reading. I have always been +grateful to Carlyle's "French Revolution," if for nothing more than that +its criss-cross, confusing and impressive dullness enabled me to find +more pleasure in "A Tale of Two Cities" than was to be extracted from +any merit or interest in that unreal novel. + +This much however, may be said of history, that it is looking up in +these days as a result of studying the spirit of the novel. It was +not many years ago that the ponderous gentlemen who write criticisms +(chiefly because it has been forgotten how to stop that ancient waste +of paper and ink) could find nothing more biting to say of Macaulay's +"England" than that it was "a splendid work of imagination," of Froude's +"Caesar" that it was "magnificent political fiction," and of Taine's +"France" that "it was so fine it should have been history instead +of fiction." And ever since then the world has read only these three +writers upon these three epochs--and many other men have been writing +history upon the same model. No good novel-reader need be ashamed to +read them, in fact. They are so like the real thing we find in the +greatest novels, instead of being the usual pompous official lies of +old-time history, that there are flesh, blood and warmth in them. + +In 1877, after the railway riots, legislative halls heard the French +Revolution rehearsed from all points of view. In one capital, where I +was reporting the debate, Old Oracle, with every fact at hand from "In +the beginning" to the exact popular vote in 1876, talked two hours of +accurate historical data from all the French histories, after which +a young lawyer replied in fifteen minutes with a vivid picture of the +popular conditions, the revolt and the result. Will it be allowable, in +the interest of conveying exact impression, to say that Old Oracle was +"swiped" off the earth? No other word will relieve my conscience. +After it was all over I asked the young lawyer where he got his French +history. + +"From Dumas," he answered, "and from critical reviews of his novels. +He's short on dates and documents, but he's long on the general facts." + +Why not? Are not novels history? + +Book for book, is not a novel by a competent conscientious novelist +just as truthful a record of typical men, manners and motives as formal +history is of official men, events and motives? + +There are persons created out of the dreams of genius so real, so +actual, so burnt into the heart and mind of the world that they have +become historical. Do they not show you, in the old Ursuline Convent at +New Orleans, the cell where poor Manon Lescaut sat alone in tears? And +do they not show you her very grave on the banks of the lake? Have I +not stood by the simple grave at Richmond, Virginia, where never lay the +body of Pocahontas and listened to the story of her burial there? One +of the loveliest women I ever knew admits that every time she visits +relatives at Salem she goes out to look at the mound over the broken +heart of Hester Prynne, that dream daughter of genius who never actually +lived or died, but who was and is and ever will be. Her grave can be +easily pointed out, but where is that of Alexander, of Themistocles, of +Aristotle, even of the first figure of history--Adam? Mark Twain found +it for a joke. Dr. Hale was finally forced to write a preface to "The +Man Without a Country" to declare that his hero was pure fiction and +that the pathetic punishment so marvelously described was not only +imaginary, but legally and actually impossible. It was because Philip +Nolan had passed into history. I myself have met old men who knew sea +captains that had met this melancholy prisoner at sea and looked upon +him, had even spoken to him upon subjects not prohibited. And these old +men did not hesitate to declare that Dr. Hale had lied in his denial and +had repudiated the facts through cowardice or under compulsion from the +War Department. + + * * * * * + +Indeed, so flexible, adaptable and penetrable is the style, and so +admirably has the use and proper direction of the imagination been +developed by the school of fiction, that every branch of literature has +gained from it power, beauty and clearness. Nothing has aided more in +the spread of liberal Christianity than the remarkable series of "Lives +of Christ," from Straus to Farrar, not omitting particular mention of +the singularly beautiful treatment of the subject by Renan. In all of +these conscientious imagination has been used, as it is used in the +highest works of fiction, to give to known facts the atmosphere and +vividness of truth in order that the spirit and personality of the +surroundings of the Savior of Mankind might be newly understood by and +made fresh to modern perception. + +Of all books it is to be said--of novels as well--that none is great +that is not true, and that cannot be true which does not carry inherence +of truth. Now every book is true to some reader. The "Arabian Nights" +tales do not seem impossible to a little child, the only delight him. +The novels of "The Duchess" seem true to a certain class of readers, if +only because they treat of a society to which those readers are entirely +unaccustomed. "Robinson Crusoe" is a gospel to the world, and yet it is +the most palpably and innocently impossible of books. It is so plausible +because the author has ingeniously or accidentally set aside the usual +earmarks of plausibility. When an author plainly and easily knows +what the reader does not know and enough more to continue the chain of +seeming reality of truth a little further, he convinces the reader of +his truth and ability. Those men, therefore, who have been endowed with +the genius almost unconsciously to absorb, classify, combine, arrange +and dispense vast knowledge in a bold, striking or noble manner, are the +recognized greatest men of genius for the simple reason that the readers +of the world who know most recognize all they know in these writers, +together with that spirit of sublime imagination that suggests still +greater realms of truth and beauty. What Shakesepare was to the +intellectual leaders of his day, "The Duchess" was to countless immature +young folks of her day who were looking for "something to read." + +All truth is history, but all history is not truth. Written history is +notoriously no well-cleaner. + + + + +III. READING THE FIRST NOVEL + +BEING MOSTLY REMINISCENCES OF EARLY CRIMES AND JOYS + + +Once more and for all, the career of a novel reader should be entered +upon, if at all, under the age of fourteen. As much earlier as possible. +The life of the intellect, as of its shadowy twin, imagination, begins +early and develops miraculously. The inbred strains of nature lie +exposed to influence as a mirror to reflections, and as open to +impression as sensitized paper, upon which pictures may be printed +and from which they may also fade out. The greater the variety of +impressions that fall upon the young mind the more certain it is that +the greatest strength of natural tendency will be touched and revealed. +Good or bad, whichever it may be, let it come out as quickly as +possible. How many men have never developed their fatal weaknesses until +success was within reach and the edifice fell upon other innocent ones. +Believe me, no innate scoundrel or brute will be much helped or hindered +by stories. These have no turn or leisure for dreaming. They are eager +for the actual touch of life. What would a dull-eyed glutton, famishing, +not with hunger but with the cravings of digestive ferocity, find in +Thackeray's "Memorials of Gormandizing" or "Barmecidal Feasts?" Such +banquets are spread for the frugal, not one of whom would swap that +immortal cook-book review for a dinner with Lucullus. Rascals will not +read. Men of action do not read. They look upon it as the gambler does +upon the game where "no money passes." It may almost be said that the +capacity for novel-reading is the patent of just and noble minds. You +never heard of a great novel-reader who was notorious as a criminal. +There have been literary criminals, I grant you--Eugene Aram Dr. Dodd, +Prof. Webster, who murdered Parkmaan, and others. But they were writers, +not readers And they did not write novels. Mr. Aram wrote scientific and +school books, as did Prof. Webster, and Dr. Wainwright wrote beautiful +sermons. We never do sufficiently consider the evil that lies behind +writing sermons. The nearest you can come to a writer of fiction who +has been steeped in crime is in Benvenuto Cellini, whose marvelous +autobiographical memoir certainly contains some fiction, though it is +classed under the suspect department of History. + +How many men actually have been saved from a criminal career by the +miraculous influence of novels? Let who will deny, but at the age of +six I myself was absolutely committed to the abandoned purpose of riding +barebacked horses in a circus. Secretly, of course, because there were +some vague speculations in the family concerning what seemed to be +special adaptability to the work of preaching. Shortly after I gave that +up to enlist in the Continental Army, under Gen. Francis Marion, and no +other soldier slew more Britons. After discharge I at once volunteered +in an Indiana regiment quartered in my native town in Kentucky, and beat +the snare drum at the head of that fine body of men for a long time. But +the tendency was downward. For three months I was chief of a of robbers +that ravaged the backyards of the vicinity. Successively I became a spy +for Washington, an Indian fighter, a tragic actor. + +With character seared, abandoned and dissolute in habit through and +by the hearing and seeing and reading of history, there was but one +desperate step left So I entered upon the career of a pirate in my ninth +year. The Spanish Main, as no doubt you remember, was at that time upon +an open common across the street from our house, and it was a hundred +feet long, half as wide and would average two feet in depth. I have +often since thanked Heaven that they filled up that pathless ocean in +order to build an iron foundry upon the spot. Suppose they had excavated +for a cellar! Why during the time that Capt. Kidd, Lafitte and I +infested the coast thereabout, sailing three "low, black-hulled +schooners with long rakish masts," I forced hundreds of merchant seamen +to walk the plank--even helpless women and children. Unless the sharks +devoured them, their bones are yet about three feet under the floor of +that iron foundry. Under the lee of the Northernmost promontory, near +a rock marked with peculiar crosses made by the point of the stiletto +which I constantly carried in my red silk sash, I buried tons of plate, +and doubloons, pieces of eight, pistoles, Louis d'ors, and galleons by +the chest. At that time galleons somehow meant to me money pieces in +use, though since then the name has been given to a species of boat. The +rich brocades, Damascus and Indian stuffs, laces, mantles, shawls and +finery were piled in riotous profusion in our cave where--let the whole +truth be told if it must--I lived with a bold, black-eyed and coquettish +Spanish girl, who loved me with ungovernable jealousy that occasionally +led to bitter and terrible scenes of rage and despair. At last when I +brought home a white and red English girl whose life I spared because +she had begged me her knees by the memory of my sainted mother to spare +her for her old father, who was waiting her coming, Joquita passed all +bounds. I killed her--with a single knife thrust I remember. She was +buried right on the spot where the Tilden and Hendricks flag pole +afterwards stood in the campaign of 1876. It was with bitter melancholy +that I fancied the red stripes on the flag had their color from the +blood of the poor, foolish jealous girl below. + + * * * * * + +Ah, well-- + +Let us all own up--we men of above forty who aspire to respectability +and do actually live orderly lives and achieve even the odor of +sanctity--have we not been stained with murder?--aye worse! What man has +not his Bluebeard closet, full of early crimes and villainies? A certain +boy in whom I take a particular interest, who goes to Sunday-school and +whose life is outwardly proper--is he not now on week days a robber of +great renown? A week ago, masked and armed, he held up his own father in +a secluded corner of the library and relieved the old man of swag of +a value beyond the dreams--not of avarice, but--of successful, +respectable, modern speculation. He purposes to be a pirate whenever +there is a convenient sheet of water near the house. God speed him. +Better a pirate at six than at sixty. + +Give them work to do and good novels to read and they will get over it. +History breeds queer ideas in children. They read of military heroes, +kings and statesmen who commit awful deeds and are yet monuments of +public honor. What a sweet hero is Raleigh, who was a farmer of piracy; +what a grand Admiral was Drake; what demi-gods the fighting Americans +who murdered Indians for the crime of wanting their own! History hath +charms to move an infant breast to savagery. Good strong novels are the +best pabulum to nourish difference between virtue and vice. + +Don't I know? I have felt the miracle and learned the difference so well +that even now at an advanced age I can tell the difference and indulge +in either. It was not a week after the killing of Joquita that I read +the first novel of my life. It was "Scottish Chiefs." The dead bodies of +ten thousand novels lie between me and that first one. I have not read +it since. Ten Incas of Peru with ten rooms full of solid gold could +not tempt me to read it again. Have I not a clear cinch on a delicious +memory, compared with which gold is only Robinson Crusoe's "drug?" After +a lapse of all these years the content of that one tremendous, noble +chapter of heroic climax is as deeply burned into my memory as if it had +been read yesterday. + +A sister, old enough to receive "beaux" and addicted to the piano-forte +accomplishment, was at that time practicing across the hall an +instrumental composition, entitled, "La Reve." Under the title, printed +in very small letters, was the English translation; but I never thought +to look at it. An elocutionist had shortly before recited Poe's Raven +at a church entertainment, and that gloomy bird flapped its wings in my +young emotional vicinity when the firelight threw vague "shadows on +the floor." When the piece of music was spoken as "La Reve," its sad +cadences, suffering, of course, under practice, were instantly wedded in +my mind to Mr. Poe's wonderful bird and for years it meant the "Raven" +to me. How curious are childish impressions. Years afterward when I +saw a copy of the music and read the translation, "The Dream" under the +title, I felt a distinct shock of resentment as if the French language +had been treacherous to my sacred ideas. Then there was the romantic +name of "Ellerslie," which, notwithstanding considerable precocity in +reading and spelling I carried off as "Elleressie" Yeas afterward when +the actual syllables confronted me in a historical sketch of Wallace, +the truth entered like a stab and I closed the book. O sacred first +illusions of childhood, you are sweeter than a thousand year of fame! It +is God's providence that hardens us to endure the throwing of them down +to our eyes and strengthens us to keep their memory sweet in our hearts. + + + * * * * * + +It would be an affront then, not to assume that every reputable novel +reader has read "Scottish Chiefs." If there is any descendant or any +personal friend of that admirable lady, Miss Jane Porter, who may now be +in pecuniary distress, let that descendant call upon me privately with +perfect confidence. There are obligations that a glacial evolutionary +period can not lessen. I make no conditions but the simple proof of +proper identity. I am not rich but I am grateful. + +It was a Saturday evening when I became aware, as by prescience, that +there hung over Sir William Wallice and Helen Mar some terrible shadow +of fate. And the piano-forte across the hall played "La Reve." My heart +failed me and I closed the book. If you can't do that, my friend, then +you waste your time trying to be a novel reader. You have not the true +touch of genius for it. It is the miracle of eating your cake and having +it, too. It must have been the unconscious moving of novel reading +genius in me. For I forgot, as clearly as if it were not a possibility, +that the next day was Sunday. And so hurried off, before time, to bed, +to be alone with the burden on my heart. + + "Backward, turn backward, O Time in your flight-- + Make me a child again just for tonight." + +There are two or three novels I should love to take to bed as of +yore--not to read, but to suffer over and to contemplate and to seek +calmness and courage with which to face the inevitable. Could there be +men base enough to do to death the noble Wallace? Or to break the heart +of Helen Mar with grief? No argument could remove the presentiment, but +facing the matter gave courage. "Let tomorrow answer," I thought, as the +piano-forte in the next room played "La Reve." Then fell asleep. + +And when I awoke next morning to the full knowledge that it was Sunday, +I could have murdered the calendar. For Sunday was Dies Irae. After +Sunday-school, at least. There is a certain amount of fun to be to +extracted from Sunday-school. The remainder of those early Sundays +was confined to reading the Bible or storybooks from the Sunday-school +library--books, by the Lord Harry, that seem to be contrived especially +to make out of healthy children life-long enemies of the church, and to +bind hypocrites to the altar with hooks of steel. There was no whistling +at all permitted; singing of hymns was encouraged; no "playing"--playing +on Sunday was a distinct source of displeasure to Heaven! Are free-born +men nine years of age to endure such tyranny with resignation? Ask +the kids of today--and with one voice, as true men and free, they will +answer you, "Nit!" In the dark days of my youth liberty was in chains, +and so Sunday was passed in dreadful suspense as to what was doing in +Scotland. + + * * * * * + +Monday night after supper I rejoined Sir William in his captivity and +soon saw that my worst fears were to be realized. My father sat on the +opposite side of the table reading politics; my mother was effecting the +restoration of socks; my brother was engaged in unraveling mathematical +tangles, and in the parlor across the hall my sister sat alone with +her piano patiently debating "La Reve." Under these circumstances I +encountered the first great miracle of intellectual emotion in the +chapter describing the execution of William Wallace on Tower Hill. No +other incident of life has left upon me such a profound impression. +It was as if I had sprung at one bound into the arena of heroism. +I remember it all. How Wallace delivered himself of theological and +Christian precepts to Helen Mar after which they both knelt before the +officiating priest. That she thought or said, "My life will expire with +yours!" It was the keynote of death and life devotion. It was worthy to +usher Wallace up the scaffold steps where he stood with his hands bound, +"his noble head uncovered." There was much Christian edification, but +the presence of such a hero as he with "noble Head uncovered" would +enable any man nine years old with a spark of honor and sympathy in him +to endure agonizing amounts of edification. Then suddenly there was a +frightful shudder in my heart. The hangman approached with the rope, and +Helen Mar, with a shriek, threw herself upon Wallace's breast. Then the +great moment. If I live a thousand years these lines will always be +with me: "Wallace, with a mighty strength, burst the bonds asunder that +confined his arms and clasped her to his heart!" + + * * * * * + +In reading some critical or pretended text books on construction since +that time I came across this sentence used to illustrate tautology. It +was pointed out that the bonds couldn't be "burst" without necessarily +being asunder. The confoundedest outrages in this world are the capers +that precisionists cut upon the bodies of the noble dead. And with +impunity too. Think of a village surveyor measuring the forest of Arden +to discover the exact acreage! Or a horse-doctor elevating his eye-brow +with a contemptuous smile and turning away, as from an innocent, when +you speak of the wings of that fine horse, Pegasus! Any idiot knows +that bonds couldn't be burst without being burst asunder. But, let the +impregnable Jackass think--what would become of the noble rhythm and the +majestic roll of sound? Shakespeare was an ignorant dunce also when +he characterized the ingratitude that involves the principle of public +honor as "the unkindest cut of all." Every school child knows that it is +ungrammatical; but only those who have any sense learn after awhile +the esoteric secret that it sometimes requires a tragedy of language to +provide fitting sacrifice to the manes of despair. There never was yet +a man of genius who wrote grammatically and under the scourge of +rhetorical rules. Anthony Trollope is a most perfect example of the +exact correctness that sterilizes in its own immaculate chastity. +Thackeray would knock a qualifying adverb across the street, or thrust +it under your nose to make room for the vivid force of an idea. Trollope +would give the idea a decent funeral for the sake of having his adverb +appear at the grave above reproach from grammatical gossip. Whenever I +have risen from the splendid psychological perspective of old Job, the +solemn introspective howls of Ecclesiasticus and the generous living +philosophy of Shakespeare it has always been with the desire--of course +it is undignified, but it is human--to go and get an English grammar +for the pleasure of spitting upon it. Let us be honest. I understand +everything about grammar except what it means; but if you will give me +the living substance and the proper spirit any gentleman who desires the +grammatical rules may have them, and be hanged to him! And, while it +may appear presumptuous, I can conscientiously say that it will not be +agreeable to me to settle down in heaven with a class of persons who +demand the rules of grammar for the intellectual reason that corresponds +to the call for crutches by one-legged men. + + * * * * * + +If the foregoing appear ill-tempered pray forget it. Remember rather +that I have sought to leave my friend Sir William Wallace, holding Helen +Mar on his breast as long as possible. And yet, I also loved her! Can +human nature go farther than that? + +"Helen," he said to her, "life's cord is cut by God's own hand." He +stooped, he fell, and the fall shook the scaffold. Helen--that glorified +heroine--raised his head to her lap. The noble Earl of Gloucester +stepped forward, took the head in his hands. + +"There," he cried in a burst of grief, letting it fall again upon the +insensible bosom of Helen, "there broke the noblest heart that ever beat +in the breast of man!" + +That page or two of description I read with difficulty and agony through +blinding tears, and when Gloucester spoke his splendid eulogy my head +fell on the table and I broke into such wild sobbing that the little +family sprang up in astonishment. I could not explain until my mother, +having led me to my room, succeeded in soothing me into calmness and +I told her the cause of it. And she saw me to bed with sympathetic +caresses and, after she left, it all broke out afresh and I cried myself +to sleep in utter desolation and wretchedness. Of course the matter +got out and my father began the book. He was sixty years old, not an +indiscriminate reader, but a man of kind and boyish heart. I felt a sort +of fascinated curiosity to watch him when he reached the chapter that +had broken me. And, as if it were yesterday, I can see him under the +lamplight compressing his lips, or puffing like a smoker through them, +taking off his spectacles, and blowing his nose with great ceremony and +carelessly allowing the handkerchief to reach his eyes. Then another +paragraph and he would complain of the glasses and wipe them carefully, +also his eyes, and replace the spectacles. But he never looked at me, +and when he suddenly banged the lids together and, turning away, sat +staring into the fire with his head bent forward, making unconcealed use +of the handkerchief, I felt a sudden sympathy for him and sneaked out. +He would have made a great novel reader if he had had the heart. But he +couldn't stand sorrow and pain. The novel reader must have a heart +for every fate. For a week or more I read that great chapter and its +approaches over and over, weeping less and less, until I had worn out +that first grief, and could look with dry eyes upon my dead. And never +since have I dared to return to it. Let who will speak freely in other +tones of "Scottish Chiefs"--opinions are sacred liberties--but as for +me I know it changed my career from one of ruthless piracy to better +purposes, and certain boys of my private acquaintance are introduced to +Miss Jane Porter as soon as they show similar bent. + + + + +IV. THE FIRST NOVEL TO READ + +CONTAINING SOME SCANDALOUS REMARKS ABOUT "ROBINSON CRUSOE" + + +The very best First-Novel-To-Read in all fiction is "Robinson Crusoe." +There is no dogmatism in the declaration; it is the announcement of a +fact as well ascertained as the accuracy of the multiplication table. +It is one of the delights of novel reading that you may have any opinion +you please and fire it off with confidence, without gainsay. Those who +differ with you merely have another opinion, which is not sacred and +cannot be proved any more than yours. All of the elements of supreme +test of imaginative interest are in "Robinson Crusoe." Love is absent, +but that is not a test; love appeals to persons who cannot read or +write--it is universal, as hunger and thirst. + +The book-reading boy is easily discovered; you always catch him reading +books. But the novel-reading boy has a system of his own, a sort of +instinctive way of getting the greatest excitement out of the story, the +very best run for his money. This sort of boy soon learns to sit with +his feet drawn up on the upper rung of a chair, so that from the knees +to the thighs there is a gentle declivity of about thirty degrees; +the knees are nicely separated that the book may lie on them without +holding. That involves one of the most cunning of psychological secrets; +because, if the boy is not a novel reader, he does not want the book to +lie open, since every time it closes he gains just that much relief +in finding the place again. The novel-reading boy knows the trick of +immortal wisdom; he can go through the old book cases and pick the +treasures of novels by the way they lie open; if he gets hold of a new +or especially fine edition of his father's he need not be told to wrench +it open in the middle and break the back of the binding--he does it +instinctively. + +There are other symptoms of the born novel reader to be observed in him. +If he reads at night he is careful to so place his chair that the light +will fall on the page from a direction that will ultimately ruin the +eyes--but it does not interfere with the light. He humps himself over +the open volume and begins to display that unerring curvalinearity of +the spine that compels his mother to study braces and to fear that he +will develop consumption. Yet you can study the world's health records +and never find a line to prove that any man with "occupation or +profession--novel reading" is recorded as dying of consumption. The +humped-over attitude promotes compression of the lungs, telescoping of +the diaphragm, atrophy of the abdominal abracadabra and other +things (see Physiological Slush, p. 179, et seq.); +but--it--never--hurts--the--boy! + +To a novel reading boy the position is one of instinct, like that of +the bicycle racer. His eyes are strained, his nerves and muscles at +tension--everything ready for excitement--and the book, lying open, +leaves his hands perfectly free to drum on the sides of the chair, slap +his legs and knees, fumble in his pockets or even scratch his head as +emotion or interest demand. Does anybody deny that the highest proof of +special genius is the possession of the instinct to adapt itself to the +matter in hand? Nothing more need be said. + + * * * * * + +Now, if you will observe carefully such a boy when he comes to a certain +point in "Robinson Crusoe" you may recognize the stroke of fate in his +destiny. If he's the right sort, he will read gayly along; he drums, +he slaps himself, he beats his breast, he scratches his head. Suddenly +there will come the shock. He is reading rapidly and gloriously. +He finds his knife in his pocket, as usual, and puts it back; the +top-string is there; he drums the devil's tattoo, he wets his finger +and smears the margin of the page as he whirls it over and then--he +finds--"The--Print--of--a--Man's--Naked--Foot--on--the--Shore!!!" + +Oh, Crackey! At this tremendous moment the novel reader who has genius +drums no more. His hands have seized the upper edges of the muslin lids, +he presses the lower edges against his stomach, his back takes an +added intensity of hump, his eyes bulge, his heart thumps--he is +landed--landed! + +Terror, surprise, sympathy, hope, skepticism, doubt--come all ye +trooping emotions to threaten or console; but an end has come to fairy +stories and wonder tales--Master Studious is in the awful presence of +Human Nature. + + * * * * * + +For many years I have believed that that +Print--of--a--Man's--Naked--Foot was set in italic type in all editions +of "Robinson Crusoe." But a patient search of many editions has +convinced me that I must have been mistaken. + +The passage comes sneaking along in the midst of a paragraph in common +Roman letters and by the living jingo! you discover it just as Mr. +Crusoe discovered the footprint itself! + +No story ever written exhibits so profoundly either the perfect +design of supreme genius or the curious accidental result of slovenly +carelessness in a hack-writer. This is not said in any critical spirit, +because, Robinson Crusoe, in one sense, is above criticism, and +in another it permits the freest analysis without suffering in the +estimation of any reader. + +But for Robinson Crusoe, De Foe would never have ranked above the level +of his time. It is customary for critics to speak in awe of the "Journal +of the Plague" and it is gravely recited that that book deceived the +great Dr. Meade. Dr. Meade must have been a poor doctor if De Foe's +accuracy of description of the symptoms and effects of disease is not +vastly superior to the detail he supplies as a sailor and solitaire upon +a desert island. I have never been able to finish the "Journal." +The only books in which his descriptions smack of reality are "Moll +Flanders" and "Roxana," which will barely stand reading these days. + +In what may be called its literary manner, Robinson Crusoe is entirely +like the others. It convinces you by its own conviction of sincerity. +It is simple, wandering yet direct; there is no making of "points" or +moving to climaxes. De Foe did unquestionably possess the capacity to +put into his story the appearance of sincerity that persuades belief at +a glance. In that much he had the spark of genius; yet that same case +has not availed to make the "Journal" of the Plague anything more than +a curious and laborious conceit, while Robinson Crusoe stands among +the first books of the world--a marvelous gleam of living interest, +inextinguishably fresh and heartening to the imagination of every reader +who has sensibility two removes above a toad. + +The question arises, then, is "Robinson Crusoe" the calculated triumph +of deliberate genius, or the accidental stroke of a hack who fell upon a +golden suggestion in the account of Alexander Selkirk and increased +its value ten thousand fold by an unintentional but rather perfect +marshaling of incidents in order, and by a slovenly ignorance of +character treatment that enhanced the interest to perfect intensity? +This question may be discussed without undervaluing the book, the +extraordinary merit of which is shown in the fact that, while its idea +has been paraphrased, it has never been equalled. The "Swiss Family +Robinson," the "Schonberg-Cotta Family" for children are full of merit +and far better and more carefully written, but there are only the desert +island and the ingenious shifts introduced. Charles Reade in "Hard +Cash," Mr. Mallock in his "Nineteenth Century Romance," Clark Russel in +"Marooned," and Mayne Reid, besides others, have used the same theater. +But only in that one great book is the theater used to display the +simple, yearning, natural, resolute, yet doubting, soul and heart of man +in profound solitude, awaiting in armed terror, but not without purpose, +the unknown and masked intentions of nature and savagery. It seems +to me--and I have been tied to Crusoe's chariot wheels for a dozen +readings, I suppose--that it is the pressing in upon your emotions of +the immensity of the great castaway's solitude, in which he appears like +some tremendous Job of abandonment, fighting an unseen world, which is +the innate note of its power. + + * * * * * + +The very moment Friday becomes a loyal subject, the suspense relaxes +into pleased interest, and after Friday's funny father and the Spaniard +and others appear it becomes a common book. As for the second part of +the adventures I do not believe any matured man ever read it a second +time unless for curious or literary purposes. If he did he must be one +of that curious but simple family that have read the second part of +"Faust," "Paradise Regained," and the "Odyssey," and who now peruse +"Clarissa Harlowe" and go carefully over the catalogue of ships in +the "Iliad" as a preparation for enjoying the excitements of the city +directory. + +Every particle of greatness in "Robinson Crusoe" is compressed within +two hundred pages, the other four hundred being about as mediocre trash +as you could purchase anywhere between cloth lids. + + * * * * * + +It is interesting to apply subjective analysis to Robinson Crusoe. The +book in its very greatness has turned more critical swans into geese +than almost any other. They have praised the marvelous ingenuity with +which De Foe described how the castaway overcame single-handed, the +deprivations of all civilized conveniences; they have marveled at the +simple method in which all his labors are marshaled so as to render his +conversion of the island into a home the type of industrial and even of +social progress and theory; they have rhapsodized over the perfection +of De Foe's style as a model of literary strength and artistic +verisemblance. Only a short time ago a mighty critic of a great +London paper said seriously that "Robinson Crusoe and Gulliver appeal +infinitely more to the literary reader than to the boy, who does +not want a classic but a book written by a contemporary." What an +extraordinary boy that must be! It is probable that few boys care for +Gulliver beyond his adventures in Lilliput and Brobdignag, but they +devour that much, together with Robinson Crusoe, with just as much +avidity now as they did a century ago. Your clear-headed, healthy boy is +the first best critic of what constitutes the very liver and lights of +a novel. Nothing but the primitive problems of courage meeting peril, +virtue meeting vice, love, hatred, ambition for power and glory, will +go down with him. The grown man is more capable of dealing with social +subtleties and the problems of conscience, but those sorts of books do +not last unless they have also "action--action--action." + +Will the New Zealander, sitting amidst the prophetic ruins of St. +Paul's, invite his soul reading Robert Elsmere? Of course you can't say +what a New Zealander of that period might actually do; but what would +you think of him if you caught him at it? The greatest stories of the +world are the Bible stories, and I never saw a boy--intractable of +acquiring the Sunday-school habit though he may have been--who wouldn't +lay his savage head on his paws and quietly listen to the good old tales +of wonder out of that book of treasures. + + * * * * * + +So let us look into the interior of our faithful old friend, Robinson +Crusoe, and examine his composition as a literary whole. From the moment +that Crusoe is washed ashore on the island until after the release of +Friday's father and the Spaniard from the hands of the cannibals, there +is no book in print, perhaps, that can surpass it in interest and the +strained impression it makes upon the unsophisticated mind. It is +all comprised in about 200 pages, but to a boy to whom the world is +a theater of crowded action, to whom everything seems to have come +ready-made, to whom the necessity of obedience and accommodation to +others has been conveyed by constant friction--here he finds himself +for the first time face to face with the problem of solitude. He can +appreciate the danger from wild animals, genii, ghosts, battles, sieges +and sudden death, but in no other book before, did he ever come upon a +human being left solitary, with all these possible dangers to face. + +The voyages on the raft, the house-building, contriving, fearing, +praying, arguing--all these are full of plaintive pathos and yet of +encouragement. He witnesses despair turned into comfortable resignation +as the result of industry. It has required about twelve years. Virtue is +apparently fattening upon its own reward, when--Smash! Bang!--our young +reader runs upon "the--print--of--a--man's--naked--foot!" and security +and happiness, like startled birds, are flown forever. For twelve more +years this new unseen terror hangs over the poor solitary. Then we +have Friday, the funny cannibals later and it is all over. But the vast +solitude of that poor castaway has entered the imagination of the youth +and dominates it. + +These two hundred pages are crowded with suggestions that set a boy's +mind on fire, yet every page contains evidence of obvious slovenliness, +indolence and ignorance of human nature and common things, half of which +faults seem directly to contribute to the result, while the other half +are never noticed by the reader. + +How many of you, who sniff at this, know Crusoe's real name? Yet it +stares right out of the very first paragraphs in the book--a clean, +perhaps accidental, proof of good scholarship, which De Foe possessed. +Crusoe tells us his father was a German from Bremen, who married an +Englishwoman, from whose family name of Robinson came the son's name +which was properly Robinson Kreutznaer. This latter name, he explains, +became corrupted in the common English speech into Crusoe. That is an +excellent touch. The German pronunciation of Kreutznaer would sound like +Krites-nare, and a mere dry scholar would have evolved Crysoe out of the +name. But the English-speaking people everywhere, until within the past +twenty years or so, have given the German "eu" the sound of "oo" or "u." +Robinson's father therefore was called Crootsner until it was shaved +into Crootsno and thence smoothed to Crusoe. + +But what was the Christian name of the elder Kreutznaer? Or of the boy's +mother? Or of his brothers or sisters? Or of the first ship captain +under whom he sailed; or any of them; or even of the ship he commanded, +and in which he was wrecked; or of the dog that he carried to the +island; or of the two cats; or of the first and all the other tame +goats; or of the inlet; or of Friday's father; or of the Spaniard he +saved; or of the ship captain; or of the ship that finally saved him? +Who knows? The book is a desert as far as nomenclature goes--the only +blossoms being his own name; that of Wells, a Brazilian neighbor; Xury, +the Moorish boy; Friday, Poll, the parrot; and Will Atkins. + + * * * * * + +You may retort that all this doesn't matter. That is very true--and be +hanged to you!--but those facts prove by every canon of literary art +that Robinson Crusoe is either a coldly calculated flight of consummate +genius or an accidental freak of hack literature. When De Foe wrote, it +was only a century after Drake and his companions in authorized +piracy had made the British privateer the scourge of the seas and had +demonstrated that naval supremacy meant the control of the world. The +seafaring life was one of peril, but it carried with it honor, glory and +envy. Forty years later Nelson was born to crown British navalry with +deathless Glory. Even the commonest sailor spoke his ship's name--if it +were a fine vessel--with the same affection that he spoke his wife's +and cursed a bad ship by its name as if to tag its vileness with +proverbiality. + +When De Foe wrote Alexander Selkirk, able seaman, was alive end had +told his story of shipwreck to Sir Richard Steele, editor of the English +Gentleman and of the Tattler, who wrote it up well--but not half as well +as any one of ten thousand newspaper men of today could do under similar +circumstances. + +Now who that has read of Selkirk and Dampierre and Stradling does not +remember the two famous ships, the "Cinque Ports" and the "St. George?" +In every actvial book of the times, ship's names were sprinkled over the +page as if they had been shaken out of the pepper box. But you inquire +in vain the name of the slaver that wrecked "poor Robinson Crusoe"--a +name that would have been printed on his memory beyond forgetting +because of the very misfortune itself. Now the book is the autobiography +of a man whose only years of active life between eighteen and twenty-six +were passed as a sailor. It was written apparently after he was +seventy-two years old, at the period when every trifling incident and +name of youth would survive most brightly; yet he names no ships, no +sailor mates, carefully avoids all knowledge of or advantage attaching +to any parts of ships. It is out of character as a sailor's tale, +showing that the author either did not understand the value of or was +too indolent to acquire the ship knowledge that would give to his work +the natural smell of salt water and the bilge. It is a landlubber's sea +yarn. + +Is it in character as a revelation of human nature? No man like unto +Robinson Crusoe ever did live, does live, or ever will live, unless as a +freak deprived of human emotions. The Robinson Crusoe of Despair Island +was not a castaway, but the mature politician. Daniel Defoe of Newgate +Prison. The castaway would have melted into loving recollections; the +imprisoned lampoonist would have busied himself with schemes, ideas, +arguments and combinations for getting out, and getting on. This poor +Robin on the island weeps over nothing but his own sorrows, and, +while pretending to bewail his solitude, turns aside coldly from +companionships next only in affection to those of men. He has a dog, two +ship's cats (of whose "eminent history" he promises something that is +never related), tame goats and parrots. He gives none of them a name, +he does not occupy his yearning for companionship and love by preparing +comforts for them or by teaching them tricks of intelligence or +amusement; and when he does make a stagger at teaching Poll to talk it +is for the sole purpose of hearing her repeat "Poor Robin Crusoe!" +The dog is dragged in to work for him, but not to be rewarded. He dies +without notice, as do the cats, and not even a billet of wood marks +their graves. + +Could any being, with a drop of human blood in his veins, do that? He +thinks of his father with tears in his eyes--because he did not escape +the present solitude by taking the old man's advice! Does he recall his +mother or any of the childish things that lie so long and deep in +the heart of every natural man? Does he ever wonder what his old +school-fellows, Bob Freckles and Pete Baker, are doing these solitary +evenings when he sits under the tropics and hopes--could he not at +least hope it?--that they are, thank God, alive and happy at York? He +discourses like a parson of the utterly impossible affection that +Friday had for his cannibal sire and tells you how noble, Christian and +beautiful it was--as if, by Jove! a little of that virtue wouldn't have +ornamented his own cold, emotionless, fishy heart! + +He had no sentimental side. Think of those dreary, egotistic, awful +evenings, when, for more than twenty years this infernal hypocrite kept +himself company and tried patiently to deceive God by flattering Him +about religion! It is impossible. Why thought turns as certainly to +revery and recollection as grass turns to seed. He married. What was his +wife's name? We know how much property she had. What were the names of +the honest Portuguese Captain and the London woman who kept his money? +The cold selfishness and gloomy egotism of this creature mark him as a +monster and not as a man. + + * * * * * + +So the book is not in character as an autobiography, nor does it contain +a single softening emotion to create sympathy. Let us see whether it +be scholarly in its ease. The one line that strikes like a bolt of +lightning is the height of absurdity. We have all laughed, afterward +of course, at that--single--naked--foot--print. It could not have +been there without others, unless Friday were a one legged man, or was +playing the good old Scots game of "hop-scotch!" + +But the foot-print is not a circumstance to the cannibals. All the stage +burlesques of Robinson Crusoe combined could not produce such funny +cannibals as he discovered. Crusoe's cannibals ate no flesh but that +of men! He had no great trouble contriving how to induce Friday to eat +goat's flesh! They took all the trouble to come to his island to indulge +in picnics, during which they ate up folks, danced and then went home +before night. When the big party of 31 arrived, they had with them one +other cannibal of Friday's tribe, a Spaniard, and Friday's father. It +appears they always carefully unbound a victim before despatching him. +They brought Friday pere for lunch, although he was old, decrepit and +thin--a condition that always unfits a man among all known cannibals +for serving as food. They reject them as we do stringy old roosters for +spring chickens in the best society. Then Friday, born a cannibal and +converted to Crusoe's peculiar religion, shows that in three years he +has acquired all the emotions of filial affection prevalent at that time +among Yorkshire folk who attended dissenting chapels. More wonderful +still! old Friday pere, immersed in age and cannibalism, has the +corresponding paternal feeling. Crusoe never says exactly where these +cannibals came from, but my own belief is that they came from that +little Swiss town whence the little wooden animals for toy Noah's Arks +also came. + +A German savant--one of the patient sort that spend half a life writing +a monograph on the variation of spots on the butterfly's wings--could +get a philosophical dissertation on Doubt out of Crusoe's troubles with +pens, ink and paper; also clothes. In the volume I am using, on page 86, +third paragraph, he says: "I should lose my reckoning of time for want +of books, and pen and ink." So he kept it by notches in wood, he tells +in the fourth paragraph. In paragraph 5, same page, he says: "We are +to observe that among the many things I brought out of the ship, I +got several of less value, etc., which I omitted setting down as in +particular pens, ink and paper!" Same paragraph, lower down: "I shall +show that while my ink lasted I kept things very exact, but after that +was gone I could not make any ink by any means that I could devise." +Page 87, second paragraph: "I wanted many things, notwithstanding all +the many things that I had amassed together, and of these ink was one!" +Page 88, first paragraph: "I drew up my affairs in writing!" Now, by +George! did you ever hear of more appearing and disappearing pens, ink +and paper? + +The adventures of his clothes were as remarkable as his own. On his very +first trip to the wreck, after landing, he went "rummaging for clothes, +of which I found enough," but took no more than he wanted for present +use. On the second trip he "took all the men's clothes" (and there were +fifteen souls on board when she sailed). Yet in his famous debit and +credit calculations between good and evil he sets these down, page 88: + + EVIL | GOOD + -------------------------------------------------- + I have no clothes to | But I am in a hot climate, + cover me. | where, if I had + | clothes (!) I could hardly + | wear them. + +On page 147, bewailing his lack of a sieve, he says: "Linen, I had none +but what was mere rags." + +Page 158 (one year later): "My clothes, too, began to decay; as to +linen, I had had none a good while, except some checkered shirts, which +I carefully preserved, because many times I could bear no other clothes +on. I had almost three dozen of shirts, several thick watch coats, too +hot to wear." + +So he tried to make jackets out of the watch coats. Then this ingenious +gentleman, who had nothing to wear and was glad of it on account of the +heat, which kept him from wearing anything but a shirt, and rendered +watch coats unendurable, actually made himself a coat, waistcoat, +breeches, cap and umbrella of skins with the hair on and wore them in +great comfort! Page 175 he goes hunting, wearing this suit, belted by +two heavy skin belts, carrying hatchet, saw, powder, shot, his heavy +fowling piece and the goatskin umbrella--total weight of baggage and +clothes about ninety pounds. It must have been a cold day! + +Yet the first thing he does for the naked Friday thirteen years later +is to give him a pair--of--LINEN--trousers! Poor Robin Crusoe--what a +colossal liar was wasted on a desert island! + + * * * * * + +Of course, no boy sees the blemishes in "Robinson Crusoe;" those are +left to the Infallible Critic. The book is as ludicrous as "Hamlet" from +one aspect and as profound as "Don Quixote" from another. In its pages +the wonder tales and wonder facts meet and resolve; realism and idealism +are joined--above all, there is a mystery no critic may solve. It is +useless to criticize genius or a miracle, except to increase its wonder. +Who remembers anything in "Crusoe" but the touch of the wizard's hand? +Who associates the Duke of Athens, Hermia and Helena, with Bottom and +Snug, Titania, Oberon and Puck? Any literary master mechanic might real +off ten thousand yards of the Greek folks or of "Pericles," but when you +want something that runs thus: + + "I know a bank whereon the wild thyme blows! + Where oxlip and the nodding violet grows--." + +why, then, my masters, you must put up the price and employ a genius to +work the miracle. + +Take all miracles without question. Whether work of genius or miracle of +accident, "Robinson Crusoe" gives you a generous run for your money. + + + + +V. THE OPEN POLAR SEA OF NOVELS + +WITH HIGHLY INCENDIARY ADVICE TO BOYS AND SOME MORE ANCIENT HISTORY + + +After the first novel has been read, somewhere under the seasoned age +of fourteen years, the beginner equipped with inherent genius for novel +reading is afloat upon an open sea of literature, a master mariner of +his own craft, having ports to make, to leave, to take, so splendid +of variety and wonder as to make the voyages of Sinbad sing small by +comparison. It may be proper and even a duty here to suggest to the +young novel reader that the Ten Commandments and all governmental +statutes authorize the instant killing, without pity or remorse, of +any heavy-headed and intrusive person who presumes to map out for him +a symmetrical and well-digested course of novel reading. The murder of +such folks is universally excused as self-defense and secretly applauded +as a public service. The born novel reader needs no guide, counsellor +or friend. He is his own "master." He can with perfect safety and +indescribable delight shut his eyes, reach out his hand, pull down any +plum of a book and never make a mistake. Novel reading is the only +one of the splendid occupations of life calling for no instruction or +advice. All that is necessary is to bite the apple with the largest +freedom possible to the intellectual and imaginative jaws, and let the +taste of it squander itself all the way down from the front teeth until +it is lost in the digestive joys of memory. There is no miserable quail +limit to novels--you can read thirty novels in thirty days or 365 novels +in 365 days for thirty years, and the last one will always have the +delicious taste of the pies of childhood. + +If any honest-minded boy chances to read these lines, let him charge +his mind with full contempt for any misguided elders who have designs of +"choosing only the best accepted novels" for his reading. There are no +"best" novels except by the grace of the poor ones, and, if you don't +read the poor ones, the "best" will be as tasteless as unsalted rice. +I say to boys that are worth growing up: don't let anybody give you +patronizing advice about novels. If your pastors and masters try +oppression, there is the orchard, the creek bank, the attic room, the +roof of the woodshed (under the peach tree), and a thousand other places +where you may hide and maintain your natural independence. Don't let +elderly and officious persons explain novels to you. They can not +honestly do so; so don't waste time. Every boy of fourteen, with the +genius to read 'em, is just as good a judge of novels and can understand +them quite as well as any gentleman of brains of any old age. Because +novels mean entirely different things to every blessed reader. + + * * * * * + +The main thing at the beginning is to be in the neighborhood of a good +"novel orchard" and to nibble and eat, and even "gormandize," as your +fancy leads you. Only--as you value your soul and your honor as a +gentleman--bear in mind that what you read in every novel that pleases +you is sacred truth. There are busy-bodies, pretenders to "culture," and +sticklers for the multiplication table and Euclid's pestiferous theorem, +who will tell you that novel reading is merely for entertainment and +light accomplishment, and that the histories of fiction are purely +imaginary and not to be taken seriously. That is pure falsehood. The +truth of all humanity, as well as all its untruth, flows in a noble +stream through the pages of fiction. Do not allow the elders to persuade +you that pirate stories, battles, sieges, murders and sudden deaths, the +road to transgression and the face of dishonesty are not good for you. +They are 90 per cent. pure nutriment to a healthy boy's mind, and any +other sort of boy ought particularly to read them and so learn the +shortest cut to the penitentiary for the good of the world. Whenever you +get hold of a novel that preaches and preaches and preaches, and can't +give a poor ticket-of-leave man or the decentest sort of a villain +credit for one good trait--Gee, Whizz! how tiresome they are--lose it, +you young scamp, at once, if you respect yourself. If you are pushed you +can say that Bill Jones took it away from you and threw it in the creek. +The great Victor Hugo and the authors of that noble drama "The Two +Orphans," are my authorities for the statement that some fibs--not all +fibs, but some proper fibs--are entered in heaven on both debit and +credit sides of the book of fate. + +There is one book, the Book of Books, swelling rich and full with +the wisdom and beauty and joy and sorrow of humanity--a book that set +humility like a diamond in the forehead of virtue; that found mercy and +charity outcasts among the minds of men and left them radiant queens in +the world's heart; that stickled not to describe the gorgeous esotery of +corroding passion and shamed it with the purity of Mary Magdelen; that +dragged from the despair of old Job the uttermost poison-drop of doubt +and answered it with the noble problem of organized existence; that +teems with murder and mistake and glows with all goodness and honest +aspiration--that is the Book of Books. There hasn't been one written +since that has crossed the boundary of its scope. What would that +book be after some goody-goody had expurgated it of evil and left it +sterilized in butter and sugar? Let no ignorant paternal Czar, ruling +over cottage or mansion, presume to keep from the mind and heart of +youth the vigorous knowledge and observation of evil and good, crime and +virtue together. No chaff, no wheat; no dross, no gold; no human faults +and weaknesses, no heavenly hope. And if any gentleman does not like +the sentiment, he can find me at my usual place of residence, unless he +intends violence--and be hanged, also, to him! + + * * * * * + +A novel is a novel, and there are no bad ones in the world, except those +you do not happen to like. Suppose a boy started with Robinson Crusoe +and was scientifically and criminally steered by the hand of misguided +"culture" to Scott and Dickens and Cooper and Hawthorne--all the +classics, in fact, so that he would escape the vulgar thousands? Answer +a straight question, ye old rooters between a thousand miles of muslin +lids--would you have been willing to miss "The Gunmaker of Moscow" back +yonder in the green days of say forty years ago? What do you think of +Prof. William Henry Peck's "Cryptogram?" Were not Sylvanus Cobb, Jr., +and Emerson Bennett authors of renown--honor to their dust, wherever it +lies! Didn't you read Mrs. Southworth's "Capitola" or the "Hidden Hand" +long before "Vashti" was dreamed of? Don't you remember that No. 52 +of Beadle's Dime Library (light yellowish red paper covers) was +"Silverheels, the Delaware," and that No. 77 was "Schinderhannes, +the Outlaw of the Black Forest?" I yield to no man in affection and +reverence for M. Dumas, Mr. Thackeray and others of the higher circles, +but what's the matter with Ned Buntline, honest, breezy, vigorous, +swinging old Ned? Put the "Three Guardsmen" where you will, but there is +also room for "Buffalo Bill, the Scout." When I first saw Col. Cody, an +ornament to the theatre and a painful trial to the drama, and realized +that he was Buffalo Bill in the flesh--why, I was glad I had also read +"Buffalo Bill's Last Shot"--(may he never shoot it). The day has passed +forever, probably, when Buffalo Bill shall shout to his other scouts, +"You set fire to the girl while I take care of the house!" or vice +versa, and so saying, bear the fainting heroine triumphantly off from +the treacherous redskins. But the story has lived. + + * * * * * + +It was a happy and honored custom in the old days for subscribers to +the New York Ledger and the New York Weekly to unite in requests for +the serial republication of favorite stories in those great fireside +luminaries. They were the old-fashioned, broadside sheets and, of +course, there were insuperable difficulties against preserving the +numbers. After a year or two, therefore, there would awaken a general +hunger among the loyal hosts to "read the story over," and when the +demand was sufficiently strong the publishers would repeat it, cuts, +divisions, and all, just as at first. How many times the "Gunmaker +of Moscow" was repeated in the Ledger, heaven knows. I remember I +petitioned repeatedly for "Buffalo Bill" in the Weekly, and we got +it, too, and waded through it again. By wading, I don't mean pushing +laboriously and tediously through, but, by George! half immersion in the +joy. It was a week between numbers, and a studious and appreciative boy +made no bones of reading the current weekly chapters half a dozen times +over while waiting for the next. + +It must have been ten years later that I felt a thrill at the coming of +Buffalo Bill himself in his first play. I had risen to the dignity of +dramatic critic upon a journal of limited civilization and boundless +politics, and was privileged to go behind the scenes at the theatre and +actually speak to the actors. (I interviewed Mary Anderson during her +first season, in the parlor of the local hotel, where honest George +Bristow--who kept the cigar stand and could not keep a healthy +appetite--always gave a Thanksgiving order for "two-whole-roast turkeys +and a piece of breast," and they were served, too, the whole ones going +to some near-by hospital, and the piece of breast to George's honest +stomach--good, kind soul that he was. And Miss Anderson chewed gum +during the whole period of the interview to the intense amusement of +my elder and brother dramatic critic, who has since become the honored +governor of his adopted state, and toward whom I beg to look with +affectionate memory of those days.) Now, when a man has known novels +intimately, has been dramatic critic, and has traveled with a circus, it +seems to me in all reason he can not fairly have any other earthly +joys to desire. At fifteen I was walking on tip-toe about the house +on Sundays, and going off to the end of the garden to softly whistle +"weekday" tunes, and at twenty I stood off the wings L. U. E., and had +twenty "Black Crook" coryphees in silk tights and tarletan squeeze +past in line, and nod and say, "Is it going all right in front?" +They--knew--I--was--the--Critic! When you can do that you can laugh at +Byron, roosting around upon inaccessible mountain crags and formulating +solitude and indigestion into poetry! + +I waited for Buffalo Bill's coming with feelings that can not be +described. It was impossible to expect to meet Sir William Wallace +in the flesh, or Sir Wilfred of Ivanhoe, or Capt. D'Artagnan, or +Umslopogaas, or any one of a thousand great fighting heroes; but here +was Buffalo Bill, just as great and glorious and dashing and handsome +as any of them, and my right hand tingled to be grasped in that of the +Bayard of the Prairies. And that hand's desire was attained. In his +dressing-room between acts I sat nervously on a chair while the splendid +Apollo of frontiersmen, in buckskin and beads, sat on his trunk, with +his long, shapely legs sprawled gracefully out, his head thrown back so +that the mane of brown hair should hang behind. It was glistening with +oil and redolent of barber's perfume. And we talked there as one man +to another, each apparently without fear. I was certainly nervous and +timid, but he did not notice it, and I am frank to say he did not appear +to feel the slightest personal fear of me. Thus, face to face, I saw the +man with whom I had trod Ned Buntline's boundless plains and had seen +and encountered a thousand perils and redskins. When the act call came, +and I rose to go, a man stopped at the door and said to him: + +"What shall it be to-night, Colonel?" + +"A big beef-steak and a bottle of Bass!" answered Buffalo Bill heartily, +"and tell 'ern to have it hot and ready at 11:15." + +The beef-steak and Bass' ale were the watchwords of true heroism. +The real hero requires substantial filling. He must have a head and a +heart--but no less a good, healthy and impatient stomach. + +In the daily paper the morning I write this I see the announcement of +Buffalo Bill's "Wild West Show" coming two week's hence. Good luck to +him! He can't charge prices too steep for me, and there are six seats +necessary--the best in the amphitheater. And I wish I could be sure the +vigorous spirit of Ned Buntline would be looking down from the blue sky +overhead to see his hero charge the hill of San Juan at the head of the +Rough Riders. + + * * * * * + +This digression may be wide of the subject of novel reading, but +the real novel reader is at home anywhere. He has thoughts, dreams, +reveries, fancies. All the world is his novel and all actions are +stories and all the actors are characters. When Lucile Western, the +excellent American actress, was at the height of her powers, not long +before her last appearances, she had as her leading man a big, slouchy +and careless person, who was advertised as "the talented young English +actor, William Whally." In the intimacies of private association he +was known as Bill Whally, and his descent was straight down from "Mount +Sinai's awful height." He was a Hebrew and no better or more uneven and +reckless actor ever played melodramatic "heavies." He had a love for +Shakespeare, but could not play him; he had a love of drink and could +gratify it. His vigorous talents purchased for him much forbearance. +I've seen Mr. Whally play the fastidious and elegant "Sir Archibald +Levison" in shiny black doe-skin trousers and old-fashioned cloth +gaiters, because his condition rendered the problem of dressing somewhat +doubtful, though it could not obscure his acting. He was the only +walking embodiment of "Bill Sykes" I ever saw, and I contracted the +habit of going to see him kill Miss Western as "Nancy" because he +butchered that young woman with a broken chair more satisfactorily than +anybody else I ever saw. There was a murderer for you--Bill +Sykes! Bad as he was in most things, let us not forget +that--he--killed--Nancy--and--killed--her--well and--thoroughly. If that +young woman didn't snivel herself under a just sentence of death, I'm no +fit householder to serve on a jury. Every time Miss Western came around +it was my custom to read up fresh on "Oliver Twist" and hurry around and +enjoy Bill Whally's happy application of retribution with the aid of +the old property chair. There were six other persons whom I succeeded in +persuading to applaud the scene with me every time it was acted. + +But there's a separate chapter for villains. + + * * * * * + +Let us return to the old novels. What curious pranks time plays with +tastes and vogues. Forty years ago N. P. Willis was just faded. Yet he +was long a great comet of literary glitter and obscured many men of much +greater ability. Everybody read him; the annuals hung upon his name; the +ladies regarded him as a finer and more dashing Byron than Byron. +The place he filled was much like that of Congreve, before whom +Shakespeare's great nose was out of joint for a long time; Congreve, who +was the margarita aluminata major of English poesy and drama and public +life, and is now found in junk stores and in the back line on book +shelves and whom nobody reads now. Willis had his languid affectations, +his superficial cynicism and added to them ostentatious sentimentality. + +Does anybody read William Gilmore Simm's elaborate rhetoric disguised +as novels? He must have written two dozen of them, the Richardson of the +United States. Lovers of delicious wit and intellectual humor still +read Dr. Holmes' essays, but it would probably take a physician's +prescription to make them swallow the novels. In what dark corners of +the library are Bayard Taylor's novels and travels hidden? Will you come +into the garden, Maud, and read Chancellor Walworth's mighty tragedies +and Miss Mulock's Swiss-toy historical novels, or will you beg off, +like the honest girl you are, and take a nap? Your sleepiness, dear Miss +Maud, does you credit. By the way, what the deuce is the name of anyone +of these novels? I can recall "Elsie Vernier," by Dr. Holmes and then +there is a blank. + +But what classics they were--then! In the thick of them had appeared a +newspaper story that struggled through and was printed in book form. Old +friends have told me how they waited at the country post-offices to +get a copy, delayed for weeks. It was a scandal to read it in some +localities. It was fiercely attacked as an outrageous exaggeration +produced by temporary excitement and hostile feeling, or praised as a +new gospel. It has been translated into every tongue having a printing +press, and has sold by millions of copies. It was "Uncle Tom's Cabin." +It was not a classic, but what a vigorous immortal mongrel of human +sentiment it was! What a row was kicked up over Miss Braddon's +"Octoroon," and what an impossible yellowback it was! The toughest piece +of fiction I met with as a boy was "Sanford and Merton," and I've been +aching to say so for four pages. If this world were full of Sanfords +and Mertons, then give me Jupiter or some other comfortable planet at a +secure sanitary distance removed. + +I can't even remember the writers who were grammatically and +rhetorically perfect forty years ago, and also very dull with it all. +Is there a bookshelf that holds "Leni Leoti, or The Flower of the +Prairies?" There are "Jane Eyre," "Lady Audley's Secret," and "John +Halifax, Gentleman," which will go with many and are all well worth the +reading, too. Are Mrs. Eliza A. Dupuy, Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth, +Mrs. Caroline Lee Hentz and Augusta J. Evans dead? Their novels still +live--look at the book stores. "Linda, or the Young Pilot of the Belle +Creole," "India, the Pearl of Pearl River," "The Planter's Northern +Bride," "St. Elmo"--they were fiction for you! A boy old enough to have +a first sweetheart could swallow them by the mile. + +You remember, when we were boys, the circus acrobats always--always, +remember--rubbed young children with snake-oil and walloped them with a +rawhide to educate them in tumbling and contortion? Well, if I could get +the snake-oil for the joints and a curly young wig, I'd like to get back +at five hundred of those books and devour them again--"as of yore!" + + + + +VI. RASCALS + +BEING A DISCOURSE UPON GOOD, HONEST SCOUNDRELISM AND VILLAINS. + + +The people that inhabit novels are like other peoples of the earth--if +they are peaceful, they have no history. So that, therefore, in novels, +as in nations, it is the great restless heights of society that are to +be approached with greatest awe and that engage admiration and regard. +Everybody is interested in Nero, but not one person in ten thousand can +tell you anything definite about Constantine or even Marcus Aurelius. If +you should speak off-handedly about Amelia Sedley in the presence of a +thousand average readers you would probably miss 85 per cent. of effect; +if you said Becky Sharp the whole thousand would understand. + +There is this to be said of disreputable folk, that they are clever and +picturesque and interesting, at least. + +An elderly jeweler in New York City was arrested several years ago +upon the charge of receiving stolen gold and silver plate, watches and +jewelry from well-known thieves. For forty years he had been a +respected merchant, a church officer, a husband, father, and citizen, of +irreproachable reputation, with enduring friendships. He was charitable, +liberal and kindly. For decade after decade he was the experienced, wise +and fatherly "fence" of professional burglars and thieves. Why, it would +be an education in itself to know that man, to shake his honest hand, +fresh from charity or concealment, and smoke a pipe with him and +hear him talk about things frankly. When he gave to the missionary +collection, rest assured he gave sincerely; when he "covered swag," +into the melting pot for an industrious burglar, he did so only in the +regular course of business. + +Strange as it may seem, even criminals have human feelings in common +with all of us. The old Thug who stepped aside into the bushes and +prayed earnestly while his son was throwing his first strangling +cloth around the throat of the English traveler--prayed for that son's +honorable, successful beginning in his life devotion--was a good father. +And when he was told that the son had acted with unusual skill, who +can doubt that his tears of joy were sincere and humble tears of +thankfulness? At least Bowanee knew. Can you not imagine a kind-hearted +Chinese matron saying to her neighbor over the bamboo fence, "Yes, +we sent the baby down to the beach (or the river bank or the forest) +yesterday. We couldn't afford to keep it. I hope the gods have taken its +little soul. At any rate it is sure of salvation hereafter." + + * * * * * + +Some twenty years ago I took the night train from Pineville to +Barbourville, in the Kentucky mountains, reaching the latter place +about 11 o'clock of a cold, rainy, dark November night. Only one other +passenger alighted. There was an express wagon to take us to the town, +a mile or so distant, and the wagon was already heavy with freight +packages. The road was through a narrow lane, hub-deep with mud, and +what, with stalling and resting, we were more than half an hour getting +to the hotel. My fellow passenger was about my age, and was a shrewd, +well-informed native of the vicinity. He knew the mineral, timber and +agricultural resources, was evidently an enterprising business man and +an intelligent but not voluble talker. He accepted a cigar, and advised +me to see the house in Barbourville where the late Justice Samuel Miller +was born. At the hotel he registered first, and, as he was going to +leave next day and I was to remain several days, he told the clerk to +give me the better of the two rooms vacant. It was a very pleasant act +of thoughtfulness. The name on the register was "A. Johnson." The next +day I asked the clerk about Mr. Johnson. My fellow passenger was Andy +Johnson, whose fame as a feud-fighter and slayer of men has never been +exceeded in the history of mountain feuds. He then had three or four men +to his credit, definitely, and several doubtful ascriptions. He added a +few more, I believe, before he met the inevitable. + +Now, while Mr. Johnson, in all matters where killing seemed to him to be +appropriate, was a most prompt and accurate man in accomplishing it, yet +he was not the murderer that ignorant and isolated folks conceive such +persons to be. The cigar I had given him was a very bad, cheap cigar, +and, if he had merely wanted murder, he had every reason to kill me for +giving it to him, and he had a perfect night for the deed. But he smoked +it to the stub without a complaint or remark and saw that I got the best +room in the hotel. Johnson was a cautious and considerate fellow-man, +whose murders were doubtless private hobbies and exercises growing out +of his environment and heredity. + +One of the houses I most delight to enter in a certain town is one where +I am always sure to see a devoted and happy wife and beautiful, +playful children clustering around the armchair in which sits a man who +committed one of the most cold-blooded assassinations you can imagine. +He is an honored, esteemed and model citizen. His acquittal was a +miracle in a million chances. He has justified it. It is beautiful to +see those happy children clinging to the hand that-- + +Well, dear friends, the dentist is not a cruel man in his social +capacity, and you can get delicious viands instead of nauseous medicines +at the doctor's private table. + +That is why beginning novel readers should take no advice. Strike out +alone through the highways and lanes of story, character and experience. +The best novelist is the one who fears not to tell you the truth, which +is more wonderful than fiction. It is always the best hearts that bend +to mistakes. Absolute virtue is as sterile as granite rock; absolute +vice is as poisonous as a stagnant pond. No healthy interest or +speculation can linger about either. Enter into the struggle and know +human nature; don't stay outside and try to appear superior. + +For, which of us has not his crimes of thought to account for? Think +not, because Andy Johnson or William Sykes or Dr. Webster actually +killed his man, that you are guiltless, because you haven't. Have you +never wanted to? Answer that, in your conscience and in solitude--not to +me. Speak up to yourself and then say whether the difference between you +and the recorded criminal is not merely the difference between the overt +act and the faltering wish. It is a matter of courage or of custom. +Speaking for one gentleman, who knows himself and is not afraid to +confess, I can say that, while he could not kill a mouse with his own +hand, he has often murdered men in his heart. It may have been in fiery +youth over the wrong name on a dancing card, or, later, when a rival +got the better of him in discussion, or, when the dreary bore came and +wouldn't go, or, when misdirected goodness insisted on thrusting upon +him intended kindness that was wormwood and poison to the soul. Are +we not covetous (not confessedly, of course, but actually)? Is not +covetousness the thwarted desire of theft without courage? How many +of us, now--speaking man to man--can open up our veiled thoughts and +desires and then look the Ten Commandments in the eye without blushing? + + * * * * * + +The bravest, noblest, gentlest gentleman I have ever known was the Count +de la Fere, whom we at the Hotel de Troisville, in old Paris, called +"Athos." He was not merely sans peur et sans reproche as Bayard, but was +positive in his virtues. He fought for his friends without even asking +the cause of the fray. Yet, what a prig he seemed to be at first, with +his eternal gentle melancholy, his irreproachable courtesy, unvarying +kindness and complete unselfishness. You cannot--quite--warm--to--a--man +--who--is--so--perfectly--right--that--he--embarrasses--everybody--but--the--angels. + +But, when he ordered the gloomy and awful death of the treacherous +Miladi, woman though she was, and thus as a perfect gentleman took on +human frailty also, ah! how attractively noble and strong he became I In +that respect he was the antithetical corollary of William Sykes, who was +a purposeless, useless and uninterestingly regular scoundrel, thief and +brute, until he redeemed himself by becoming the instrument of social +justice and pounding that unendurable lady, Miss Nancy, of his name, +into absence from the world. Perhaps I have remarked before--and even if +I have it is pleasant to repeat it--that Bill Sykes had his faults, as +also have most of us, but it was given to him to earn forgiveness by the +aid of a cheap chair and the providential propinquity of Miss Nancy. I +never think of it without regretting that poor Bill Whally is dead. He +did it--so--much--to--my--taste! + +Who shall we say is the most loved and respected criminal in fiction? +Not Monsignor Rodin, of "The Wandering Jew;" not Thenardier in "Les +Miserables." These are really not criminals; they are allegorical +figures of perfect crime. They are solar centers, so far off and fixed +that one may regard them only with awe, reverence and fear. They are +types of fate, desire, temptation and chastisement. Let us turn to our +own flesh and blood and speak gratefully of them. + + * * * * * + +Who says Count Fosco? Now there is a criminal worthy of affection and +confidence. What an expansive nature, with kindness presented on every +side. Even the dogs fawned upon him and the birds came at his call. +An accomplished gentleman, considerately mannered--queer, as becomes a +foreigner, yet possessing the touchstone of universal sympathy. Another +man with crime to commit almost certainly would have dispatched it with +ruthless coldness; but how kindly and gently Count Fosco administered +the cord of necessity. With what delicacy he concealed the bowstring +and spoke of the Bosphorus only as a place for moonlight excursions. He +could have presented prussic acid and sherry to a lady in such a manner +as to render the results a grateful sacrifice to his courtesy. It was +all due to his corpulence; a "lean and hungry" villain lacks repose, +patience and the tact of good humor. In almost every small social and +individual attitude Count Fosco was human. He was exceedingly attentive +to his wife in society and bullied her only in private and when +necessary. He struck no dramatic attitudes. "The world is mine oyster!" +is not said by real men bent on terrible deeds. Count Fosco is the +perfect villain, and also the perfect criminal, inasmuch as he not only +acts naturally, but deliberately determines the action instead of being +drawn into it or having it forced upon him. + +He was a highly cultivated type of Andy Johnson, inasmuch as crime +with him was not a life purpose, but what is called in business a +"side-line." All of us have our hobbies; the closely confined clerk +goes home and roots up his yard to plant flower bulbs or cabbage plants; +another fancies fowls; another man collects pewter pots and old brass +and the millionaire takes to priceless horses; others of us turn from +useful statistics and go broke on novels or poetry or music. Count Fosco +was an educated gentleman and the pleasure of life was his purpose; +crime and intrigue were his recreations. Andy Johnson was a good +business man and wealth producer; murder was the direction in which +his private understanding of personal disagreements was exercised and +vented. Some men turn to poker playing, which is as wasteful as murder +and not half as dignified. Count Fosco is the villain par excellence of +novels. I do not remember what he did, because "The Woman in White" is +the best novel in the world to read gluttonously at a sitting and then +forget absolutely. It is nearly always a new book if you use it that +way. When the world is dark, the fates bilious, the appetite dead +and the infernal twinges of pain or sickness seem beyond reach of the +doctor, "The Woman in White" is a friend indeed. + + * * * * * + +But the man of men for villains, not necessarily criminals; but the +ordinary, every-day, picturesque worthies of good, honest scoundrelism +and disreputableness is Sir Robert Louis Stevenson. You can afford +conscientiously to stuff ballot boxes in order that his election may be +secured as Poet Laureate of Rascals. Leaving out John Silver and Billy +Bones and Alan Breck, whom every privately shriven rascal of us simply +must honor and revere as giants of courage, cunning and controlled, +conscience, Stevenson turned from singles and pairs, and in "The Ebb +Tide," drove, by turns, tandem and abreast, a four-in-hand of scoundrels +so buoyant, natural, strong, and yet each so totally unlike the others, +that every honest novel reader may well be excused for shedding tears +when he reflects that the marvelous hand and heart that created them are +gone forever from the haunts of the interestingly wicked. No novelist +ever exposed the human nature of rascals as Stevenson did. + +Now, lago was not a villain; he was a venomous toad, a scorpion, a +mad-dog, a poisonous plant in a fair meadow. There was nobody lago +loved, no weakness he concealed, no point of contact with any human +being. His sister was Pandora, his brother made the shirt of Nessus, +himself dealt in Black Plagues and the Leprosy. The old Serpent was +permitted to rise from his belly and walk upright on the tip of his tail +when he met Iago, as a demonstration of moral superiority. But think +of those three Babes-in-the-Wood villains, skipper Davis, the Yankee +swashbuckler and ship scuttler; Herrick, the dreamy poet, ruined by +commerce and early love, with his days of remorse and his days of +compensatary liquor; and Huish, the great-hearted Scotch ruffian, who +chafed at the conventional concealments of trade among pals and never +could--as a true Scotchman--understand why you should wait to use a +knife upon a victim when promptness lay in the club right at hand--think +of them sailing out of Honolulu harbor on the Farallone. + +Let who will prefer to have sailed with Jason or Aeneas or Sinbad; but +the Farallone and its precious freight of rascality gets my money every +time. Think of the three incomparable reprobates afloat, with one case +of smallpox and a cargo of champagne, daring to make no port, with over +a hundred million square miles of ocean around them, every ten lookout +knots of it containing a possible peril! It was simply grand--not +pirates, shipwrecks or mutinies could beat that problem. And the pathos +of the sixth day, when, with every man Jack of them looking delirium +tremens in the face and suspecting each the other, Mr. Huish opened a +new case of champagne and--found clear spring water under the French +label! The honest scoundrels had been laid by the heels by a common wine +merchant in the regular way of business! Oh, gentlemen, there should be +honor in business; so that gallant villains can be free of betrayal. + +The keynote of these gentlemen is struck in the second chapter, where +all three of them writing lies home--Davis and Herrick, sentimental +equivocations, Huish the strongest of brag with nobody to send it to. +In a burst of weakness Davis tells Herrick what a villain he has been, +through rum, and how he can not let his daughter, "little Adar," know +it. "Yes, there was a woman on board," he said, describing the ship +he had scuttled. "Guess I sent her to hell, if there's such a place. +I never dared go home again, and I don't know," he added, bitterly, +"what's come to them." + +"Thank you, Captain," said Herrick, "I never liked you better!" + +Is it not in human nature to cuddle to a great sheepish murderer like +that, who groans in secret for his little girl--if even the girl was +truth? I think she turned out a myth, but he had the sentiment. + +Was there ever a more melancholy, remorse-stricken wretch than Cap'n +Davis? Or a gentler and seedier poet than Herrick? Or a more finely +sodden and soaked old rum sport than Huish (not--Whish!) But it was not +until they fell in with Attwater that their weakness as scoundrels was +exposed. Attwater was so splendidly religious! He was determined to have +things right if he had to have them so by bloodshed; he saved souls by +bullets. Things were right when they were as he thought they should +be. And believing so, with Torquemada, Alexander Sixtus and other most +religious brethren, he was ready to set up the stake and fagot and +cauterize sin with fire. One thing you can say about the religious folks +that are big with cocksureness and a mission--they may make mistakes, +but the mistake doesn't talk and criticise. + + * * * * * + +The only rascal worthy to travel in company with Stevenson's rascals +is the Chevalier Balibari, of Castle Barry, in Ireland, whose admirable +memoirs have been so well told by Mr. Thackeray. The Baron de la Motte +in "Denis Duval," was advantageously born to ornament the purple and +fine linen of picturesque unrighteousness--but his was a brief star that +fell unfinished from its place amidst the Pleiades. Thackeray's genius +ran more to disreputable men than to actual villains. But he drew two +scoundrels that will serve as beacon lights to any clean-souled youth +with the instinct to take warning. One was Lord Steyne, the other, Dr. +George Brand Firmin; one the aristocratic, class-bred, cynical brute, +the other the cold, tuft-hunting trained hypocrite. What encouragement +of self-respect Judas Iscariot might have received if he had met Dr. +Firmin! + +Dr. Chadband, Mr. Pecksniff, Bill Sykes, Fagin, Mr. Murdstone, of +Dickens' family--they are all strong in impression, but wholly unreal; +mere stage villains and caricatures. A villain who has no good traits, +no hobbies of kindness and affection, is never born into the world; he +is always created by grotesque novel writers. + +The villains of Dumas, Hugo, Balzac, Daudet are French. There may have +been, or may be now such prototypes alive in France--because the Dreyfus +case occurred in France, and no doubt much can happen in that fine, +fertile country which translators cannot fully convey over the +frontiers; but they have always seemed to me first cousins to my +friends, the ogres, the evil magicians and the werewolves, and, in that +much, not quite natural. + +For heroes of the genuine cavalleria type, plumed, doubleted, pumpt and +magnificent, give me Dumas; for good folks and true, the great American +Fenimore Cooper; but for the blessed company of blooming, breathing +rascals, Stevenson and Thackeray all the time. + + + + +VII. HEROES + +THE NATURE AND THE FLOWER OF THEM--THE GALLANT D'ARTAGNAN OR THE +GLORIOUS BUSSY. + + +Let us agree at the start that no perfect hero can be entirely mortal. +The nearer the element of mortality in him corresponds to the heel +measure of Achilles, the better his chance as hero. The Egyptian and +Greek heroes were invariably demi-gods on the paternal or maternal side. +Few actual historic heroes have escaped popular scandal concerning their +origin, because the savage logic in us demands lions from a lion; that +Theseus shall trace to Mars; that courage shall spring from courage. + +Another most excellent thing about the ideal hero is that the immortal +quality enables him to go about the business of his heroism without +bothering his head with the rights or wrongs of it, except as the +prevailing sentiment of social honor (as distinguished from the inborn +sentiment of honesty) requires at the time. Of course, there is a lower +grade of measly, "moral heroes," who (thank heaven and the innate sense +of human justice!) are usually well peppered with sorrow and punishment. +The hero of romance is a different stripe; Hyperion to a Satyr. He +doesn't go around groaning page after page of top-heavy debates as to +the inherent justice of his cause or his moral right to thrust a tallow +candle between the particular ribs behind which the heart of his enemy +is to be found--balancing his pros and cons, seeking a quo for each +quid, and conscientiously prowling for final authorities. When you +invade the chiropodical secret of the real hero's fine boot, or brush +him in passing--if you have looked once too often at a certain lady, or +have stood between him and the sun, or even twiddled your thumbs at him +in an indecorous or careless manner--look to it that you be prepared +to draw and mayhap to be spitted upon his sword's point, with honor. +Sdeath! A gentlemen of courage carries his life lightly at the needle +end of his rapier, as that wonderful Japanese, Samsori, used to make the +flimsiest feather preside in miraculous equilibration upon the tip of +his handsome nose. + +No hero who does more or less than is demanded by the best practical +opinion of the society of his time is worth more than thirty cents as +a hero. Boys are literary and dramatic critics so far above the critics +formed by strained formulas of the schools that you can trust them. +They have an unerring distrust of the fellow who moves around with his +confounded conscientious scruples, as if the well-settled opinion of the +breathing world were not good enough for him! Who the deuce has got any +business setting everybody else right? + +Some of these days I believe it is going to be discovered that the +atmosphere and the encompassing radiance and sweetness of Heaven are +composed of the dear sighs and loving aspirations of earthly motherhood. +If it turns out otherwise, rest assured Heaven will not have reached +its perfect point of evolution. Why is it, then, that mothers +will--will--will--try, so mistakenly, to extirpate the jewel of honest, +manly savagery from the breasts of their boys? I wonder if they know +that when grown men see one of these "pretty-mannered boys," cocksure +as a Swiss toy new painted and directed by watch spring, they feel an +unholy impulse to empty an ink-bottle over the young calf? Fauntleroy +kids are a reproach to our civilization. Men, women and children, all of +us, crowd around the grimy Deignan of the Merrimac crew, and shout and +cheer for Bill Smith, the Rough Rider, who carried his mate out of the +ruck at San Juan and twirls his hat awkwardly and explains: "Ef I hadn't +a saw him fall he would 'a' laid thar yit!"--and go straight home and +pretend to be proud of a snug little poodle of a man who doesn't play +for fear of soiling his picture-clothes, and who says: "Yes, sir, thank +you," and "No, thank you, ma'am," like a French doll before it has had +the sawdust kicked out of it! + + * * * * * + +Now, when a hero tries to stamp his acts with the precise quality of +exact justice--why, he performs no acts. He is no better than that poor +tongue-loose Hamlet, who argues you the right of everything, and then, +by the great Jingo! piles in and messes it all by doing the wrong thing +at the wrong time and in the wrong manner. It is permitted of course to +be a great moral light and correct the errors of all the dust of earth +that has been blown into life these ages; but human justice has been +measured out unerringly with poetry and irony to such folk. They are +admitted to be saints, but about the time they have got too good for +their earthly setting, they have been tied to stakes and lighted up +with oil and faggots; or a soda phosphate with a pinch of cyanide of +potassium inserted has been handed to them, as in the case of our old +friend, Socrates. And it's right. When a man gets too wise and good +for his fellows and is embarrassed by the healthful scent of good human +nature, send him to heaven for relief, where he can have the goodly +fellowship of the prophets, the company of the noble army of martyrs, +and amuse himself suggesting improvements upon the vocal selections +of cherubim and seraphim! Impress the idea upon these gentry with +warmth--and--with--oil! + + * * * * * + +The ideal hero of fiction, you say, is Capt. D'Artagnan, first name +unknown, one time cadet in the Reserves of M. de Troisville's company +of the King's Guards, intrusted with the care of the honor and safety of +His Majesty, Louis XIV. Very well; he is a noble gentleman; the +choice does honor to your heart, mind and soul; take him and hold the +remembrance of his courage, loyalty, adroitness and splendid endurance +with hooks of steel. For myself, while yielding to none who honor +the great D'Artagnan, yet I march under the flag of the Sieur Bussy +d'Amboise, a proud Clermont, of blood royal in the reign of Henry +III., who shed luster upon a court that was edified by the wisdom of M. +Chicot, the "King's Brother," the incomparable jester and philosopher, +who would have himself exceeded all heroes except that he despised the +actors and the audience of the world's theater and performed valiant +feats only that he might hang his cap and bells upon the achievements in +ridicule. + +Can it be improper to compare D'Artagnan and Bussy--when the intention +is wholly respectful and the motive pure? If a single protest is +heard, there will be an end to this paper now--at once. There are some +comparisons that strengthen both candidates. For, we must consider the +extent of the theater and the stage, the space of time covering the +achievements, the varying conditions, lights and complexities. As, +for instance, the very atmosphere in which these two heroes moved, the +accompaniment of manner which we call the "air" of the histories, and +which are markedly different. The contrast of breeding, quality and +refinement between Bussy and D'Artagnan is as great as that which +distinguishes Mercutio from the keen M. Chicot. Yet each was his own +ideal type. Birth and the superior privileges of the haute noblesse +conferred upon the Sieur Bussy the splendid air of its own sufficient +prestige; the lack of these require of D'Artagnan that his intelligence, +courage and loyal devotion should yet seem to yield something of their +greatness in the submission that the man was compelled to pay to +the master. True, this attitude was atoned for on occasion by blunt +boldness, but the abased position and the lack of subtle distinction of +air and mind of the noble, forbade to the Fourth Mousquetaire the last +gracious touch of a Bayard of heroism. But the vulgarity was itself +heroic. + + * * * * * + +Compare the first appearance of the great Gascon at the Hotel de +Troisville, or even his manner and attitude toward the King when he +sought to warn that monarch against forgetfulness of loyalty proved, +with the haughty insolence of indomitable spirit in which Bussy threw +back to Henry the shuttle of disfavor on the night of that remarkable +wedding of St. Luc with the piquant little page soubrette, Jeanne de +Brissac. + +D'Artagnan's air to his King has its pathos. It seems to say: "I speak +bluntly, sire, knowing that my life is yours and yet feeling that it is +too obscure to provoke your vengeance." A very hard draught for a man +of fire and fearlessness to take without a gulp. But into Bussy's manner +toward his King there was this flash of lightning from Olympus: "My +life, sire, is yours, as my King, to take or leave; but not even you +may dare to think of taking the life of Bussy with the dust of least +reproach upon it. My life you may blow out; my honor you do not dare +approach to question!" + +There are advantages in being a gentleman, which can not be denied. +One is that it commands credit in the King's presence as well as at the +tailor's. + +It is interesting to compare both these attitudes with that of +"Athos," the Count de la Fere, toward the King. He was lacking in +the irresistibly fierce insolence of Bussy and in the abasement of +D'Artagnan; it was melancholy, patient, persistent and terrible in its +restrained calmness. How narrowly he just escaped true greatness. I +would no more cast reproaches upon that noble gentleman than I would +upon my grandmother; but he--was--a--trifle--serous, wasn't he? He was +brave, prompt, resourceful, splendid, and, at need, gingerish as the +best colt in the paddock. It is the deuce's own pity for a man to be +born to too much seriousness. Do you know--and as I love my country, I +mean it in honest respect--that I sometimes think that the gentleness +and melancholy of Athos somehow suggests a bit of distrust. One is +almost terrified at times lest he may begin the Hamlet controversies. +You feel that if he committed a murder by mistake you are not absolutely +sure he wouldn't take a turn with Remorse. Not so Bussy; he would throw +the mistake in with good will and not create worry about it. Hang it +all, if the necessary business of murder is to halt upon the shuffling +accident of mistake, we may as well sell out the hero business and rent +the shop. It would be down to the level of Hamlet in no time. Unless, of +course, the hero took the view of it that Nero adopted. It is improbable +that Nero inherited the gift of natural remorse; but he cultivated one +and seemed to do well with it. He used to reflect upon his mother and +his wife, both of whom he had affectionately murdered, and justified +himself by declaring that a great artist, who was also the Roman +Emperor, would be lacking in breadth of emotional experience and +retrospective wisdom, unless he knew the melancholy of a two-pronged +family remorse. And from Nero's standpoint it was one of the best +thoughts that he ever formulated into language. + +To return to Bussy and D'Artagnan. In courage they were Hector and +Achilles. You remember the champagne picnic before the bastion St. +Gervais at the siege of St. Rochelle? What light-hearted gayety amid the +flying missiles of the arquebusiers! Yet, do not forget that--ignoring +the lacquey--there were four of them, and that his Eminence, the +Cardinal Duke, had said the four of them were equal to a thousand men! +If you have enough knowledge of human nature to understand the fine +game of baseball, and have at any time scraped acquaintance with the +interesting mathematical doctrine of progressive permutations, you will +see, when four men equal to a thousand are under the eyes of each other, +and of the garrison in the fort, that the whole arsenal of logarithms +would give out before you could compute the permutative possibilities +of the courage that would be refracted, reflected, compounded and +concentrated by all there, each giving courage to and receiving courage +from each and all the others. It makes my head ache to think of it. I +feel as if I could be brave myself. + +Certainly they were that day. To the bitter end of finishing the meal; +and they confessed the added courage by gamboling like boys amid awful +thunders of the arquebuses, which made a rumble in their time like their +successors, the omnibuses, still make to this day on the granite streets +of cities populated by deaf folks. + +There never was more of a gay, lilting, impudent courage than those four +mousquetaires displayed with such splendid coolness and spirit. + +But compare it with the fight which Bussy made, single-handed, against +the assassins hired by Monsereau and authorized by that effeminate +fop, the Due D'Anjou. Of course you remember it. Let me pay you the +affectionate compliment of presuming that you have read "La Dame de +Monsereau," often translated under the English title, "Chicot, the +Jester," that almost incomparable novel of historical romance, by M. +Dumas. If, through some accident or even through lack of culture, you +have failed to do so, pray do not admit it. Conceal your blemish +and remedy the matter at once. At least, seem to deserve respect and +confidence, and appear to be a worthy novel-reader if actually you are +not. There is a novel that, I assure you on my honor, is as good as +the "Three Guardsmen;" but--oh!--so--much--shorter; the pity of it, +too!--oh, the pity of it! On the second reading--now, let us speak with +frank conservatism--on the second reading of it, I give you my word, man +to man, I dreaded to turn every page, because it brought the end nearer. +If it had been granted to me to have one wish fulfilled that fine winter +night, I should have said with humility: "Beneficent Power, string it +out by nine more volumes, presto me here a fresh box of cigars, and the +account of your kindness, and my gratitude is closed." + + * * * * * + +If the publisher of this series did not have such absurd sensitiveness +about the value of space and such pitifully small ideas about the +nobility of novels, I should like to write at least twenty pages about +"Chicot." There are books that none of us ever put down in our lists of +great books, and yet which we think more of and delight more in than all +the great guns. Not one of the friends I've loved so long and well has +been President of the United States, but I wouldn't give one of them for +all the Presidents. Just across the hall at this minute I can hear the +frightful din of war--shells whistling and moaning, bullets s-e-o-uing, +the shrieks of the dying and wounded--Merciful Heaven! the "Don Juan +of Asturia" has just blown up in Manila Bay with an awful roar--again! +Again, as I'm a living man, just as she has blown up every day, and +several times every day, since May 1, 1898. There are two warriors over +in the play-room, drenched with imaginary gore, immersed in the tender +grace of bestowing chastening death and destruction upon the Spanish +foe. Don't I know that they rank somewhat below Admiral Dewey as heroes? +But do you suppose that their father would swap them for Admiral Dewey +and all the rainbow glories that fine old Yankee sea-dog ever will +enjoy--long may he live to enjoy them all!--do you think so? Of course +not! You know perfectly well that his--wife--wouldn't--let--him! + +I would not wound the susceptibilities of any reader; but speaking for +myself--"Chicot" being beloved of my heart--if there was a mean +man, living in a mean street, who had the last volume of "Chicot" in +existence, I would pour out my library's last heart's blood to get +it. He could have all of Scott but "Ivanhoe," all of Dickens but +"Copperfield," all of Hugo but "Les Miserables," cords of Fielding, +Marryat, Richardson, Reynolds, Eliot, Smollet, a whole ton of German +translations--by George! he could leave me a poor old despoiled, +destitute and ruined book-owner in things that folks buy in costly +bindings for the sake of vanity and the deception of those who also +deceive them in turn. + +Brother, "Chicot" is a book you lend only to your dearest friend, and +then remind him next day that he hasn't sent it back. + + * * * * * + +Now, as to Bussy's great fight. He had gone to the house of Madame Diana +de Monsereau. I am not au fait upon French social customs, but let us +presume his being there was entirely proper, because that excellent lady +was glad to see him. He was set upon by her husband, M. de Monsereau, +with fifteen hired assassins. Outside, the Due D'Anjou and some others +of assassins were in hiding to make sure that Monsereau killed Bussy, +and that somebody killed Monsereau! There's a "situation" for you, +double-edged treachery against--love and innocence, let us say. Bussy +is in the house with Madame. His friend, St. Luc, is with him; also +his lacquey and body-physician, the faithful Rely. Bang! the doors are +broken in, and the assassins penetrate up the stairway. The brave Bussy +confides Diana to St. Luc and Rely, and, hastily throwing up a barricade +of tables and chairs near the door of the apartment, draws his sword. +Then, ye friends of sudden death and valorous exercise, began a surfeit +of joy. Monsereau and his assassins numbered sixteen. In less than three +moderate paragraphs Bessy's sword, playing like avenging lightning, +had struck fatality to seven. Even then, with every wrist going, he +reflected, with sublime calculation: "I can kill five more, because I +can fight with all my vigor ten minutes longer!" After that? Bessy could +see no further--there spoke fate!--you feel he is to die. Once more the +leaping steel point, the shrill death cry, the miraculous parry. The +villain, Monsereau, draws his pistol. Bessy, who is fighting half +a dozen swordsmen, can even see the cowardly purpose; he watches; +he--dodges--the--bullets!--by watching the aim-- + + "Ye sons of France, behold the glory!" + +He thrusts, parries and swings the sword as a falchion. Suddenly a +pistol ball snaps the blade off six inches from the hilt. +Bessy picks up the blade and in an instant +splices--it--to--the--hilt--with--his--handkerchief! Oh, good sword +of the good swordsman! it drinks the blood of three more before +it--bends--and--loosens--under--the--strain! Bessy is shot in the thigh; +Monsereau is upon him; the good Rely, lying almost lifeless from a +bullet wound received at the outset, thrusts a rapier to Bessy's grasp +with a last effort. Bessy springs upon Monsereau with the great bound +of a panther and +pins--the--son--of--a--gun--to--the--floor--with--the--rapier--and--watches--him--die! + +You can feel faint for joy at that passage for a good dozen readings, if +you are appreciative. Poor Bessy, faint from wounds and blood-letting, +retreats valiantly to a closet window step by step and drops out, +leaving Monsereau spitted, like a black spider, dead on the floor. +Here hope and expectation are drawn out in your breast like chewing +gum stretched to the last shred of tenuation. At this point I firmly +believed that Bessy would escape. I feel sorry for the reader who does +not. You just naturally argue that the faithful Rely will surely reach +him and rub him with the balsam. That balsam of Dumas! The same that +D'Artagnan's mother gave him when he rode away on the yellow horse, +and which cured so many heroes hurt to the last gasp. That miraculous +balsam, which would make doctors and surgeons sing small today if they +had not suppressed it from the materia medica. May be they can silence +their consciences by the reflection that they suppressed it to enhance +the value and necessity of their own personal services. But let them +look at the death rate and shudder. I had confidence in Rely and the +balsam, but he could not get there in time. Then, it was forgone that +Bessy must die. Like Mercutio, he was too brilliant to live. Depend upon +it, these wizards of story tellers know when the knell of fate rings +much sooner than we halting readers do. + +Bessy drops from the closet window upon an iron fence that surrounded +the park and was impaled upon the dreadful pickets! Even then for +another moment you can cherish a hope that he may escape after all. +Suspended there and growing weaker, he hears footsteps approaching. Is +it a rescuing friend? He calls out--and a dagger stroke from the hand of +D'Anjou, his Judas master, finds his heart. That's the way Bessy died. +No man is proof against the dagger stroke of treachery. Bessy was +powerful and the due jealous. + +Diana has been carried off safely by the trustworthy St. Luc. She must +have died of grief if she had not been kept alive to be the instrument +of retributive justice. (In the sequel you will find that this Queen of +Hearts descended upon the ignoble due at the proper time like a thousand +of brick and took the last trick of justice.) + + * * * * * + +The extraordinary description of Bussy's fight is beyond everything. You +gallop along as if in a whirlwind, and it is only in cooler moments that +you discover he killed about twelve rascals with his own good arm. It +seems impossible; the scientific, careful readers have been known to +declare it impossible and sneer at it with laughter. I trust every +novel reader respects scientific folks as he should; but science is not +everything. Our scientific friends have contended that the whale did not +engulf Jonah; that the sun did not pause over the vale of Askelon; that +Baron Munchausen's horse did not hang to the steeple by his bridle; +that the beanstalk could not have supported a stout lad like Jack; that +General Monk was not sent to Holland in a cage; that Remus and Romulus +had not a devoted lady wolf for a step-mother; in fact, that loads of +things, of which the most undeniable proof exists in plain print all +over the world, never were done or never happened. Bessy was killed, +Rely was killed later, Diana died in performing her destiny, St. Luc was +killed. Nobody left to make affidavits, except M. Dumas; in his lifetime +nobody questioned it; he is now dead and unable to depose; whereupon the +scientists sniff scornfully and deny. I hope I shall always continue to +respect science in its true offices, but, brethren, are there not times +when--science--makes--you--just--a--little--tired? + +Heroes! D'Artagnan or Bessy? Choose, good friends, freely; as freely let +me have my Bessy. + + + + +VIII. HEROINES + +A SUBJECT ALMOST WITHOUT AN OBJECT--WHY THERE ARE FEW HEROINES FOR MEN. + + +Notwithstanding the subject, there are almost no heroines in novels. +There are impossibly good women, absurdly patient and brave women, but +few heroines as the convention of worldly thinking demands heroines. +There is an endless train of what Thackeray so aptly described as "pale, +pious, and pulmonary ladies" who snivel and snuffle and sigh and +linger irresolutely under many trials which a little common sense would +dissolve; but they are pathological heroines. "Little Nell," "Little +Eva," and their married sisters are unquestionable in morals, purpose +and faith; but oh! how--they--do--try--the--nerves! How brave and noble +was Jennie Deans, but how thick-headed was the dear lass! + +These women who are merely good, and enforce it by turning on the faucet +of tears, or by old-fashioned obstinacy, or stupidity of purpose, can +scarcely be called heroines by the canons of understood definition. +On the other hand, the conventions do not permit us to describe as a +heroine any lady who has what is nowadays technically called "a past." +The very best men in the world find splendid heroism and virtue in Tess +l'Durbeyfield. There is nowhere an honest, strong, good man, full of +weakness, though he may be, scarred so much, however with fault, who +does not read St. John vii., 3-11, with sympathy, reverence and Amen! +The infallible critics can prove to a hair that this passage is an +interpolation. An interpolation in that sense means something inserted +to deceive or defraud; a forgery. How can you defraud or deceive anybody +by the interpolation of pure gold with pure gold? How can that be a +forgery which hurts nobody, but gives to everybody more value in the +thing uttered? If John vii., 3-11, is an interpolation let us hope +Heaven has long ago blessed the interpolator. Does anybody--even the +infallible critic--contend that Jesus would not have so said and done +if the woman had been brought to Him? Was that not the very flower and +savor and soul of His teaching? Would He have said or done otherwise? +If the Ten Commandments were lost utterly from among men there would yet +remain these four greater: + +"Do unto others as ye would they should do unto you." + +"Suffer little children to come unto me." + +"Go and sin no more." + +"Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." + +My lords and ladies, men and women, the Ten Commandments, by the side of +these sighs of gentleness, are the Police Court and the Criminal Code, +which are intended to pay cruelty off in punishment. These Four are +the tears with which sympathy soothes the wounds of suffering. Blessed +interpolator of St. John! + +There are three marvelous novels in the Bible--not Novels in the sense +of fiction, but in the sense of vivid, living narratives of human +emotions and of events. A million Novels rest on those nine verses in +John, and the nine verses are better than the million books. The story +of David and Uriah's wife is in a similar catalogue as regards quality +and usefulness; the story of Esther is a pearl of great beauty. + + * * * * * + +But to return to heroines, let us make a volte face. There is an old +story of the lady who wrote rather irritably to Thackeray, asking, +curtly, why all the good women he created were fools and the bright +women all bad. "The same complaint," he answered, "has been made, +Madame, of God and Shakespeare, and as neither has given explanation I +can not presume to attempt one." It was curt and severe, and, of course, +Thackeray did not write it as it would appear, even though he may have +said as much jestingly to some intimate who understood the epigram; +but was not the question rather impudently intrusive? Thackeray, you +remember, was the "seared cynic" who created Caroline Gann, the gentle, +beautiful, glorious "Little Sister," the staunch, pure-hearted woman +whose character not even the perfect scoundrelism of Dr. George Brand +Firmin could tarnish or disturb. If there are heroines, surely she has +her place high amid the noble group! + +There are plenty of intelligent persons sacramentally wedded to mere +conventions of good and bad. You could never persuade them that Rebecca +Sharp--that most perfect daughter of Thackeray's mind--was a heroine. +But of course she was. In that world wherein she was cast to live she +was indubitably, incomparably, the very best of all the inhabitants +to whom you are intimately introduced. Capt. Dobbin? Oh, no, I am not +forgetting good Old Dob. Of all the social door mats that ever I +wiped my feet upon Old Dob is certainly the cleanest, most patient, +serviceable and unrevolutionary. But, just a door mat, with the virtues +and attractions of that useful article of furniture--the sublime, +immortal prig of all the ages, or you can take the head of any +novel-reader under thirty for a football. You may have known many women, +from Bernadettes of Massavielle to Borgias of scant neighborhoods, but +you know you never knew one who would marry Old Dob, except as that +emotional dishrag, Amelia, married him--as the Last Chance on the +stretching high-road of uncertain years. No girl ever willingly marries +door mats. She just wipes her feet on them and passes on into the +drawing room looking for the Prince. It seems to me one of the +triumphant proofs of Becky as a heroine that she did not marry Captain +Dobbin. She might have done it any day by crooking her little finger at +him--but she didn't. + +Madame Becky, that smart daughter of an alcoholic gentleman artist +and of his lady of the French ballet, inherited the perfect non-moral +morality of the artist blood that sang mercurially through her veins. +How could she, therefore, how could she, being non-moral, be immoral? It +is clear nonsense. But she did possess the instinctive artist +morality of unerring taste for selection in choice. Examine the facts +meticulously--meticulously--and observe how carefully she selected that +best in all that worst she moved among. + +In the will I shall some day leave behind me there will be devised, in +primogenitural trust forever, the priceless treasure of conviction that +Becky was innocent of Lord Steyne. I leave it to any gentleman who has +had the great opportunity to look in familiarly upon the outer and upper +fringes of the world of unclassed and predatory women and the noble +lords that abound thereamong. Let him read over again that famous scene +where Becky writes her scorn upon Steyne's forehead in the noble blood +of that aristocratic wolf. Then let him give his decision, as an honest +juryman upon his oath, whether he is convinced that the most noble +Marquis was raging because he was losing a woman, or from the discovery +that he was one of two dupes facing each other, and that he was the fool +who had paid for both and had had "no run for his money!" Marquises of +Steyne do not resent sentimental losses--they can be hurt only in their +sportsmanship. + +You may begin with the Misses Pinkerton (in whose select school Becky +absorbed the intricate hypocrisies and saturated snobbery of the highest +English society) and follow her through all the little and big turmoils +of her life, meeting on the way of it all the elaborated differentials +of the country-gentleman and lady tribe of Crawley, the line officers +and bemedalled generals of the army (except honest O'Dowd and his lady), +the most noble Marquis and his shadowy and resigned Marchioness, the +R--y--l P--rs--n--ge himself--even down to the tuft-hunters Punter and +Loder--and if Becky is not superior to every man and woman of them in +every personal trait and grace that calls for admiration--then, why, by +George! do you take such an interest, such an undying interest, in her? +You invariably take the greatest interest in the best character in a +story--unless it's too good and gets "sweety" and "sticky" and so sours +on your philosophical stomach. You can't possibly take any interest in +Dobbin--you just naturally, emphatically, and in the most unreflecting +way in the world, say "Oh, d--n Dobbin!" and go right ahead after +somebody else. I don't say Becky was all that a perfect Sunday School +teacher should have been, but in the group in which she was born to move +she smells cleaner than the whole raft of them--to me. + + * * * * * + +Thackeray was, next to Shakespeare, the writer most wonderfully combined +of instinct and reason that English literature of grace has produced. He +has been compared with the Frenchman, Balzac. Since I have no desire to +provoke squabbles about favorite authors, let us merely definitely agree +that such a comparison is absurd and pass on. Because you must have +noticed that Balzac was often feeble in his reason and couldn't make it +keep step with his instinct, while in Thackeray they both step together +like the Siamese twins. It is a very striking fact, indeed, that during +all Becky's intense early experiences with the great world, Thackeray +does not make her guilty. All the circumstances of that world were +guilty and she is placed amidst the circumstances; but that is all. + +"The ladies in the drawing room," said one lady to Thackeray, when +"Vanity Fair" in monthly parts publishing had just reached the +catastrophe of Rawdon, Rebecca, old Steyne and the bracelet--"The +ladies have been discussing Becky Sharpe and they all agree that she was +guilty. May I ask if we guessed rightly?" + +"I am sure I don't know," replied the "seared cynic," mischievously. "I +am only a man and I haven't been able to make up my mind on that point. +But if the ladies agree I fear it may be true--you must understand your +sex much better than we men!" + +That is proof that she was not guilty with Steyne. But straightway then, +Thackeray starts out to make her guilty with others. It is so much the +more proof of her previous innocence that, incomparable artist as he +was in showing human character, he recognized that he could convince +the reader of her guilt only by disintegrating her, whipping himself +meanwhile into a ceaseless rage of vulgar abuse of her, a thing of which +Thackeray was seldom guilty. But it was not really Becky that +became guilty--it was the woman that English society and Thackeray +remorselessly made of her. I wouldn't be a lawyer for a wagon load of +diamonds, but if I had had to be a lawyer I should have preferred to +be a solicitor at the London bar in 1817 to write the brief for the +respondent in the celebrated divorce case of Crawley vs. Crawley. +Against the back-ground of the world she lived in Becky could have been +painted as meekly white and beautiful as that lovely old picture of St. +Cecilia at the Choir Organ. + +Perhaps Becky was not strictly a heroine; but she was a honey. + + * * * * * + +Men can not "create" heroines in the sense of shadowing forth what +they conceive to be the glory, beauty, courage and splendor of womanly +character. It is the indescribable sum of womanhood corresponding to the +unutterable name of God. The true man's love of woman is a spirit sense +attending upon the actual senses of seeing, hearing, feeling, tasting +and smelling. The woman he loves enters into every one of these senses +and thus is impounded five-fold upon that union of all of them, which, +together with the miracle of mind, composes what we call the human soul +as a divine essence. She is attached to every religion, yet enters with +authority into none. She is first at its birth, the last to stay +weeping at its death. In every great novel a heroine, unnamed, unspoken, +undescribed, hovers throughout like an essence. The heroism of woman +is her privacy. There is to me no more wonderful, philosophical, +psychological and delicate triumph of literary art in existence than the +few chapters in "Quo Vadis" in which that great introspective genius, +Sienkiewicz, sets forth the growth of the spell of love with which Lygia +has encompassed Vinicius, and the singular development and progress of +the emotion through which Vinicius is finally immersed in human love of +Lygia and in the Christian reverence of her spiritual purity at the same +time. It is the miracle of soul in sex. + +Every clean-hearted youth that has had the happiness to marry a good +woman--and, thank Heaven, clean youths and good women are thick as +leaves in Vallambrosa in this sturdy old world of ours--every such youth +has had his day of holy conversion, his touch of the wand conferring +upon him the miracle of love, and he has been a better and wiser man +for it. Not sense love, not the instinctive, restless love of matter for +matter, but the love that descends like the dove amid radiance. + + * * * * * + +We've all seen that bridal couple; she is as pretty as peaches; he is as +proud of her as if she were a splendid race horse; he glories in knowing +she is lovely and accepts the admiration offered to her as a tribute to +his own judgment, his own taste and even his merit, which obtained her. +There is a certain amount of silliness in her which he soon detects, +a touch of helplessness, and unsophistication in knowledge of worldly +things that he yet feels is mysteriously guarded against intrusion +upon and which makes companionship with her sometimes irksome. He feels +superior and uncompensated; from the superb isolation of his greater +knowledge, courage and independence, he grants to her a certain tender +pity and protection; he admits her faith and purity and--er--but--you +see, he is sorry she is not quite the well poised and noble creature he +is! Mr. Youngwed is at this time passing through the mental digestive +process of feeling his oats. He is all right, though, if he is half as +good as he thinks he is. He has not been touched by the live wire of +experience--yet; that's all. + +Well, in the course of human events, there comes a time when he is +frightened to death, then greatly relieved and for a few weeks becomes +as proud as if he had actually provided the last census of the United +States with most of the material contained in it. A few months later, +when the feeble whines and howls have found increased vigor of utterance +and more frequency of expression; when they don't know whether Master +Jack or Miss Jill has merely a howling spell or is threatened with fatal +convulsions; when they don't know whether they want a dog-muzzle or a +doctor; when Mr. Youngwed has lost his sleep and his temper, together, +and has displayed himself with spectacular effect as a brute, selfish, +irritable, helpless, resourceless and conquered--then--then, my dear +madame, you have doubtless observed him decrease in self-estimated size +like a balloon into which a pin has been introduced, until he looks, in +fact, like Master Frog reduced in bulk from the bull-size, to which he +aspired, to his original degree. + +At that time Mrs. Youngwed is very busy with little Jack or Jill, as the +case may be. Her husband's conduct she probably regards with resignation +as the first heavy burden of the cross she is expected to bear. She +does not reproach him, it is useless; she has perhaps suspected that +his assumed superiority would not stand the real strain. But, he is the +father of the dear baby and, for that precious darling's sake, she will +be patient. I wonder if she feels that way? She has every right to, and, +for one, I say that I'll be hanged if I find any fault with her if she +does. That is the way she must keep human, and so balance the little +open accounts that married folks ought to run between themselves for +the purpose of keeping cobwebs and mildew off, or rather of maintaining +their lives as a running stream instead of a stagnant pond. A little +good talking back now and then is good for wives and married men. +Don't be afraid, Mrs. Youngwed; and when the very worst has come, why +cry--at--him! One tear weighs more and will hit him harder than an ax. +In the lachrymal ducts with which heaven has blessed you, you are more +surely protected against the fires of your honest indignation than you +are by the fire department against a blaze in the house. And be +patient, also; remember, dear sister, that, though you can cry, he has +a gift--that--enables--him--to--swear! You and other wedded wives very +properly object to swearing, but you will doubtless admit that there +is compensation in that when he does swear in his usual good form +you--never--feel--any--apprehension--about--the--state--of--his--health! + +This natural outburst of resentment has not lasted three minutes. Mr. +Y. has returned to his couch, sulky and ashamed. He pretends to sleep +ostentatiously; he--does--not! He is thinking with remarkable intensity +and has an eye open. He sees the slender figure in the dim light, +hanging over the crib, he hears the crooning, he begins to suspect that +there is an alloy in his godlikeness. He looks to earth, listens to the +thin, wailing cries, wonders, regrets, wearies, sleeps. At that moment +Mrs. Y. should fall on her knees and rejoice. She would if she could +leave young Jack or Jill; but she can't--she--never--can. That's +what sent Mr. Y. to sleep. It is just as well perhaps that Mrs. Y. is +unobservant. + +A miracle is happening to Mr. Y. In an hour or two, let us say, there +is a new vocal alarm from the crib. Almost with the first suspicion +of fretfulness or pain the mother has heard it. Heaven's mysterious +telepathy of instinct has operated. Between angels, babies and mothers +the distance is no longer than your arm can reach. They understand, feel +and hear each other, and are linked in one chain. So, that, when Mr. +Y. has struggled laboriously awake and wonders +if--that--child--is--going--to--howl--all----. Well, he goes no further. +In the dim light he sees again the slender figure hanging over the crib, +he hears the crooning and the retreating sobs. It is just as he saw +and heard before he fell asleep. No complaints, no reproaches, no +irritation. Oh, what a brute he feels! He battles with his reason and +his bewilderment. Had he fallen asleep and left her to bear that strain; +or has she gone anew to the rescue, while he slept without thought? Up +out of his heart the tenderness wells; down into his mind the revelation +comes. The miracle works. He looks and listens. In the figure hanging +there so patiently and tenderly he sees for the first time the wonderful +vision of the sweetheart wife, not lost, but enveloped in the mystery of +motherhood; he hears in the crooning voice a tone he never before knew. +Mother and child are united in mysterious converse. Where did that girl +whom he thought so unsophisticated of the world learn that marvel of +acquaintance with that babe, so far removed from his ability to reach? +It must be that while he knew the world, she understood the secret of +heaven. She is so patient. What a brute he is to grow impatient, when +she endures day and night in rapt patience and the joy of content! She +can enter a world from which he is barred. And, that is his wife! +That was his sweetheart, and is now--ah, what is she? He feels somehow +abashed; he knows that if he were ten times better than he is he might +still feel unworthy to touch the latchet of her shoes; he feels that +reverence and awe have enveloped her, and that the first happy love and +longing are springing afresh in his heart. It is his wife and his +child; apart from him unless he can note and understand that miracle +of nature's secret. Can he? Well, he will try--oh, what a brute! And he +watches the bending figure, he hears the blending of soft crooning and +retreating sobs--and, listening, he is lost in the wonder and falls +under the spell asleep. + +Mrs. Y., you are happy henceforth, if you will disregard certain small +matters, such as whether chairs or hat-racks are for hats, or whether +the marble mantelpiece or the floor is intended for polishing boot +heels. + + * * * * * + +Of course, such an incident as has been suggested is but one of +thousands of golden moments when to the husband comes the sudden +dazzling recognition of the mergence of that half-sweetheart, +half-mistress, he has admired and a little tired of, into the +reverential glory and loveliness of wifehood, motherhood, companionhood, +through all life and on through the eternity of inheritance they shall +leave to Jacks and Jills and their little sisters and brothers. In +that lies the priceless secret of Christianity and its influence. +The unspeakably immoral Greeks reared a temple to Pity; the grossest +mythologies of Babylon, Greece, Rome and Carthage could not change +human nature. There have been always persons whose temperament made +them sympathize with grief and pity the suffering; who, caring none +for wealth, had no desire to steal; who purchased a little pleasure for +vanity in the thanks received for kindness given. But Christianity saw +the jewel underneath the passing emotion and gave it value by +cleansing and cutting it. In lust-love is the instinctive secret of the +preservation of the race; but the race is not worth preserving that it +may be preserved only for lust. Upon that animal foundation is to be +built the radiant home of confident, enduring and exchanging love +in which all the senses, tastes, hopes, aspirations and delights of +friendship, companionship and human society shall find hospitality +and comfort. When it has been achieved it is beautiful, a twin to the +delicate rose that lies in its own delicious fragrance, happy on the +pure bosom of a lovely girl--the rose that is finest and most exquisite +because it has sprung from the horrid heat of the compost; but who shall +think of the one in the presence of the pure beauty of the other? + +Nature and art are entirely unlike each other, though the one simulates +the other. The art of beauty in writing, said Balzac, is to be able +to construct a palace upon the point of a needle; the art of beauty +in living and loving is to build all the beauty of social life and +aspiration upon the sordid yet solid and persisting instincts of +savagery that lie deep at the bottom of our gross natures. + + * * * * * + +Now, it is in this tender sacred atmosphere, such as Mr. and Mrs. +Youngwed always pass through, that the man worthy of a woman's +confidence finds the radiant ideal of his heroine. He may with propriety +speak of these transfigured personalities to his intimates or write of +them with kindly pleasantry and suggestion as, perhaps, this will be +considered. But, there is a monitor within that restrains him from +analyzing and describing and dragging into the glare of publicity the +sacred details that give to life all its secret happiness, faith and +delight. To do so would be ten times worse offense against the ethics +of unwritten and unspoken things than describing with pitiless precision +the death beds of children, as Little Nell, Paul Dombey, Dora, Little +Eva, and, thank heaven! only a few others. + +How can anybody bear to read such pages without feeling that he is +an intruder where angels should veil their faces as they await the +transformation? + +"It is not permitted to do evil," says the philosopher, "that good may +result." + +There are some things that should remain unspoken and undescribed. Have +you never listened to some great brute of a sincere preacher of the +gospel, as he warned his congregation against the terrible dangers +attending the omission of purely theological rites upon infants? Have +you thought of the mothers of those children, listening, whose little +ones were sick or delicate, and who felt each word of that hard, ominous +warning as an agonizing terror? And haven't you wanted to kick the +minister out of the pulpit, through the reredos and into the middle +of next week? How can anybody harrow up such tender feelings? How can +anybody like to believe that a little child will be held to account? +Many of us do so believe, perhaps, whether or no; but is it not cruel +to shake the rod of terror over us in public? "Suffer little children +to come unto Me," said the Master; He did not instruct us to drive them +with fear and terror and trembling. Whenever I have heard such sermons I +have wanted to get up and stalk out of the church with ostentatiousness +of contempt, as if to say to the preacher that his conduct +did--not--meet--with--my--approval. But I didn't; the philosopher has +his cowardice not less than the preacher. + +But there is something meretricious and cheap in the use of material +and subjects that lie warm against the very secret heart of nature. The +mystery of love and the sanctity of death are to be used by writers and +artists only in their ennobling aspect of results. A certain class of +French writers have sickened the world by invading the sacredness of +passion and giving prostitution the semblance of self-abnegated love; a +certain class of English and American writers have purchased popularity +by the meretricious parade of the scenes of death-beds. Both are +violations of the ethics of art as they are of nature. True love as +true sorrow shrinks from exhibition and should be permitted to enjoy +the sacredness of privacy. The famous women of the world, Herodias, +Semiramis, Aspasia, Thais, Cleopatra, Sapho, Messalina, Marie de +Medici, Catherine of Russia, Elizabeth of England--all of them have been +immoral. Publicity to women is like handling to peaches--the bloom comes +off, whether or not any other harm occurs. In literature, the great +feminine figures, George Sand, Madame de Sevigne, Madame de Stael, +George Eliot--all were banned and at least one--the first--was out of +the pale. Creative thought has in it the germ of masculinity. Genius in +a woman, as we usually describe genius, means masculinity, which, of all +things, to real men is abhorrent in woman. True genius in woman is the +antithesis of the qualities that make genius in man; so is her heroism, +her beauty, her virtue, her destiny and her duty. + +Let this be said--even though it be only a jest--one of those smart +attempts at epigram, which, ladies, a man has no more power to resist +than a baby to resist the desire to improve his thumb by sucking +it--that: whenever you find a woman who looks real--that is, who +produces upon a real man the impression of being endowed with +the splendid gifts for united and patient companionship in +marriage--whenever you find her advocating equal suffrage, equal rights, +equal independence with men in all things, you may properly run away. +Equality means so much, dear sisters. No man can be your equal; you can +not be his, without laying down the very jewels of the womanliness +that men love. Be thankful you have not this strength and daring; +he possesses those in order that he many stand between you and more +powerful brutes. Now, let us try for a smart epigram: But no! hang the +epigram, let it go. This, however, may be said: That, whenever you find +a woman wanting all rights with man; wanting his morals to be judged +by hers, or willing to throw hers in with his, or itching to enter his +employments and labors and willing that he shall--of course--nurse the +children and patch the small trousers and dresses, depend upon it that +some weak and timid man has been neglecting the old manly, savage duty +of applying quiet home murder as society approves now and then. + + + + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Delicious Vice, by Young E. 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Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..0406216 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #8686 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/8686) diff --git a/old/8686-h.htm.2021-01-26 b/old/8686-h.htm.2021-01-26 new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b8116a2 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/8686-h.htm.2021-01-26 @@ -0,0 +1,3685 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> + +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" > + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en"> + <head> + <title> + The Delicious Vice, by Young E. Allison + </title> + <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> + + body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify} + P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } + hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} + .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; } + blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} + .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} + .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} + div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } + div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; } + .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} + .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} + .pagenum {display:inline; font-size: 70%; font-style:normal; + margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%; + text-align: right;} + .side { float: right; font-size: 75%; width: 25%; padding-left: 0.8em; + border-left: dashed thin; margin-left: 0.8em; text-align: left; + text-indent: 0; font-weight: bold; font-style: italic; + font-weight: bold; color: black; background: #eeeeee; border: solid 1px;} + pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} + +</style> + </head> + <body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Delicious Vice, by Young E. Allison + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Delicious Vice + +Author: Young E. Allison + + +Release Date: August, 2005 [EBook #8686] +This file was first posted on August 1, 2003 +Last Updated: March 14, 2018 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DELICIOUS VICE *** + + + + +Text file produced by Ted Garvin, Charles Franks and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team + +HTML file produced by David Widger + + + + +</pre> + + <div style="height: 8em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h1> + THE DELICIOUS VICE + </h1> + <h4> + Pipe Dreams and Fond Adventures of an<br /> Habitual Novel-Reader Among + Some<br /> Great Books and Their People + </h4> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h2> + By Young E. Allison + </h2> + <p> + <br /> + </p> + <h5> + <i>Second Edition</i> <br /> <br /> (Revised and containing new material) + </h5> + <h6> + CHICAGO THE PRAIRIELAND PUBLISHING CO. 1918 <br /> Printed originally in + the Louisville Courier-Journal. <br /> Reprinted by courtesy. <br /> <br /> + First edition, Cleveland, Burrows Bros., 1907. <br /> <br /> Copyright + 1907-1918 + </h6> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + <b>CONTENTS</b> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0001"> I. A RHAPSODY ON THE NOBLE PROFESSION OF NOVEL + READING </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0002"> II. NOVEL-READERS </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0003"> III. READING THE FIRST NOVEL </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0004"> IV. THE FIRST NOVEL TO READ </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0005"> V. THE OPEN POLAR SEA OF NOVELS </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0006"> VI. RASCALS </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0007"> VII. HEROES </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0008"> VIII. HEROINES </a> + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + I. A RHAPSODY ON THE NOBLE PROFESSION OF NOVEL READING + </h2> + <p> + It must have been at about the good-bye age of forty that Thomas Moore, + that choleric and pompous yet genial little Irish gentleman, turned a sigh + into good marketable “copy” for Grub Street and with shrewd economy got + two full pecuniary bites out of one melancholy apple of reflection: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “Kind friends around me fall + Like leaves in wintry weather,” + + —he sang of his own dead heart in the stilly night. + + “Thus kindly I scatter thy leaves on the bed + Where thy mates of the garden lie scentless and dead.” + —he sang to the dying rose. In the red month of October the rose is +forty years old, as roses go. How small the world has grown to a man of +forty, if he has put his eyes, his ears and his brain to the uses for +which they are adapted. And as for time—why, it is no longer than a +kite string. At about the age of forty everything that can happen to a +man, death excepted, has happened; happiness has gone to the devil or +is a mere habit; the blessing of poverty has been permanently secured +or you are exhausted with the cares of wealth; you can see around +the corner or you do not care to see around it; in a word—that is, +considering mental existence—the bell has rung on you and you are up +against a steady grind for the remainder of your life. It is then there +comes to the habitual novel reader the inevitable day when, in anguish +of heart, looking back over his life, he—wishes he hadn't; then he asks +himself the bitter question if there are not things he has done that he +wishes he hadn't. Melancholy marks him for its own. He sits in his room +some winter evening, the lamp swarming shadowy seductions, the grate +glowing with siren invitation, the cigar box within easy reach for that +moment when the pending sacrifice between his teeth shall be burned out; +his feet upon the familiar corner of the mantel at that automatically +calculated altitude which permits the weight of the upper part of the +body to fall exactly upon the second joint from the lower end of the +vertebral column as it rests in the comfortable depression created by +continuous wear in the cushion of that particular chair to which every +honest man who has acquired the library vice sooner or later gets +attached with a love no misfortune can destroy. As he sits thus, +having closed the lids of, say, some old favorite of his youth, he will +inevitably ask himself if it would not have been better for him if he +hadn't. And the question once asked must be answered; and it will be an +honest answer, too. For no scoundrel was ever addicted to the delicious +vice of novel-reading. It is too tame for him. “There is no money in +it.” + +</pre> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + And every habitual novel-reader will answer that question he has asked + himself, after a sigh. A sigh that will echo from the tropic deserted + island of Juan Fernandez to that utmost ice-bound point of Siberia where + by chance or destiny the seven nails in the sole of a certain mysterious + person's shoe, in the month of October, 1831, formed a cross—thus: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + * + * * * + * + * + * +</pre> + <p> + while on the American promontory opposite, “a young and handsome woman + replied to the man's despairing gesture by silently pointing to heaven.” + The Wandering Jew may be gone, but the theater of that appalling prologue + still exists unchanged. That sigh will penetrate the gloomy cell of the + Abbe Faria, the frightful dungeons of the Inquisition, the gilded halls of + Vanity Fair, the deep forests of Brahmin and fakir, the jousting list, the + audience halls and the petits cabinets of kings of France, sound over the + trackless and storm-beaten ocean—will echo, in short, wherever warm + blood has jumped in the veins of honest men and wherever vice has sooner + or later been stretched groveling in the dust at the feet of triumphant + virtue. + </p> + <p> + And so, sighing to the uttermost ends of the earth, the old novel-reader + will confess that he wishes he hadn't. Had not read all those novels that + troop through his memory. Because, if he hadn't—and it is the + impossibility of the alternative that chills his soul with the despair of + cruel realization—if he hadn't, you see, he could begin at the very + first, right then and there, and read the whole blessed business through + for the first time. For the FIRST TIME, mark you! Is there anywhere in + this great round world a novel reader of true genius who would not do that + with the joy of a child and the thankfulness of a sage? + </p> + <p> + Such a dream would be the foundation of the story of a really noble Dr. + Faustus. How contemptible is the man who, having staked his life freely + upon a career, whines at the close and begs for another chance; just one + more—and a different career! It is no more than Mr. Jack Hamlin, a + friend from Calaveras County, California, would call “the baby act,” or + his compeer, Mr. John Oakhurst, would denominate “a squeal.” How glorious, + on the other hand, is the man who has spent his life in his own way, and, + at its eventide, waves his hand to the sinking sun and cries out: + “Goodbye; but if I could do so, I should be glad to go over it all again + with you—just as it was!” If honesty is rated in heaven as we have + been taught to believe, depend upon it the novel-reader who sighs to eat + the apple he has just devoured, will have no trouble hereafter. + </p> + <p> + What a great flutter was created a few years ago when a blind + multi-millionaire of New York offered to pay a million dollars in cash to + any scientist, savant or surgeon in the world who would restore his sight. + Of course he would! It was no price at all to offer for the service—considering + the millions remaining. It was no more to him than it would be to me to + offer ten dollars for a peep at Paradise. Poor as I am I will give any man + in the world one hundred dollars in cash who will enable me to remove + every trace of memory of M. Alexandre Dumas' “Three Guardsmen,” so that I + may open that glorious book with the virgin capacity of youth to enjoy its + full delight. More; I will duplicate the same offer for any one or all of + the following: + </p> + <p> + “Les Miserables,” of M. Hugo. + </p> + <p> + “Don Quixote,” of Senor Cervantes. + </p> + <p> + “Vanity Fair,” of Mr. Thackeray. + </p> + <p> + “David Copperfield,” of Mr. Dickens. + </p> + <p> + “The Cloister and the Hearth,” of Mr. Reade. + </p> + <p> + And if my good friend, Isaac of York, is lending money at the old stand + and will take pianos, pictures, furniture, dress suits and plain household + plate as collateral, upon even moderate valuation, I will go fifty dollars + each upon the following: + </p> + <p> + “The Count of Monte Cristo,” of M. Dumas. + </p> + <p> + “The Wandering Jew,” of M. Sue. + </p> + <p> + “The Memoirs of Barry Lyndon, Esq.,” of Mr. Thackeray. + </p> + <p> + “Treasure Island,” of Mr. Robbie Stevenson. + </p> + <p> + “The Vicar of Wakefield,” of Mr. Goldsmith. + </p> + <p> + “Pere Goriot,” of M. de Balzac. + </p> + <p> + “Ivanhoe,” of Baronet Scott. + </p> + <p> + (Any one previously unnamed of the whole layout of M. Dumas, excepting + only a paretic volume entitled “The Conspirators.”) + </p> + <p> + Now, the man who can do the trick for one novel can do it for all—and + there's a thousand dollars waiting to be earned, and a blessing also. It's + a bald “bluff,” of course, because it can't be done as we all know. I + might offer a million with safety. If it ever could have been done the + noble intellectual aristocracy of novel-readers would have been reduced to + a condition of penury and distress centuries ago. + </p> + <p> + For, who can put fetters upon even the smallest second of eternity? Who + can repeat a joy or duplicate a sweet sorrow? Who has ever had more than + one first sweetheart, or more than one first kiss under the honeysuckle? + Or has ever seen his name in print for the first time, ever again? Is it + any wonder that all these inexplicable longings, these hopeless hopes, + were summed up in the heart-cry of Faust— + </p> + <p> + “Stay, yet awhile, O moment of beauty.” + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Yet, I maintain, Dr. Faustus was a weak creature. He begged to be given + another and wholly different chance to linger with beauty. How much nobler + the magnificent courage of the veteran novel-reader, who in the old age of + his service, asks only that he may be permitted to do again all that he + has done, blindly, humbly, loyally, as before. + </p> + <p> + Don't I know? Have I not been there? It is no child's play, the life of a + man who—paraphrasing the language of Spartacus, the much neglected + hero of the ages—has met upon the printed page every shape of + perilous adventure and dangerous character that the broad empire of + fiction could furnish, and never yet lowered his arm. Believe me it is no + carpet duty to have served on the British privateers in Guiana, under + Commodore Kingsley, alongside of Salvation Yeo; to have been a loyal + member of Thuggee and cast the scarf for Bowanee; to have watched the + tortures of Beatrice Cenci (pronounced as written in honest English, and I + spit upon the weaklings of the service who imagine that any freak of woman + called Bee-ah-treech-y Chon-chy could have endured the agonies related of + that sainted lady)—to have watched those tortures, I say, without + breaking down; to have fought under the walls of Acre with Richard Coeur + de Lion; to have crawled, amid rats and noxious vapors, with Jean Valjean + through the sewers of Paris; to have dragged weary miles through the snow + with Uncas, Chief of the Mohicans; to have lived among wild beasts with + Morok the lion tamer; to have charged with the impis of Umslopogaas; to + have sailed before the mast with Vanderdecken, spent fourteen gloomy years + in the next cell to Edmund Dantes, ferreted out the murders in the Rue + Morgue, advised Monsieur Le Cocq and given years of life's prime in + tedious professional assistance to that anointed idiot and pestiferous + scoundrel, Tittlebat Titmouse! Equally, of course, it has not been all + horror and despair. Life averages up fairly, as any novel-reader will + admit, and there has been much of delight—even luxury and idleness—between + the carnage hours of battle. Is it not so? Ask that boyish-hearted old + scamp whom you have seen scuttling away from the circulating library with + M. St. Pierre's memoirs of young Paul and his beloved Virginia under his + arm; or stepping briskly out of the book store hugging to his left side a + carefully wrapped biography of Lady Diana Vernon, Mlle. de la Valliere, or + Madame Margaret Woffington; or in fact any of a thousand charming ladies + whom it is certain he had met before. Ladies too, who, born whensoever, + are not one day older since he last saw them. Nearly a hundred years of + Parisian residence have not served to induce the Princess Haydee of Yanina + to forego her picturesque Greek gowns and coiffures, or to alter the + somewhat embarrassing status of her relations with her striking but gloomy + protector, the Count of Monte Cristo. + </p> + <p> + The old memories are crowded with pleasures. Those delicious mornings in + the allee of the park, where you were permitted to see Cosette with her + old grandfather, M. Fauchelevent; those hours of sweet pain when it was + impossible to determine whether it was Rebecca or Rowena who seemed to + give most light to the day; the flirtations with Blanche Amory, and the + notes placed in the hollow tree; the idyllic devotion of Little Emily, + dating from the morning when you saw her dress fluttering on the beam as + she ran along it, lightly, above the flowing tide—(devotion that is + yet tender, for, God forgive you Steerforth as I do, you could not smirch + that pure heart;) the melancholy, yet sweet sorrow, with which you saw the + loved and lost Little Eva borne to her grave over which the mocking-bird + now sings his liquid requiem. Has it not been sweet good fortune to love + Maggie Tulliver, Margot of Savoy, Dora Spenlow (undeclared because she was + an honest wife—even though of a most conceited and commonplace + jackass, totally undeserving of her); Agnes Wicklow (a passion quickly + cured when she took Dora's pitiful leavings), and poor ill-fated Marie + Antoinette? You can name dozens if you have been brought up in good + literary society. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + These love affairs may be owned freely, as being perfectly honorable, even + if hopeless. And, of course, there have been gallantries—mere + affaires du jour—such as every man occasionally engages in. + Sometimes they seemed serious, but only for a moment. There was Beatrix + Esmond, for whom I could certainly have challenged His Grace of Hamilton, + had not Lord Mohun done the work for me. Wandering down the street in + London one night, in a moment of weak admiration for her unrivalled nerve + and aplomb, I was hesitating—whether to call on Mrs. Rawdon Crawley, + knowing that her thick-headed husband was in hoc for debt—when the + door of her house crashed open and that old scoundrel, Lord Steyne, came + wildly down the steps, his livid face blood-streaked, his topcoat on his + arm and a dreadful look in his eye. The world knows the rest as I learned + it half an hour later at the greengrocer's, where the Crawleys owed an + inexcusably large bill. Then the Duchess de Langeais—but all this is + really private. + </p> + <p> + After all, a man never truly loves but once. And somewhere in Scotland + there is a mound above the gentle, tender and heroic Helen Mar, where lies + buried the first love of my soul. That mound, O lovely and loyal Helen, + was watered by the first blinding and unselfish tears that ever sprang + from my eyes. You were my first love; others may come and inevitably they + go, but you are still here, under the pencil pocket of my waistcoat. + </p> + <p> + Who can write in such a state? It is only fair to take a rest and brace + up. [Blank Page] + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + II. NOVEL-READERS + </h2> + <h3> + AS DISTINGUISHED FROM WOMEN AND NIBBLERS AND AMATEURS + </h3> + <p> + There is, of course, but one sort of novel-reader who is of any importance + He is the man who began under the age of fourteen and is still sticking to + it—at whatever age he may be—and full of a terrifying anxiety + lest he may be called away in the midst of preliminary announcements of + some pet author's “next forthcoming.” For my own part I cannot conceive + dying with resignation knowing that the publishers were binding up at the + time anything of Henryk Sienckiewicz's or Thomas Hardy's. So it is + important that a man begin early, because he will have to quit all too + soon. + </p> + <p> + There are no women novel-readers. There are women who read novels, of + course; but it is a far cry from reading novels to being a novel-reader. + It is not in the nature of a woman. The crown of woman's character is her + devotion, which incarnate delicacy and tenderness exalt into perfect + beauty of sacrifice. Those qualities could no more live amid the clashings + of indiscriminate human passions than a butterfly wing could go between + the mill rollers untorn. Women utterly refuse to go on with a book if the + subject goes against their settled opinions. They despise a novel—howsoever + fine and stirring it may be—if there is any taint of unhappiness to + the favorite at the close. But the most flagrant of all their incapacities + in respect to fiction is the inability to appreciate the admirable + achievements of heroes, unless the achievements are solely in behalf of + women. And even in that event they complacently consider them to be a + matter of course, and attach no particular importance to the perils or the + hardships undergone. “Why shouldn't he?” they argue, with triumphant trust + in ideals; “surely he loved her!” + </p> + <p> + There are many women who nibble at novels as they nibble at luncheon—there + are also some hearty eaters; but 98 per cent of them detest Thackeray and + refuse resolutely to open a second book of Robert Louis Stevenson. They + scent an enemy of the sex in Thackeray, who never seems to be in earnest, + and whose indignant sarcasm and melancholy truthfulness they shrink from. + “It's only a story, anyhow,” they argue again; “he might, at least write a + pleasant one, instead of bringing in all sorts of disagreeable people—some + of them positively disreputable.” As for Stevenson, whom men read with the + thrill of boyhood rising new in their veins, I believe in my soul women + would tear leaves out of his novels to tie over the tops of preserve jars, + and never dream of the sacrilege. + </p> + <p> + Now I hold Thackeray and Stevenson to be the absolute test of capacity for + earnest novel-reading. Neither cares a snap of his fingers for anybody's + prejudices, but goes the way of stern truth by the light of genius that + shines within him. + </p> + <p> + If you could ever pin a woman down to tell you what she thought, instead + of telling you what she thinks it is proper to tell you, or what she + thinks will please you, you would find she has a religious conviction that + Dot Perrybingle in “The Cricket of the Hearth,” and Ouida's Lord Chandos + were actually a materializable an and a reasonable gentleman, either of + whom might be met with anywhere in their proper circles, I would be + willing to stand trial for perjury on the statement that I've known + admirable women—far above the average, really showing signs of moral + discrimination—who have sniveled pitifully over Nancy Sykes and + sniffed scornfully at Mrs. Tess Durbeyfield Clare. It is due to their + constitution and social heredity. Women do not strive and yearn and stalk + abroad for the glorious pot of intellectual gold at the end of the + rainbow; they pick and choose and, having chosen, sit down straightway and + become content. And a state of contentment is an abomination in the sight + of man. Contentment is to be sought for by great masculine minds only with + the purpose of being sure never quite to find it. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + For all practical purposes, therefore—except perhaps as object + lessons of “the incorrect method” in reading novels—women, as + novel-readers, must be considered as not existing. And, of course, no + offense is intended. But if there be any weak-kneed readers who prefer the + gilt-wash of pretty politeness to the solid gold of truth, let them + understand that I am not to be frightened away from plain facts by any + charge of bad manners. + </p> + <p> + On the contrary, now that this disagreeable interruption has been forced + upon me—certainly not through any seeking of mine—it may be + better to speak out and settle the matter. Men who have the happiness of + being in the married state know that nothing is to be gained by failing to + settle instantly with women who contradict and oppose them. Who was that + mellow philosopher in one of Trollope's tiresomely clever novels who said: + “My word for it, John, a husband ought not to take a cane to his wife too + soon. He should fairly wait till they are half-way home from the church—but + not longer, not longer.” Of course every man with a spark of intelligence + and gallantry wishes that women COULD rise to real novel-reading Think + what courtship would be! Every true man wishes to heaven there was nothing + more to be said against women than that they are not novel-readers. But + can mere forgetting remove the canker? Do not all of us know that the + abstract good of the very existence of woman is itself open to grave doubt—with + no immediate hope of clearing up? Woman has certainly been thrust upon us. + Is there any scrap of record to show that Adam asked for her? He was doing + very well, was happy, prosperous and healthy. There was no certainty that + her creation was one of that unquestionably wonderful series that occupied + the six great days. We cannot conceal that her creation caused a great + pain in Adam's side—undoubtedly the left side, in the region of the + heart. She has been described by young and dauntless poets as “God's best + afterthought;” but, now, really—and I advance the suggestion with no + intention to be brutal but solely as a conscientious duty to the + ascertainment of truth—why is it, that—. But let me try to + present the matter in the most unobjectionable manner possible. + </p> + <p> + In reading over that marvelous account of creation I find frequent + explicit declaration that God pronounced everything good after he had + created it—except heaven and woman. I have maintained sometimes to + stern, elderly ladies that this might have been an error of omission by + early copyists, perpetuated and so become fixed in our translations. To + other ladies, of other age and condition, to whom such propositions of + scholarship might appear to be dull pedantry, I have ventured the + gentlemanlike explanation that, as woman was the only living thing created + that was good beyond doubt, perhaps God had paid her the special + compliment of leaving the approval unspoken, as being in a sense + supererogatory. At best, either of these dispositions of the matter is, of + course, far-fetched, maybe even frivolous. The fact still remains by the + record. And it is beyond doubt awkward and embarrassing, because + ill-natured men can refer to it in moments of hatefulness—moments + unfortunately too frequent. + </p> + <p> + Is it possible that this last creation was a mistake of Infinite Charity + and Eternal Truth? That Charity forbore to acknowledge that it was a + mistake and that Truth, in the very nature of its eternal essence, could + not say it was good? It is so grave a matter that one wonders Helvetius + did not betray it, as he did that other secret about which the + philosophers had agreed to keep mum, so that Herr Schopenhauer could write + about it as he did about that other. Herr Schopenhauer certainly had the + courage to speak with philosophical asperity of the gentle sex. It may be + because he was never married. And then his mother wrote novels! I have + been surprised that he was not accused of prejudice. + </p> + <p> + But if all these everyday obstacles were absent there would yet remain + insurmountable reasons why women can never be novel-readers in the sense + that men are. Your wife, for instance, or the impenetrable mystery of + womanhood that you contemplate making your wife some day—can you, + honestly, now, as a self-respecting husband of either de facto or in + futuro, quite agree to the spectacle of that adored lady sitting over + across the hearth from you in the snug room, evening after evening, with + her feet—however small and well-shaped—cocked up on the other + end of the mantel and one of your own big colorado maduros between her + teeth! We men, and particularly novel-readers, are liberal even generous, + in our views; but it is not in human nature to stand that! + </p> + <p> + Now, if a woman can not put her feet up and smoke, how in the name of + heaven, can she seriously read novels? Certainly not sitting bolt upright, + in order to prevent the back of her new gown from rubbing the chair; + certainly not reclining upon a couch or in a hammock. A boy, yet too young + to smoke may properly lie on his stomach on the floor and read novels, but + the mature veteran will fight for his end of the mantel as for his wife + and children. It is physiological necessity, inasmuch as the blood that + would naturally go to the lower extremities, is thus measurably lessened + in quantity and goes instead to the head, where a state of gentle + congestion ensues, exciting the brain cells, setting free the imagination + to roam hand in hand with intelligence under the spell of the wizard. + There may be novel-readers who do not smoke at the game, but surely they + cannot be quite earnest or honest—you had better put in writing all + business agreements with this sort. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + No boy can ever hope to become a really great or celebrated novel-reader + who does not begin his apprenticeship under the age of fourteen, and, as I + said before, stick to it as long as he lives. He must learn to scorn those + frivolous, vacillating and purposeless ones who, after beginning properly, + turn aside and whiling away their time on mere history, or science, or + philosophy. In a sense these departments of literature are useful enough. + They enable you often to perceive the most cunning and profoundly + interesting touches in fiction. Then I have no doubt that, merely as + mental exercise, they do some good in keeping the mind in training for the + serious work of novel-reading. I have always been grateful to Carlyle's + “French Revolution,” if for nothing more than that its criss-cross, + confusing and impressive dullness enabled me to find more pleasure in “A + Tale of Two Cities” than was to be extracted from any merit or interest in + that unreal novel. + </p> + <p> + This much however, may be said of history, that it is looking up in these + days as a result of studying the spirit of the novel. It was not many + years ago that the ponderous gentlemen who write criticisms (chiefly + because it has been forgotten how to stop that ancient waste of paper and + ink) could find nothing more biting to say of Macaulay's “England” than + that it was “a splendid work of imagination,” of Froude's “Caesar” that it + was “magnificent political fiction,” and of Taine's “France” that “it was + so fine it should have been history instead of fiction.” And ever since + then the world has read only these three writers upon these three epochs—and + many other men have been writing history upon the same model. No good + novel-reader need be ashamed to read them, in fact. They are so like the + real thing we find in the greatest novels, instead of being the usual + pompous official lies of old-time history, that there are flesh, blood and + warmth in them. + </p> + <p> + In 1877, after the railway riots, legislative halls heard the French + Revolution rehearsed from all points of view. In one capital, where I was + reporting the debate, Old Oracle, with every fact at hand from “In the + beginning” to the exact popular vote in 1876, talked two hours of accurate + historical data from all the French histories, after which a young lawyer + replied in fifteen minutes with a vivid picture of the popular conditions, + the revolt and the result. Will it be allowable, in the interest of + conveying exact impression, to say that Old Oracle was “swiped” off the + earth? No other word will relieve my conscience. After it was all over I + asked the young lawyer where he got his French history. + </p> + <p> + “From Dumas,” he answered, “and from critical reviews of his novels. He's + short on dates and documents, but he's long on the general facts.” + </p> + <p> + Why not? Are not novels history? + </p> + <p> + Book for book, is not a novel by a competent conscientious novelist just + as truthful a record of typical men, manners and motives as formal history + is of official men, events and motives? + </p> + <p> + There are persons created out of the dreams of genius so real, so actual, + so burnt into the heart and mind of the world that they have become + historical. Do they not show you, in the old Ursuline Convent at New + Orleans, the cell where poor Manon Lescaut sat alone in tears? And do they + not show you her very grave on the banks of the lake? Have I not stood by + the simple grave at Richmond, Virginia, where never lay the body of + Pocahontas and listened to the story of her burial there? One of the + loveliest women I ever knew admits that every time she visits relatives at + Salem she goes out to look at the mound over the broken heart of Hester + Prynne, that dream daughter of genius who never actually lived or died, + but who was and is and ever will be. Her grave can be easily pointed out, + but where is that of Alexander, of Themistocles, of Aristotle, even of the + first figure of history—Adam? Mark Twain found it for a joke. Dr. + Hale was finally forced to write a preface to “The Man Without a Country” + to declare that his hero was pure fiction and that the pathetic punishment + so marvelously described was not only imaginary, but legally and actually + impossible. It was because Philip Nolan had passed into history. I myself + have met old men who knew sea captains that had met this melancholy + prisoner at sea and looked upon him, had even spoken to him upon subjects + not prohibited. And these old men did not hesitate to declare that Dr. + Hale had lied in his denial and had repudiated the facts through cowardice + or under compulsion from the War Department. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Indeed, so flexible, adaptable and penetrable is the style, and so + admirably has the use and proper direction of the imagination been + developed by the school of fiction, that every branch of literature has + gained from it power, beauty and clearness. Nothing has aided more in the + spread of liberal Christianity than the remarkable series of “Lives of + Christ,” from Straus to Farrar, not omitting particular mention of the + singularly beautiful treatment of the subject by Renan. In all of these + conscientious imagination has been used, as it is used in the highest + works of fiction, to give to known facts the atmosphere and vividness of + truth in order that the spirit and personality of the surroundings of the + Savior of Mankind might be newly understood by and made fresh to modern + perception. + </p> + <p> + Of all books it is to be said—of novels as well—that none is + great that is not true, and that cannot be true which does not carry + inherence of truth. Now every book is true to some reader. The “Arabian + Nights” tales do not seem impossible to a little child, the only delight + him. The novels of “The Duchess” seem true to a certain class of readers, + if only because they treat of a society to which those readers are + entirely unaccustomed. “Robinson Crusoe” is a gospel to the world, and yet + it is the most palpably and innocently impossible of books. It is so + plausible because the author has ingeniously or accidentally set aside the + usual earmarks of plausibility. When an author plainly and easily knows + what the reader does not know and enough more to continue the chain of + seeming reality of truth a little further, he convinces the reader of his + truth and ability. Those men, therefore, who have been endowed with the + genius almost unconsciously to absorb, classify, combine, arrange and + dispense vast knowledge in a bold, striking or noble manner, are the + recognized greatest men of genius for the simple reason that the readers + of the world who know most recognize all they know in these writers, + together with that spirit of sublime imagination that suggests still + greater realms of truth and beauty. What Shakesepare was to the + intellectual leaders of his day, “The Duchess” was to countless immature + young folks of her day who were looking for “something to read.” + </p> + <p> + All truth is history, but all history is not truth. Written history is + notoriously no well-cleaner. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0003" id="link2H_4_0003"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + III. READING THE FIRST NOVEL + </h2> + <h3> + BEING MOSTLY REMINISCENCES OF EARLY CRIMES AND JOYS + </h3> + <p> + Once more and for all, the career of a novel reader should be entered + upon, if at all, under the age of fourteen. As much earlier as possible. + The life of the intellect, as of its shadowy twin, imagination, begins + early and develops miraculously. The inbred strains of nature lie exposed + to influence as a mirror to reflections, and as open to impression as + sensitized paper, upon which pictures may be printed and from which they + may also fade out. The greater the variety of impressions that fall upon + the young mind the more certain it is that the greatest strength of + natural tendency will be touched and revealed. Good or bad, whichever it + may be, let it come out as quickly as possible. How many men have never + developed their fatal weaknesses until success was within reach and the + edifice fell upon other innocent ones. Believe me, no innate scoundrel or + brute will be much helped or hindered by stories. These have no turn or + leisure for dreaming. They are eager for the actual touch of life. What + would a dull-eyed glutton, famishing, not with hunger but with the + cravings of digestive ferocity, find in Thackeray's “Memorials of + Gormandizing” or “Barmecidal Feasts?” Such banquets are spread for the + frugal, not one of whom would swap that immortal cook-book review for a + dinner with Lucullus. Rascals will not read. Men of action do not read. + They look upon it as the gambler does upon the game where “no money + passes.” It may almost be said that the capacity for novel-reading is the + patent of just and noble minds. You never heard of a great novel-reader + who was notorious as a criminal. There have been literary criminals, I + grant you—Eugene Aram Dr. Dodd, Prof. Webster, who murdered + Parkmaan, and others. But they were writers, not readers And they did not + write novels. Mr. Aram wrote scientific and school books, as did Prof. + Webster, and Dr. Wainwright wrote beautiful sermons. We never do + sufficiently consider the evil that lies behind writing sermons. The + nearest you can come to a writer of fiction who has been steeped in crime + is in Benvenuto Cellini, whose marvelous autobiographical memoir certainly + contains some fiction, though it is classed under the suspect department + of History. + </p> + <p> + How many men actually have been saved from a criminal career by the + miraculous influence of novels? Let who will deny, but at the age of six I + myself was absolutely committed to the abandoned purpose of riding + barebacked horses in a circus. Secretly, of course, because there were + some vague speculations in the family concerning what seemed to be special + adaptability to the work of preaching. Shortly after I gave that up to + enlist in the Continental Army, under Gen. Francis Marion, and no other + soldier slew more Britons. After discharge I at once volunteered in an + Indiana regiment quartered in my native town in Kentucky, and beat the + snare drum at the head of that fine body of men for a long time. But the + tendency was downward. For three months I was chief of a of robbers that + ravaged the backyards of the vicinity. Successively I became a spy for + Washington, an Indian fighter, a tragic actor. + </p> + <p> + With character seared, abandoned and dissolute in habit through and by the + hearing and seeing and reading of history, there was but one desperate + step left So I entered upon the career of a pirate in my ninth year. The + Spanish Main, as no doubt you remember, was at that time upon an open + common across the street from our house, and it was a hundred feet long, + half as wide and would average two feet in depth. I have often since + thanked Heaven that they filled up that pathless ocean in order to build + an iron foundry upon the spot. Suppose they had excavated for a cellar! + Why during the time that Capt. Kidd, Lafitte and I infested the coast + thereabout, sailing three “low, black-hulled schooners with long rakish + masts,” I forced hundreds of merchant seamen to walk the plank—even + helpless women and children. Unless the sharks devoured them, their bones + are yet about three feet under the floor of that iron foundry. Under the + lee of the Northernmost promontory, near a rock marked with peculiar + crosses made by the point of the stiletto which I constantly carried in my + red silk sash, I buried tons of plate, and doubloons, pieces of eight, + pistoles, Louis d'ors, and galleons by the chest. At that time galleons + somehow meant to me money pieces in use, though since then the name has + been given to a species of boat. The rich brocades, Damascus and Indian + stuffs, laces, mantles, shawls and finery were piled in riotous profusion + in our cave where—let the whole truth be told if it must—I + lived with a bold, black-eyed and coquettish Spanish girl, who loved me + with ungovernable jealousy that occasionally led to bitter and terrible + scenes of rage and despair. At last when I brought home a white and red + English girl whose life I spared because she had begged me her knees by + the memory of my sainted mother to spare her for her old father, who was + waiting her coming, Joquita passed all bounds. I killed her—with a + single knife thrust I remember. She was buried right on the spot where the + Tilden and Hendricks flag pole afterwards stood in the campaign of 1876. + It was with bitter melancholy that I fancied the red stripes on the flag + had their color from the blood of the poor, foolish jealous girl below. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Ah, well— + </p> + <p> + Let us all own up—we men of above forty who aspire to respectability + and do actually live orderly lives and achieve even the odor of sanctity—have + we not been stained with murder?—aye worse! What man has not his + Bluebeard closet, full of early crimes and villainies? A certain boy in + whom I take a particular interest, who goes to Sunday-school and whose + life is outwardly proper—is he not now on week days a robber of + great renown? A week ago, masked and armed, he held up his own father in a + secluded corner of the library and relieved the old man of swag of a value + beyond the dreams—not of avarice, but—of successful, + respectable, modern speculation. He purposes to be a pirate whenever there + is a convenient sheet of water near the house. God speed him. Better a + pirate at six than at sixty. + </p> + <p> + Give them work to do and good novels to read and they will get over it. + History breeds queer ideas in children. They read of military heroes, + kings and statesmen who commit awful deeds and are yet monuments of public + honor. What a sweet hero is Raleigh, who was a farmer of piracy; what a + grand Admiral was Drake; what demi-gods the fighting Americans who + murdered Indians for the crime of wanting their own! History hath charms + to move an infant breast to savagery. Good strong novels are the best + pabulum to nourish difference between virtue and vice. + </p> + <p> + Don't I know? I have felt the miracle and learned the difference so well + that even now at an advanced age I can tell the difference and indulge in + either. It was not a week after the killing of Joquita that I read the + first novel of my life. It was “Scottish Chiefs.” The dead bodies of ten + thousand novels lie between me and that first one. I have not read it + since. Ten Incas of Peru with ten rooms full of solid gold could not tempt + me to read it again. Have I not a clear cinch on a delicious memory, + compared with which gold is only Robinson Crusoe's “drug?” After a lapse + of all these years the content of that one tremendous, noble chapter of + heroic climax is as deeply burned into my memory as if it had been read + yesterday. + </p> + <p> + A sister, old enough to receive “beaux” and addicted to the piano-forte + accomplishment, was at that time practicing across the hall an + instrumental composition, entitled, “La Rève.” Under the title, printed in + very small letters, was the English translation; but I never thought to + look at it. An elocutionist had shortly before recited Poe's Raven at a + church entertainment, and that gloomy bird flapped its wings in my young + emotional vicinity when the firelight threw vague “shadows on the floor.” + When the piece of music was spoken as “La Rève,” its sad cadences, + suffering, of course, under practice, were instantly wedded in my mind to + Mr. Poe's wonderful bird and for years it meant the “Raven” to me. How + curious are childish impressions. Years afterward when I saw a copy of the + music and read the translation, “The Dream” under the title, I felt a + distinct shock of resentment as if the French language had been + treacherous to my sacred ideas. Then there was the romantic name of + “Ellerslie,” which, notwithstanding considerable precocity in reading and + spelling I carried off as “Elleressie” Yeas afterward when the actual + syllables confronted me in a historical sketch of Wallace, the truth + entered like a stab and I closed the book. O sacred first illusions of + childhood, you are sweeter than a thousand year of fame! It is God's + providence that hardens us to endure the throwing of them down to our eyes + and strengthens us to keep their memory sweet in our hearts. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + It would be an affront then, not to assume that every reputable novel + reader has read “Scottish Chiefs.” If there is any descendant or any + personal friend of that admirable lady, Miss Jane Porter, who may now be + in pecuniary distress, let that descendant call upon me privately with + perfect confidence. There are obligations that a glacial evolutionary + period can not lessen. I make no conditions but the simple proof of proper + identity. I am not rich but I am grateful. + </p> + <p> + It was a Saturday evening when I became aware, as by prescience, that + there hung over Sir William Wallice and Helen Mar some terrible shadow of + fate. And the piano-forte across the hall played “La Rève.” My heart + failed me and I closed the book. If you can't do that, my friend, then you + waste your time trying to be a novel reader. You have not the true touch + of genius for it. It is the miracle of eating your cake and having it, + too. It must have been the unconscious moving of novel reading genius in + me. For I forgot, as clearly as if it were not a possibility, that the + next day was Sunday. And so hurried off, before time, to bed, to be alone + with the burden on my heart. + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “Backward, turn backward, O Time in your flight— + Make me a child again just for tonight.” + </pre> + <p> + There are two or three novels I should love to take to bed as of yore—not + to read, but to suffer over and to contemplate and to seek calmness and + courage with which to face the inevitable. Could there be men base enough + to do to death the noble Wallace? Or to break the heart of Helen Mar with + grief? No argument could remove the presentiment, but facing the matter + gave courage. “Let tomorrow answer,” I thought, as the piano-forte in the + next room played “La Rève.” Then fell asleep. + </p> + <p> + And when I awoke next morning to the full knowledge that it was Sunday, I + could have murdered the calendar. For Sunday was Dies Irae. After + Sunday-school, at least. There is a certain amount of fun to be to + extracted from Sunday-school. The remainder of those early Sundays was + confined to reading the Bible or storybooks from the Sunday-school library—books, + by the Lord Harry, that seem to be contrived especially to make out of + healthy children life-long enemies of the church, and to bind hypocrites + to the altar with hooks of steel. There was no whistling at all permitted; + singing of hymns was encouraged; no “playing”—playing on Sunday was + a distinct source of displeasure to Heaven! Are free-born men nine years + of age to endure such tyranny with resignation? Ask the kids of today—and + with one voice, as true men and free, they will answer you, “Nit!” In the + dark days of my youth liberty was in chains, and so Sunday was passed in + dreadful suspense as to what was doing in Scotland. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Monday night after supper I rejoined Sir William in his captivity and soon + saw that my worst fears were to be realized. My father sat on the opposite + side of the table reading politics; my mother was effecting the + restoration of socks; my brother was engaged in unraveling mathematical + tangles, and in the parlor across the hall my sister sat alone with her + piano patiently debating “La Rève.” Under these circumstances I + encountered the first great miracle of intellectual emotion in the chapter + describing the execution of William Wallace on Tower Hill. No other + incident of life has left upon me such a profound impression. It was as if + I had sprung at one bound into the arena of heroism. I remember it all. + How Wallace delivered himself of theological and Christian precepts to + Helen Mar after which they both knelt before the officiating priest. That + she thought or said, “My life will expire with yours!” It was the keynote + of death and life devotion. It was worthy to usher Wallace up the scaffold + steps where he stood with his hands bound, “his noble head uncovered.” + There was much Christian edification, but the presence of such a hero as + he with “noble Head uncovered” would enable any man nine years old with a + spark of honor and sympathy in him to endure agonizing amounts of + edification. Then suddenly there was a frightful shudder in my heart. The + hangman approached with the rope, and Helen Mar, with a shriek, threw + herself upon Wallace's breast. Then the great moment. If I live a thousand + years these lines will always be with me: “Wallace, with a mighty + strength, burst the bonds asunder that confined his arms and clasped her + to his heart!” + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + In reading some critical or pretended text books on construction since + that time I came across this sentence used to illustrate tautology. It was + pointed out that the bonds couldn't be “burst” without necessarily being + asunder. The confoundedest outrages in this world are the capers that + precisionists cut upon the bodies of the noble dead. And with impunity + too. Think of a village surveyor measuring the forest of Arden to discover + the exact acreage! Or a horse-doctor elevating his eye-brow with a + contemptuous smile and turning away, as from an innocent, when you speak + of the wings of that fine horse, Pegasus! Any idiot knows that bonds + couldn't be burst without being burst asunder. But, let the impregnable + Jackass think—what would become of the noble rhythm and the majestic + roll of sound? Shakespeare was an ignorant dunce also when he + characterized the ingratitude that involves the principle of public honor + as “the unkindest cut of all.” Every school child knows that it is + ungrammatical; but only those who have any sense learn after awhile the + esoteric secret that it sometimes requires a tragedy of language to + provide fitting sacrifice to the manes of despair. There never was yet a + man of genius who wrote grammatically and under the scourge of rhetorical + rules. Anthony Trollope is a most perfect example of the exact correctness + that sterilizes in its own immaculate chastity. Thackeray would knock a + qualifying adverb across the street, or thrust it under your nose to make + room for the vivid force of an idea. Trollope would give the idea a decent + funeral for the sake of having his adverb appear at the grave above + reproach from grammatical gossip. Whenever I have risen from the splendid + psychological perspective of old Job, the solemn introspective howls of + Ecclesiasticus and the generous living philosophy of Shakespeare it has + always been with the desire—of course it is undignified, but it is + human—to go and get an English grammar for the pleasure of spitting + upon it. Let us be honest. I understand everything about grammar except + what it means; but if you will give me the living substance and the proper + spirit any gentleman who desires the grammatical rules may have them, and + be hanged to him! And, while it may appear presumptuous, I can + conscientiously say that it will not be agreeable to me to settle down in + heaven with a class of persons who demand the rules of grammar for the + intellectual reason that corresponds to the call for crutches by + one-legged men. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + If the foregoing appear ill-tempered pray forget it. Remember rather that + I have sought to leave my friend Sir William Wallace, holding Helen Mar on + his breast as long as possible. And yet, I also loved her! Can human + nature go farther than that? + </p> + <p> + “Helen,” he said to her, “life's cord is cut by God's own hand.” He + stooped, he fell, and the fall shook the scaffold. Helen—that + glorified heroine—raised his head to her lap. The noble Earl of + Gloucester stepped forward, took the head in his hands. + </p> + <p> + “There,” he cried in a burst of grief, letting it fall again upon the + insensible bosom of Helen, “there broke the noblest heart that ever beat + in the breast of man!” + </p> + <p> + That page or two of description I read with difficulty and agony through + blinding tears, and when Gloucester spoke his splendid eulogy my head fell + on the table and I broke into such wild sobbing that the little family + sprang up in astonishment. I could not explain until my mother, having led + me to my room, succeeded in soothing me into calmness and I told her the + cause of it. And she saw me to bed with sympathetic caresses and, after + she left, it all broke out afresh and I cried myself to sleep in utter + desolation and wretchedness. Of course the matter got out and my father + began the book. He was sixty years old, not an indiscriminate reader, but + a man of kind and boyish heart. I felt a sort of fascinated curiosity to + watch him when he reached the chapter that had broken me. And, as if it + were yesterday, I can see him under the lamplight compressing his lips, or + puffing like a smoker through them, taking off his spectacles, and blowing + his nose with great ceremony and carelessly allowing the handkerchief to + reach his eyes. Then another paragraph and he would complain of the + glasses and wipe them carefully, also his eyes, and replace the + spectacles. But he never looked at me, and when he suddenly banged the + lids together and, turning away, sat staring into the fire with his head + bent forward, making unconcealed use of the handkerchief, I felt a sudden + sympathy for him and sneaked out. He would have made a great novel reader + if he had had the heart. But he couldn't stand sorrow and pain. The novel + reader must have a heart for every fate. For a week or more I read that + great chapter and its approaches over and over, weeping less and less, + until I had worn out that first grief, and could look with dry eyes upon + my dead. And never since have I dared to return to it. Let who will speak + freely in other tones of “Scottish Chiefs”—opinions are sacred + liberties—but as for me I know it changed my career from one of + ruthless piracy to better purposes, and certain boys of my private + acquaintance are introduced to Miss Jane Porter as soon as they show + similar bent. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0004" id="link2H_4_0004"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + IV. THE FIRST NOVEL TO READ + </h2> + <h3> + CONTAINING SOME SCANDALOUS REMARKS ABOUT “ROBINSON CRUSOE” + </h3> + <p> + The very best First-Novel-To-Read in all fiction is “Robinson Crusoe.” + There is no dogmatism in the declaration; it is the announcement of a fact + as well ascertained as the accuracy of the multiplication table. It is one + of the delights of novel reading that you may have any opinion you please + and fire it off with confidence, without gainsay. Those who differ with + you merely have another opinion, which is not sacred and cannot be proved + any more than yours. All of the elements of supreme test of imaginative + interest are in “Robinson Crusoe.” Love is absent, but that is not a test; + love appeals to persons who cannot read or write—it is universal, as + hunger and thirst. + </p> + <p> + The book-reading boy is easily discovered; you always catch him reading + books. But the novel-reading boy has a system of his own, a sort of + instinctive way of getting the greatest excitement out of the story, the + very best run for his money. This sort of boy soon learns to sit with his + feet drawn up on the upper rung of a chair, so that from the knees to the + thighs there is a gentle declivity of about thirty degrees; the knees are + nicely separated that the book may lie on them without holding. That + involves one of the most cunning of psychological secrets; because, if the + boy is not a novel reader, he does not want the book to lie open, since + every time it closes he gains just that much relief in finding the place + again. The novel-reading boy knows the trick of immortal wisdom; he can go + through the old book cases and pick the treasures of novels by the way + they lie open; if he gets hold of a new or especially fine edition of his + father's he need not be told to wrench it open in the middle and break the + back of the binding—he does it instinctively. + </p> + <p> + There are other symptoms of the born novel reader to be observed in him. + If he reads at night he is careful to so place his chair that the light + will fall on the page from a direction that will ultimately ruin the eyes—but + it does not interfere with the light. He humps himself over the open + volume and begins to display that unerring curvalinearity of the spine + that compels his mother to study braces and to fear that he will develop + consumption. Yet you can study the world's health records and never find a + line to prove that any man with “occupation or profession—novel + reading” is recorded as dying of consumption. The humped-over attitude + promotes compression of the lungs, telescoping of the diaphragm, atrophy + of the abdominal abracadabra and other things (see Physiological Slush, p. + 179, et seq.); but—it—never—hurts—the—boy! + </p> + <p> + To a novel reading boy the position is one of instinct, like that of the + bicycle racer. His eyes are strained, his nerves and muscles at tension—everything + ready for excitement—and the book, lying open, leaves his hands + perfectly free to drum on the sides of the chair, slap his legs and knees, + fumble in his pockets or even scratch his head as emotion or interest + demand. Does anybody deny that the highest proof of special genius is the + possession of the instinct to adapt itself to the matter in hand? Nothing + more need be said. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Now, if you will observe carefully such a boy when he comes to a certain + point in “Robinson Crusoe” you may recognize the stroke of fate in his + destiny. If he's the right sort, he will read gayly along; he drums, he + slaps himself, he beats his breast, he scratches his head. Suddenly there + will come the shock. He is reading rapidly and gloriously. He finds his + knife in his pocket, as usual, and puts it back; the top-string is there; + he drums the devil's tattoo, he wets his finger and smears the margin of + the page as he whirls it over and then—he finds—“The—Print—of—a—Man's—Naked—Foot—on—the—Shore!!!” + </p> + <p> + Oh, Crackey! At this tremendous moment the novel reader who has genius + drums no more. His hands have seized the upper edges of the muslin lids, + he presses the lower edges against his stomach, his back takes an added + intensity of hump, his eyes bulge, his heart thumps—he is landed—landed! + </p> + <p> + Terror, surprise, sympathy, hope, skepticism, doubt—come all ye + trooping emotions to threaten or console; but an end has come to fairy + stories and wonder tales—Master Studious is in the awful presence of + Human Nature. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + For many years I have believed that that Print—of—a—Man's—Naked—Foot + was set in italic type in all editions of “Robinson Crusoe.” But a patient + search of many editions has convinced me that I must have been mistaken. + </p> + <p> + The passage comes sneaking along in the midst of a paragraph in common + Roman letters and by the living jingo! you discover it just as Mr. Crusoe + discovered the footprint itself! + </p> + <p> + No story ever written exhibits so profoundly either the perfect design of + supreme genius or the curious accidental result of slovenly carelessness + in a hack-writer. This is not said in any critical spirit, because, + Robinson Crusoe, in one sense, is above criticism, and in another it + permits the freest analysis without suffering in the estimation of any + reader. + </p> + <p> + But for Robinson Crusoe, De Foe would never have ranked above the level of + his time. It is customary for critics to speak in awe of the “Journal of + the Plague” and it is gravely recited that that book deceived the great + Dr. Meade. Dr. Meade must have been a poor doctor if De Foe's accuracy of + description of the symptoms and effects of disease is not vastly superior + to the detail he supplies as a sailor and solitaire upon a desert island. + I have never been able to finish the “Journal.” The only books in which + his descriptions smack of reality are “Moll Flanders” and “Roxana,” which + will barely stand reading these days. + </p> + <p> + In what may be called its literary manner, Robinson Crusoe is entirely + like the others. It convinces you by its own conviction of sincerity. It + is simple, wandering yet direct; there is no making of “points” or moving + to climaxes. De Foe did unquestionably possess the capacity to put into + his story the appearance of sincerity that persuades belief at a glance. + In that much he had the spark of genius; yet that same case has not + availed to make the “Journal” of the Plague anything more than a curious + and laborious conceit, while Robinson Crusoe stands among the first books + of the world—a marvelous gleam of living interest, inextinguishably + fresh and heartening to the imagination of every reader who has + sensibility two removes above a toad. + </p> + <p> + The question arises, then, is “Robinson Crusoe” the calculated triumph of + deliberate genius, or the accidental stroke of a hack who fell upon a + golden suggestion in the account of Alexander Selkirk and increased its + value ten thousand fold by an unintentional but rather perfect marshaling + of incidents in order, and by a slovenly ignorance of character treatment + that enhanced the interest to perfect intensity? This question may be + discussed without undervaluing the book, the extraordinary merit of which + is shown in the fact that, while its idea has been paraphrased, it has + never been equalled. The “Swiss Family Robinson,” the “Schonberg-Cotta + Family” for children are full of merit and far better and more carefully + written, but there are only the desert island and the ingenious shifts + introduced. Charles Reade in “Hard Cash,” Mr. Mallock in his “Nineteenth + Century Romance,” Clark Russel in “Marooned,” and Mayne Reid, besides + others, have used the same theater. But only in that one great book is the + theater used to display the simple, yearning, natural, resolute, yet + doubting, soul and heart of man in profound solitude, awaiting in armed + terror, but not without purpose, the unknown and masked intentions of + nature and savagery. It seems to me—and I have been tied to Crusoe's + chariot wheels for a dozen readings, I suppose—that it is the + pressing in upon your emotions of the immensity of the great castaway's + solitude, in which he appears like some tremendous Job of abandonment, + fighting an unseen world, which is the innate note of its power. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + The very moment Friday becomes a loyal subject, the suspense relaxes into + pleased interest, and after Friday's funny father and the Spaniard and + others appear it becomes a common book. As for the second part of the + adventures I do not believe any matured man ever read it a second time + unless for curious or literary purposes. If he did he must be one of that + curious but simple family that have read the second part of “Faust,” + “Paradise Regained,” and the “Odyssey,” and who now peruse “Clarissa + Harlowe” and go carefully over the catalogue of ships in the “Iliad” as a + preparation for enjoying the excitements of the city directory. + </p> + <p> + Every particle of greatness in “Robinson Crusoe” is compressed within two + hundred pages, the other four hundred being about as mediocre trash as you + could purchase anywhere between cloth lids. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + It is interesting to apply subjective analysis to Robinson Crusoe. The + book in its very greatness has turned more critical swans into geese than + almost any other. They have praised the marvelous ingenuity with which De + Foe described how the castaway overcame single-handed, the deprivations of + all civilized conveniences; they have marveled at the simple method in + which all his labors are marshaled so as to render his conversion of the + island into a home the type of industrial and even of social progress and + theory; they have rhapsodized over the perfection of De Foe's style as a + model of literary strength and artistic verisemblance. Only a short time + ago a mighty critic of a great London paper said seriously that “Robinson + Crusoe and Gulliver appeal infinitely more to the literary reader than to + the boy, who does not want a classic but a book written by a + contemporary.” What an extraordinary boy that must be! It is probable that + few boys care for Gulliver beyond his adventures in Lilliput and + Brobdignag, but they devour that much, together with Robinson Crusoe, with + just as much avidity now as they did a century ago. Your clear-headed, + healthy boy is the first best critic of what constitutes the very liver + and lights of a novel. Nothing but the primitive problems of courage + meeting peril, virtue meeting vice, love, hatred, ambition for power and + glory, will go down with him. The grown man is more capable of dealing + with social subtleties and the problems of conscience, but those sorts of + books do not last unless they have also “action—action—action.” + </p> + <p> + Will the New Zealander, sitting amidst the prophetic ruins of St. Paul's, + invite his soul reading Robert Elsmere? Of course you can't say what a New + Zealander of that period might actually do; but what would you think of + him if you caught him at it? The greatest stories of the world are the + Bible stories, and I never saw a boy—intractable of acquiring the + Sunday-school habit though he may have been—who wouldn't lay his + savage head on his paws and quietly listen to the good old tales of wonder + out of that book of treasures. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + So let us look into the interior of our faithful old friend, Robinson + Crusoe, and examine his composition as a literary whole. From the moment + that Crusoe is washed ashore on the island until after the release of + Friday's father and the Spaniard from the hands of the cannibals, there is + no book in print, perhaps, that can surpass it in interest and the + strained impression it makes upon the unsophisticated mind. It is all + comprised in about 200 pages, but to a boy to whom the world is a theater + of crowded action, to whom everything seems to have come ready-made, to + whom the necessity of obedience and accommodation to others has been + conveyed by constant friction—here he finds himself for the first + time face to face with the problem of solitude. He can appreciate the + danger from wild animals, genii, ghosts, battles, sieges and sudden death, + but in no other book before, did he ever come upon a human being left + solitary, with all these possible dangers to face. + </p> + <p> + The voyages on the raft, the house-building, contriving, fearing, praying, + arguing—all these are full of plaintive pathos and yet of + encouragement. He witnesses despair turned into comfortable resignation as + the result of industry. It has required about twelve years. Virtue is + apparently fattening upon its own reward, when—Smash! Bang!—our + young reader runs upon “the—print—of—a—man's—naked—foot!” + and security and happiness, like startled birds, are flown forever. For + twelve more years this new unseen terror hangs over the poor solitary. + Then we have Friday, the funny cannibals later and it is all over. But the + vast solitude of that poor castaway has entered the imagination of the + youth and dominates it. + </p> + <p> + These two hundred pages are crowded with suggestions that set a boy's mind + on fire, yet every page contains evidence of obvious slovenliness, + indolence and ignorance of human nature and common things, half of which + faults seem directly to contribute to the result, while the other half are + never noticed by the reader. + </p> + <p> + How many of you, who sniff at this, know Crusoe's real name? Yet it stares + right out of the very first paragraphs in the book—a clean, perhaps + accidental, proof of good scholarship, which De Foe possessed. Crusoe + tells us his father was a German from Bremen, who married an Englishwoman, + from whose family name of Robinson came the son's name which was properly + Robinson Kreutznaer. This latter name, he explains, became corrupted in + the common English speech into Crusoe. That is an excellent touch. The + German pronunciation of Kreutznaer would sound like Krites-nare, and a + mere dry scholar would have evolved Crysoe out of the name. But the + English-speaking people everywhere, until within the past twenty years or + so, have given the German “eu” the sound of “oo” or “u.” Robinson's father + therefore was called Crootsner until it was shaved into Crootsno and + thence smoothed to Crusoe. + </p> + <p> + But what was the Christian name of the elder Kreutznaer? Or of the boy's + mother? Or of his brothers or sisters? Or of the first ship captain under + whom he sailed; or any of them; or even of the ship he commanded, and in + which he was wrecked; or of the dog that he carried to the island; or of + the two cats; or of the first and all the other tame goats; or of the + inlet; or of Friday's father; or of the Spaniard he saved; or of the ship + captain; or of the ship that finally saved him? Who knows? The book is a + desert as far as nomenclature goes—the only blossoms being his own + name; that of Wells, a Brazilian neighbor; Xury, the Moorish boy; Friday, + Poll, the parrot; and Will Atkins. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + You may retort that all this doesn't matter. That is very true—and + be hanged to you!—but those facts prove by every canon of literary + art that Robinson Crusoe is either a coldly calculated flight of + consummate genius or an accidental freak of hack literature. When De Foe + wrote, it was only a century after Drake and his companions in authorized + piracy had made the British privateer the scourge of the seas and had + demonstrated that naval supremacy meant the control of the world. The + seafaring life was one of peril, but it carried with it honor, glory and + envy. Forty years later Nelson was born to crown British navalry with + deathless Glory. Even the commonest sailor spoke his ship's name—if + it were a fine vessel—with the same affection that he spoke his + wife's and cursed a bad ship by its name as if to tag its vileness with + proverbiality. + </p> + <p> + When De Foe wrote Alexander Selkirk, able seaman, was alive end had told + his story of shipwreck to Sir Richard Steele, editor of the English + Gentleman and of the Tattler, who wrote it up well—but not half as + well as any one of ten thousand newspaper men of today could do under + similar circumstances. + </p> + <p> + Now who that has read of Selkirk and Dampierre and Stradling does not + remember the two famous ships, the “Cinque Ports” and the “St. George?” In + every actvial book of the times, ship's names were sprinkled over the page + as if they had been shaken out of the pepper box. But you inquire in vain + the name of the slaver that wrecked “poor Robinson Crusoe”—a name + that would have been printed on his memory beyond forgetting because of + the very misfortune itself. Now the book is the autobiography of a man + whose only years of active life between eighteen and twenty-six were + passed as a sailor. It was written apparently after he was seventy-two + years old, at the period when every trifling incident and name of youth + would survive most brightly; yet he names no ships, no sailor mates, + carefully avoids all knowledge of or advantage attaching to any parts of + ships. It is out of character as a sailor's tale, showing that the author + either did not understand the value of or was too indolent to acquire the + ship knowledge that would give to his work the natural smell of salt water + and the bilge. It is a landlubber's sea yarn. + </p> + <p> + Is it in character as a revelation of human nature? No man like unto + Robinson Crusoe ever did live, does live, or ever will live, unless as a + freak deprived of human emotions. The Robinson Crusoe of Despair Island + was not a castaway, but the mature politician. Daniel Defoe of Newgate + Prison. The castaway would have melted into loving recollections; the + imprisoned lampoonist would have busied himself with schemes, ideas, + arguments and combinations for getting out, and getting on. This poor + Robin on the island weeps over nothing but his own sorrows, and, while + pretending to bewail his solitude, turns aside coldly from companionships + next only in affection to those of men. He has a dog, two ship's cats (of + whose “eminent history” he promises something that is never related), tame + goats and parrots. He gives none of them a name, he does not occupy his + yearning for companionship and love by preparing comforts for them or by + teaching them tricks of intelligence or amusement; and when he does make a + stagger at teaching Poll to talk it is for the sole purpose of hearing her + repeat “Poor Robin Crusoe!” The dog is dragged in to work for him, but not + to be rewarded. He dies without notice, as do the cats, and not even a + billet of wood marks their graves. + </p> + <p> + Could any being, with a drop of human blood in his veins, do that? He + thinks of his father with tears in his eyes—because he did not + escape the present solitude by taking the old man's advice! Does he recall + his mother or any of the childish things that lie so long and deep in the + heart of every natural man? Does he ever wonder what his old + school-fellows, Bob Freckles and Pete Baker, are doing these solitary + evenings when he sits under the tropics and hopes—could he not at + least hope it?—that they are, thank God, alive and happy at York? He + discourses like a parson of the utterly impossible affection that Friday + had for his cannibal sire and tells you how noble, Christian and beautiful + it was—as if, by Jove! a little of that virtue wouldn't have + ornamented his own cold, emotionless, fishy heart! + </p> + <p> + He had no sentimental side. Think of those dreary, egotistic, awful + evenings, when, for more than twenty years this infernal hypocrite kept + himself company and tried patiently to deceive God by flattering Him about + religion! It is impossible. Why thought turns as certainly to revery and + recollection as grass turns to seed. He married. What was his wife's name? + We know how much property she had. What were the names of the honest + Portuguese Captain and the London woman who kept his money? The cold + selfishness and gloomy egotism of this creature mark him as a monster and + not as a man. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + So the book is not in character as an autobiography, nor does it contain a + single softening emotion to create sympathy. Let us see whether it be + scholarly in its ease. The one line that strikes like a bolt of lightning + is the height of absurdity. We have all laughed, afterward of course, at + that—single—naked—foot—print. It could not have + been there without others, unless Friday were a one legged man, or was + playing the good old Scots game of “hop-scotch!” + </p> + <p> + But the foot-print is not a circumstance to the cannibals. All the stage + burlesques of Robinson Crusoe combined could not produce such funny + cannibals as he discovered. Crusoe's cannibals ate no flesh but that of + men! He had no great trouble contriving how to induce Friday to eat goat's + flesh! They took all the trouble to come to his island to indulge in + picnics, during which they ate up folks, danced and then went home before + night. When the big party of 31 arrived, they had with them one other + cannibal of Friday's tribe, a Spaniard, and Friday's father. It appears + they always carefully unbound a victim before despatching him. They + brought Friday pere for lunch, although he was old, decrepit and thin—a + condition that always unfits a man among all known cannibals for serving + as food. They reject them as we do stringy old roosters for spring + chickens in the best society. Then Friday, born a cannibal and converted + to Crusoe's peculiar religion, shows that in three years he has acquired + all the emotions of filial affection prevalent at that time among + Yorkshire folk who attended dissenting chapels. More wonderful still! old + Friday pere, immersed in age and cannibalism, has the corresponding + paternal feeling. Crusoe never says exactly where these cannibals came + from, but my own belief is that they came from that little Swiss town + whence the little wooden animals for toy Noah's Arks also came. + </p> + <p> + A German savant—one of the patient sort that spend half a life + writing a monograph on the variation of spots on the butterfly's wings—could + get a philosophical dissertation on Doubt out of Crusoe's troubles with + pens, ink and paper; also clothes. In the volume I am using, on page 86, + third paragraph, he says: “I should lose my reckoning of time for want of + books, and pen and ink.” So he kept it by notches in wood, he tells in the + fourth paragraph. In paragraph 5, same page, he says: “We are to observe + that among the many things I brought out of the ship, I got several of + less value, etc., which I omitted setting down as in particular pens, ink + and paper!” Same paragraph, lower down: “I shall show that while my ink + lasted I kept things very exact, but after that was gone I could not make + any ink by any means that I could devise.” Page 87, second paragraph: “I + wanted many things, notwithstanding all the many things that I had amassed + together, and of these ink was one!” Page 88, first paragraph: “I drew up + my affairs in writing!” Now, by George! did you ever hear of more + appearing and disappearing pens, ink and paper? + </p> + <p> + The adventures of his clothes were as remarkable as his own. On his very + first trip to the wreck, after landing, he went “rummaging for clothes, of + which I found enough,” but took no more than he wanted for present use. On + the second trip he “took all the men's clothes” (and there were fifteen + souls on board when she sailed). Yet in his famous debit and credit + calculations between good and evil he sets these down, page 88: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + EVIL | GOOD + ————————————————————————— + I have no clothes to | But I am in a hot climate, + cover me. | where, if I had + | clothes (!) I could hardly + | wear them. +</pre> + <p> + On page 147, bewailing his lack of a sieve, he says: “Linen, I had none + but what was mere rags.” + </p> + <p> + Page 158 (one year later): “My clothes, too, began to decay; as to linen, + I had had none a good while, except some checkered shirts, which I + carefully preserved, because many times I could bear no other clothes on. + I had almost three dozen of shirts, several thick watch coats, too hot to + wear.” + </p> + <p> + So he tried to make jackets out of the watch coats. Then this ingenious + gentleman, who had nothing to wear and was glad of it on account of the + heat, which kept him from wearing anything but a shirt, and rendered watch + coats unendurable, actually made himself a coat, waistcoat, breeches, cap + and umbrella of skins with the hair on and wore them in great comfort! + Page 175 he goes hunting, wearing this suit, belted by two heavy skin + belts, carrying hatchet, saw, powder, shot, his heavy fowling piece and + the goatskin umbrella—total weight of baggage and clothes about + ninety pounds. It must have been a cold day! + </p> + <p> + Yet the first thing he does for the naked Friday thirteen years later is + to give him a pair—of—LINEN—trousers! Poor Robin Crusoe—what + a colossal liar was wasted on a desert island! + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Of course, no boy sees the blemishes in “Robinson Crusoe;” those are left + to the Infallible Critic. The book is as ludicrous as “Hamlet” from one + aspect and as profound as “Don Quixote” from another. In its pages the + wonder tales and wonder facts meet and resolve; realism and idealism are + joined—above all, there is a mystery no critic may solve. It is + useless to criticize genius or a miracle, except to increase its wonder. + Who remembers anything in “Crusoe” but the touch of the wizard's hand? Who + associates the Duke of Athens, Hermia and Helena, with Bottom and Snug, + Titania, Oberon and Puck? Any literary master mechanic might real off ten + thousand yards of the Greek folks or of “Pericles,” but when you want + something that runs thus: + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “I know a bank whereon the wild thyme blows! + Where oxlip and the nodding violet grows—.” + </pre> + <p> + why, then, my masters, you must put up the price and employ a genius to + work the miracle. + </p> + <p> + Take all miracles without question. Whether work of genius or miracle of + accident, “Robinson Crusoe” gives you a generous run for your money. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0005" id="link2H_4_0005"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + V. THE OPEN POLAR SEA OF NOVELS + </h2> + <h3> + WITH HIGHLY INCENDIARY ADVICE TO BOYS AND SOME MORE ANCIENT HISTORY + </h3> + <p> + After the first novel has been read, somewhere under the seasoned age of + fourteen years, the beginner equipped with inherent genius for novel + reading is afloat upon an open sea of literature, a master mariner of his + own craft, having ports to make, to leave, to take, so splendid of variety + and wonder as to make the voyages of Sinbad sing small by comparison. It + may be proper and even a duty here to suggest to the young novel reader + that the Ten Commandments and all governmental statutes authorize the + instant killing, without pity or remorse, of any heavy-headed and + intrusive person who presumes to map out for him a symmetrical and + well-digested course of novel reading. The murder of such folks is + universally excused as self-defense and secretly applauded as a public + service. The born novel reader needs no guide, counsellor or friend. He is + his own “master.” He can with perfect safety and indescribable delight + shut his eyes, reach out his hand, pull down any plum of a book and never + make a mistake. Novel reading is the only one of the splendid occupations + of life calling for no instruction or advice. All that is necessary is to + bite the apple with the largest freedom possible to the intellectual and + imaginative jaws, and let the taste of it squander itself all the way down + from the front teeth until it is lost in the digestive joys of memory. + There is no miserable quail limit to novels—you can read thirty + novels in thirty days or 365 novels in 365 days for thirty years, and the + last one will always have the delicious taste of the pies of childhood. + </p> + <p> + If any honest-minded boy chances to read these lines, let him charge his + mind with full contempt for any misguided elders who have designs of + “choosing only the best accepted novels” for his reading. There are no + “best” novels except by the grace of the poor ones, and, if you don't read + the poor ones, the “best” will be as tasteless as unsalted rice. I say to + boys that are worth growing up: don't let anybody give you patronizing + advice about novels. If your pastors and masters try oppression, there is + the orchard, the creek bank, the attic room, the roof of the woodshed + (under the peach tree), and a thousand other places where you may hide and + maintain your natural independence. Don't let elderly and officious + persons explain novels to you. They can not honestly do so; so don't waste + time. Every boy of fourteen, with the genius to read 'em, is just as good + a judge of novels and can understand them quite as well as any gentleman + of brains of any old age. Because novels mean entirely different things to + every blessed reader. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + The main thing at the beginning is to be in the neighborhood of a good + “novel orchard” and to nibble and eat, and even “gormandize,” as your + fancy leads you. Only—as you value your soul and your honor as a + gentleman—bear in mind that what you read in every novel that + pleases you is sacred truth. There are busy-bodies, pretenders to + “culture,” and sticklers for the multiplication table and Euclid's + pestiferous theorem, who will tell you that novel reading is merely for + entertainment and light accomplishment, and that the histories of fiction + are purely imaginary and not to be taken seriously. That is pure + falsehood. The truth of all humanity, as well as all its untruth, flows in + a noble stream through the pages of fiction. Do not allow the elders to + persuade you that pirate stories, battles, sieges, murders and sudden + deaths, the road to transgression and the face of dishonesty are not good + for you. They are 90 per cent. pure nutriment to a healthy boy's mind, and + any other sort of boy ought particularly to read them and so learn the + shortest cut to the penitentiary for the good of the world. Whenever you + get hold of a novel that preaches and preaches and preaches, and can't + give a poor ticket-of-leave man or the decentest sort of a villain credit + for one good trait—Gee, Whizz! how tiresome they are—lose it, + you young scamp, at once, if you respect yourself. If you are pushed you + can say that Bill Jones took it away from you and threw it in the creek. + The great Victor Hugo and the authors of that noble drama “The Two + Orphans,” are my authorities for the statement that some fibs—not + all fibs, but some proper fibs—are entered in heaven on both debit + and credit sides of the book of fate. + </p> + <p> + There is one book, the Book of Books, swelling rich and full with the + wisdom and beauty and joy and sorrow of humanity—a book that set + humility like a diamond in the forehead of virtue; that found mercy and + charity outcasts among the minds of men and left them radiant queens in + the world's heart; that stickled not to describe the gorgeous esotery of + corroding passion and shamed it with the purity of Mary Magdelen; that + dragged from the despair of old Job the uttermost poison-drop of doubt and + answered it with the noble problem of organized existence; that teems with + murder and mistake and glows with all goodness and honest aspiration—that + is the Book of Books. There hasn't been one written since that has crossed + the boundary of its scope. What would that book be after some goody-goody + had expurgated it of evil and left it sterilized in butter and sugar? Let + no ignorant paternal Czar, ruling over cottage or mansion, presume to keep + from the mind and heart of youth the vigorous knowledge and observation of + evil and good, crime and virtue together. No chaff, no wheat; no dross, no + gold; no human faults and weaknesses, no heavenly hope. And if any + gentleman does not like the sentiment, he can find me at my usual place of + residence, unless he intends violence—and be hanged, also, to him! + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + A novel is a novel, and there are no bad ones in the world, except those + you do not happen to like. Suppose a boy started with Robinson Crusoe and + was scientifically and criminally steered by the hand of misguided + “culture” to Scott and Dickens and Cooper and Hawthorne—all the + classics, in fact, so that he would escape the vulgar thousands? Answer a + straight question, ye old rooters between a thousand miles of muslin lids—would + you have been willing to miss “The Gunmaker of Moscow” back yonder in the + green days of say forty years ago? What do you think of Prof. William + Henry Peck's “Cryptogram?” Were not Sylvanus Cobb, Jr., and Emerson + Bennett authors of renown—honor to their dust, wherever it lies! + Didn't you read Mrs. Southworth's “Capitola” or the “Hidden Hand” long + before “Vashti” was dreamed of? Don't you remember that No. 52 of Beadle's + Dime Library (light yellowish red paper covers) was “Silverheels, the + Delaware,” and that No. 77 was “Schinderhannes, the Outlaw of the Black + Forest?” I yield to no man in affection and reverence for M. Dumas, Mr. + Thackeray and others of the higher circles, but what's the matter with Ned + Buntline, honest, breezy, vigorous, swinging old Ned? Put the “Three + Guardsmen” where you will, but there is also room for “Buffalo Bill, the + Scout.” When I first saw Col. Cody, an ornament to the theatre and a + painful trial to the drama, and realized that he was Buffalo Bill in the + flesh—why, I was glad I had also read “Buffalo Bill's Last Shot”—(may + he never shoot it). The day has passed forever, probably, when Buffalo + Bill shall shout to his other scouts, “You set fire to the girl while I + take care of the house!” or vice versa, and so saying, bear the fainting + heroine triumphantly off from the treacherous redskins. But the story has + lived. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + It was a happy and honored custom in the old days for subscribers to the + New York Ledger and the New York Weekly to unite in requests for the + serial republication of favorite stories in those great fireside + luminaries. They were the old-fashioned, broadside sheets and, of course, + there were insuperable difficulties against preserving the numbers. After + a year or two, therefore, there would awaken a general hunger among the + loyal hosts to “read the story over,” and when the demand was sufficiently + strong the publishers would repeat it, cuts, divisions, and all, just as + at first. How many times the “Gunmaker of Moscow” was repeated in the + Ledger, heaven knows. I remember I petitioned repeatedly for “Buffalo + Bill” in the Weekly, and we got it, too, and waded through it again. By + wading, I don't mean pushing laboriously and tediously through, but, by + George! half immersion in the joy. It was a week between numbers, and a + studious and appreciative boy made no bones of reading the current weekly + chapters half a dozen times over while waiting for the next. + </p> + <p> + It must have been ten years later that I felt a thrill at the coming of + Buffalo Bill himself in his first play. I had risen to the dignity of + dramatic critic upon a journal of limited civilization and boundless + politics, and was privileged to go behind the scenes at the theatre and + actually speak to the actors. (I interviewed Mary Anderson during her + first season, in the parlor of the local hotel, where honest George + Bristow—who kept the cigar stand and could not keep a healthy + appetite—always gave a Thanksgiving order for “two-whole-roast + turkeys and a piece of breast,” and they were served, too, the whole ones + going to some near-by hospital, and the piece of breast to George's honest + stomach—good, kind soul that he was. And Miss Anderson chewed gum + during the whole period of the interview to the intense amusement of my + elder and brother dramatic critic, who has since become the honored + governor of his adopted state, and toward whom I beg to look with + affectionate memory of those days.) Now, when a man has known novels + intimately, has been dramatic critic, and has traveled with a circus, it + seems to me in all reason he can not fairly have any other earthly joys to + desire. At fifteen I was walking on tip-toe about the house on Sundays, + and going off to the end of the garden to softly whistle “weekday” tunes, + and at twenty I stood off the wings L. U. E., and had twenty “Black Crook” + coryphees in silk tights and tarletan squeeze past in line, and nod and + say, “Is it going all right in front?” They—knew—I—was—the—Critic! + When you can do that you can laugh at Byron, roosting around upon + inaccessible mountain crags and formulating solitude and indigestion into + poetry! + </p> + <p> + I waited for Buffalo Bill's coming with feelings that can not be + described. It was impossible to expect to meet Sir William Wallace in the + flesh, or Sir Wilfred of Ivanhoe, or Capt. D'Artagnan, or Umslopogaas, or + any one of a thousand great fighting heroes; but here was Buffalo Bill, + just as great and glorious and dashing and handsome as any of them, and my + right hand tingled to be grasped in that of the Bayard of the Prairies. + And that hand's desire was attained. In his dressing-room between acts I + sat nervously on a chair while the splendid Apollo of frontiersmen, in + buckskin and beads, sat on his trunk, with his long, shapely legs sprawled + gracefully out, his head thrown back so that the mane of brown hair should + hang behind. It was glistening with oil and redolent of barber's perfume. + And we talked there as one man to another, each apparently without fear. I + was certainly nervous and timid, but he did not notice it, and I am frank + to say he did not appear to feel the slightest personal fear of me. Thus, + face to face, I saw the man with whom I had trod Ned Buntline's boundless + plains and had seen and encountered a thousand perils and redskins. When + the act call came, and I rose to go, a man stopped at the door and said to + him: + </p> + <p> + “What shall it be to-night, Colonel?” + </p> + <p> + “A big beef-steak and a bottle of Bass!” answered Buffalo Bill heartily, + “and tell 'ern to have it hot and ready at 11:15.” + </p> + <p> + The beef-steak and Bass' ale were the watchwords of true heroism. The real + hero requires substantial filling. He must have a head and a heart—but + no less a good, healthy and impatient stomach. + </p> + <p> + In the daily paper the morning I write this I see the announcement of + Buffalo Bill's “Wild West Show” coming two week's hence. Good luck to him! + He can't charge prices too steep for me, and there are six seats necessary—the + best in the amphitheater. And I wish I could be sure the vigorous spirit + of Ned Buntline would be looking down from the blue sky overhead to see + his hero charge the hill of San Juan at the head of the Rough Riders. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + This digression may be wide of the subject of novel reading, but the real + novel reader is at home anywhere. He has thoughts, dreams, reveries, + fancies. All the world is his novel and all actions are stories and all + the actors are characters. When Lucile Western, the excellent American + actress, was at the height of her powers, not long before her last + appearances, she had as her leading man a big, slouchy and careless + person, who was advertised as “the talented young English actor, William + Whally.” In the intimacies of private association he was known as Bill + Whally, and his descent was straight down from “Mount Sinai's awful + height.” He was a Hebrew and no better or more uneven and reckless actor + ever played melodramatic “heavies.” He had a love for Shakespeare, but + could not play him; he had a love of drink and could gratify it. His + vigorous talents purchased for him much forbearance. I've seen Mr. Whally + play the fastidious and elegant “Sir Archibald Levison” in shiny black + doe-skin trousers and old-fashioned cloth gaiters, because his condition + rendered the problem of dressing somewhat doubtful, though it could not + obscure his acting. He was the only walking embodiment of “Bill Sykes” I + ever saw, and I contracted the habit of going to see him kill Miss Western + as “Nancy” because he butchered that young woman with a broken chair more + satisfactorily than anybody else I ever saw. There was a murderer for you—Bill + Sykes! Bad as he was in most things, let us not forget that—he—killed—Nancy—and—killed—her—well + and—thoroughly. If that young woman didn't snivel herself under a + just sentence of death, I'm no fit householder to serve on a jury. Every + time Miss Western came around it was my custom to read up fresh on “Oliver + Twist” and hurry around and enjoy Bill Whally's happy application of + retribution with the aid of the old property chair. There were six other + persons whom I succeeded in persuading to applaud the scene with me every + time it was acted. + </p> + <p> + But there's a separate chapter for villains. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Let us return to the old novels. What curious pranks time plays with + tastes and vogues. Forty years ago N. P. Willis was just faded. Yet he was + long a great comet of literary glitter and obscured many men of much + greater ability. Everybody read him; the annuals hung upon his name; the + ladies regarded him as a finer and more dashing Byron than Byron. The + place he filled was much like that of Congreve, before whom Shakespeare's + great nose was out of joint for a long time; Congreve, who was the + margarita aluminata major of English poesy and drama and public life, and + is now found in junk stores and in the back line on book shelves and whom + nobody reads now. Willis had his languid affectations, his superficial + cynicism and added to them ostentatious sentimentality. + </p> + <p> + Does anybody read William Gilmore Simm's elaborate rhetoric disguised as + novels? He must have written two dozen of them, the Richardson of the + United States. Lovers of delicious wit and intellectual humor still read + Dr. Holmes' essays, but it would probably take a physician's prescription + to make them swallow the novels. In what dark corners of the library are + Bayard Taylor's novels and travels hidden? Will you come into the garden, + Maud, and read Chancellor Walworth's mighty tragedies and Miss Mulock's + Swiss-toy historical novels, or will you beg off, like the honest girl you + are, and take a nap? Your sleepiness, dear Miss Maud, does you credit. By + the way, what the deuce is the name of anyone of these novels? I can + recall “Elsie Vernier,” by Dr. Holmes and then there is a blank. + </p> + <p> + But what classics they were—then! In the thick of them had appeared + a newspaper story that struggled through and was printed in book form. Old + friends have told me how they waited at the country post-offices to get a + copy, delayed for weeks. It was a scandal to read it in some localities. + It was fiercely attacked as an outrageous exaggeration produced by + temporary excitement and hostile feeling, or praised as a new gospel. It + has been translated into every tongue having a printing press, and has + sold by millions of copies. It was “Uncle Tom's Cabin.” It was not a + classic, but what a vigorous immortal mongrel of human sentiment it was! + What a row was kicked up over Miss Braddon's “Octoroon,” and what an + impossible yellowback it was! The toughest piece of fiction I met with as + a boy was “Sanford and Merton,” and I've been aching to say so for four + pages. If this world were full of Sanfords and Mertons, then give me + Jupiter or some other comfortable planet at a secure sanitary distance + removed. + </p> + <p> + I can't even remember the writers who were grammatically and rhetorically + perfect forty years ago, and also very dull with it all. Is there a + bookshelf that holds “Leni Leoti, or The Flower of the Prairies?” There + are “Jane Eyre,” “Lady Audley's Secret,” and “John Halifax, Gentleman,” + which will go with many and are all well worth the reading, too. Are Mrs. + Eliza A. Dupuy, Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth, Mrs. Caroline Lee Hentz and + Augusta J. Evans dead? Their novels still live—look at the book + stores. “Linda, or the Young Pilot of the Belle Creole,” “India, the Pearl + of Pearl River,” “The Planter's Northern Bride,” “St. Elmo”—they + were fiction for you! A boy old enough to have a first sweetheart could + swallow them by the mile. + </p> + <p> + You remember, when we were boys, the circus acrobats always—always, + remember—rubbed young children with snake-oil and walloped them with + a rawhide to educate them in tumbling and contortion? Well, if I could get + the snake-oil for the joints and a curly young wig, I'd like to get back + at five hundred of those books and devour them again—“as of yore!” + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0006" id="link2H_4_0006"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + VI. RASCALS + </h2> + <h3> + BEING A DISCOURSE UPON GOOD, HONEST SCOUNDRELISM AND VILLAINS. + </h3> + <p> + The people that inhabit novels are like other peoples of the earth—if + they are peaceful, they have no history. So that, therefore, in novels, as + in nations, it is the great restless heights of society that are to be + approached with greatest awe and that engage admiration and regard. + Everybody is interested in Nero, but not one person in ten thousand can + tell you anything definite about Constantine or even Marcus Aurelius. If + you should speak off-handedly about Amelia Sedley in the presence of a + thousand average readers you would probably miss 85 per cent. of effect; + if you said Becky Sharp the whole thousand would understand. + </p> + <p> + There is this to be said of disreputable folk, that they are clever and + picturesque and interesting, at least. + </p> + <p> + An elderly jeweler in New York City was arrested several years ago upon + the charge of receiving stolen gold and silver plate, watches and jewelry + from well-known thieves. For forty years he had been a respected merchant, + a church officer, a husband, father, and citizen, of irreproachable + reputation, with enduring friendships. He was charitable, liberal and + kindly. For decade after decade he was the experienced, wise and fatherly + “fence” of professional burglars and thieves. Why, it would be an + education in itself to know that man, to shake his honest hand, fresh from + charity or concealment, and smoke a pipe with him and hear him talk about + things frankly. When he gave to the missionary collection, rest assured he + gave sincerely; when he “covered swag,” into the melting pot for an + industrious burglar, he did so only in the regular course of business. + </p> + <p> + Strange as it may seem, even criminals have human feelings in common with + all of us. The old Thug who stepped aside into the bushes and prayed + earnestly while his son was throwing his first strangling cloth around the + throat of the English traveler—prayed for that son's honorable, + successful beginning in his life devotion—was a good father. And + when he was told that the son had acted with unusual skill, who can doubt + that his tears of joy were sincere and humble tears of thankfulness? At + least Bowanee knew. Can you not imagine a kind-hearted Chinese matron + saying to her neighbor over the bamboo fence, “Yes, we sent the baby down + to the beach (or the river bank or the forest) yesterday. We couldn't + afford to keep it. I hope the gods have taken its little soul. At any rate + it is sure of salvation hereafter.” + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Some twenty years ago I took the night train from Pineville to + Barbourville, in the Kentucky mountains, reaching the latter place about + 11 o'clock of a cold, rainy, dark November night. Only one other passenger + alighted. There was an express wagon to take us to the town, a mile or so + distant, and the wagon was already heavy with freight packages. The road + was through a narrow lane, hub-deep with mud, and what, with stalling and + resting, we were more than half an hour getting to the hotel. My fellow + passenger was about my age, and was a shrewd, well-informed native of the + vicinity. He knew the mineral, timber and agricultural resources, was + evidently an enterprising business man and an intelligent but not voluble + talker. He accepted a cigar, and advised me to see the house in + Barbourville where the late Justice Samuel Miller was born. At the hotel + he registered first, and, as he was going to leave next day and I was to + remain several days, he told the clerk to give me the better of the two + rooms vacant. It was a very pleasant act of thoughtfulness. The name on + the register was “A. Johnson.” The next day I asked the clerk about Mr. + Johnson. My fellow passenger was Andy Johnson, whose fame as a + feud-fighter and slayer of men has never been exceeded in the history of + mountain feuds. He then had three or four men to his credit, definitely, + and several doubtful ascriptions. He added a few more, I believe, before + he met the inevitable. + </p> + <p> + Now, while Mr. Johnson, in all matters where killing seemed to him to be + appropriate, was a most prompt and accurate man in accomplishing it, yet + he was not the murderer that ignorant and isolated folks conceive such + persons to be. The cigar I had given him was a very bad, cheap cigar, and, + if he had merely wanted murder, he had every reason to kill me for giving + it to him, and he had a perfect night for the deed. But he smoked it to + the stub without a complaint or remark and saw that I got the best room in + the hotel. Johnson was a cautious and considerate fellow-man, whose + murders were doubtless private hobbies and exercises growing out of his + environment and heredity. + </p> + <p> + One of the houses I most delight to enter in a certain town is one where I + am always sure to see a devoted and happy wife and beautiful, playful + children clustering around the armchair in which sits a man who committed + one of the most cold-blooded assassinations you can imagine. He is an + honored, esteemed and model citizen. His acquittal was a miracle in a + million chances. He has justified it. It is beautiful to see those happy + children clinging to the hand that— + </p> + <p> + Well, dear friends, the dentist is not a cruel man in his social capacity, + and you can get delicious viands instead of nauseous medicines at the + doctor's private table. + </p> + <p> + That is why beginning novel readers should take no advice. Strike out + alone through the highways and lanes of story, character and experience. + The best novelist is the one who fears not to tell you the truth, which is + more wonderful than fiction. It is always the best hearts that bend to + mistakes. Absolute virtue is as sterile as granite rock; absolute vice is + as poisonous as a stagnant pond. No healthy interest or speculation can + linger about either. Enter into the struggle and know human nature; don't + stay outside and try to appear superior. + </p> + <p> + For, which of us has not his crimes of thought to account for? Think not, + because Andy Johnson or William Sykes or Dr. Webster actually killed his + man, that you are guiltless, because you haven't. Have you never wanted + to? Answer that, in your conscience and in solitude—not to me. Speak + up to yourself and then say whether the difference between you and the + recorded criminal is not merely the difference between the overt act and + the faltering wish. It is a matter of courage or of custom. Speaking for + one gentleman, who knows himself and is not afraid to confess, I can say + that, while he could not kill a mouse with his own hand, he has often + murdered men in his heart. It may have been in fiery youth over the wrong + name on a dancing card, or, later, when a rival got the better of him in + discussion, or, when the dreary bore came and wouldn't go, or, when + misdirected goodness insisted on thrusting upon him intended kindness that + was wormwood and poison to the soul. Are we not covetous (not confessedly, + of course, but actually)? Is not covetousness the thwarted desire of theft + without courage? How many of us, now—speaking man to man—can + open up our veiled thoughts and desires and then look the Ten Commandments + in the eye without blushing? + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + The bravest, noblest, gentlest gentleman I have ever known was the Count + de la Fere, whom we at the Hotel de Troisville, in old Paris, called + “Athos.” He was not merely sans peur et sans reproche as Bayard, but was + positive in his virtues. He fought for his friends without even asking the + cause of the fray. Yet, what a prig he seemed to be at first, with his + eternal gentle melancholy, his irreproachable courtesy, unvarying kindness + and complete unselfishness. You cannot—quite—warm—to—a—man + —who—is—so—perfectly—right—that—he—embarrasses—everybody—but—the—angels. + </p> + <p> + But, when he ordered the gloomy and awful death of the treacherous Miladi, + woman though she was, and thus as a perfect gentleman took on human + frailty also, ah! how attractively noble and strong he became I In that + respect he was the antithetical corollary of William Sykes, who was a + purposeless, useless and uninterestingly regular scoundrel, thief and + brute, until he redeemed himself by becoming the instrument of social + justice and pounding that unendurable lady, Miss Nancy, of his name, into + absence from the world. Perhaps I have remarked before—and even if I + have it is pleasant to repeat it—that Bill Sykes had his faults, as + also have most of us, but it was given to him to earn forgiveness by the + aid of a cheap chair and the providential propinquity of Miss Nancy. I + never think of it without regretting that poor Bill Whally is dead. He did + it—so—much—to—my—taste! + </p> + <p> + Who shall we say is the most loved and respected criminal in fiction? Not + Monsignor Rodin, of “The Wandering Jew;” not Thenardier in “Les + Miserables.” These are really not criminals; they are allegorical figures + of perfect crime. They are solar centers, so far off and fixed that one + may regard them only with awe, reverence and fear. They are types of fate, + desire, temptation and chastisement. Let us turn to our own flesh and + blood and speak gratefully of them. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Who says Count Fosco? Now there is a criminal worthy of affection and + confidence. What an expansive nature, with kindness presented on every + side. Even the dogs fawned upon him and the birds came at his call. An + accomplished gentleman, considerately mannered—queer, as becomes a + foreigner, yet possessing the touchstone of universal sympathy. Another + man with crime to commit almost certainly would have dispatched it with + ruthless coldness; but how kindly and gently Count Fosco administered the + cord of necessity. With what delicacy he concealed the bowstring and spoke + of the Bosphorus only as a place for moonlight excursions. He could have + presented prussic acid and sherry to a lady in such a manner as to render + the results a grateful sacrifice to his courtesy. It was all due to his + corpulence; a “lean and hungry” villain lacks repose, patience and the + tact of good humor. In almost every small social and individual attitude + Count Fosco was human. He was exceedingly attentive to his wife in society + and bullied her only in private and when necessary. He struck no dramatic + attitudes. “The world is mine oyster!” is not said by real men bent on + terrible deeds. Count Fosco is the perfect villain, and also the perfect + criminal, inasmuch as he not only acts naturally, but deliberately + determines the action instead of being drawn into it or having it forced + upon him. + </p> + <p> + He was a highly cultivated type of Andy Johnson, inasmuch as crime with + him was not a life purpose, but what is called in business a “side-line.” + All of us have our hobbies; the closely confined clerk goes home and roots + up his yard to plant flower bulbs or cabbage plants; another fancies + fowls; another man collects pewter pots and old brass and the millionaire + takes to priceless horses; others of us turn from useful statistics and go + broke on novels or poetry or music. Count Fosco was an educated gentleman + and the pleasure of life was his purpose; crime and intrigue were his + recreations. Andy Johnson was a good business man and wealth producer; + murder was the direction in which his private understanding of personal + disagreements was exercised and vented. Some men turn to poker playing, + which is as wasteful as murder and not half as dignified. Count Fosco is + the villain par excellence of novels. I do not remember what he did, + because “The Woman in White” is the best novel in the world to read + gluttonously at a sitting and then forget absolutely. It is nearly always + a new book if you use it that way. When the world is dark, the fates + bilious, the appetite dead and the infernal twinges of pain or sickness + seem beyond reach of the doctor, “The Woman in White” is a friend indeed. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + But the man of men for villains, not necessarily criminals; but the + ordinary, every-day, picturesque worthies of good, honest scoundrelism and + disreputableness is Sir Robert Louis Stevenson. You can afford + conscientiously to stuff ballot boxes in order that his election may be + secured as Poet Laureate of Rascals. Leaving out John Silver and Billy + Bones and Alan Breck, whom every privately shriven rascal of us simply + must honor and revere as giants of courage, cunning and controlled, + conscience, Stevenson turned from singles and pairs, and in “The Ebb + Tide,” drove, by turns, tandem and abreast, a four-in-hand of scoundrels + so buoyant, natural, strong, and yet each so totally unlike the others, + that every honest novel reader may well be excused for shedding tears when + he reflects that the marvelous hand and heart that created them are gone + forever from the haunts of the interestingly wicked. No novelist ever + exposed the human nature of rascals as Stevenson did. + </p> + <p> + Now, lago was not a villain; he was a venomous toad, a scorpion, a + mad-dog, a poisonous plant in a fair meadow. There was nobody lago loved, + no weakness he concealed, no point of contact with any human being. His + sister was Pandora, his brother made the shirt of Nessus, himself dealt in + Black Plagues and the Leprosy. The old Serpent was permitted to rise from + his belly and walk upright on the tip of his tail when he met Iago, as a + demonstration of moral superiority. But think of those three + Babes-in-the-Wood villains, skipper Davis, the Yankee swashbuckler and + ship scuttler; Herrick, the dreamy poet, ruined by commerce and early + love, with his days of remorse and his days of compensatary liquor; and + Huish, the great-hearted Scotch ruffian, who chafed at the conventional + concealments of trade among pals and never could—as a true Scotchman—understand + why you should wait to use a knife upon a victim when promptness lay in + the club right at hand—think of them sailing out of Honolulu harbor + on the Farallone. + </p> + <p> + Let who will prefer to have sailed with Jason or Aeneas or Sinbad; but the + Farallone and its precious freight of rascality gets my money every time. + Think of the three incomparable reprobates afloat, with one case of + smallpox and a cargo of champagne, daring to make no port, with over a + hundred million square miles of ocean around them, every ten lookout knots + of it containing a possible peril! It was simply grand—not pirates, + shipwrecks or mutinies could beat that problem. And the pathos of the + sixth day, when, with every man Jack of them looking delirium tremens in + the face and suspecting each the other, Mr. Huish opened a new case of + champagne and—found clear spring water under the French label! The + honest scoundrels had been laid by the heels by a common wine merchant in + the regular way of business! Oh, gentlemen, there should be honor in + business; so that gallant villains can be free of betrayal. + </p> + <p> + The keynote of these gentlemen is struck in the second chapter, where all + three of them writing lies home—Davis and Herrick, sentimental + equivocations, Huish the strongest of brag with nobody to send it to. In a + burst of weakness Davis tells Herrick what a villain he has been, through + rum, and how he can not let his daughter, “little Adar,” know it. “Yes, + there was a woman on board,” he said, describing the ship he had scuttled. + “Guess I sent her to hell, if there's such a place. I never dared go home + again, and I don't know,” he added, bitterly, “what's come to them.” + </p> + <p> + “Thank you, Captain,” said Herrick, “I never liked you better!” + </p> + <p> + Is it not in human nature to cuddle to a great sheepish murderer like + that, who groans in secret for his little girl—if even the girl was + truth? I think she turned out a myth, but he had the sentiment. + </p> + <p> + Was there ever a more melancholy, remorse-stricken wretch than Cap'n + Davis? Or a gentler and seedier poet than Herrick? Or a more finely sodden + and soaked old rum sport than Huish (not—Whish!) But it was not + until they fell in with Attwater that their weakness as scoundrels was + exposed. Attwater was so splendidly religious! He was determined to have + things right if he had to have them so by bloodshed; he saved souls by + bullets. Things were right when they were as he thought they should be. + And believing so, with Torquemada, Alexander Sixtus and other most + religious brethren, he was ready to set up the stake and fagot and + cauterize sin with fire. One thing you can say about the religious folks + that are big with cocksureness and a mission—they may make mistakes, + but the mistake doesn't talk and criticise. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + The only rascal worthy to travel in company with Stevenson's rascals is + the Chevalier Balibari, of Castle Barry, in Ireland, whose admirable + memoirs have been so well told by Mr. Thackeray. The Baron de la Motte in + “Denis Duval,” was advantageously born to ornament the purple and fine + linen of picturesque unrighteousness—but his was a brief star that + fell unfinished from its place amidst the Pleiades. Thackeray's genius ran + more to disreputable men than to actual villains. But he drew two + scoundrels that will serve as beacon lights to any clean-souled youth with + the instinct to take warning. One was Lord Steyne, the other, Dr. George + Brand Firmin; one the aristocratic, class-bred, cynical brute, the other + the cold, tuft-hunting trained hypocrite. What encouragement of + self-respect Judas Iscariot might have received if he had met Dr. Firmin! + </p> + <p> + Dr. Chadband, Mr. Pecksniff, Bill Sykes, Fagin, Mr. Murdstone, of Dickens' + family—they are all strong in impression, but wholly unreal; mere + stage villains and caricatures. A villain who has no good traits, no + hobbies of kindness and affection, is never born into the world; he is + always created by grotesque novel writers. + </p> + <p> + The villains of Dumas, Hugo, Balzac, Daudet are French. There may have + been, or may be now such prototypes alive in France—because the + Dreyfus case occurred in France, and no doubt much can happen in that + fine, fertile country which translators cannot fully convey over the + frontiers; but they have always seemed to me first cousins to my friends, + the ogres, the evil magicians and the werewolves, and, in that much, not + quite natural. + </p> + <p> + For heroes of the genuine cavalleria type, plumed, doubleted, pumpt and + magnificent, give me Dumas; for good folks and true, the great American + Fenimore Cooper; but for the blessed company of blooming, breathing + rascals, Stevenson and Thackeray all the time. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0007" id="link2H_4_0007"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + VII. HEROES + </h2> + <p> + THE NATURE AND THE FLOWER OF THEM—THE GALLANT D'ARTAGNAN OR THE + GLORIOUS BUSSY. + </p> + <p> + Let us agree at the start that no perfect hero can be entirely mortal. The + nearer the element of mortality in him corresponds to the heel measure of + Achilles, the better his chance as hero. The Egyptian and Greek heroes + were invariably demi-gods on the paternal or maternal side. Few actual + historic heroes have escaped popular scandal concerning their origin, + because the savage logic in us demands lions from a lion; that Theseus + shall trace to Mars; that courage shall spring from courage. + </p> + <p> + Another most excellent thing about the ideal hero is that the immortal + quality enables him to go about the business of his heroism without + bothering his head with the rights or wrongs of it, except as the + prevailing sentiment of social honor (as distinguished from the inborn + sentiment of honesty) requires at the time. Of course, there is a lower + grade of measly, “moral heroes,” who (thank heaven and the innate sense of + human justice!) are usually well peppered with sorrow and punishment. The + hero of romance is a different stripe; Hyperion to a Satyr. He doesn't go + around groaning page after page of top-heavy debates as to the inherent + justice of his cause or his moral right to thrust a tallow candle between + the particular ribs behind which the heart of his enemy is to be found—balancing + his pros and cons, seeking a quo for each quid, and conscientiously + prowling for final authorities. When you invade the chiropodical secret of + the real hero's fine boot, or brush him in passing—if you have + looked once too often at a certain lady, or have stood between him and the + sun, or even twiddled your thumbs at him in an indecorous or careless + manner—look to it that you be prepared to draw and mayhap to be + spitted upon his sword's point, with honor. Sdeath! A gentlemen of courage + carries his life lightly at the needle end of his rapier, as that + wonderful Japanese, Samsori, used to make the flimsiest feather preside in + miraculous equilibration upon the tip of his handsome nose. + </p> + <p> + No hero who does more or less than is demanded by the best practical + opinion of the society of his time is worth more than thirty cents as a + hero. Boys are literary and dramatic critics so far above the critics + formed by strained formulas of the schools that you can trust them. They + have an unerring distrust of the fellow who moves around with his + confounded conscientious scruples, as if the well-settled opinion of the + breathing world were not good enough for him! Who the deuce has got any + business setting everybody else right? + </p> + <p> + Some of these days I believe it is going to be discovered that the + atmosphere and the encompassing radiance and sweetness of Heaven are + composed of the dear sighs and loving aspirations of earthly motherhood. + If it turns out otherwise, rest assured Heaven will not have reached its + perfect point of evolution. Why is it, then, that mothers will—will—will—try, + so mistakenly, to extirpate the jewel of honest, manly savagery from the + breasts of their boys? I wonder if they know that when grown men see one + of these “pretty-mannered boys,” cocksure as a Swiss toy new painted and + directed by watch spring, they feel an unholy impulse to empty an + ink-bottle over the young calf? Fauntleroy kids are a reproach to our + civilization. Men, women and children, all of us, crowd around the grimy + Deignan of the Merrimac crew, and shout and cheer for Bill Smith, the + Rough Rider, who carried his mate out of the ruck at San Juan and twirls + his hat awkwardly and explains: “Ef I hadn't a saw him fall he would 'a' + laid thar yit!”—and go straight home and pretend to be proud of a + snug little poodle of a man who doesn't play for fear of soiling his + picture-clothes, and who says: “Yes, sir, thank you,” and “No, thank you, + ma'am,” like a French doll before it has had the sawdust kicked out of it! + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Now, when a hero tries to stamp his acts with the precise quality of exact + justice—why, he performs no acts. He is no better than that poor + tongue-loose Hamlet, who argues you the right of everything, and then, by + the great Jingo! piles in and messes it all by doing the wrong thing at + the wrong time and in the wrong manner. It is permitted of course to be a + great moral light and correct the errors of all the dust of earth that has + been blown into life these ages; but human justice has been measured out + unerringly with poetry and irony to such folk. They are admitted to be + saints, but about the time they have got too good for their earthly + setting, they have been tied to stakes and lighted up with oil and + faggots; or a soda phosphate with a pinch of cyanide of potassium inserted + has been handed to them, as in the case of our old friend, Socrates. And + it's right. When a man gets too wise and good for his fellows and is + embarrassed by the healthful scent of good human nature, send him to + heaven for relief, where he can have the goodly fellowship of the + prophets, the company of the noble army of martyrs, and amuse himself + suggesting improvements upon the vocal selections of cherubim and + seraphim! Impress the idea upon these gentry with warmth—and—with—oil! + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + The ideal hero of fiction, you say, is Capt. D'Artagnan, first name + unknown, one time cadet in the Reserves of M. de Troisville's company of + the King's Guards, intrusted with the care of the honor and safety of His + Majesty, Louis XIV. Very well; he is a noble gentleman; the choice does + honor to your heart, mind and soul; take him and hold the remembrance of + his courage, loyalty, adroitness and splendid endurance with hooks of + steel. For myself, while yielding to none who honor the great D'Artagnan, + yet I march under the flag of the Sieur Bussy d'Amboise, a proud Clermont, + of blood royal in the reign of Henry III., who shed luster upon a court + that was edified by the wisdom of M. Chicot, the “King's Brother,” the + incomparable jester and philosopher, who would have himself exceeded all + heroes except that he despised the actors and the audience of the world's + theater and performed valiant feats only that he might hang his cap and + bells upon the achievements in ridicule. + </p> + <p> + Can it be improper to compare D'Artagnan and Bussy—when the + intention is wholly respectful and the motive pure? If a single protest is + heard, there will be an end to this paper now—at once. There are + some comparisons that strengthen both candidates. For, we must consider + the extent of the theater and the stage, the space of time covering the + achievements, the varying conditions, lights and complexities. As, for + instance, the very atmosphere in which these two heroes moved, the + accompaniment of manner which we call the “air” of the histories, and + which are markedly different. The contrast of breeding, quality and + refinement between Bussy and D'Artagnan is as great as that which + distinguishes Mercutio from the keen M. Chicot. Yet each was his own ideal + type. Birth and the superior privileges of the haute noblesse conferred + upon the Sieur Bussy the splendid air of its own sufficient prestige; the + lack of these require of D'Artagnan that his intelligence, courage and + loyal devotion should yet seem to yield something of their greatness in + the submission that the man was compelled to pay to the master. True, this + attitude was atoned for on occasion by blunt boldness, but the abased + position and the lack of subtle distinction of air and mind of the noble, + forbade to the Fourth Mousquetaire the last gracious touch of a Bayard of + heroism. But the vulgarity was itself heroic. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Compare the first appearance of the great Gascon at the Hotel de + Troisville, or even his manner and attitude toward the King when he sought + to warn that monarch against forgetfulness of loyalty proved, with the + haughty insolence of indomitable spirit in which Bussy threw back to Henry + the shuttle of disfavor on the night of that remarkable wedding of St. Luc + with the piquant little page soubrette, Jeanne de Brissac. + </p> + <p> + D'Artagnan's air to his King has its pathos. It seems to say: “I speak + bluntly, sire, knowing that my life is yours and yet feeling that it is + too obscure to provoke your vengeance.” A very hard draught for a man of + fire and fearlessness to take without a gulp. But into Bussy's manner + toward his King there was this flash of lightning from Olympus: “My life, + sire, is yours, as my King, to take or leave; but not even you may dare to + think of taking the life of Bussy with the dust of least reproach upon it. + My life you may blow out; my honor you do not dare approach to question!” + </p> + <p> + There are advantages in being a gentleman, which can not be denied. One is + that it commands credit in the King's presence as well as at the tailor's. + </p> + <p> + It is interesting to compare both these attitudes with that of “Athos,” + the Count de la Fere, toward the King. He was lacking in the irresistibly + fierce insolence of Bussy and in the abasement of D'Artagnan; it was + melancholy, patient, persistent and terrible in its restrained calmness. + How narrowly he just escaped true greatness. I would no more cast + reproaches upon that noble gentleman than I would upon my grandmother; but + he—was—a—trifle—serous, wasn't he? He was brave, + prompt, resourceful, splendid, and, at need, gingerish as the best colt in + the paddock. It is the deuce's own pity for a man to be born to too much + seriousness. Do you know—and as I love my country, I mean it in + honest respect—that I sometimes think that the gentleness and + melancholy of Athos somehow suggests a bit of distrust. One is almost + terrified at times lest he may begin the Hamlet controversies. You feel + that if he committed a murder by mistake you are not absolutely sure he + wouldn't take a turn with Remorse. Not so Bussy; he would throw the + mistake in with good will and not create worry about it. Hang it all, if + the necessary business of murder is to halt upon the shuffling accident of + mistake, we may as well sell out the hero business and rent the shop. It + would be down to the level of Hamlet in no time. Unless, of course, the + hero took the view of it that Nero adopted. It is improbable that Nero + inherited the gift of natural remorse; but he cultivated one and seemed to + do well with it. He used to reflect upon his mother and his wife, both of + whom he had affectionately murdered, and justified himself by declaring + that a great artist, who was also the Roman Emperor, would be lacking in + breadth of emotional experience and retrospective wisdom, unless he knew + the melancholy of a two-pronged family remorse. And from Nero's standpoint + it was one of the best thoughts that he ever formulated into language. + </p> + <p> + To return to Bussy and D'Artagnan. In courage they were Hector and + Achilles. You remember the champagne picnic before the bastion St. Gervais + at the siege of St. Rochelle? What light-hearted gayety amid the flying + missiles of the arquebusiers! Yet, do not forget that—ignoring the + lacquey—there were four of them, and that his Eminence, the Cardinal + Duke, had said the four of them were equal to a thousand men! If you have + enough knowledge of human nature to understand the fine game of baseball, + and have at any time scraped acquaintance with the interesting + mathematical doctrine of progressive permutations, you will see, when four + men equal to a thousand are under the eyes of each other, and of the + garrison in the fort, that the whole arsenal of logarithms would give out + before you could compute the permutative possibilities of the courage that + would be refracted, reflected, compounded and concentrated by all there, + each giving courage to and receiving courage from each and all the others. + It makes my head ache to think of it. I feel as if I could be brave + myself. + </p> + <p> + Certainly they were that day. To the bitter end of finishing the meal; and + they confessed the added courage by gamboling like boys amid awful + thunders of the arquebuses, which made a rumble in their time like their + successors, the omnibuses, still make to this day on the granite streets + of cities populated by deaf folks. + </p> + <p> + There never was more of a gay, lilting, impudent courage than those four + mousquetaires displayed with such splendid coolness and spirit. + </p> + <p> + But compare it with the fight which Bussy made, single-handed, against the + assassins hired by Monsereau and authorized by that effeminate fop, the + Due D'Anjou. Of course you remember it. Let me pay you the affectionate + compliment of presuming that you have read “La Dame de Monsereau,” often + translated under the English title, “Chicot, the Jester,” that almost + incomparable novel of historical romance, by M. Dumas. If, through some + accident or even through lack of culture, you have failed to do so, pray + do not admit it. Conceal your blemish and remedy the matter at once. At + least, seem to deserve respect and confidence, and appear to be a worthy + novel-reader if actually you are not. There is a novel that, I assure you + on my honor, is as good as the “Three Guardsmen;” but—oh!—so—much—shorter; + the pity of it, too!—oh, the pity of it! On the second reading—now, + let us speak with frank conservatism—on the second reading of it, I + give you my word, man to man, I dreaded to turn every page, because it + brought the end nearer. If it had been granted to me to have one wish + fulfilled that fine winter night, I should have said with humility: + “Beneficent Power, string it out by nine more volumes, presto me here a + fresh box of cigars, and the account of your kindness, and my gratitude is + closed.” + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + If the publisher of this series did not have such absurd sensitiveness + about the value of space and such pitifully small ideas about the nobility + of novels, I should like to write at least twenty pages about “Chicot.” + There are books that none of us ever put down in our lists of great books, + and yet which we think more of and delight more in than all the great + guns. Not one of the friends I've loved so long and well has been + President of the United States, but I wouldn't give one of them for all + the Presidents. Just across the hall at this minute I can hear the + frightful din of war—shells whistling and moaning, bullets + s-e-o-uing, the shrieks of the dying and wounded—Merciful Heaven! + the “Don Juan of Asturia” has just blown up in Manila Bay with an awful + roar—again! Again, as I'm a living man, just as she has blown up + every day, and several times every day, since May 1, 1898. There are two + warriors over in the play-room, drenched with imaginary gore, immersed in + the tender grace of bestowing chastening death and destruction upon the + Spanish foe. Don't I know that they rank somewhat below Admiral Dewey as + heroes? But do you suppose that their father would swap them for Admiral + Dewey and all the rainbow glories that fine old Yankee sea-dog ever will + enjoy—long may he live to enjoy them all!—do you think so? Of + course not! You know perfectly well that his—wife—wouldn't—let—him! + </p> + <p> + I would not wound the susceptibilities of any reader; but speaking for + myself—“Chicot” being beloved of my heart—if there was a mean + man, living in a mean street, who had the last volume of “Chicot” in + existence, I would pour out my library's last heart's blood to get it. He + could have all of Scott but “Ivanhoe,” all of Dickens but “Copperfield,” + all of Hugo but “Les Miserables,” cords of Fielding, Marryat, Richardson, + Reynolds, Eliot, Smollet, a whole ton of German translations—by + George! he could leave me a poor old despoiled, destitute and ruined + book-owner in things that folks buy in costly bindings for the sake of + vanity and the deception of those who also deceive them in turn. + </p> + <p> + Brother, “Chicot” is a book you lend only to your dearest friend, and then + remind him next day that he hasn't sent it back. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Now, as to Bussy's great fight. He had gone to the house of Madame Diana + de Monsereau. I am not au fait upon French social customs, but let us + presume his being there was entirely proper, because that excellent lady + was glad to see him. He was set upon by her husband, M. de Monsereau, with + fifteen hired assassins. Outside, the Due D'Anjou and some others of + assassins were in hiding to make sure that Monsereau killed Bussy, and + that somebody killed Monsereau! There's a “situation” for you, + double-edged treachery against—love and innocence, let us say. Bussy + is in the house with Madame. His friend, St. Luc, is with him; also his + lacquey and body-physician, the faithful Rely. Bang! the doors are broken + in, and the assassins penetrate up the stairway. The brave Bussy confides + Diana to St. Luc and Rely, and, hastily throwing up a barricade of tables + and chairs near the door of the apartment, draws his sword. Then, ye + friends of sudden death and valorous exercise, began a surfeit of joy. + Monsereau and his assassins numbered sixteen. In less than three moderate + paragraphs Bessy's sword, playing like avenging lightning, had struck + fatality to seven. Even then, with every wrist going, he reflected, with + sublime calculation: “I can kill five more, because I can fight with all + my vigor ten minutes longer!” After that? Bessy could see no further—there + spoke fate!—you feel he is to die. Once more the leaping steel + point, the shrill death cry, the miraculous parry. The villain, Monsereau, + draws his pistol. Bessy, who is fighting half a dozen swordsmen, can even + see the cowardly purpose; he watches; he—dodges—the—bullets!—by + watching the aim— + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + “Ye sons of France, behold the glory!” + </pre> + <p> + He thrusts, parries and swings the sword as a falchion. Suddenly a pistol + ball snaps the blade off six inches from the hilt. Bessy picks up the + blade and in an instant splices—it—to—the—hilt—with—his—handkerchief! + Oh, good sword of the good swordsman! it drinks the blood of three more + before it—bends—and—loosens—under—the—strain! + Bessy is shot in the thigh; Monsereau is upon him; the good Rely, lying + almost lifeless from a bullet wound received at the outset, thrusts a + rapier to Bessy's grasp with a last effort. Bessy springs upon Monsereau + with the great bound of a panther and pins—the—son—of—a—gun—to—the—floor—with—the—rapier—and—watches—him—die! + </p> + <p> + You can feel faint for joy at that passage for a good dozen readings, if + you are appreciative. Poor Bessy, faint from wounds and blood-letting, + retreats valiantly to a closet window step by step and drops out, leaving + Monsereau spitted, like a black spider, dead on the floor. Here hope and + expectation are drawn out in your breast like chewing gum stretched to the + last shred of tenuation. At this point I firmly believed that Bessy would + escape. I feel sorry for the reader who does not. You just naturally argue + that the faithful Rely will surely reach him and rub him with the balsam. + That balsam of Dumas! The same that D'Artagnan's mother gave him when he + rode away on the yellow horse, and which cured so many heroes hurt to the + last gasp. That miraculous balsam, which would make doctors and surgeons + sing small today if they had not suppressed it from the materia medica. + May be they can silence their consciences by the reflection that they + suppressed it to enhance the value and necessity of their own personal + services. But let them look at the death rate and shudder. I had + confidence in Rely and the balsam, but he could not get there in time. + Then, it was forgone that Bessy must die. Like Mercutio, he was too + brilliant to live. Depend upon it, these wizards of story tellers know + when the knell of fate rings much sooner than we halting readers do. + </p> + <p> + Bessy drops from the closet window upon an iron fence that surrounded the + park and was impaled upon the dreadful pickets! Even then for another + moment you can cherish a hope that he may escape after all. Suspended + there and growing weaker, he hears footsteps approaching. Is it a rescuing + friend? He calls out—and a dagger stroke from the hand of D'Anjou, + his Judas master, finds his heart. That's the way Bessy died. No man is + proof against the dagger stroke of treachery. Bessy was powerful and the + due jealous. + </p> + <p> + Diana has been carried off safely by the trustworthy St. Luc. She must + have died of grief if she had not been kept alive to be the instrument of + retributive justice. (In the sequel you will find that this Queen of + Hearts descended upon the ignoble due at the proper time like a thousand + of brick and took the last trick of justice.) + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + The extraordinary description of Bussy's fight is beyond everything. You + gallop along as if in a whirlwind, and it is only in cooler moments that + you discover he killed about twelve rascals with his own good arm. It + seems impossible; the scientific, careful readers have been known to + declare it impossible and sneer at it with laughter. I trust every novel + reader respects scientific folks as he should; but science is not + everything. Our scientific friends have contended that the whale did not + engulf Jonah; that the sun did not pause over the vale of Askelon; that + Baron Munchausen's horse did not hang to the steeple by his bridle; that + the beanstalk could not have supported a stout lad like Jack; that General + Monk was not sent to Holland in a cage; that Remus and Romulus had not a + devoted lady wolf for a step-mother; in fact, that loads of things, of + which the most undeniable proof exists in plain print all over the world, + never were done or never happened. Bessy was killed, Rely was killed + later, Diana died in performing her destiny, St. Luc was killed. Nobody + left to make affidavits, except M. Dumas; in his lifetime nobody + questioned it; he is now dead and unable to depose; whereupon the + scientists sniff scornfully and deny. I hope I shall always continue to + respect science in its true offices, but, brethren, are there not times + when—science—makes—you—just—a—little—tired? + </p> + <p> + Heroes! D'Artagnan or Bessy? Choose, good friends, freely; as freely let + me have my Bessy. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008"> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + VIII. HEROINES + </h2> + <h3> + A SUBJECT ALMOST WITHOUT AN OBJECT—WHY THERE ARE FEW HEROINES FOR + MEN. + </h3> + <p> + Notwithstanding the subject, there are almost no heroines in novels. There + are impossibly good women, absurdly patient and brave women, but few + heroines as the convention of worldly thinking demands heroines. There is + an endless train of what Thackeray so aptly described as “pale, pious, and + pulmonary ladies” who snivel and snuffle and sigh and linger irresolutely + under many trials which a little common sense would dissolve; but they are + pathological heroines. “Little Nell,” “Little Eva,” and their married + sisters are unquestionable in morals, purpose and faith; but oh! how—they—do—try—the—nerves! + How brave and noble was Jennie Deans, but how thick-headed was the dear + lass! + </p> + <p> + These women who are merely good, and enforce it by turning on the faucet + of tears, or by old-fashioned obstinacy, or stupidity of purpose, can + scarcely be called heroines by the canons of understood definition. On the + other hand, the conventions do not permit us to describe as a heroine any + lady who has what is nowadays technically called “a past.” The very best + men in the world find splendid heroism and virtue in Tess l'Durbeyfield. + There is nowhere an honest, strong, good man, full of weakness, though he + may be, scarred so much, however with fault, who does not read St. John + vii., 3-11, with sympathy, reverence and Amen! The infallible critics can + prove to a hair that this passage is an interpolation. An interpolation in + that sense means something inserted to deceive or defraud; a forgery. How + can you defraud or deceive anybody by the interpolation of pure gold with + pure gold? How can that be a forgery which hurts nobody, but gives to + everybody more value in the thing uttered? If John vii., 3-11, is an + interpolation let us hope Heaven has long ago blessed the interpolator. + Does anybody—even the infallible critic—contend that Jesus + would not have so said and done if the woman had been brought to Him? Was + that not the very flower and savor and soul of His teaching? Would He have + said or done otherwise? If the Ten Commandments were lost utterly from + among men there would yet remain these four greater: + </p> + <p> + “Do unto others as ye would they should do unto you.” + </p> + <p> + “Suffer little children to come unto me.” + </p> + <p> + “Go and sin no more.” + </p> + <p> + “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” + </p> + <p> + My lords and ladies, men and women, the Ten Commandments, by the side of + these sighs of gentleness, are the Police Court and the Criminal Code, + which are intended to pay cruelty off in punishment. These Four are the + tears with which sympathy soothes the wounds of suffering. Blessed + interpolator of St. John! + </p> + <p> + There are three marvelous novels in the Bible—not Novels in the + sense of fiction, but in the sense of vivid, living narratives of human + emotions and of events. A million Novels rest on those nine verses in + John, and the nine verses are better than the million books. The story of + David and Uriah's wife is in a similar catalogue as regards quality and + usefulness; the story of Esther is a pearl of great beauty. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + But to return to heroines, let us make a volte face. There is an old story + of the lady who wrote rather irritably to Thackeray, asking, curtly, why + all the good women he created were fools and the bright women all bad. + “The same complaint,” he answered, “has been made, Madame, of God and + Shakespeare, and as neither has given explanation I can not presume to + attempt one.” It was curt and severe, and, of course, Thackeray did not + write it as it would appear, even though he may have said as much + jestingly to some intimate who understood the epigram; but was not the + question rather impudently intrusive? Thackeray, you remember, was the + “seared cynic” who created Caroline Gann, the gentle, beautiful, glorious + “Little Sister,” the staunch, pure-hearted woman whose character not even + the perfect scoundrelism of Dr. George Brand Firmin could tarnish or + disturb. If there are heroines, surely she has her place high amid the + noble group! + </p> + <p> + There are plenty of intelligent persons sacramentally wedded to mere + conventions of good and bad. You could never persuade them that Rebecca + Sharp—that most perfect daughter of Thackeray's mind—was a + heroine. But of course she was. In that world wherein she was cast to live + she was indubitably, incomparably, the very best of all the inhabitants to + whom you are intimately introduced. Capt. Dobbin? Oh, no, I am not + forgetting good Old Dob. Of all the social door mats that ever I wiped my + feet upon Old Dob is certainly the cleanest, most patient, serviceable and + unrevolutionary. But, just a door mat, with the virtues and attractions of + that useful article of furniture—the sublime, immortal prig of all + the ages, or you can take the head of any novel-reader under thirty for a + football. You may have known many women, from Bernadettes of Massavielle + to Borgias of scant neighborhoods, but you know you never knew one who + would marry Old Dob, except as that emotional dishrag, Amelia, married him—as + the Last Chance on the stretching high-road of uncertain years. No girl + ever willingly marries door mats. She just wipes her feet on them and + passes on into the drawing room looking for the Prince. It seems to me one + of the triumphant proofs of Becky as a heroine that she did not marry + Captain Dobbin. She might have done it any day by crooking her little + finger at him—but she didn't. + </p> + <p> + Madame Becky, that smart daughter of an alcoholic gentleman artist and of + his lady of the French ballet, inherited the perfect non-moral morality of + the artist blood that sang mercurially through her veins. How could she, + therefore, how could she, being non-moral, be immoral? It is clear + nonsense. But she did possess the instinctive artist morality of unerring + taste for selection in choice. Examine the facts meticulously—meticulously—and + observe how carefully she selected that best in all that worst she moved + among. + </p> + <p> + In the will I shall some day leave behind me there will be devised, in + primogenitural trust forever, the priceless treasure of conviction that + Becky was innocent of Lord Steyne. I leave it to any gentleman who has had + the great opportunity to look in familiarly upon the outer and upper + fringes of the world of unclassed and predatory women and the noble lords + that abound thereamong. Let him read over again that famous scene where + Becky writes her scorn upon Steyne's forehead in the noble blood of that + aristocratic wolf. Then let him give his decision, as an honest juryman + upon his oath, whether he is convinced that the most noble Marquis was + raging because he was losing a woman, or from the discovery that he was + one of two dupes facing each other, and that he was the fool who had paid + for both and had had “no run for his money!” Marquises of Steyne do not + resent sentimental losses—they can be hurt only in their + sportsmanship. + </p> + <p> + You may begin with the Misses Pinkerton (in whose select school Becky + absorbed the intricate hypocrisies and saturated snobbery of the highest + English society) and follow her through all the little and big turmoils of + her life, meeting on the way of it all the elaborated differentials of the + country-gentleman and lady tribe of Crawley, the line officers and + bemedalled generals of the army (except honest O'Dowd and his lady), the + most noble Marquis and his shadowy and resigned Marchioness, the R—y—l + P—rs—n—ge himself—even down to the tuft-hunters + Punter and Loder—and if Becky is not superior to every man and woman + of them in every personal trait and grace that calls for admiration—then, + why, by George! do you take such an interest, such an undying interest, in + her? You invariably take the greatest interest in the best character in a + story—unless it's too good and gets “sweety” and “sticky” and so + sours on your philosophical stomach. You can't possibly take any interest + in Dobbin—you just naturally, emphatically, and in the most + unreflecting way in the world, say “Oh, d—n Dobbin!” and go right + ahead after somebody else. I don't say Becky was all that a perfect Sunday + School teacher should have been, but in the group in which she was born to + move she smells cleaner than the whole raft of them—to me. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Thackeray was, next to Shakespeare, the writer most wonderfully combined + of instinct and reason that English literature of grace has produced. He + has been compared with the Frenchman, Balzac. Since I have no desire to + provoke squabbles about favorite authors, let us merely definitely agree + that such a comparison is absurd and pass on. Because you must have + noticed that Balzac was often feeble in his reason and couldn't make it + keep step with his instinct, while in Thackeray they both step together + like the Siamese twins. It is a very striking fact, indeed, that during + all Becky's intense early experiences with the great world, Thackeray does + not make her guilty. All the circumstances of that world were guilty and + she is placed amidst the circumstances; but that is all. + </p> + <p> + “The ladies in the drawing room,” said one lady to Thackeray, when “Vanity + Fair” in monthly parts publishing had just reached the catastrophe of + Rawdon, Rebecca, old Steyne and the bracelet—“The ladies have been + discussing Becky Sharpe and they all agree that she was guilty. May I ask + if we guessed rightly?” + </p> + <p> + “I am sure I don't know,” replied the “seared cynic,” mischievously. “I am + only a man and I haven't been able to make up my mind on that point. But + if the ladies agree I fear it may be true—you must understand your + sex much better than we men!” + </p> + <p> + That is proof that she was not guilty with Steyne. But straightway then, + Thackeray starts out to make her guilty with others. It is so much the + more proof of her previous innocence that, incomparable artist as he was + in showing human character, he recognized that he could convince the + reader of her guilt only by disintegrating her, whipping himself meanwhile + into a ceaseless rage of vulgar abuse of her, a thing of which Thackeray + was seldom guilty. But it was not really Becky that became guilty—it + was the woman that English society and Thackeray remorselessly made of + her. I wouldn't be a lawyer for a wagon load of diamonds, but if I had had + to be a lawyer I should have preferred to be a solicitor at the London bar + in 1817 to write the brief for the respondent in the celebrated divorce + case of Crawley vs. Crawley. Against the back-ground of the world she + lived in Becky could have been painted as meekly white and beautiful as + that lovely old picture of St. Cecilia at the Choir Organ. + </p> + <p> + Perhaps Becky was not strictly a heroine; but she was a honey. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Men can not “create” heroines in the sense of shadowing forth what they + conceive to be the glory, beauty, courage and splendor of womanly + character. It is the indescribable sum of womanhood corresponding to the + unutterable name of God. The true man's love of woman is a spirit sense + attending upon the actual senses of seeing, hearing, feeling, tasting and + smelling. The woman he loves enters into every one of these senses and + thus is impounded five-fold upon that union of all of them, which, + together with the miracle of mind, composes what we call the human soul as + a divine essence. She is attached to every religion, yet enters with + authority into none. She is first at its birth, the last to stay weeping + at its death. In every great novel a heroine, unnamed, unspoken, + undescribed, hovers throughout like an essence. The heroism of woman is + her privacy. There is to me no more wonderful, philosophical, + psychological and delicate triumph of literary art in existence than the + few chapters in “Quo Vadis” in which that great introspective genius, + Sienkiewicz, sets forth the growth of the spell of love with which Lygia + has encompassed Vinicius, and the singular development and progress of the + emotion through which Vinicius is finally immersed in human love of Lygia + and in the Christian reverence of her spiritual purity at the same time. + It is the miracle of soul in sex. + </p> + <p> + Every clean-hearted youth that has had the happiness to marry a good woman—and, + thank Heaven, clean youths and good women are thick as leaves in + Vallambrosa in this sturdy old world of ours—every such youth has + had his day of holy conversion, his touch of the wand conferring upon him + the miracle of love, and he has been a better and wiser man for it. Not + sense love, not the instinctive, restless love of matter for matter, but + the love that descends like the dove amid radiance. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + We've all seen that bridal couple; she is as pretty as peaches; he is as + proud of her as if she were a splendid race horse; he glories in knowing + she is lovely and accepts the admiration offered to her as a tribute to + his own judgment, his own taste and even his merit, which obtained her. + There is a certain amount of silliness in her which he soon detects, a + touch of helplessness, and unsophistication in knowledge of worldly things + that he yet feels is mysteriously guarded against intrusion upon and which + makes companionship with her sometimes irksome. He feels superior and + uncompensated; from the superb isolation of his greater knowledge, courage + and independence, he grants to her a certain tender pity and protection; + he admits her faith and purity and—er—but—you see, he is + sorry she is not quite the well poised and noble creature he is! Mr. + Youngwed is at this time passing through the mental digestive process of + feeling his oats. He is all right, though, if he is half as good as he + thinks he is. He has not been touched by the live wire of experience—yet; + that's all. + </p> + <p> + Well, in the course of human events, there comes a time when he is + frightened to death, then greatly relieved and for a few weeks becomes as + proud as if he had actually provided the last census of the United States + with most of the material contained in it. A few months later, when the + feeble whines and howls have found increased vigor of utterance and more + frequency of expression; when they don't know whether Master Jack or Miss + Jill has merely a howling spell or is threatened with fatal convulsions; + when they don't know whether they want a dog-muzzle or a doctor; when Mr. + Youngwed has lost his sleep and his temper, together, and has displayed + himself with spectacular effect as a brute, selfish, irritable, helpless, + resourceless and conquered—then—then, my dear madame, you have + doubtless observed him decrease in self-estimated size like a balloon into + which a pin has been introduced, until he looks, in fact, like Master Frog + reduced in bulk from the bull-size, to which he aspired, to his original + degree. + </p> + <p> + At that time Mrs. Youngwed is very busy with little Jack or Jill, as the + case may be. Her husband's conduct she probably regards with resignation + as the first heavy burden of the cross she is expected to bear. She does + not reproach him, it is useless; she has perhaps suspected that his + assumed superiority would not stand the real strain. But, he is the father + of the dear baby and, for that precious darling's sake, she will be + patient. I wonder if she feels that way? She has every right to, and, for + one, I say that I'll be hanged if I find any fault with her if she does. + That is the way she must keep human, and so balance the little open + accounts that married folks ought to run between themselves for the + purpose of keeping cobwebs and mildew off, or rather of maintaining their + lives as a running stream instead of a stagnant pond. A little good + talking back now and then is good for wives and married men. Don't be + afraid, Mrs. Youngwed; and when the very worst has come, why cry—at—him! + One tear weighs more and will hit him harder than an ax. In the lachrymal + ducts with which heaven has blessed you, you are more surely protected + against the fires of your honest indignation than you are by the fire + department against a blaze in the house. And be patient, also; remember, + dear sister, that, though you can cry, he has a gift—that—enables—him—to—swear! + You and other wedded wives very properly object to swearing, but you will + doubtless admit that there is compensation in that when he does swear in + his usual good form you—never—feel—any—apprehension—about—the—state—of—his—health! + </p> + <p> + This natural outburst of resentment has not lasted three minutes. Mr. Y. + has returned to his couch, sulky and ashamed. He pretends to sleep + ostentatiously; he—does—not! He is thinking with remarkable + intensity and has an eye open. He sees the slender figure in the dim + light, hanging over the crib, he hears the crooning, he begins to suspect + that there is an alloy in his godlikeness. He looks to earth, listens to + the thin, wailing cries, wonders, regrets, wearies, sleeps. At that moment + Mrs. Y. should fall on her knees and rejoice. She would if she could leave + young Jack or Jill; but she can't—she—never—can. That's + what sent Mr. Y. to sleep. It is just as well perhaps that Mrs. Y. is + unobservant. + </p> + <p> + A miracle is happening to Mr. Y. In an hour or two, let us say, there is a + new vocal alarm from the crib. Almost with the first suspicion of + fretfulness or pain the mother has heard it. Heaven's mysterious telepathy + of instinct has operated. Between angels, babies and mothers the distance + is no longer than your arm can reach. They understand, feel and hear each + other, and are linked in one chain. So, that, when Mr. Y. has struggled + laboriously awake and wonders if—that—child—is—going—to—howl—all——. + Well, he goes no further. In the dim light he sees again the slender + figure hanging over the crib, he hears the crooning and the retreating + sobs. It is just as he saw and heard before he fell asleep. No complaints, + no reproaches, no irritation. Oh, what a brute he feels! He battles with + his reason and his bewilderment. Had he fallen asleep and left her to bear + that strain; or has she gone anew to the rescue, while he slept without + thought? Up out of his heart the tenderness wells; down into his mind the + revelation comes. The miracle works. He looks and listens. In the figure + hanging there so patiently and tenderly he sees for the first time the + wonderful vision of the sweetheart wife, not lost, but enveloped in the + mystery of motherhood; he hears in the crooning voice a tone he never + before knew. Mother and child are united in mysterious converse. Where did + that girl whom he thought so unsophisticated of the world learn that + marvel of acquaintance with that babe, so far removed from his ability to + reach? It must be that while he knew the world, she understood the secret + of heaven. She is so patient. What a brute he is to grow impatient, when + she endures day and night in rapt patience and the joy of content! She can + enter a world from which he is barred. And, that is his wife! That was his + sweetheart, and is now—ah, what is she? He feels somehow abashed; he + knows that if he were ten times better than he is he might still feel + unworthy to touch the latchet of her shoes; he feels that reverence and + awe have enveloped her, and that the first happy love and longing are + springing afresh in his heart. It is his wife and his child; apart from + him unless he can note and understand that miracle of nature's secret. Can + he? Well, he will try—oh, what a brute! And he watches the bending + figure, he hears the blending of soft crooning and retreating sobs—and, + listening, he is lost in the wonder and falls under the spell asleep. + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Y., you are happy henceforth, if you will disregard certain small + matters, such as whether chairs or hat-racks are for hats, or whether the + marble mantelpiece or the floor is intended for polishing boot heels. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Of course, such an incident as has been suggested is but one of thousands + of golden moments when to the husband comes the sudden dazzling + recognition of the mergence of that half-sweetheart, half-mistress, he has + admired and a little tired of, into the reverential glory and loveliness + of wifehood, motherhood, companionhood, through all life and on through + the eternity of inheritance they shall leave to Jacks and Jills and their + little sisters and brothers. In that lies the priceless secret of + Christianity and its influence. The unspeakably immoral Greeks reared a + temple to Pity; the grossest mythologies of Babylon, Greece, Rome and + Carthage could not change human nature. There have been always persons + whose temperament made them sympathize with grief and pity the suffering; + who, caring none for wealth, had no desire to steal; who purchased a + little pleasure for vanity in the thanks received for kindness given. But + Christianity saw the jewel underneath the passing emotion and gave it + value by cleansing and cutting it. In lust-love is the instinctive secret + of the preservation of the race; but the race is not worth preserving that + it may be preserved only for lust. Upon that animal foundation is to be + built the radiant home of confident, enduring and exchanging love in which + all the senses, tastes, hopes, aspirations and delights of friendship, + companionship and human society shall find hospitality and comfort. When + it has been achieved it is beautiful, a twin to the delicate rose that + lies in its own delicious fragrance, happy on the pure bosom of a lovely + girl—the rose that is finest and most exquisite because it has + sprung from the horrid heat of the compost; but who shall think of the one + in the presence of the pure beauty of the other? + </p> + <p> + Nature and art are entirely unlike each other, though the one simulates + the other. The art of beauty in writing, said Balzac, is to be able to + construct a palace upon the point of a needle; the art of beauty in living + and loving is to build all the beauty of social life and aspiration upon + the sordid yet solid and persisting instincts of savagery that lie deep at + the bottom of our gross natures. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <p> + Now, it is in this tender sacred atmosphere, such as Mr. and Mrs. Youngwed + always pass through, that the man worthy of a woman's confidence finds the + radiant ideal of his heroine. He may with propriety speak of these + transfigured personalities to his intimates or write of them with kindly + pleasantry and suggestion as, perhaps, this will be considered. But, there + is a monitor within that restrains him from analyzing and describing and + dragging into the glare of publicity the sacred details that give to life + all its secret happiness, faith and delight. To do so would be ten times + worse offense against the ethics of unwritten and unspoken things than + describing with pitiless precision the death beds of children, as Little + Nell, Paul Dombey, Dora, Little Eva, and, thank heaven! only a few others. + </p> + <p> + How can anybody bear to read such pages without feeling that he is an + intruder where angels should veil their faces as they await the + transformation? + </p> + <p> + “It is not permitted to do evil,” says the philosopher, “that good may + result.” + </p> + <p> + There are some things that should remain unspoken and undescribed. Have + you never listened to some great brute of a sincere preacher of the + gospel, as he warned his congregation against the terrible dangers + attending the omission of purely theological rites upon infants? Have you + thought of the mothers of those children, listening, whose little ones + were sick or delicate, and who felt each word of that hard, ominous + warning as an agonizing terror? And haven't you wanted to kick the + minister out of the pulpit, through the reredos and into the middle of + next week? How can anybody harrow up such tender feelings? How can anybody + like to believe that a little child will be held to account? Many of us do + so believe, perhaps, whether or no; but is it not cruel to shake the rod + of terror over us in public? “Suffer little children to come unto Me,” + said the Master; He did not instruct us to drive them with fear and terror + and trembling. Whenever I have heard such sermons I have wanted to get up + and stalk out of the church with ostentatiousness of contempt, as if to + say to the preacher that his conduct did—not—meet—with—my—approval. + But I didn't; the philosopher has his cowardice not less than the + preacher. + </p> + <p> + But there is something meretricious and cheap in the use of material and + subjects that lie warm against the very secret heart of nature. The + mystery of love and the sanctity of death are to be used by writers and + artists only in their ennobling aspect of results. A certain class of + French writers have sickened the world by invading the sacredness of + passion and giving prostitution the semblance of self-abnegated love; a + certain class of English and American writers have purchased popularity by + the meretricious parade of the scenes of death-beds. Both are violations + of the ethics of art as they are of nature. True love as true sorrow + shrinks from exhibition and should be permitted to enjoy the sacredness of + privacy. The famous women of the world, Herodias, Semiramis, Aspasia, + Thais, Cleopatra, Sapho, Messalina, Marie de Medici, Catherine of Russia, + Elizabeth of England—all of them have been immoral. Publicity to + women is like handling to peaches—the bloom comes off, whether or + not any other harm occurs. In literature, the great feminine figures, + George Sand, Madame de Sevigne, Madame de Stael, George Eliot—all + were banned and at least one—the first—was out of the pale. + Creative thought has in it the germ of masculinity. Genius in a woman, as + we usually describe genius, means masculinity, which, of all things, to + real men is abhorrent in woman. True genius in woman is the antithesis of + the qualities that make genius in man; so is her heroism, her beauty, her + virtue, her destiny and her duty. + </p> + <p> + Let this be said—even though it be only a jest—one of those + smart attempts at epigram, which, ladies, a man has no more power to + resist than a baby to resist the desire to improve his thumb by sucking it—that: + whenever you find a woman who looks real—that is, who produces upon + a real man the impression of being endowed with the splendid gifts for + united and patient companionship in marriage—whenever you find her + advocating equal suffrage, equal rights, equal independence with men in + all things, you may properly run away. Equality means so much, dear + sisters. No man can be your equal; you can not be his, without laying down + the very jewels of the womanliness that men love. Be thankful you have not + this strength and daring; he possesses those in order that he many stand + between you and more powerful brutes. Now, let us try for a smart epigram: + But no! hang the epigram, let it go. This, however, may be said: That, + whenever you find a woman wanting all rights with man; wanting his morals + to be judged by hers, or willing to throw hers in with his, or itching to + enter his employments and labors and willing that he shall—of course—nurse + the children and patch the small trousers and dresses, depend upon it that + some weak and timid man has been neglecting the old manly, savage duty of + applying quiet home murder as society approves now and then. + </p> + <div style="height: 6em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Delicious Vice, by Young E. 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