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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/10079-0.txt b/10079-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c37284d --- /dev/null +++ b/10079-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8753 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 10079 *** + +THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + +A MAGAZINE OF LITERATURE, ART, AND POLITICS. + +VOL. II.--JULY, 1858.--NO. IX. + + + + + + +THE CATACOMBS OF ROME. +[Concluded.] + +--fessoque Sacrandum +Supponato capiti lapidem, Curistoque quiescam. +PAULINUS OF NOLL + +Et factus est in pace locus ejus et halitatio in Sion. +Ps. LXXV. 2 + +V. + +Rome is preëminently the city of monuments and inscriptions, and the +lapidary style is the one most familiar to her. The Republic, the Empire, +the Papacy, the Heathens, and the Christians have written their record +upon marble. But gravestones are proverbially dull reading, and +inscriptions are often as cold as the stone upon which they are engraved. + +The long gallery of the Vatican, through which one passes to enter the +famous library, and which leads to the collection of statues, is lined on +one side with heathen inscriptions, of miscellaneous character, on the +other with Christian inscriptions, derived chiefly from the catacombs, but +arranged with little order. The comparison thus exhibited to the eye is an +impressive one. The contrast of one class with the other is visible even +in external characteristics. The old Roman lines are cut with precision +and evenness; the letters are well formed, the words are rightly spelt, +the construction of the sentences is grammatical. But the Christian +inscriptions bear for the most part the marks of ignorance, poverty, and +want of skill. Their lines are uneven, the letters of various sizes, the +words ill-spelt, the syntax often incorrect. Not seldom a mixture of Greek +and Latin in the same sentence betrays the corrupt speech of the lower +classes, and the Latin itself is that of the common people. But defects of +style and faults of engraving are insufficient to hide the feeling that +underlies them. + +Besides this great collection of the Vatican, there is another collection +now being formed in the _loggia_ of the Lateran Palace, in immediate +connection with the Christian Museum. Arranged as the inscriptions will +here be in historic sequence and with careful classification, it will be +chiefly to this collection that the student of Christian antiquity will +hereafter resort. It in in the charge of the Cavaliere de Rossi, who is +engaged in editing the Christian inscriptions of the first six centuries, +and whose extraordinary learning and marvellous sagacity in deciphering +and determining the slightest remains of ancient stone-cutting give him +unexampled fitness for the work. Of these inscriptions, about eleven +thousand are now known, and of late some forty or fifty have been added +each year to the number previously recorded. But a very small proportion +of the eleven thousand remain _in situ_ in the catacombs, and besides the +great collections of the Vatican and the Lateran, there are many smaller +ones in Rome and in other Italian cities, and many inscriptions originally +found in the subterranean cemeteries are now scattered in the porticos or +on the pavements of churches in Rome, Ravenna, Milan, and elsewhere. From +the first period of the desecration of the catacombs, the engraved tablets +that had closed the graves were almost as much an object of the greed of +pious or superstitious marauders as the more immediate relics of the +saints. Hence came their dispersion through Italy, and hence, too, it has +happened that many very important and interesting inscriptions belonging +to Rome are now found scattered through the Continent. + +It has been, indeed, sometimes the custom of the Roman Church to enhance +the value of a gift of relics by adding to it the gift of the inscription +on the grave from which they were taken. A curious instance of this kind, +connected with the making of a very popular saint, occurred not many years +since. In the year 1802 a grave was found in the Cemetery of St. +Priscilla, by which were the remains of a glass vase that had held blood, +the indication of the burial-place of a martyr. The grave was closed by +three tiles, on which were the following words painted in red letters: +LVMENA PAXTE CVMFL. There were also rudely painted on the tiles two +anchors, three darts, a torch, and a palm-branch. The bones found within +the grave, together with the tiles bearing the inscription, were placed in +the Treasury of Relics at the Lateran. + +On the return of Pius VII., one of the deputation of Neapolitan clergy +sent to congratulate him sought and received from the Pope these relics +and the tiles as a gift for his church. The inscription had been read by +placing the first tile after the two others, thus,--PAX TECUM FILUMENA, +_Peace be with thee, Filumena_; and Filumena was adopted as a new saint in +the long list of those to whom the Roman Church has given this title. It +was supposed, that, in the haste of closing the grave, the tiles had been +thus misplaced. + +Very soon after the gift, a priest, who desired not to be named _on +account of his great humility_, had a vision at noonday, in which the +beautiful virgin with the beautiful name appeared to him and revealed to +him that she had suffered death rather than yield her chastity to the will +of the Emperor, who desired to make her his wife. Thereupon a young +artist, whose name is also suppressed, likewise had a vision of St. +Filomena, who told him that the emperor was Diocletian; but as history +stands somewhat opposed to this statement, it has been suggested that the +artist mistook the name, and that the Saint said Maximian. However this +may be, the day of her martyrdom was fixed on the 10th of August, 303. Her +relics were carried to Naples with great reverence; they were inclosed, +after the Neapolitan fashion, in a wooden doll of the size of life, +dressed in a white satin skirt and a red tunic, with a garland of flowers +on its head, and a lily and a dart in its hand. This doll, with the red- +lettered tiles, was soon transferred to its place in the church of +Mugnano, a small town not far from Naples. Many miracles were wrought on +the way, and many have since been wrought in the church itself. The fame +of the virgin spread through Italy, and chapels were dedicated to her +honor in many distant churches; from Italy it reached Germany and France, +and it has even crossed the Atlantic to America. Thus a new saint, a new +story, and a new exhibition of credulity had their rise not long ago from +a grave and three words in the catacombs. + +One of the first differences which are obvious, in comparing the Christian +with the heathen mortuary inscriptions, is the introduction in the former +of some new words, expressive of the new ideas that prevailed among them. +Thus, in place of the old formula which had been in most common use upon +gravestones, D.M., or, in Greek, [Greek: TH.K.], standing for _Dis +Manibus_, or [Greek: _Theois karachthoniois_], a dedication of the stone +to the gods of death, we find constantly the words _In pace_. The exact +meaning of these words varies on different inscriptions, but their general +significance is simple and clear. When standing alone, they seem to mean +that the dead rests in the peace of God; sometimes they are preceded by +_Requiescat_, "May he rest in peace"; sometimes there is the affirmation, +_Dormit in pace_, "He sleeps in peace"; sometimes a person is said +_recessisse in pace_, "to have departed in peace." Still other forms are +found, as, for instance, _Vivas in pace_, "Live in peace," or _Suscipiatur +in pace_, "May he be received into peace,"--all being only variations of +the expression of the Psalmist's trust, "I will lay me down in peace and +sleep, for thou, Lord, only makest me dwell in safety." It is a curious +fact, however, that on some of the Christian tablets the same letters +which were used by the heathens have been found. One inscription exists +beginning with the words _Dis Manibus_, and ending with the words _in +pace_. But there is no need of finding a difficulty in this fact, or of +seeking far for an explanation of it. As we have before remarked, in +speaking of works of Art, the presence of some heathen imagery and ideas +in the multitude of the paintings and inscriptions in the catacombs is not +so strange as the comparatively entire absence of them. Many professing +Christians must have had during the early ages but an imperfect conception +of the truth, and can have separated themselves only partially from their +previous opinions, and from the conceptions that prevailed around them in +the world. To some the letters of the heathen gravestones, and the words +which they stood for, probably appeared little more than a form expressive +of the fact of death, and, with the imperfect understanding natural to +uneducated minds, they used them with little thought of their absolute +significance.[1] + +[Footnote 1: It is probable that most of the gravestones upon which this +heathen formula is found are not of an earlier date than the middle of the +fourth century. At this time Christianity became the formal religion of +many who were still heathen in character and thought, and cared little +about the expression of a faith which they had adopted more from the +influence of external motives than from principle or conviction.] + +Another difference in words which is very noticeable, running through the +inscriptions, is that of _depositus_, used by the Christians to signify +the _laying away_ in the grave, in place of the heathen words _situs, +positus, sepultus, conditus_. The very name of _coemeterium_, adopted by +the Christians for their burial-places, a name unknown to the ancient +Romans, bore a reference to the great doctrine of the Resurrection. Their +burial-ground was a _cemetery_, that is, a _sleeping-place_; they regarded +the dead as put there to await the awakening; the body was _depositus_, +that is, _intrusted to_ the grave, while the heathen was _situs_ or +_sepultus, interred_ or _buried_,--the words implying a final and +definitive position. And as the Christian _dormit_ or _quiescit, sleeps_ +or _rests_ in death, so the heathen is described as _abreptus_, or +_defunctus, snatched away_ or _departed_ from life. + +Again, the contrast between the inscriptions is marked, and in a sadder +way, by the difference of the expressions of mourning and grief. No one +who has read many of the ancient gravestones but remembers the bitter +words that are often found on them,--words of indignation against the +gods, of weariness of life, of despair and unconsoled melancholy. Here is +one out of many:-- + + PROCOPE MANVS LEBO CONTRA + DEVM QVI ME INNOCENTEM SVS + TVLIT QVAE VIXI ANNOS XX. + POS. PROCLVS. + + I, Procope, who lived twenty years, lift up + my hands against God, who took me away innocent. + Proclus set up this. + +But among the Christian inscriptions of the first centuries there is not +one of this sort. Most of them contain no reference to grief; they are the +very short and simple words of love, remembrance, and faith,--as in the +following from the Lateran:-- + + ADEODATE DIGNAE ET MERITAE VIRGINI + ETQVIESCE HIC IN PACE IVBENTE XPO EJUS + + To Adeodata, a worthy and deserving Virgin, + and rests here in peace, her Christ commanding. + +On a few the word _dolens_ is found, simply telling of grief. On one to +the memory of a sweetest daughter the word _irreparable_ is used, _Filiae +dulcissimae inreparabili_. Another is, "To Dalmatius, sweetest son, whom +his _unhappy_ father was not permitted to enjoy for even seven years." +Another inscription, in which something of the feeling that was unchecked +among the heathens finds expression in Christian words, is this: "Sweet +soul. To the incomparable child, who lived seventeen years, and +_undeserving_ [of death] gave up life in the peace of the Lord." Neither +the name of the child nor of the parents is on the stone, and the word +_immeritus_, which is used here, and which is common in heathen use, is +found, we believe, on only one other Christian grave. One inscription, +which has been interpreted as being an expression of unresigned sorrow, is +open to a very different signification. It is this:-- + + INNOCENTISSISSIMÆ ETATIS + DVLCISSIMO FILIO + JOVIANO QVI VIXIT ANN· VII + ET MENSES VI NON MERENTES + THEOCTISTVS ET THALLVSA PARENTES + + To their sweetest boy Jovian, of the most + innocent age, who lived seven years and six + months, his undeserving [or unlamenting] parents + Theoctistus and Thallusa. + +Here, without forcing the meaning, _non merentes_ might be supposed to +refer to the parents' not esteeming themselves worthy to be left in +possession of such a treasure; but the probability is that _merentes_ is +only a misspelling of _maerentes_ for otherwise _immerentes_ would have +been the natural word. + +But it is thus that the Christian inscriptions must be sifted, to find +expressions at variance with their usual tenor, their general composure +and trust. The simplicity and brevity of the greater number of them are, +indeed, striking evidence of the condition of feeling among those who set +them upon the graves. Their recollections of the dead feared no fading, +and Christ, whose coming was so near at hand, would know and reunite his +own. Continually we read only a name with _in pace_, without date, age, or +title, but often with some symbol of love or faith hastily carved or +painted on the stone or tiles. Such inscriptions as the following are +common:-- + + FELICISSIMVS DVLCIS,--GAVDENTIA IN PACE, + --SEVERA IN DEO VIVAS,-- + +or, with a little more fulness of expression,-- + + DVLCISSIMO FILIO ENDELECIO + BENEMERENTI QVI VIXIT + ANNOS II MENSE VNV + DIES XX IN PACE + + To the sweetest son Endelechius, the well- + deserving, who lived two years, one month, + twenty days. In peace. + +The word _benemerenti_ is of constant recurrence. It is used both of the +young and the old; and it seems to have been employed, with comprehensive +meaning, as an expression of affectionate and grateful remembrance. + +Here is another short and beautiful epitaph. The two words with which it +begins are often found. + + ANIMA DVLCIS AVFENIA VIRGO + BENEDICTA QVE VIXIT ANN: XXX + DORMIT IN PACE + + Sweet Soul. The Blessed Virgin Aufenia, + who lived thirty years. She sleeps in peace. + +But the force and tenderness of such epitaphs as these is hardly to be +recognized in single examples. There is a cumulative pathos in them, as +one reads, one after another, such as these that follow:-- + + ANGELICE BENE IN PACE + + To Angelica well in peace. + + CVRRENTIO SERVO DEI DEP. D. XVI. KAL + NOVEM. + + To Currentius, the servant of God, laid in + the grave on the sixteenth of the Kalends of + November. + + MAXIMINVS QVI VIXIT ANNOS XXIII + AMICVS OMNIVM + + Maximin, who lived twenty-three years, the + friend of all. + + SEPTIMVS MARCIANE + IN PACE QUE BICSIT MECV + ANNOS XVII. DORMIT IN PACE + + Septimus to Marciana in peace. Who lived + with me seventeen years. She sleeps in peace. + + GAVDENTIA + PAVSAT DVLCIS + SPIRITVS ANNORVM II + MENSORVM TRES. + + Gaudentia rests. Sweet spirit of two years + and three months. + +Here is a gravestone with the single word VIATOR; here one that tells only +that Mary placed it for her daughter; here one that tells of the light of +the house,--[Greek: To phos thaes Oikias]. + +Nor is it only in these domestic and intimate inscriptions that the +habitual temper and feeling of the Christians is shown, but even still +more in those that were placed over the graves of such members of the +household of faith as had made public profession of their belief, and +shared in the sufferings of their Lord. There is no parade of words on the +gravestones of the martyrs. Their death needed no other record than the +little jar of blood placed in the mortar, and the fewest words were enough +where this was present. Here is an inscription in the rudest letters from +a martyr's grave:-- + + SABATIVS BENEMERENTI QVI VIXIT ANNOS XL + + To the well-deserving Sabatias, who lived + forty years. + +And here another:-- + + PROSPERO INNOCENTI ANIMAE IN PACE. + + To Prosperus, innocent soul, in peace. + +And here a third, to a child who had died as one of the Innocents:-- + + MIRAE INNOCENTIAE ANIMA DULCIS AEMILEANVS + QVI VIXIT ANNO VNO, MENS. VIII D. XXVIII + DORMIT IN PACE + + Aemilian, sweet soul of marvellous innocence, + who lived one year, eight months, twenty-eight + days. He sleeps in peace. + +At this grave was found the vase of blood, and on the gravestone was the +figure of a dove. + +Another inscription, which preserves the name of one of those who suffered +in the most severe persecution to which the ancient Church was exposed, +and which, if genuine, is, so far as known, the only monument of the kind, +is marked by the same simplicity of style:-- + + LANNVS XPI MA + RTIR HC*[Hic?] REQVIESC + IT SVR [E-P-S] DIOCLITI ANO PASSVS + + Lannus Martyr of Christ here rests. He + suffered under Diocletian. + +The three letters EPS have been interpreted as standing for the words _et +posteris suis_, and as meaning that the grave was also for his successors. +Not yet, then, had future saints begun to sanctify their graves, and to +claim the exclusive possession of them. + +But there is another point of contrast between the inscriptions of the un- +Christianized and the Christian Romans, which illustrates forcibly the +difference in the regard which they paid to the dead. To the one the dead +were still of this world, and the greatness of life, the distinctions of +class, the titles of honor still clung to them; to the other the past life +was as nothing to that which had now begun. The heathen epitaphs are +loaded with titles of honor, and with the names of the offices which the +dead had borne, and, like the modern Christian (?) epitaphs whose style +has been borrowed from them, the vanity of this world holds its place +above the grave. But among the early Christian inscriptions of Rome +nothing of this kind is known. Scarcely a title of rank or a name of +office is to be found among them. A military title, or the name of priest +or deacon, or of some other officer in the Church, now and then is met +with; but even these, for the most part, would seem to belong to the +fourth century, and never contain any expression of boastfulness or +flattery. + + FL. OLIVS PATERNVS + CENTVRIO CHOR. X VRB. + QVI VIXIT AH XXVII + IN PACE + + Flavius Olius Paternus, Centurion of the + Tenth Urban Cohort, who lived twenty-seven + years. In peace. + +It is true, no doubt, that among the first Christians there were very few +of the rich and great. The words of St. Paul to the Corinthians were as +true of the Romans as of those to whom they were specially addressed: "For +ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, +not many mighty, not many noble are called." Still there is evidence +enough that even in the first two centuries some of the mighty and some of +the noble at Rome were among those called, but that evidence is not to be +gathered from the gravestones of the catacombs. We have seen, in a former +article, that even the grave of one of the early bishops,--the highest +officer of the Church,--and one who had borne witness to the truth in his +death, was marked by the words, + + CORNELIVS MARTYR + EP. + + The Martyr Cornelius, Bishop. + +Compare this with the epitaphs of the later popes, as they are found on +their monuments in St. Peter's,--"flattering, false insculptions on a +tomb, and in men's hearts reproach,"--epitaphs overweighted with +superlatives, ridiculous, were it not for their impiety, and full of the +lies and vanities of man in the very house of God. + +With this absence of boastfulness and of titles of rank on the early +Christian graves two other characteristics of the inscriptions are closely +connected, which bear even yet more intimate and expressive relation to +the change wrought by Christianity in the very centre of the heathen +world. + +"One cannot study a dozen monuments of pagan Rome," says Mr. Northcote, in +his little volume on the catacombs, "without reading something of _servus_ +or _libertus, libertis libertabusque posterisque eorum_; and I believe the +proportion in which they are found is about three out of every four. Yet, +in a number of Christian inscriptions exceeding eleven thousand, and all +belonging to the first six centuries of our era, scarcely six have been +found containing any allusion whatever--and even two or three of these are +doubtful--to this fundamental division of ancient Roman society. + +"No one, we think, will be rash enough to maintain, either that this +omission is the result of mere accident, or that no individual slave or +freedman was ever buried in the catacombs. Rather, these two cognate +facts, the absence from ancient Christian epitaphs of all titles of rank +and honor on the one hand, or of disgrace and servitude on the other, can +only be adequately explained by an appeal to the religion of those who +made them. The children of the primitive Church did not record upon their +monuments titles of earthly dignity, because they knew that with the God +whom they served 'there was no respect of persons'; neither did they care +to mention the fact of their bondage, or of their deliverance from +bondage, to some earthly master, because they thought only of that higher +and more perfect liberty wherewith Christ had set them free; remembering +that 'he that was called, being a bondman, was yet the freeman of the +Lord, and likewise he that was called, being free, was still the bondman +of Christ.' + +"And this conclusion is still further confirmed by another remarkable fact +which should be mentioned, namely, that there are not wanting in the +catacombs numerous examples of another class of persons, sometimes ranked +among slaves, but the mention of whose servitude, such as it was, served +rather to record an act of Christian charity than any social degradation; +I allude to the alumni, or foundlings, as they may be called. The laws of +pagan Rome assigned these victims of their parents' crimes or poverty to +be the absolute property of any one who would take charge of them. As +nothing, however, but compassion could move a man to do this, children +thus acquired were not called _servi_, as though they were slaves who had +been bought with money, nor _vernae_, as though they had been the children +of slaves born in the house, but _alumni_, a name simply implying that +they had been brought up (_ab alendo_) by their owners. Now it is a very +singular fact, that there are actually more instances of _alumni_ among +the sepulchral inscriptions of Christians than among the infinitely more +numerous inscriptions of pagans, showing clearly that this was an act of +charity to which the early Christians were much addicted; and the +_alumni_, when their foster-parents died, very properly and naturally +recorded upon their tombs this act of charity, to which they were +themselves so deeply indebted." + +So far Mr. Northcote. It is still further to be noted, as an expression of +the Christian temper, as displayed in this kind of charity, that it never +appears in the inscriptions as furnishing a claim for praise, or as being +regarded as a peculiar merit. There is no departure from the usual +simplicity of the gravestones in those of this class. + + [Greek: + PETROS + THREPTOS + RAUKUTA + TOS EN THEO] + + Peter, sweetest foster-child, in God. + +And a dove is engraved at either side of +this short epitaph. + + VITALIANO ALVMNO KARO + EVTROPIVS FECIT. + + Eutropius made this for the dear foster-child + Vitalian. + + ANTONIVS DISCOLIVS FILIVS ET BIBIVS + FELLICISSIMVS ALVMNVS VALERIE CRESTENI + MATRI BIDVE ANORVM XVIII INTET SANCTOS + + Antonius Discolius her son, and Bibius Felicissimus + her foster-child, to Valeria Crestina + their mother, a widow for eighteen years. + [Her grave is] among the holy.[2] + +[Footnote 2: This inscription is not of earlier date than the fourth +century, as is shown by the words, _Inter sancios_,--referring, as we +heretofore stated, to the grave being made near that of some person +esteemed a saint.] + +These inscriptions lead us by a natural transition to such as contain some +reference to the habits of life or to the domestic occupations and +feelings of the early Christians. Unfortunately for the gratification of +the desire to learn of these things, this class of inscriptions is far +from numerous,--and the common conciseness is rarely, in the first +centuries, amplified by details. But here is one that tells a little story +in itself:-- + + DOMNINAE +INNOCENTISSINAE ET DVLCISSIMAE COIVGI + QVAE VIXIT ANN XVI M. IIII ET FVIT + IMARITATA ANN. DVOBVS M. IIII D. VIIII + CVM QVA SON LICVIT FVISSE PROPTER + CAVSAS PEREGRINATIONIS + NISI MENEIE VI +QVO TEMPORE VT EGO SENSI ET EXHBVI + AMOREM MEVM + NVLLI SV ALII SIC DILEXERVNT + DEPOSIT XV KAL. IVN. + + To Domnina, my most innocent and sweetest + wife; who lived sixteen years and four + months, and was married two years, four + months, and nine days; with whom, on account + of my journeys, I was permitted to be + only six months; in which time, as I felt, so + I showed my love. No others have so loved + one another. Placed in the grave the 15th + of the Kalends of June. + +Who was this husband whose far-off journeys had so separated him from his +lately married wife? Who were they who so loved as no others had loved? +The tombstone gives only the name of Domnina. But in naming her, and in +the expression of her husband's love, it gives evidence, which is +confirmed by many other tokens in the catacombs, of the change introduced +by Christianity in the position of women, and in the regard paid to them. +Marriage was invested with a sanctity which redeemed it from sensuality, +and Christianity became the means of uniting man and woman in the bonds of +an immortal love. + +Here is an inscription which, spite of the rudeness of its style, +preserves the pleasant memory of a Roman child:-- + + ISPIRITO SANTO BONO + FLORENTIO QVI VIXIT ANIS XIII + QVAM SI FILIVM SVVM ET COTDEVS + MATER FILIO BENEMERETI FECERVNT. + + To the good and holy spirit Florentius, who + lived thirteen years, Coritus, his master, who + loved him more than if he were his own son, + and Cotdeus, his mother, have made this for + her well-deserving son.[3] + +[Footnote 3: Compare an inscription from a heathen tomb:-- + + C. JVLIVS MAXIMVS + ANN. II. M. V. + + ATROX O FORTVNA TRVCI QVAE FVNERR GAVDES + QVID MIHI TAM SVBITO MAXIMVS ERIPITVR + QVI MODO JVCVNDVS GREMIO SVPERESSE SOLEBAT + HIC LAPIS TN TVMVLO NVNC JACET ECCE MATER + + C. Julius Maximus, + Two years, five months old. + + Harsh Fortune, that in cruel death finds't joy, + Why is my Maximus thus sudden reft, + So late the pleasant burden of my breast? + Now in the grave this stone lies: lo, his mother!] + +And Coritus, his master, and Cotdeus, his mother, might have rejoiced in +knowing that their poor, rough tablet would keep the memory of her boy +alive for so many centuries; and that long after they had gone to the +grave, the good spirit of Florentius should still, through these few +words, remain to work good upon the earth.--Note in this inscription (as +in many others) the Italianizing of the old Latin,--the _ispirito_, and +the _santo_; note also the mother's strange name, reminding one of Puritan +appellations,--Cotdeus being the abbreviation of _Quod vult Deus_, "What +God wills."[4] + +[Footnote 4: Other names of this kind were _Deogratias_, _Habetdeum_, and +_Adeodatus_.] + +Here is an inscription set up by a husband to his wife, Dignitas, who was +a woman of great goodness and entire purity of life:-- + + QUE SINE LESIONE ANIMI MEI VIXI MECVM + ANNOS XV FILIOS AVTEM PROCREAVIT VII + EX QVIBVS SECV ABET AD DOMINVM IIII + + Who, without ever wounding my soul, lived + with me for fifteen years, and bore seven + children, four of whom she has with her in + the Lord. + +We have already referred to the inscriptions which bear the name of some +officer of the early Church; but there is still another class, which +exhibits in clear letters others of the designations and customs familiar +to the first Christians. Thus, those who had not yet been baptized and +received into the fold, but were being instructed in Christian doctrine +for that end, were called _catechumens_; those who were recently baptized +were called _neophytes_; and baptism itself appears sometimes to have +been designated by the word _illuminatio_. Of the use of these names the +inscriptions give not infrequent examples. It was the custom also among +the Christians to afford support to the poor and to the widows of their +body. Thus we read such inscriptions as the following:-- + + RIGINE VENEMEREMTI FILIA SVA FECIT + VENERIGINE MATRI VIDVAE QVE SE + DIT VIDVA ANNOS LX ET ECLESA + VIXIT ANNOS LXXX MESIS V + DIES XXVI + + Her daughter Reneregina made this for her + well-deserving mother Regina, a widow, who + sat a widow sixty years, and never burdened + the church, the wife of one husband, who lived + eighty years, five months, twenty-six days. + +The words of this inscription recall to mind those of St. Paul, in his +First Epistle to Timothy, (v. 3-16,) and especially the verse, "If any man +or woman that believeth have widows, let them relieve them, and let not +the church be charged." + +Some of the inscriptions preserve a record of the occupation or trade of +the dead, sometimes in words, more often by the representation of the +implements of labor. Here, for instance, is one which seems like the +advertisement of a surviving partner:-- + + DE BIANOBA + POLLECLA QVE ORDEV BENDET DE + BIANOBA + + From New Street. Pollecla, who sold barley + on New Street. + +Others often bear a figure which refers to the name of the deceased, an +_armoirie parlante_ as it were, which might be read by those too ignorant +to read the letters on the stone. Thus, a lion is scratched on the grave +of a man named Leo; a little pig on the grave of the little child +Porcella, who had lived not quite four years; on the tomb of Dracontius is +a dragon; and by the side of the following charming inscription is found +the figure of a ship:-- + + NABIRA IN PACE ANIMA DULCIS + QVI BIXIT ANOS XVI M V + ANIMA MELEIEA + TITVLV FACTV + APARENTES SIGNVM NABE + + Navira in peace. Sweet soul, who lived sixteen + years, five months. Soul honey-sweet. + This inscription made by her parents. The + sign a ship. + +The figures that are most frequent upon the sepulchral slabs are, however, +not such as bear relation to a name or profession, but the commonly +adopted symbols of the faith, similar in design and character to those +exhibited in the paintings of the catacombs. The Good Shepherd is thus +often rudely represented; the figure of Jonah is naturally, from its +reference to the Resurrection, also frequently found; and the figure of a +man or woman with arms outstretched, in the attitude of prayer, occurs on +many of the sepulchral slabs. The anchor, the palm, the crown, and the +dove, as being simpler in character and more easily represented, are still +more frequently found. The varying use of symbols at different periods has +been one of the means which have assisted in determining approximate dates +for the inscriptions upon which they are met with. It is a matter of +importance, in many instances, to fix a date to an inscription. Historical +and theological controversies hang on such trifles. Most of the early +gravestones bear no date; and it was not till the fourth century, that, +with many other changes, the custom of carving a date upon them became +general. The century to which an inscription belongs may generally be +determined with some confidence, either by the style of expression and the +nature of the language, or by the engraved character, or some other +external indications. Among these latter are the symbols. It has, for +instance, been recently satisfactorily proved by the Cavaliere de Rossi +that the use of the emblem of the fish in the catacombs extended only to +the fourth century, so that the monuments upon which it is found may, with +scarcely an exception, be referred to the preceding period. As this emblem +went out of use, owing perhaps to the fact that the Christians were no +longer forced to seek concealment for their name and profession, the +famous monogram of Christ, [Symbol] the hieroglyphic, not only of his +name, but of his cross, succeeded to it, and came, indeed, into far more +general use than that which the fish had ever attained. The monogram is +hardly to be found before the time of Constantine, and, as it is very +frequently met with in the inscriptions from the catacombs, it affords an +easy means, in the absence of a more specific date, for determining a +period earlier than which any special inscription bearing it cannot have +originated. Its use spread rapidly during the fourth century. It "became," +says Gibbon, with one of his amusing sneers, "extremely fashionable in the +Christian world." The story of the vision of Constantine was connected +with it, and the Labarum displayed its form in the front of the imperial +army. It was thus not merely the emblem of Christ, but that also of the +conversion of the Emperor and of the fatal victory of the Church. + +It is a remarkable fact, and one which none of the recent Romanist +authorities attempt to controvert, that the undoubted earlier inscriptions +afford no evidence of any of the peculiar doctrines of the Roman Church. +There is no reference to the doctrine of the Trinity to be found among +them; nothing is to be derived from them in support of the worship of the +Virgin; her name even is not met with on any monument of the first three +centuries; and none of the inscriptions of this period give any sign of +the prevalence of the worship of saints. There is no support of the claim +of the Roman Church to supremacy, and no reference to the claim of the +Popes to be the Vicars of Christ. As the third century advances to its +close, we find the simple and crude beginning of that change in Christian +faith which developed afterward into the broad idea of the intercessory +power of the saints. Among the earlier inscriptions prayers to God or to +Christ are sometimes met with, generally in short exclamatory expressions +concerning the dead. Thus we find at first such words as these:-- + + AMERIMNVS + RVFINAE COIV + GI CARISSIME + BENEMEREN + TI SPIRITVM + TVVM DEVS + REFRIGERET + + Amerimnus to his dearest wife Rufina well- + deserving. May God refresh thy spirit! + +And, in still further development,-- + + [Greek: AUR. AIANOS PAPHLAGON THEOU + DOULOS PISTOS + EKOIMNON EN EIPNIN MINSON + AUTOU + O THEOS EIS TOUS AIONAS] + + Aurelius Aelianus, a Paphlagonian, faithful + servant of God. He sleeps in peace. Remember + him, O God, forever! + +Again, two sons ask for their mother,-- + + DOMINE NE QVANDO + ADVMBRETVR SPIRITVS + VENERES + + O Lord, let not the spirit of Venus be shadowed + at any time! + +From such petitions as these we come by a natural transition to such as +are addressed to the dead themselves, as being members of the same +communion with the living, and uniting in prayers with those they had left +on earth and for their sake. + + VIBAS IN PACE ET PETE PRO NOBIS + + Mayst thou live in peace and ask for us! + +Or, as in another instance,-- + + PETE PRO PARENTES TVOS + MATRONATA MATRONA + QVE VIXIT AN. I. DI. LII. + + Pray for thy parents, Matronata Matrona! + Who lived one year, fifty-two days. + +And as we have seen how in the fourth century the desire arose of being +buried near the graves of those reputed holy, so by a similar process we +find this simple and affectionate petition to the dead passing into a +prayer for the dead to those under whose protection it was hoped that they +might be. In the multitude of epitaphs, however, these form but a small +number. Here is one that begins with a heathen formula:-- + + SOMNO HETERNALI + AVRELIVS GEMELLVS QVI BIXIT AN-- + ET MESES VIII DIES XVIII MATER FILIO + CARISSIMO BENAEMERENTI FECIT IN PA-- + [C]ONMANDO BASSILA INNOCENTIA GEMELLI + + In Eternal Sleep. Aurelius Gemellus, who + lived --- years, and eight months, eighteen + days. His mother made this for her dearest + well-deserving son in peace. I commend to + Basilla the innocence of Gemellus. + +Basilla was one of the famous martyrs of the time of Valerian and +Gallienus. + +Here again is another inscription of a curious character, as interposing a +saint between the dead and his Saviour. The monogram marks its date. + + RVTA OMNIBVS SVBDITA ET ATFABI + LIS BIBET IN NOMINE PETRI + IN PACE + + Ruta, subject and affable to all, shall live in + the name of Peter, in the peace of Christ. + +But it would seem from other inscriptions as if the new practice of +calling upon the saints were not adopted without protest. Thus we read, in +contrast to the last epitaph, this simple one:-- + + ZOSIME VIVAS IN NOMINE XTI + + O Zosimus, mayst thou live in the name of Christ! + +And again, in the strongest and most direct words:-- + + SOLVS DEVS ANIMAM TVAM + DEFENDAD ALEXANDRE + + May God alone protect thy spirit, Alexander! + +One more inscription and we have done; it well closes the long list:-- + + QVI LEGERIT VIVAT IN CHRISTO + + Whoever shall read this, may he live in Christ! + +As the fourth century advanced, the character of the inscriptions +underwent great change. They become less simple; they exhibit less faith, +and more worldliness; superlatives abound in them; and the want of feeling +displays itself in the abundance of words. + +We end here our examinations of the testimony of the catacombs regarding +the doctrine, the faith, and the lives of the Christians of Rome in the +first three centuries. The evidence is harmonious and complete. It leaves +no room for skepticism or doubt. There are no contradictions in it. From +every point of view, theologic, historic, artistic, the results coincide +and afford mutual support. The construction of the catacombs, the works of +painting found within them, the inscriptions on the graves, all unite in +bearing witness to the simplicity of the faith, the purity of the +doctrine, the strength of the feeling, the change in the lives of the vast +mass of the members of the early church of Christ. A light had come into +the world, and the dark passages of the underground cemeteries were +illuminated by it, and manifest its brightness. Wherever it reached, the +world was humanized and purified. To the merely outward eye it might at +first have seemed faint and dim, but "the kingdom of God cometh not with +observation." + + + + +THREE OF US. + + +Such a spring day as it was!--the sky all one mild blue, hazy on the +hills, warm with sunshine overhead; a soft south-wind, expressive, and +full of new impulses, blowing up from the sea, and spreading the news of +life all over our brown pastures and leaf-strewn woods. The crocuses in +Friend Allis's garden-bed shot up cups of gold and sapphire from the dark +mould; slight long buds nestled under the yellow-green leafage of the +violet-patch; white and sturdy points bristled on the corner that in May +was thick with lilies-of-the-valley, crisp, cool, and fragrant; and in a +knotty old apricot-tree two bluebirds and a robin did heralds' duty, +singing of summer's procession to come; and we made ready to receive it +both in our hearts and garments. + +Josephine Boyle, Letty Allis, and I, Sarah Anderson, three cousins as we +were, sat at the long window of Friend Allis's parlor, pretending to sew, +really talking. Mr. Stepel, a German artist, had just left us; and a +little trait of Miss Josephine's, that had occurred during his call, +brought out this observation from Cousin Letty:-- + +"Jo, how could thee let down thy hair so before that man?" + +Jo laughed. "Thee is a little innocent, Letty, with your pretty dialect! +Why did I let my hair down? For Mr. Stepel to see it, of course." + +"That is very evident," interposed I; "but Letty is not so innocent or so +wise as to have done wondering at your caprices, Jo; expound, if you +please, for her edification." + +"I do not pretend to be wise or simple, Sarah; but I didn't think Cousin +Josephine had so much vanity." + +"You certainly shall have a preacher-bonnet, Letty. How do you know it was +vanity, my dear? I saw you show Mr. Stepel your embroidery with the +serenest satisfaction; now you made your crewel cherries, and I didn't +make my hair; which was vain?" + +Letty was astounded. "Thee has a gift of speech, certainly, Jo." + +"I have a gift of honesty, you mean. My hair is very handsome, and I knew +Mr. Stepel would admire it with real pleasure, for it is a rare color. I +took down those curls with quite as simple an intention as you brought him +that little picture of Cole's to see." + +Josephine was right,--partly, at least. Her hair was perfect; its tint the +exact hue of a new chestnut-skin, with golden lights, and shadows of deep +brown; not a tinge of red libelled it as auburn; and the light broke on +its glittering waves as it does on the sea, tipping the undulations with +sunshine, and scattering rays of gold through the long, loose curls, and +across the curve of the massive coil, that seemed almost too heavy for her +proud and delicate head to bear. Mr. Stepel was excusably enthusiastic +about its beauty, and Jo as cool as if it had been a wig. Sometimes I +thought this peculiar hair was an expression of her own peculiar +character. + +Letty said truly that Jo had a gift of speech; and she, having said her +say about the hair, dismissed the matter, with no uneasy recurring to it, +and took up a book from the table, declaring she was tired of her seam;-- +she always was tired of sewing! Presently she laughed. + +"What is it, Jo?" said I. + +"Why, it is 'Jane Eyre,' with Letty Allis's name on the blank leaf. That +is what I call an anachronism, spiritually. What do you think about the +book, Letty?" said she, turning her lithe figure round in the great chair +toward the little Quakeress, whose pretty red head and apple-blossom of a +face bloomed out of her gray attire and prim collar with a certain +fascinating contrast. + +"I think it has a very good moral tendency, Cousin Jo." + +The clear, hazel eyes flashed a most amused comment at me. + +"Well, what do you call the moral, Letty?" + +"Why,--I should think,--I do not quite know that the moral is stated, +Josephine,--but I think thee will allow it was a great triumph of +principle for Jane Eyre to leave Mr. Rochester when she discovered that he +was married." + +Jo flung herself back impatiently in the chair, and began an harangue. + +"That is a true world's judgment! And you, you innocent little Quaker +girl! think it is the height of virtue not to elope with a married man, +who has entirely and deliberately deceived you, and adds to the wrong of +deceit the insult of proposing an elopement! Triumph of principle! I +should call it the result of common decency, rather,--a thing that the +instinct of any woman would compel her to do. My only wonder is how Jane +Eyre could continue to love him." + +"My dear young friend," said I, rather grimly, "when a woman loves a man, +it is apt, I regret to say, to become a fact, not a theory; and facts are +stubborn things, you know. It is not easy to set aside a real affection." + +"I know that, ma'am," retorted Jo, in a slightly sarcastic tone; "it is a +painful truth; still, I do think a deliberate deceit practised on me by +any man would decapitate any love I had for him, quite inevitably." + +"So it might, in your case," replied I; "for you never will love a man, +only your idea of one. You will go on enjoying your mighty theories and +dreams till suddenly the juice of that 'little western flower' drips on +your eyelids, and then I shall have the pleasure of seeing you caress 'the +fair large ears' of some donkey, and hang rapturously upon its bray, till +you perhaps discover that he has pretended, on your account solely, to +like roses, when he has a natural proclivity to thistles; and then, +pitiable child! you will discover what you have been caressing, and--I +spare you conclusions; only, for my part, I pity the animal! Now Jane Eyre +was a highly practical person; she knew the man she loved was only a man, +and rather a bad specimen at that; she was properly indignant at this +further development of his nature, but reflecting in cool blood, +afterward, that it was only his nature, and finding it proper and legal to +marry him, she did so, to the great satisfaction of herself and the +public. _You_ would have made a new ideal of St. John Rivers, who was +infinitely the best material of the two, and possibly gone on to your +dying day in the belief that his cold and hard soul was only the adamant +of the seraph, encouraged in that belief by his real and high principle,-- +a thing that went for sounding brass with that worldly-wise little +philosopher, Jane, because it did not act more practically on his inborn +traits." + +"Bah!" said Josephine, "when did you turn gypsy, Sally? You ought to sell +_dukkeripen_, and make your fortune. Why don't you unfold Letty's fate?" + +"No," said I, laughing. "Don't you know that the afflatus always exhausts +the priestess? You may tell Letty's fortune, or mine, if you will; but my +power is gone." + +"I can tell yours easily, O Sibyl!" replied she. "You will never marry, +neither for real nor ideal. You should have fallen in love in the orthodox +way, when you were seventeen. You are adaptive enough to have moulded +yourself into any nature that you loved, and constant enough to have clung +to it through good and evil. You would have been a model wife, and a +blessed mother. But now--you are too old, my dear; you have seen too +much; you have not hardened yourself, but you have learned to see too +keenly into other people. You don't respect men, 'except exceptions'; and +you have seen so much matrimony that is harsh and unlovable, that you +dread it; and yet--Don't look at me that way, Sarah! I shall cry!--My +dear! my darling! I did not mean to hurt you.--I am a perfect fool!--Do +please look at me with your old sweet eyes again!--How could I!"---- + +"Look at Letty," said I, succeeding at last in a laugh. And really Letty +was comical to look at; she was regarding Josephine and me with her eyes +wide open like two blue larkspur flowers, her little red lips apart, and +her whole pretty surface face quite full of astonishment. + +"Wasn't that a nice little tableau, Letty?" said Josephine, with +preternatural coolness. "You looked so sleepy, I thought I'd wake you up +with a bit of a scene from 'Lara Aboukir, the Pirate Chief'; you know we +have a great deal of private theatricals at Baltimore; you should see me +in that play as Flashmoria, the Bandit's Bride." + +Letty rubbed her left eye a little, as if to see whether she was sleepy or +not, and looked grave; for me, the laugh came easily enough now. Jo saw +she had not quite succeeded, so she turned the current another way. + +"Shall I tell your fortune now, Letty? Are you quite waked up?" said she. + +"No, thee needn't, Cousin Jo; thee don't tell very good ones, I think." + +"No, Letty, she shall not vex your head with nonsense. I think your fate +is patent; you will grow on a little longer like a pink china-aster, safe +in the garden, and in due time marry some good Friend,--Thomas Dugdale, +very possibly,--and live a tranquil life here in Slepington till you +arrive at a preacher-bonnet, and speak in meeting, as dear Aunt Allis did +before you." + +Letty turned pale with rage. I did not think her blonde temperament held +such passion. + +"I won't! I won't! I never will!" she cried out. "I hate Thomas Dugdale, +Sarah! Thee ought to know better about me! thee knows I cannot endure him, +the old thing!" + +This climax was too much for Jo. With raised brows and a round mouth, she +had been on the point of whistling ever since Letty began; it was an old, +naughty trick of hers; but now she laughed outright. + +"No sort of inspiration left, Sally! I must patch up Letty's fate myself. +Flatter not yourself that she is going to be a good girl and marry in +meeting; not she! If there's a wild, scatter-brained, handsome, +dissipated, godless youth in all Slepington, it is on him that testy +little heart will fix,--and think him not only a hero, but a prodigy of +genius. Friend Allis will break her heart over Letty; but I'd bet you a +pack of gloves, that in three years you'll see that juvenile Quakeress in +a scarlet satin hat and feather, with a blue shawl, and green dress, on +the arm of a fast young man with black hair, and a cigar in his mouth." + +"Why! where _did_ thee ever see him, Josey?" exclaimed Letty, now rosy +with quick blushes. + +The question was irresistible. Jo and I burst into a peal of laughter that +woke Friend Allis from her nap, and, bringing her into the parlor, forced +us to recover our gravity; and presently Jo and I took leave. + +Letty was an orphan, and lived with her cousin, Friend Allis. I, too, was +alone; but I kept a tiny house in Slepington, part of which I rented, and +Jo was visiting me. + +As we walked home, along the quiet street overhung with willows and +sycamores, I said to her, "Jo, how came you to know Letty's secret?" + +"My dear, I did not know it any more than you; but I drew the inference of +her tastes from her character. She is excitable,--even passionate; but her +formal training has allowed no scope for either trait, and suppression has +but concentrated them. She really pines for some excitement;--what, then, +could be more natural than that her fancy should light upon some person +utterly diverse from what she is used to see? That is simple enough. I hit +upon the black hair on the same principle, 'like in difference.' The cigar +seemed wonderful to the half-frightened, all-amazed child; but who ever +sees a fast young man without a cigar?" + +"I am afraid it is Henry Malden," said I, meditatively; "he is all you +describe, but he is also radically bad; besides, having been in the +Mexican war, he will have the prestige of a hero to Letty. How can the +poor girl be undeceived before it is quite too late?" + +"What do you want to undeceive her for, Sally? Do you suppose that will +prevent her marrying Mr. Malden?" + +"I should think so, most certainly!" + +"Not in the least. If you want Letty to marry him, just judiciously oppose +it. Go to her, and say you come as a friend to tell her Mr. Malden's +faults, and the result will be, she will hate you, and be deeper in love +with him than ever." + +"You don't give her credit for common sense, Jo." + +"Just as much as any girl of her age has in love. Did you ever know a +woman who gave up a man she loved because she was warned against him?--or +even if she knew his character well, herself? I don't know but there are +women who could do it, from sheer religious principle. I believe you +might, Sarah. It would be a hard struggle, and wear you to a shadow in +mind and body; but you have a conscience, and, for a woman with a heart as +soft as pudding, the most thoroughly rigid streak of duty in you; none of +which Letty has to depend on. No; if you want to save her, take her away +from Slepington; take her to Saratoga, to Newport, to Washington; turn her +small head with gayety: she is pretty enough to have a dozen lovers at any +watering-place; it is only propinquity that favors Mr. Malden here." + +"I can't do that, Josephine. I have not the means, and Miss Allis would +not have the will, even if she believed in your prescription." + +"Then Letty must stay here and bide her time. You believe in a special +Providence, Sarah, don't you?" + +"Yes, of course I do." + +"Then cannot you leave her to that care? Circumstances do not work for +you. Perhaps it is best that she should marry him, suffer, live, love, and +be refined by fire." + +My heart sunk at the prospect of these possibilities. Josephine put her +arm round me. "Sally," said she, in her softest tone, "I grieved you, +dear, this afternoon. I did not mean to. I grieved myself most. Please +forgive me!" + +"I haven't anything to forgive, Jo," said I. "What you said to me was +true, painfully true,--and, being so, for a moment pained me. I should +have been much happier to be married, I know; but now I daren't think of +it. I have lost a great deal. I have + + "--'lost _my_ place, + _My_ sweet, safe corner by the household fire, + Behind the heads of children'; + +"and yet I do not know that I have not gained a little. It is something, +Jo, to know that I am not in the power of a bad, or even an ill-tempered +man. I can sit by my fire and know that no one will come home to fret at +me,--that I shall encounter no cold looks, no sneers, no bursts of anger, +no snarl of stinginess, no contempt of my opinion and advice. I know that +now men treat me with respect and attention, such as their wives rarely, +if ever, receive from them. Sensitive and fastidious as I am, I do not +know whether my gain is not, to me, greater than my loss. I know it ought +not to be so,--that it argues a vicious, an unchristian, almost an +uncivilized state of society; but that does not affect the facts." + +"You frighten me, Sarah. I cannot believe this is always true of men and +their wives." + +"Neither is it. Some men are good and kind and gentle, gentle-men, even in +their families; and every woman believes the man she is to marry is that +exception. Jo,--bend your ear down closer,--I thought once I knew such a +man,--and,--dear,--I loved him." + +"My darling!--but, Sarah, why"-- + +"Because, as you said, Josey, I was too old; I had seen too much; I would +not give way to an impulse. I bent my soul to know him; I rang the metal +on more than one stone, and every time it rang false. I knew, if I married +him, I should live and die a wretched woman. Was it not better to live +alone?" + +"But, Sarah,--if he loved you?" + +"He did not,--not enough to hurt himself; he could not love anything so +much better than his ease as to suffer, Josey: he was safe. He thought, or +said, he loved me; but he was mistaken." + +"Safe, indeed! He ought to have been shot!" + +"Hush, dear!" + +There was a long pause. It was as when you lift a wreck from the tranquil +sea and let it fall again to the depths, useless to wave or shore; the +black and ghastly hulk is covered; it is seen no more; but the water +palpitates with circling rings, trembles above the grave, dashes quick and +apprehensive billows upon the sand, and is long in regaining its quiet +surface. + +"I wonder if there ever was a perfect man," said Jo, at length, drawing a +deep sigh. + +"You an American girl, Jo, and don't think at once of Washington?" + +"My dear, I am bored to death with Washington _à l'Américain_. A man!-- +how dare you call him a man?--don't you know he is a myth, an abstraction, +a plaster-of-Paris cast? Did you ever hear any human trait of his noticed? +Weren't you brought up to regard him as a species of special seraph, a +sublime and stainless figure, inseparable from a grand manner and a +scroll? Did you ever dare suppose he ate, or drank, or kissed his wife? +You started then at the idea: I saw you!" + +"You are absurd, Jo. It is true that he is exactly, among us, what +demigods were to the Greeks,--only less human than they. But when I once +get my neck out of the school-yoke, I do not start at such suggestions as +yours; I believe he did comport himself as a man of like passions with +others, and was as far from being a hero to his _valet-de-chambre_ as +anybody." + +By this time we were at home, and Jo flung her parasol on the bench in the +porch, and sat down beside it with a gesture of weariness and disgust +mingled. + +"Why will you, of all people, Sarah, quote that tinkling, superficial +trash of a proverb, so palpably French, when the true reason why a man is +not a hero to his lackey is only because he is seen with a lackey's eyes, +--the sight of a low, convention-ridden, narrow, uneducated mind, unable +to take a broad enough view to see that a man is a hero because he is a +man, because he overleaps the level of his life, and is greater than his +race, being one of them? If he were of the heroic race, what virtue in +being heroic? it is the assertion of his trivial life that makes his +speciality evident,--the shadow that throws out the bas-relief. We chatter +endlessly about the immense good of Washington's example: I believe its +good would be more than doubled, could we be made, nationally, to see him +as a human being, living on 'human nature's daily food,' having mortal and +natural wants, tastes, and infirmities, but building with and over all, by +the help of God and a good will, the noble and lofty edifice of a patriot +manhood, a pure life of duty and devotion, sublime for its very strength +and simpleness, heroic because manly and human." + +The day had waned, and the sunset lit Josephine's excited eyes with fire: +she was not beautiful, but now, if ever, beauty visited her with a +transient caress. She looked up and met my eyes fixed on her. + +"What is it, Sally?--what do I look like?" + +"Very pretty, just now, Jo; your eyes are bright and your cheek flushed: +the sunshine suits you. I admire you tonight." + +"I am glad," said she, naively. "I often wish to be pretty." + +"A waste wish, Jo!--and yet I have entertained it myself." + +"It's not so much matter for you, Sarah; for people love you. And besides, +you have a certain kind of beauty: your eyes are beautiful,--rather too +sad, perhaps, but fine in shape and tint; and you have a good head, and a +delicately outlined face. Moreover, you are picturesque: people look at +you, and then look again,--and, any way, love you, don't they?" + +"People are very good to me, Jo." + +"Oh, yes! we all know that people as a mass are kindly, considerate, and +unselfish; that they are given to loving and admiring disagreeable and +ugly people; in short, that the millennium has come. Sally, my dear, you +are a small hypocrite,--or else--But I think we won't establish a mutual- +admiration society to-night, as there are only two of us; besides, I am +hungry: let us have tea." + +The next day, Josephine left me. As we walked together toward the landing +of the steamer, Letty Allis emerged from a green lane to say good-bye, and +down its vista I discerned the handsome, lazy person of Henry Malden, but +I did not inform Letty of my discovery. + +A year passed away,--to me with the old monotonous routine; full of work, +not wanting in solace; barren, indeed, of household enjoyments and +vicissitudes; solitary, sometimes desolate, yet peaceful even in monotony. +But this new spring had not come with such serene neglect to the other two +of us three. Against advice, remonstrance, and entreaty from her good +friends, Letty Allis had married Henry Malden, and, in attire more +tasteful, but quite as far from Quakerism as Josephine had predicted, +beamed upon the inhabitants of Slepington from the bow-window, or open +door, of a cottage very _ornée_ indeed; while the odor of a tolerable +cigar served as Mr. Malden's exponent, wherever he abode. And to Josephine +had come a loss no annual resurrection should repair: her mother was dead; +she, too, was orphaned,--for she had never known her father; her only +sister was married far away; and I kept an old promise in going to her for +a year's stay at least. + +Aunt Boyle's property had consisted chiefly in large cotton mills owned by +herself and her twin brother,--who, dying before her, left her all his own +share in them. These mills were on a noisy little river in the western +part of Massachusetts,--in a valley, narrow, but picturesque, and so far +above the level of the sea that the air was keen and pure as among +mountains. Mrs. Boyle had removed here from Baltimore, a few years before +her own death, that she might be with her brother through his long and +fatal illness; and, finding her health improved by change of air, had +occupied his house ever since, until one of those typhoid fevers that +infest such river-gorges at certain seasons of the year entered the +village about the mills, when, in visiting the sick, she took the epidemic +herself and died. Josephine still retained the house endeared to her by +sad and glad recollections; and it was there I found her, when, after +renting the whole of my little tenement at Slepington, I betook myself to +Valley Mills at her request. + +The cottage where she lived was capacious enough for her wants, and though +plain, even to an air of superciliousness, without, was most luxurious +within,--made to use and live in; for Mr. Brown, her uncle, was an +Englishman, and had never arrived at that height of Transatlantic _ton_ +which consists in shrouding and darkening all the pleasant rooms in the +house, and skulking through life in the basement and attic. Sunshine, +cushions, and flowers were Mr. Brown's personal tastes; and plenty of +these characterized the cottage. A green terrace between hill and river +spread out before the door for lawn and garden, and a tiny conservatory +abutted upon the brink of the terrace slope, from a bay-window in the +library, that opened sidewise into this winter-garden. + +I found Jo more changed than I had expected: this last year of country +life had given strength and elasticity to the tall and slender figure; a +steady rose of health burned on either cheek; and sorrow had subdued and +calmed her quick spirits. + +I was at home directly, and a sweeter summer never glowed and blushed over +earth than that which installed me in the Nook Cottage. Out of doors the +whole country was beautiful, and attainable; within, I had continual +resources in my usual work and in Jo's society: for she was one of those +persons who never are uninteresting, never fatiguing; a certain salient +charm pervaded her conversation, and a simplicity quite original startled +you continually in her manner and ways. I liked to watch her about the +house; dainty and fastidious in the extreme about some things, utterly +careless about others, you never knew where or when either trait would +show itself next. She was scrupulous as to the serving of meals, for +instance,--almost to a fault; no carelessness, no slight neglect, was +admitted here, and always on the spotless damask laid with quaint china +stood a tapered vase of white Venice glass, with one, or two, or three +blossoms, sometimes a cluster of leaves, the spray of a wild vine, or the +tasselled branch of a larch-tree jewelled with rose-red cones, arranged +therein with an artist's taste and skill: but perhaps, while she sharply +rebuked the maid for a dim spot on her chocolate-pitcher or a grain of +sugar spilt on the salver, her white India shawl lay trailed over the +divan half upon the floor, and her gloves fluttered on the doorstep till +the wind carried them off to find her parasol hanging in the honeysuckle +boughs. + +But, happily, it is not one's duty to make other people uncomfortable by +perpetually tinkering at that trait in them which most offends our own +nature; and I thought it more for my good and hers to learn patience +myself than undertake to beat her into order; the result of which was +peace and good-will that vindicated my wisdom to myself; and I found her, +faults and all, sufficiently fascinating and lovable. + +A year passed away serenely; and when spring came again, Josephine refused +to let me leave her. Our life was quiet enough, but, with such beautiful +Nature, and plenty to do, we were not lonely,--less so because Jo's hands +were as open as her heart, and to her all the sick and poor looked, not +only for help, but for the rarer consolations of living sympathy and +counsel. Her shrewd common sense, her practical capacity, her kindly, +cheerful face, her power of appreciating a position of want and perplexity +and seeing the best way out of it, and, above all, her deep and fervent +religious feeling, made her an invaluable friend to just that class who +most needed her. + +In the course of this spring we gained an addition to our society, in the +person of Mr. Waring, the son of the gentleman who had bought the mills at +Mrs. Boyle's death, but who had hitherto conducted them by an overseer. He +had recently bought a little island in the middle of the river, just below +the dam, and proposed erecting a new mill upon it; but as the Tunxis (the +Indian name of our river) was liable to rapid and destructive freshets, +the mill required a deep and secure foundation and a lower story of stone. + +This implied some skilful engineering, and Mr. Arthur Waring, having +studied this subject fully abroad, came on from Boston, and took up his +abode in Valley Mills village. Of course, we being his only hope of +society in the place, he made our acquaintance early. I rather liked him; +his manner was good, his perceptions acute, his tastes refined, and he had +a certain strength of will that gave force to a character otherwise +common-place. Josephine liked him at once; she laid his shyness and +_brusquerie_, which were only the expression of a dominant self- +consciousness, to genuine modesty. He was depressed and moody, because he +was bored for want of acquaintance, and missed the adulation and caresses +that he received at home as an only child; but Jo's swift imagination +painted this as the trait of a reflective and melancholy nature disgusted +with the world, and pitied him accordingly; a mild way of misanthropic +speech, that is apt to infest young men, added to this delusion; and, with +all the energy of her sweet, earnest disposition, Josephine undertook his +education,--undertook to teach him faith and hope and charity, to set +right his wayward soul, to renovate his bitter opinions, to make him a +better and a happier man. + +It is a well-known fact in the philosophy of the human mind, that it is +apt to gain more by imparting than by receiving; and since philosophy, +where it becomes fact, does not mercifully adjust its results to +circumstance, but rushes on in implacable grooves, and clears its own +track of whatever lies thereon by the summary process of crushing it to +dust, it did not pause now for the pure intentions and tender heart which, +in teaching another love to men, taught herself love to a man, and learnt +far better than her pupil. + +Mr. Waring was but a man; he did not love Josephine,--he admired her; he +loved nothing but himself, his quiet, his pleasure; and while she +ministered to either, he regarded her with a species of affection that put +on the mask of a diviner passion and used its language. A thousand little +things showed the man fully to me, a cool spectator; but she who needed +most the discerning eye regarded this gay bubble as if it had been a +jewel. + +Perhaps I blame him too severely, for it was against the very heart of my +heart that he sinned; possibly I do not allow for the temptation it was to +a young man, quite alone in a country village, without resources, and +accustomed to the flattery and caresses of a devoted mother, to find +himself agreeable in the eyes of a noble and lovable woman. Possibly, in +his place, a better man might have sought her society, drawn her out of +her reserve for his own delectation, confided in her, worked upon her +pity, claimed her care, played on her simplicity and ignorance of the +world, crept into her heart and won its strength of emotion and its +generous affection,--in short, made love to her, without saying so, +honestly and openly. Yet there are some men who would not have done it; +and even yet, while I try to regard Arthur Waring with Christian charity, +I feel that I cannot trust him, that I do not respect him,--that, if I +dared despise anything God has made, my first contempt would light on him. + +In the autumn, while all this was going on, I received a painful and +wretched letter from Letty Malden, begging me to come to her. I could not +resist such an appeal; and one of Josephine's little nieces having come to +spend the winter with her, I hurried to Slepington,--not, I am sure, in +the least regretted by Mr. Waring, who had begun to look at me with uneasy +and sometimes defiant eyes. + +I found a miserable household here. Mr. Malden had in no way reformed. +When did marriage ever reform a bad man? On the contrary, he was more +dissipated than ever; and whenever he came home, the welcome that waited +for him was one little calculated to make home pleasant; for Letty's quick +temper blazed up in reproach and reviling that drew out worse +recrimination; and even the little, wailing, feeble baby, that filled +Letty's arms and consoled her in his absence, was only further cause of +strife between her and her husband. Often, as I came down the street and +saw the pretty outside of the cottage, waving with creepers, and hedged +about with thorns, whose gay berries decked it as if for a festival, I +thought of what a good old preacher among the Friends once said to me: +"Sarah, thee will live to find shows are often seems; thee sees many a +quiet house, with gay windows, that is hell inside." + +I soon found that I must stay all winter at Slepington. I had a hard task +before me,--to try and teach Letty that she had no right to neglect her +own duties because her husband ignored his. But six months of continual +dropping seemed to wear a tiny channel of perception; and my presence, as +well as the efforts we made together to preserve order, if not serenity, +in the house, restored a certain dim hope to Letty's mind, and I began to +see that the "purification by fire" was doing its work, in slow pain, but +to a sure end. + +Selfish as it was, I cannot say that I felt sorry to return to Jo, who +wrote for me in April, urging me to come as soon as I could, for Mr. +Waring had fallen from the mill-wall and broken his leg, and the workmen, +in their confusion, had carried him to her house, and she wanted me to +help her. I learned, on reaching Valley Mills, that the new building on +the island had not been completed far enough to resist a heavy freshet, +that had swept away part of the first story, where the mortar was not yet +hardened; and it was in traversing these wet stones to ascertain the +extent of the damage that Mr. Waring had slipped, and, unable to recover +his footing, fallen on a heap of stones and received his injury. + +My first question to Josephine was, "Where is Mr. Waring's mother?" + +"He would not send for her, Sally," said she, "because she is not well, +and he feared to startle her." + +"H'm!" said I, very curtly. + +Josephine looked at me with innocent, grave eyes,--dear, simple child!-- +and yet, for anybody but herself she would have been sufficiently +discerning. This love seemed to have remodelled her nature, to have taken +from her all the serpent's wisdom, to have destroyed her common sense, and +distorted her view of everything in which Arthur Waring was concerned. She +had certainly got on very fast in my absence. I had returned too late. + +I had little to do with the care of the invalid; that devolved on Jo; my +offers of service were kindly received, but always declined. Nobody could +read to him so well as Miss Boyle. Nobody else understood his moods, his +humors, his whims; she knew his tastes with ominous exactness. It was she +who arranged his meals on the salver with such care and grace, nay, even +cooked them at times; for Jo believed, like a rational woman, that +intellect and cultivation increase one's capacity for every office,--that +a woman of intelligence should be able to excel an ignorant servant in +every household duty, by just so much as she excels her in mind. In fact, +this was a pleasant life to two persons, but harassing enough for me. Had +I been confident of Arthur Waring's integrity, I should have regarded him +with friendly and cordial interest; but I had every reason to distrust +him. I perceived he had so far insinuated himself into Jo's confidence, +that his whole artillery of expressive looks, broken sentences, even +caresses, were received by her with entire good faith; but when I asked +her seriously if I was to regard Mr. Waring as her lover, she burst into +indignant denial, colored scarlet, and was half inclined to be angry with +me,--though a certain tremulous key, into which her usually sweet and +steady voice broke while she declared he had never spoken to her of love, +it was only friendship, witnessed against her that she was apprehensive, +sad, perhaps visited with a tinge of that causeless shame which even in a +pure and good woman conventionality constrains, when she has loved a man +before he says in plain English, "I love you," though every act and look +and tone of his may have carried that significance unmistakably for years. +Thank God, there is a day of sure judgment coming, when conventions and +shields of usage will save no man from the due vengeance of truth upon +falsehood, justice upon smooth and plausible duplicity! + +In due time Mr. Waring recovered. If there was any change in his manner to +Jo, it was too slight to be seen, though it was felt, and was, after all, +the carelessness of a person certain of his foothold in her good graces, +rather than the evident withdrawal of attention,--which I could have +pardoned even then, had it been the result of honest regret for past +carelessness, and stern resolution to repair that past. Whatever it was, +Jo perceived that her ideal man was become a real man; but, with a +tenacity of nature, for which in my fate-telling I had not given her +credit, she was as constant to the substance as she had been to the dream; +and while she lost both health and spirits in the contemplation of Arthur +Waring's fitful and heedless manner toward her, and was evidently pained +by the discovery of his selfish and politic traits,--to call them by no +harsher name,--it was inexpressibly touching to hear the excuses she made +for him, to see the all-shielding love with which she veiled his faults, +and kept him as a mother would keep her graceless, yet dearest child from +animadversion and reproach. + +In the mean time I heard often from Letty,--no good news of her husband, +but that her child grew more and more a comfort, that her friends were +very kind, and always in a tiny postscript some such phrase as this: "I +try to be patient, Sarah," or "I don't scold Harry so much as I did, +dear." I hoped for Letty, for she persevered. + +That summer we saw less than ever of Mr. Waring; he was very busy at the +mill in order that it might be far enough advanced to resist the +inevitable spring freshets; and besides, we were absent from the Valley +some weeks, endeavoring to recruit Jo's failing health at the sea-side. +But this was a vain endeavor; that which sapped the springs of her life +was past outward cure. She inherited her father's delicate and unreliable +constitution, and a nervous organization, whose worst disease is ever the +preying of doubt, anxiety, or regret. As winter drew on, she grew no +better; a dim, dreamy abstraction brooded over her. She said to me often, +with a vague alarm, "Sally, how far off you seem! Do come nearer!" She +ceased to talk when we were alone, her step grew languid, her eye deeper, +--and its bright expression, when you roused her, was longer in shooting +back into the clouded sphere than ever before. She sat for hours by the +window, her lovely head resting on its casement, looking out, always out +and away, beyond the hills, into the deep spaces of blue air, past cloud +and vapor, to the stars. Sudden noises startled her to an extreme degree; +a quick step flushed her cheek with fire and fluttered her breath. How I +longed for spring! I hoped all from the delicate ministrations of Nature; +though the physician we called gave me no hope of her final recovery. Mr. +Waring himself seemed struck with her aspect, and many little signs of +friendly interest came from him. As often as he could, he returned to his +old haunts; and while the pleasure of his presence and the excitement of +his undisguised anxiety wrought on her, Jo became almost her old self for +the moment, gay, cheerful, blooming,--alas! with the bloom of feverishness +and vain hope. + +So spring drew near. The mill was nearly finished. One day in March a warm +south-wind "quieted the earth" after a long rain, the river began to stir, +its mail of ice to crack and heave under the sun's rays. I persuaded Jo to +take a little drive, and once in the carriage the air reanimated her; she +rested against me and talked more than I had known her for weeks. + +"What a lovely day!" said she; "how balmy the air is! there is such an +expression of rest without despair, such calm expectation! I always think +of heaven such days, Sally!--they are like the long sob with which a child +finishes weeping. Only to think of never more knowing tears!--that is life +indeed!" + +A keen pang pierced me at the vibration of her voice as she spoke. I +thought to soothe her a little, and said, "Heaven can be no more than +love, Jo, and we have a great deal of that on earth." + +"Do we?" answered she, in a tone of grief just tipped with irony,--and +then went on: "I believe you love me, Sally. I would trust you with--my +heart, if need were. I think you love me better than any one on earth +does." + +"I love you enough, dear," said I; more words would have choked me in the +utterance. + +Soon we turned homeward. + +"Tell John to drive down by the river," said Josephine,--"I want to see +the new mill." + +"But you cannot see it from the road, Jo; the hemlocks stand between." + +"Never mind, Sally; I shall just walk through them; don't deny me! I want +to see it all again; and perhaps the arbutus is in bloom." + +"Not yet, Jo." + +"I can get some buds, then; I want to have some just once." + +We left the carriage, and on my arm Jo strolled through the little thicket +of hemlock-trees, green and fragrant. She seemed unusually strong. I began +to hope. After much searching, we found the budded flowers; she loved most +of all wild blossoms; no scent breathed from the closed petals; they were +not yet kissed by the odor-giving south-wind into life and expression; but +Jo looked at them with sad, far-reaching eyes. I think she silently said +good-bye to them. + +Presently we came out on the steep bank of the river, directly opposite +the mill. A heavy timber was thrown across from the shore to the island, +on which the workmen from the west side had passed and repassed; it was +firm enough for its purpose, but now, wet with the morning's rain, and +high above the grinding ice, it seemed a hazardous bridge. As we stood +looking over at the new mill, listening to the slight stir within it, +apparently the setting to rights by some lingering workman of such odds +and ends as remain after finishing the great whole of such a building, +suddenly the cool wind, which had shifted to the north, brought on its +waft a most portentous roar. We stood still to listen. Nearer and nearer +it swelled, crashing and hissing as it approached. Josephine grasped my +arm with convulsive energy, and at that instant we perceived Mr. Waring's +plaid cap pass an open casement. She turned upon me like a wild creature +driven to bay. I looked up-stream;--the ice had gathered in one high +barrier mixed with flood-wood and timber, and, bearing above all the +uprooted trunk of a huge sycamore, was coming down upon the dam like a +battering-ram. Jo gasped. "The river is broken up and Arthur is on the +island," said she, in a fearfully suppressed tone, and, swifter than I +could think or guess her meaning, she had reached the timber, she was on +it,--and with light, untrembling steps half across, when both she and I +simultaneously caught sight of Mr. Waring running for dear life to the +other and stronger bridge. Jo turned to come back; but the excitement was +past that had sustained her; she trembled, she tottered. I ran to meet and +aid her. Just then the roots of the great sycamore thundered against the +dam; the already heavily pressed structure gave way; with the freed roar +of a hurricane, the barrier, the dam, the foot-bridge swept down toward +us. She had all but reached the end of the timber,--I stood there to grasp +her hand,--when the old tree, whirled down by the torrent, struck the +other end of the beam and threw Josephine forward to the bank, dashing her +throbbing, panting breast, with all the force of her fall, against the +hard ground. I lifted her in my arms. She was white with pain. Presently +she opened her eyes and looked up, a flush of rapture glowed all over her +face, and then the awful mist of death, gray and rigid, veiled it. Her +head dropped on my shoulder; a sharp cry and a rush of scarlet blood +passed her lips together; the head lay more heavily,--she was dead. But +Arthur Waring never knew how or for what she died! + +Five years have passed since that day. Still I live at Nook Cottage; but +not alone. Of us three, Josephine is in heaven. Letty is still troubled +upon earth; her husband tests her patience and her temper every hour, but +both temper and patience are in good training; and if ever Henry Malden is +reclaimed, as I begin to see reasons to hope he will be, he will owe it to +the continual example and gentle goodness of his wife, who has grown from +a petulant, thoughtless girl into a lovely, unselfish, religious woman, a +devoted mother and wife, "refined by fire." For me, the last,--whenever +now I say, as I used to say, "Three of us," I mean a new three,--Paul, +baby, and me; for Jo was not a prophet. Four years ago, while my heart- +ache for her was fresh and torturing, a new pastor came to the little +village church of Valley Mills. Mr. Lyman was very good; I have seen other +men with as fine natural traits, but I have never seen a man or woman so +entirely good. He came to me to console me; for he, too, had just lost a +sister, and in listening to his story I for a moment forgot my own, as he +meant I should. But I did not love him,--no, not till I discovered, months +afterward, that he suffered incessantly from ill-health, and was all alone +in the world. I was too much a woman to resist such a plea. I pitied him; +I tried to take care of him; and when he asked me if I liked the office of +sick-nurse, I told him I liked it well enough to wish it were for life; +and now, when he wants to light my eyes out of that dreamy expression that +tells him I am re-living the past, and thinking of the dead, he tells me, +for the sake of the flash that follows, that I offered myself to him! +Perhaps I did. But he is well now; the air of the Tunxis hills, and the +rest of a quiet life, partly, I hope, good care also, have restored to him +his lost health. And I am what Jo said I should have been,--a blessed +mother, as well as a happy wife. The baby that lies across my lap has +traits that endear her to me doubly,--traits of each of us three cousins: +Josephine's hair on her little nestling head, Letty's apple-blossom +complexion, and my eyes, except that they are serene when they are not +smiling. I ask only of the love that has given me all this unexpected joy, +that my little Jo may have one better trait,--her father's heart; a +stronger, tenderer, and purer heart than belonged to any one among "Three +of us!" + + + + +WHAT A WRETCHED WOMAN SAID TO ME. + + +All the broad East was laced with tender rings + Of widening light; the Daybreak shone afar; +Deep in the hollow, 'twixt her fiery wings, + Fluttered the morning star. + +A cloud, that through the time of darkness went + With wanton winds, now, heavy-hearted, came +And fell upon the sunshine, penitent, + And burning up with shame. + +The grass was wet with dew; the sheep-fields lay + Lapping together far as eye could see; +And the great harvest hung the golden way + Of Nature's charity. + +My house was full of comfort; I was propped + With life's delights, all sweet as they could be, +When at my door a wretched woman stopped, + And, weeping, said to me,-- + +"Its rose-root in youth's seasonable hours + Love in thy bosom set, so blest wert thou; +Hence all the pretty little red-mouthed flowers + That climb and kiss thee now! + +"_I_ loved, but _I_ must stifle Nature's cries + With old dry blood, else perish, I was told; +Hence the young light shrunk up within my eyes, + And left them blank and bold. + +"I take my deeds, all, bad as they have been,-- + The way was dark, the awful pitfall bare;-- +In my weak hands, up through the fires of sin, + I hold them for my prayer." + +"The thick, tough husk of evil grows about + Each soul that lives," I mused, "but doth it kill? +When the tree rots, the imprisoned wedge falls out, + Rusted, but iron still. + +"Shall He who to the daisy has access, + Reaching it down its little lamp of dew +To light it up through earth, do any less, + Last and best work, for you?" + + + + +SONGS OF THE SEA. + + +Not Dibdin's; not Barry Cornwall's; not Tom Campbell's; not any of the +"Pirate's Serenades" and "I'm afloats!" which appear in the music-shop- +windows, illustrated by lithographic vignettes of impossible ships in +impracticable positions. These are sung by landsmen yachting in still +waters and in sight of green fields, by romantic young ladies in +comfortable and unmoving drawing-rooms to the tinkling of Chickering's +pianos. What are the songs the sailor sings to the accompaniment of the +thrilling shrouds, the booming double-bass of the hollow topsails, and the +multitudinous chorus of Ocean? What does the coaster, in his brief walk +"three steps and overboard," hum to himself, as he tramps up and down his +little deck through the swathing mists of a Bank fog? What sings the cook +at the galley-fire in doleful unison with the bubble of his coppers? +Surely not songs that exult in the life of the sea. Certainly not, my +amateur friend, anything that breathes of mastery over the elements. The +sea is a real thing to him. He never is familiar with it, or thinks of it +or speaks of it as his slave. It is "a steed that knows his rider," and, +like many another steed which the men of the forecastle have mounted, +knows that it can throw its rider at pleasure, and the riders know it too. +Now and then a sailor will utter some fierce imprecation upon wind or sea, +but it is in the impotence of despair, and not in the conscious, boastful +mastery which the land-songs attribute to him. What, then, does the sailor +sing?--and does he sing at all? + +Certainly the sailor sings. Did you ever walk through Ann Street, Boston, +or haunt the purlieus of the Fulton Market? and when there did you never +espy a huckster's board covered with little slips of printed paper of the +size and shape of the bills-of-fare at the Commonwealth Hotel? They are +printed on much coarser paper, and are by no means as typographically +exact as the aforesaid _carte_, or as this page of the "Atlantic Monthly," +but they are what the sailor sings. I know they are there, for I once +spent a long summer's day in the former place, searching those files for a +copy of the delightful ballad sung (or attempted to be sung) by Dick +Fletcher in Scott's "Pirate,"--the ballad beginning + + "It was a ship, and a ship of fame, + Launched off the stocks, bound for the main." + +I did not find my ballad, and to this day remain in ignorance of what fate +befell the "hundred and fifty brisk young men" therein commemorated. But I +found what the sailor does sing. It was a miscellaneous collection of +sentimental songs, the worn-out rags of the stage and the parlor, or +ditties of highwaymen, or ballad narratives of young women who ran away +from a rich "parient" with "silvier and gold" to follow the sea. The truth +of the story was generally established by the expedient of putting the +damsel's name in the last verse,--delicately suppressing all but the +initial and final letters. The only sea-songs that I remember were other +ballads descriptive of piracies, of murders by cruel captains, and of +mutinies, with a sprinkling of sea-fights dating from the last war with +England. + +The point of remark is, that all of these depend for their interest upon a +human association. Not one of them professes any concern with the sea or +ships for their own sake. The sea is a sad, solemn reality, the theatre +upon which the seaman acts his life's tragedy. It has no more of +enchantment to him than the "magic fairy palace" of the ballet has to a +scene-shifter. + +But other songs the sailor sings. The Mediterranean sailor is popularly +supposed to chant snatches of opera over his fishing-nets; but, after all, +his is only a larger sort of lake, with water of a questionable saltness. +It can furnish dangerous enough storms upon occasion, and, far worse than +storms, the terrible white-squall which lies ambushed under sunny skies, +and leaps unawares upon the doomed vessel. But the Mediterranean is not +the deep sea, nor has it produced the best and boldest navigators. +Therefore, although we still seek the sources of our maritime law amid the +rock-poised huts (once palaces) of Amalfi, we must go elsewhere for our +true sea-songs. + +The sailor does not lack for singing. He sings at certain parts of his +work;--indeed, he must sing, if he would work. On vessels of war, the drum +and fife or boatswain's whistle furnish the necessary movement-regulator. +There, where the strength of one or two hundred men can be applied to one +and the same effort, the labor is not intermittent, but continuous. The +men form on either side of the rope to be hauled, and walk away with it +like firemen marching with their engine. When the headmost pair bring up +at the stern or bow, they part, and the two streams flow back to the +starting-point, outside the following files. Thus in this perpetual +"follow-my-leader" way the work is done, with more precision and +steadiness than in the merchant-service. Merchant-men are invariably +manned with the least possible number, and often go to sea shorthanded, +even according to the parsimonious calculations of their owners. The only +way the heavier work can be done at all is by each man doing his utmost at +the same moment. This is regulated by the song. And here is the true +singing of the deep sea. It is not recreation; it is an essential part of +the work. It mastheads the topsail-yards, on making sail; it starts the +anchor from the domestic or foreign mud; it "rides down the main tack with +a will"; it breaks out and takes on board cargo; it keeps the pumps (the +ship's,--not the sailor's) going. A good voice and a new and stirring +chorus are worth an extra man. And there is plenty of need of both. + +I remember well one black night in the mid-Atlantic, when we were beating +up against a stiff breeze, coming on deck near midnight, just as the ship +was put about. When a ship is tacking, the tacks and sheets (ropes which +confine the clews or lower corners of the sails) are let run, in order +that the yards may be swung round to meet the altered position of the +ship. They must then be hauled taut again, and belayed, or secured, in +order to keep the sails in their place and to prevent them from shaking. +When the ship's head comes up in the wind, the sail is for a moment or two +edgewise to it, and then is the nice moment, as soon as the head-sails +fairly fill, when the main-yard and the yards above it can be swung +readily, and the tacks and sheets hauled in. If the crew are too few in +number, or too slow at their work, and the sails get fairly filled on the +new tack, it is a fatiguing piece of work enough to "board" the tacks and +sheets, as it is called. You are pulling at one end of the rope, but the +gale is tugging at the other. The advantages of lungs are all against you, +and perhaps the only thing to be done is to put the helm down a little, +and set the sails shaking again before they can be trimmed properly.--It +was just at such a time that I came on deck, as above mentioned. Being +near eight bells, the watch on deck had been not over spry; and the +consequence was that our big main-course was slatting and flying out +overhead with a might that shook the ship from stem to stern. The flaps of +the mad canvas were like successive thumps of a giant's fist upon a mighty +drum. The sheets were jerking at the belaying-pins, the blocks rattling in +sharp snappings like castanets. You could hear the hiss and seething of +the sea alongside, and see it flash by in sudden white patches of +phosphorescent foam, while all overhead was black with the flying scud. +The English second-mate was stamping with vexation, and, with all his +ills misplaced, storming at the men:--"'An'somely the weather main- +brace,--'an'somely, I tell you!--'Alf a dozen of you clap on to the main +sheet here,--down with 'im!--D'y'see 'ere's hall like a midshipman's +bag,--heverythink huppermost and nothing 'andy.--'Aul 'im in, Hi say!" +--But the sail wouldn't come, though. All the most forcible expressions of +the Commination-Service were liberally bestowed on the watch. "Give us +the song, men!" sang out the mate, at last,--"pull with a will! +--together, men!--haltogether now!"--And then a cracked, melancholy voice +struck up this chant: + + "Oh, the bowline, bully bully bowline, + Oh, the bowline, bowline, HAUL!" + +At the last word every man threw his whole strength into the pull,--all +singing it in chorus, with a quick, explosive sound. And so, jump by jump, +the sheet was at last hauled taut.--I dare say this will seem very much +spun out to a seafarer, but landsmen like to hear of the sea and its ways; +and as more landsmen than seamen, probably, read the "Atlantic Monthly," I +have told them of one genuine sea-song, and its time and place. + +Then there are pumping-songs. "The dismal sound of the pumps is heard," +says Mr. Webster's Plymouth-Rock Oration; but being a part of the daily +morning duty of a well-disciplined merchant-vessel,--just a few minutes' +spell to keep the vessel free and cargo unharmed by bilge-water,--it is +not a dismal sound at all, but rather a lively one. It was a favorite +amusement with us passengers on board the ---- to go forward about +pumping-time to the break of the deck and listen. Any quick tune to which +you might work a fire-engine will serve for the music, and the words were +varied with every fancy. "Pay me the money down," was one favorite chorus, +and the verse ran thus:-- + + _Solo._ Your money, young man, is no object to me. + + _Chorus._ Pay me the money down! + + _Solo._ Half a crown's no great amount. + + _Chorus._ Pay me the money down! + + _Solo and Chorus. (Bis)_ Money down, money down, pay me the money down! + +Not much sense in all this, but it served to man and move the brakes +merrily. Then there were other choruses, which were heard from time to +time,--"And the young gals goes a-weepin',"--"O long storm, storm along +stormy"; but the favorite tune was "Money down," at least with our crew. +They were not an avaricious set, either; for their parting ceremony, on +embarking, was to pitch the last half-dollars of their advance on to the +wharf, to be scrambled for by the land-sharks. But "Money down" was the +standing chorus. I once heard, though not on board that ship, the lively +chorus of "Off she goes, and off she must go,"-- + + "Highland day and off she goes, + Off she goes with a flying fore-topsail, + Highland day and off she goes." + +It is one of the most spirited things imaginable, when well sung, and, +when applied to the topsail-halyards, brings the yards up in grand style. + +These are some of the working-songs of the sea. They are not chosen for +their sense, but for their sound. They must contain good mouth-filling +words, with the vowels in the right place, and the rhythmic ictus at +proper distances for chest and hand to keep true time. And this is why the +seaman beats the wind in a trial of strength. The wind may whistle, but it +cannot sing. The sailor does not whistle, on shipboard at least, but does +sing. + +Besides the working-day songs, there are others for the forecastle and +dog-watches, which have been already described. But they are seldom of the +parlor pattern. I remember one lovely moonlight evening, off the Irish +coast, when our ship was slipping along before a light westerly air,--just +enough of it for everything to draw, and the ship as steady as Ailsa Crag, +so that everybody got on deck, even the chronically sea-sick passengers of +the steerage. There was a boy on board, a steerage passenger, who had been +back and forth several times on this Liverpool line of packets. He was set +to singing, and his sweet, clear voice rang out with song after song,-- +almost all of them sad ones. At last one of the crew called on him for a +song which he made some demur at singing. I remember the refrain well (for +he _did_ sing it at last); it ran thus:-- + + "My crew are tried, my bark's my pride, +I'm the Pirate of the Isles." + +It was no rose-water piracy that the boy sang of; it was the genuine +pirate of the Isle of Pines,--the gentleman who before the days of +California and steamers was the terror of the Spanish Main. He was +depicted as falling in deadly combat with a naval cruiser, after many +desperate deeds. What was most striking to us of the cabin was, that the +sympathy of the song, and evidently of the hearers, was all on the side of +the defier of law and order. There was no nonsense in it about "islands on +the face of the deep where the winds never blow and the skies never weep," +which to the parlor pirate are the indications of a capital station for +wood and water, and for spending his honeymoon. It was downright cutting +of throats and scuttling of ships that our youngster sang of, and the grim +faces looked and listened approvingly, as you might fancy Ulysses's +veterans hearkening to a tale of Troy. + +There is another class of songs, half of the sea, half of the shore, which +the fishermen and coasters croon in their lonely watches. Such is the +rhyme of "Uncle Peleg," or "Pillick," as it is pronounced,--probably an +historical ballad concerning some departed worthy of the Folger family of +Nantucket. It begins-- + + "Old Uncle Pillick he built him a boat + On the ba-a-ck side of Nantucket P'int; + He rolled up his trowsers and set her afloat + From the ba-a-ck side of Nantucket P'int." + +Like "Christabel," this remains a fragment. Not so the legend of "Captain +Cottington," (or Coddington,) which perhaps is still traditionally known +to the young gentlemen at Harvard. It is marked by a bold and ingenious +metrical novelty. + + "Captain Cottington he went to sea, + Captain Cottington he went to sea, + Captain Cottington he went to sea-e-e, + Captain Cottington he went to sea." + +The third verse of the next stanza announces that he didn't go to sea in a +schoo-oo-ooner,--of the next that he went to sea in a bri-i-ig,--and so +on. We learn that he got wrecked on the "Ba-ha-ha-hamys," that he swam +ashore with the papers in his hat, and, I believe, entered his protest at +the nearest "Counsel's" (_Anglicé_. Consul's) dwelling. + +For the amateur of genuine ballad verse, here is a field quite as fertile +as that which was reaped by Scott and Ritson amid the border peels and +farmhouses of Liddesdale. It is not unlikely that some treasures may thus +be brought to light. The genuine expression of popular feeling is always +forcible, not seldom poetic. And at any rate, these wild bits of verse are +redolent of the freshness of the sea-breeze, the damps of the clinging +fog, the strange odors of the caboose-cookery, of the curing of cod, and +of many another "ancient and fish-like smell." Who will tell us of these +songs, not indeed of the deep sea, but of soundings? What were the stanzas +which Luckie Mucklebackit sang along the Portanferry Sands? What is the +dredging-song which the oyster "come of a gentle kind" is said to love? + +These random thoughts may serve to indicate to the true seeker new and +unworked mines of rhythmic ore. We are crying continually, that we have no +national literature, that we are a nation of imitators and plagiarists. +Why will not some one take the trouble to learn what we have? This does +not mean that amateurs should endeavor to write such ballad fragments and +popular songs,--because that cannot be done; such things grow,--they are +not made. If the sea wants songs, it will have them. It is only suggested +here that we look about us and ascertain of what lyric blessings we may +now be the unconscious possessors. Can it be that oars have risen and +fallen, sails flapped, waves broken in thunder upon our shores in vain? +that no whistle of the winds, or moan of the storm-foreboding seas has +waked a responsive chord in the heart of pilot or fisherman? If we are so +poor, let us know our poverty. + +And now to bring these desultory remarks to a practical conclusion. I have +written these seemingly trifling fragments with a serious purpose. It is +to show that the seaman has little or no art or part in the poetry of the +seas. I have put down facts, have given what experience I have had of some +of the idiosyncrasies of the forecastle. The poetry of the sea has been +written on shore and by landsmen. Falconer's "Shipwreck" is a clever +nautical tract, written in verse,--or if it be anything more, it is but +the solitary exception which proves and enforces the rule. Midshipmen have +written ambitious verses about the sea; but by the time the young +gentlemen were promoted to the ward-room they have dropped the habit or +found other themes for their stanzas. In truth, the stern manliness of his +calling forbids the seaman to write poetry. He acts it. His is a +profession which leaves no room for any assumed feeling or for any +reflective tendencies. His instincts are developed, rather than his +reason. He has no time to speculate. He must be prepared to lay his hand +on the right rope, let the night be the darkest that ever came down upon +the waves. He obeys orders, heedless of consequences; he issues commands +amid the uproar and tumult of pressing emergencies. There is no chance for +quackery in his work. The wind and the wave are infallible tests of all +his knots and splices. He cannot cheat them. The gale and the lee-shore +are not pictures, but fierce realities, with which he has to grapple for +life or death. The soldier and the fireman may pass for heroes upon an +assumed stock of courage; but the seaman must be a brave man in his +calling, or Nature steps in and brands him coward. Therefore he cares +little about the romance of his duties. If you would win his interest and +regard, it must be on the side of his personal and human sensibilities. +Cut off during his whole active life from any but the most partial +sympathy with his kind, he yearns for the life of the shore, its social +pleasures and its friendly greetings. Captains, whose vessels have been +made hells-afloat by their tyranny, have found abundant testimony in the +courts of law to their gentle and humane deportment on land. Therefore, +when you would address seamen effectively, either in acts or words, let it +be by no shallow mimicry of what you fancy to be their life afloat. It +will be at best but "shop" to them, and we all know how distasteful that +is in the mouth of a stranger to our pursuits. They laugh at your clumsy +imitations, or are puzzled by your strange misconceptions. It is painful +to see the forlorn attempts which are made to raise the condition of this +noble race of men, to read the sad nonsense that is perpetrated for their +benefit. If you wish really to benefit them, it must be by raising their +characters as men; and to do this, you must address them as such, +irrespectively of the technicalities of their calling. + + + + +THE KINLOCH ESTATE, AND HOW IT WAS SETTLED. + + +CHAPTER I. + +"Mildred, my daughter, I am faint. Run and get me a glass of cordial from +the buffet." + +The girl looked at her father as he sat in his bamboo chair on the piazza, +his pipe just let fall on the floor, and his face covered with a deadly +pallor. She ran for the cordial, and poured it out with a trembling hand. + +"Shan't I go for the doctor, father?" she asked. + +"No, my dear, the spasm will pass off presently." But his face grew more +ashy pale, and his jaw drooped. + +"Dear father," said the frightened girl, "what shall I do for you? Oh, +dear, if mother were only at home, or Hugh, to run for the doctor!" + +"Mildred, my daughter," he gasped with difficulty, "the blacksmith,--send +for Ralph Hardwick,--quick! In the ebony cabinet, middle drawer, you will +find----Oh! oh!--God bless you, my daughter!--God bless"---- + +The angels, only, heard the conclusion of the sentence; for the speaker, +Walter Kinloch, was dead, summoned to the invisible world without a +warning and with hardly a struggle. + +But Mildred thought he had fainted, and, raising the window, called loudly +for Lucy Ransom, the only female domestic then in the house. + +Lucy, frightened out of her wits at the sudden call, came rushing to the +piazza, flat-iron in hand, and stood riveted to the spot where she first +saw the features on which the awful shadow of death had settled. + +"Rub his hands, Lucy!" said Mildred. "Run for some water! Get me the +smelling-salts!" + +Lucy attempted to obey all three orders at once, and therefore did +nothing. + +Mildred held the unresisting hand. "It is warm," she said. "But the +pulse,--I can't find it." + +"Deary, no," said Lucy, "you won't find it." + +"Why, you don't mean"---- + +"Yes, Mildred, he's dead!" And she let fall her flat-iron, and covered her +face with her apron. + +But Mildred kept chafing her father's temples and hands,--calling +piteously, in hopes to get an answer from the motionless lips. Then she +sank down at his feet, and clasped his knees in an agony of grief. + +A carriage stopped at the door, and a hasty step came up the walk. + +"Lucy Ransom," said Mrs. Kinloch, (for it was she, just returned from her +drive,) "Lucy Ransom, what are you blubbering about? Here on the piazza, +and with your flat-iron! What is the matter?" + +"Matter enough!" said Lucy. "See!--see Mr."----But the sobs were too +frequent. She became choked, and fell into an hysterical paroxysm. + +By this time Mrs. Kinloch had stepped upon the piazza, and saw the +drooping head, the dangling arms, and the changed face of her husband. +"Dead! dead!" she exclaimed. "My God! what has happened? Mildred, who was +with him? Was the doctor sent for? or Squire Clamp? or Mr. Rook? What did +he say to you, dear?" And she tried to lift up the sobbing child, who +still clung to the stiffening knees where she had so often climbed for a +kiss. + +"Oh, mother! _is_ he dead?--no life left?" + +"Calm yourself, my dear child," said Mrs. Kinloch. "Tell me, did he say +anything?" + +Mildred replied, "He was faint, and before I could give him the cordial he +asked for he was almost gone. 'The blacksmith,' he said, 'send for Ralph +Hardwick'; then he said something of the ebony cabinet, but could not +speak the words which were on his lips." She could say no more, but gave +way to uncontrollable tears and sobs. + +By this time, Mrs. Kinloch's son, Hugh Branning, who had been to the +stable with the horse and carriage, came whistling through the yard, and +cutting off weeds or twigs along the path with sharp cuts of his whip. + +"Which way is the wind now?" said he, as he approached; "the governor +asleep, Mildred crying, and you scolding, mother?" In a moment, however, +the sight of the ghastly face transfixed the thoughtless youth, as it had +done his mother; and, dropping his whip, he stood silent, awe-struck, in +the presence of the dead. + +"Hugh," said Mrs. Kinloch, speaking in a very quiet tone, "go and tell +Squire Clamp to come over here." + +In a few minutes the dead body was carried into the house by George, the +Asiatic servant, aided by a villager who happened to pass by. Squire +Clamp, the lawyer of the town, came and had a conference with Mrs. Kinloch +respecting the funeral. Neighbors came to offer sympathy, and aid, if need +should be. Then the house was put in order, and crape hung on the door- +handle. The family were alone with their dead. + +On the village green the boys were playing a grand game of "round ball," +for it was a half-holiday. The clear, silvery tones of the bell were +heard, and we stopped to listen. Was it a fire? No, the ringing was not +vehement enough. A meeting of the church? In a moment we should know. As +the bell ceased, we looked up to the white taper spire to catch the next +sound. One stroke. It was a death, then,--and of a man. We listened for +the age tolled from the belfry. Fifty-five. Who had departed? The sexton +crossed the green on his way to the shop to make the coffin, and informed +us. Our bats and balls had lost their interest for us; we did not even ask +our tally-man, who cut notches for us on a stick, how the game stood. For +Squire Walter Kinloch was the most considerable man in our village of +Innisfield. Without being highly educated, he was a man of reading and +intelligence. In early life he had amassed a fortune in the China trade, +and with it he had brought back a deeply bronzed complexion, a scar from +the creese of a Malay pirate, and the easy manners which travel always +gives to observant and sensible men. But his rather stately carriage +produced no envy or ill-will among his humbler neighbors, for his +superiority was never questioned. Men bowed to him with honest good-will, +and boys, who had been flogged at school for confounding Congo and +Coromandel, and putting Borneo in the Bight of Benin, made an awkward +obeisance and stared wonderingly, as they met the man who had actually +sailed round the world, and had, in his own person, illustrated the +experiment of walking with his head downwards among the antipodes. His +house had no rival in the country round, and his garden was considered a +miracle of art, having, in popular belief, all the fruits, flowers, and +shrubs that had been known from the days of Solomon to those of Linnaeus. +Prodigious stories were told of his hoard of gold, and some of the less +enlightened thought that even the outlandish ornaments of the balustrade +over the portico were carven silver. Curious vases adorned the hall and +side-board; and numberless quaint trinkets, whose use the villagers could +not even imagine, gave to the richly-furnished rooms an air of Oriental +magnificence. Tropical birds sang or chattered in cages, and a learned but +lawless parrot talked, swore, or made mischief, as he chose. The tawny +servant George, brought by Mr. Kinloch from one of the islands of the +Pacific, completed his claims upon the admiration of the untravelled. + +He was just ready to enjoy the evening of life, when the night of death +closed upon him with tropic suddenness. He left one child only, his +daughter Mildred, then just turned of eighteen; and as Mrs. Kinloch had +only one son to claim her affection, the motherless girl would seem to be +well provided for. Mildred was sweet-tempered, and her step-mother had +hitherto been discreet and kind. + +The funeral was over, and the townspeople recovered from the shock which +the sudden death had caused. Administration was granted to the widow +conjointly with Squire Clamp, the lawyer, and the latter was appointed +guardian for Mildred during her minority. + +Squire Clamp was an ill-favored man, heavy-browed and bald, and with a +look which, in a person of less consequence, would have been called "hang- +dog,"--owing partly, no doubt, to the tribulation he had suffered from his +vixen spouse, whose tongue was now happily silenced. He was the town's +only lawyer, (a fortunate circumstance,) so that he could frequently +manage to receive fees for advice from both parties in a controversy. He +made all the wills, deeds, and contracts, and settled all the estates he +could get hold of. But no such prize as the Kinloch property had ever +before come into his hands. + +If Squire Clamp's reputation for shrewdness had belonged to an irreligious +man, it would have been of questionable character; but as he was a zealous +member of the church, he was protected from assaults upon his integrity. +If there were suspicions, they were kept close, not bruited abroad. + +He was now an almost daily visitor at the widow Kinloch's. What was the +intricate business that required the constant attention of a legal +adviser? The settlement of the estate, so far as the world knew, was an +easy matter. The property consisted of the dwelling-house, a small tract +of land near the village, a manufactory at the dam, by the side of Ralph +Hardwick's blacksmith's shop, and money, plate, furniture, and stocks. +There were no debts. There was but one child, and, after the assignment of +the widow's dower, the estate was Mildred's. Nothing, therefore, could be +simpler for the administrators. The girl trusted to the good faith of her +stepmother and the justice of the lawyer, who now stood to her in the +place of a father. She was an orphan, and her innocence and childlike +dependence would doubtless be a sufficient spur to the consciences of her +protectors. So the girl thought, if she thought at all,--and so all +charitable people were bound to think. + +How wearily the days passed during the month after the funeral! The shadow +of death seemed to darken everything. Doors creaked dismally when they +were opened. The room where the body had been laid seemed to have grown a +century older than the other parts of the once bright and cheerful house, +--its atmosphere was so stagnant and full of mould. The family spoke only +in suppressed tones; their countenances were as sad as their garments. All +this was terrible to the impressible, imaginative, and naturally buoyant +temper of Mildred. It was like dwelling in a tomb, and her heart cried out +for very loneliness. She must do something to take her mind out of the +sunless vault,--she must resume her relations with the dwellers in the +upper air. All at once she thought of her father's last words,--of Ralph +Hardwick, and the ebony cabinet. It was in the next room. She opened the +door, half expecting to see some bodiless presence in the silent space. +She could hear her own heart beat between the tickings of the great Dutch +clock, as she stepped across the floor. How still was everything! The air +tingled in her ears as though now disturbed for the first time. + +She opened the cabinet, which was not locked, and pulled out the middle +drawer. She found nothing but a dried rose-bud and a lock of sunny hair +wrapped in a piece of yellowed paper. Was it her mother's hair? As +Mildred remembered her mother, the color of her hair was dark, not golden. +Still it might have been cut in youth, before its hue had deepened. And +what a world of mystery, of feeling, of associations there was in that +scentless and withered rose-bud! What fair hand had first plucked it? What +pledge did it carry? Was the subtile aroma of love ever blended with its +fragrance? Had her father borne it with him in his wanderings? The secret +was in his coffin. The struggling lips could not utter it before they were +stiffened into marble. Yet she could not believe that these relics were +the sole things to which he had referred. There must have been something +that more nearly concerned her,--something in which the blacksmith or his +nephew was interested. + + +CHAPTER II. + +In order to show the position of Mrs. Kinloch and her son in our story, it +will be necessary to make the reader acquainted with some previous +occurrences. + +Six years before this date, Mrs. Kinloch was the Widow Branning. Her +husband's small estate had melted like a snow-bank in the liquidation of +his debts. She had only one child, Hugh, to support; but in a country town +there is generally little that a woman can do to earn a livelihood; and +she might often have suffered from want, if the neighbors had not relieved +her. If she left her house for any errand, (locks were but seldom used in +Innisfield,) she would often on her return find a leg of mutton, a basket +of apples or potatoes, or a sack of flour, conveyed there by some unknown +hands. In winter nights she would hear the voices of Ralph Hardwick, the +village blacksmith, and his boys, as they drew sled-loads of wood, ready +cut and split, to keep up her kitchen fire. Other friends ploughed and +planted her garden, and performed numberless kind offices. But, though +aided in this way by charity, Mrs. Branning never lost her self-respect +nor her standing in the neighborhood. + +Everybody knew that she was poor, and she knew that everybody knew it; yet +so long as she was not in absolute want, and the poor-house, that bugbear +of honest poverty, was yet far distant, she managed to keep a cheerful +heart, and visited her neighbors on terms of entire equality. + +At this period Walter Kinloch's wife died, leaving an only child. During +her sickness, Mrs. Branning had been sent for to act as nurse and +temporary house-keeper, and, at the urgent request of the widower, +remained for a time after the funeral. Weeks passed, and her house was +still tenantless. Mildred had become so much attached to the motherly +widow and her son, that she would not allow the servants to do anything +for her. So, without any definite agreement, their relations continued. +By-and-by the village gossips began to query and surmise. At the sewing- +society the matter was fully discussed. + +Mrs. Greenfield, the doctor's wife, admitted that it would be an excellent +match, "jest a child apiece, both on 'em well brought up, used to good +company, and all that; but, land's sakes! he, with his mint o' money, +a'n't a-goin' to marry a poor widder that ha'n't got nothin' but her +husband's pictur' and her boy,--not he!" + +Others insinuated that Mrs. Branning knew what she was about when she went +to Squire Kinloch's, and his wife was 'most gone with consumption. +"'Twasn't a mite strange that little Mildred took to her so kindly; plenty +of women could find ways to please a child, if so be they could have such +a chance to please themselves." + +The general opinion seemed to be that Mrs. Branning would marry the +Squire, if she could get him; but that as to his intentions, the matter +was quite doubtful. Nevertheless, after being talked about for a year, the +parties were duly published, married, and settled down into the quiet +routine of country life. + +Doubtless the accident of daily contact was the secret of the match. Had +Mrs. Branning been living in her own poorly-furnished house, Mr. Kinloch +would hardly have thought of going to seek her. But as mistress of his +establishment she had an opportunity to display her house-wifely +qualities, as well as to practise those nameless arts by which almost any +clever woman knows how to render herself agreeable. + +The first favorable impression deepened, until the widower came to believe +that the whole parish did not contain so proper a person to be the +successor of Mrs. Kinloch, as his housekeeper. Their union, though +childless, was as happy as common; there was nothing of the romance of a +first attachment,--little of the tenderness that springs from fresh +sensibilities, for she at least was of a matter-of-fact turn. But there +was a constant and hearty good feeling, resulting from mutual kindness and +deference. + +If the step-mother made any difference in her treatment of the two +children, it was in favor of the gentle Mildred. And though the Squire +naturally felt more affection for his motherless daughter, yet he was +proud of his step-son, gave him the advantages of the best schools, and +afterwards sent him for a year to college. But the lad's spirits were too +buoyant for the sober notions of the Faculty. He was king in the +gymnasium, and was minutely learned in the natural history and botany of +the neighborhood; at least, he knew all the haunts of birds, rabbits, and +squirrels, as well as the choicest orchards of fruit. + +After repeated admonitions without effect, a letter was addressed to his +stepfather by vote at a Faculty-meeting. A damsel at service in the +President's house overheard the discussion, and found means to warn the +young delinquent of his danger; for she, as well as most people who came +within the sphere of his attraction, felt kindly toward him. + +The stage-coach that conveyed the next morning's mail to Innisfield +carried Hugh Branning as a passenger. Alighting at the post-office, he +took out the letter superscribed in the well-known hand of the President, +pocketed it, and returned by the next stage to college. This prank only +moved the Squire to mirth, when he heard of it. He knew that Hugh was a +lad of spirit,--that in scholarship he was by no means a dunce; and as +long as there was no positive tendency to vice, he thought but lightly of +his boyish peccadilloes. But it was impossible for such irregularities to +continue, and after a while Mr. Kinloch yielded to his step-son's request +and took him home. + +Next year it was thought best that the young man should go to sea, and a +midshipman's commission was procured for him. Now, for the second time, +after an absence of three years, Hugh was at home in all the dignity of +navy blue, anchor buttons, glazed cap, and sword. + + +CHAPTER III. + +"I have brought you the statement of the property, Mrs. Kinloch," said Mr. +Clamp. "It is merely a legal form, embracing the items which you gave to +me; it must be returned at the next Probate term." + +Mrs. Kinloch took the paper and glanced over it. + +"This statement must be sworn to, Mrs. Kinloch." + +"By you?" + +"We are joined in the administration, and both must swear to it." + +There was a pause. Mrs. Kinloch, resting her hands on her knee, tossed the +hem of her dress with her foot, as though meditating. + +"I shall of course readily make oath to the schedule," he continued,--"at +least, after you have done so; for I have no personal knowledge of the +effects of the deceased." + +His manner was decorous, but he regarded her keenly. She changed the +subject. + +"People seem to think I have a mint in the house; and _such_ bills as come +in! Sawin, the cabinet-maker, has sent his to-day, as soon as my husband +is fairly under ground: forty dollars for a cherry coffin, which he made +in one day. Cleaver, the butcher, too, has sent a bill running back for +five years or more. Now I _know_ that Mr. Kinloch never had an ounce of +meat from him that he didn't pay for. If they all go on in this way, I +sha'n't have a cent left. Everybody tries to cheat the widow"---- + +"And orphan," interposed Mr. Clamp. + +She looked at him quietly; but he was imperturbable. + +"We must begin to collect what is due," she continued. + +"Did you refer to the notes from Ploughman?" asked Mr. Clamp. "He is +perfectly good; and he will pay the interest till we want to use the +money." + +"I wasn't thinking of Ploughman," she replied, "but of Mark Davenport, +Uncle Ralph Hardwick's nephew. They say he is a teacher in one of the +fashionable schools in New York,--and he must be able to pay, if he's ever +going to." + +"Well, when he comes on here, I will present the notes." + +"But I don't intend to wait till he comes; can't you send the demands to a +lawyer where he is?" + +"Certainly, if you wish it; but that course will necessarily be attended +with some expense." + +"I choose to have it done," said Mrs. Kinloch, decisively. "Mildred, who +has always been foolishly partial to the young upstart, insists that her +father intended to give up the notes to Mark, and she thinks that was what +he wanted to send for Uncle Ralph about, just before he died. I don't +believe it, and I don't intend to fling away _my_ money upon such folks." + +"You are quite right, ma'am," said the lawyer. "The inconsiderate +generosity of school-children would be a poor basis for the transactions +of business." + +"And besides," continued Mrs. Kinloch, "I want the young man to remember +the blacksmith's shop that he came from, and get over his ridiculous +notion of looking up to our family." + +"Oh ho!" said Mr. Clamp, "that is it? Well, you are a sagacious woman,"-- +looking at her with unfeigned admiration. + +"I _can_ see through a millstone, when there is a hole in it," said Mrs. +Kinloch. "And I mean to stop this nonsense." + +"To be sure,--it would be a very unequal match in every way. Besides, I'm +told that he isn't well-grounded in doctrine. He even goes to Brooklyn to +hear Torchlight preach." And Mr. Clamp rolled up his eyes, interlocking +his fingers, as he was wont when at church-meeting he rose to exhort. + +"I don't pretend to be a judge of doctrine, further than the catechism +goes," said the widow; "but Mr. Rook says that Torchlight is a dangerous +man, and will lead the churches off into infidelity." + +"Yes, Mrs. Kinloch, the free-thinking of this age is the fruitful parent +of all evil,--of Mormonism, Unitarianism, Spiritualism, and of all those +forms of error which seek to overthrow"---- + +There was a crash in the china-closet. Mrs. Kinloch went to the door, and +leading out Lucy Ransom, the maid, by the ear, exclaimed, "You hussy, what +were you there for? I'll teach you to be listening about in closets," +(giving the ear a fresh tweak,) "you eavesdropper!" + +"Quit!" cried Lucy. "I didn't mean to listen. I was there rubbin' the +silver 'fore you come. Then I didn't wanter come out, for I was afeard." + +"What made the smash, then?" demanded Mrs. Kinloch. + +"I was settin' things on the top shelf, and the chair tipped over." + +"Don't make it worse by fibbing! If that was so, how came the chair to tip +the way it did? You were trying to peep over the door. Go to the kitchen!" + +Lucy went out with fallen plumes. Mr. Clamp took his hat to go also. + +"Don't go till I get you the notes," said Mrs. Kinloch. + +As she brought them, he said, "I will send these by the next mail, with +instructions to collect." + +While his hand was on the latch, she spoke again:-- + +"Mr. Clamp, did you ever look over the deed of the land we own about the +dam where the mill stands?" + +"No, ma'am, I have never seen it." + +"I wish you would have the land surveyed according to this title," she +said. "Quite privately, you know. Just have the line run, and let me know +about it. Perhaps it will be as well to send over to Riverbank and get +Gunter to do it; he will keep quiet about it." + +Mr. Clamp stood still a moment. Here was a woman whom he was expecting to +lead like a child, but who on the other hand had fairly bridled and +saddled _him_, so that he was driven he knew not whither. + +"Why do you propose this, may I ask, Mrs. Kinloch?" + +"Oh, I have heard," she replied, carelessly, "that there was some error in +the surveys. Mr. Kinloch often talked of having it corrected, but, like +most men, put it off. Now, as we may sell the property, we shall want to +know what we have got." + +"Certainly, Mrs. Kinloch, I will follow your prudent suggestions,"--adding +to himself, as he walked away, "I shall have to be tolerably shrewd to get +ahead of that woman. I wonder what she is driving at." + + +CHAPTER IV. + +Ralph Hardwick was the village blacksmith. His shop stood on the bank of +the river, not far from the dam. The great wheel below the flume rolled +all day, throwing over its burden of diamond drops, and tilting the +ponderous hammer with a monotonous clatter. What a palace of wonders to +the boys was that grim and sooty shop!--the roar of the fires, as they +were fed by the laboring bellows; the sound of water, rushing, gurgling, +or musically dropping, heard in the pauses; the fiery shower of sparkles +that flew when the trip-hammer fell; and the soft and glowing mass held by +the smith's tongs with firm grasp, and turning to some form of use under +his practised eye! How proud were the young amateur blacksmiths when the +kind-hearted owner of the shop gave them liberty to heat and pound a bit +of nail-rod, to mend a skate or a sled-runner, or sharpen a pronged fish- +spear! Still happier were they, when, at night, with his sons and nephew, +they were allowed to huddle on the forge, sitting on the bottoms of old +buckets or boxes, and watching the fire, from the paly blue border of +flame in the edge of the damp charcoal, to the reddening, glowing column +that shot with an arrowy stream of sparks up the wide-throated chimney. +How the dark rafters and nail-pierced roof grew ruddy as the white-hot +ploughshare or iron bar was drawn from the fire!--what alternations of +light and shadow! No painter ever drew figure in such relief as the +blacksmith presented in that wonderful light, with his glistening face, +his tense muscles, and his upraised arm. + +Alas! the hammer is still; the wheel dashes no more the glittering spray; +the fire has died out in the forge; the blacksmith's long day's work is +done! + +He settled in Innisfield when it was but a district attached to a +neighboring town. There were but three or four houses in the now somewhat +populous village. He came on foot, driving his cow; his wife following in +the wagon, with their little stock of household goods,--not forgetting his +hammer, more potent than Prospero's wand. The minister, the doctor, and +Squire Kinloch, who constituted the aristocracy, yielded precedence in +date to Ralph Hardwick, Knight of the Ancient Order of the Anvil. + +So he toiled, faithful to his calling. By day the din of his hammer rarely +ceased, and by night the flame and sparks from his chimney were a Pharos +to all travellers approaching the town. Children were born to him, for +which he blessed God, and worked the harder. He attained a moderate +prosperity, secure from want, but still dependent upon labor for bread. At +length his wife died; he wept like a true and faithful husband as he was, +and thenceforth was both mother and father to his babes. + +During all his life he kept Sunday with religious scrupulousness, and with +his family went to the house of worship in all weathers. From the very +first he had been leader of the choir, and had given the pitch with a fork +hammered and tuned by his own hands. With a clear and sympathetic voice, +he had such an instinctive taste and power of expression, that his song of +penitence or praise was far more devotional than the labored efforts of +many more highly cultivated singers. Music and poetry flowed smoothly and +naturally from his lips, but in uttering the common prose of daily life +his organs were rebellious. The truth must be spoken,--he stammered badly, +incurably. Whether it was owing to the attempt to overcome his impediment +by making his speech musical, or to the cadences of his hammer beating +time while his brain was shaping its airy fancies, his thoughts ran +naturally in verse. + +Do not smile at the thought of Vulcan's callused fingers touching the +chords of the lyre to delicate music. The sun shone as lovingly upon the +swart face of the blacksmith in his shop-door, as upon the scholar at his +library-window. "Poetry was an angel in his breast," making his heart glad +with her heavenly presence; he did not "make her his drudge, his maid-of- +all-work," as professional verse-makers do. + +Mr. Hardwick's younger sister was married to a hard-working, stern, +puritanical man named Davenport, (not her first love,) who removed to a +Western State when it was almost a wilderness, cleared for himself a farm, +and built a log-house. The toil and privations of frontier life soon +wrought their natural effects upon Mrs. Davenport's delicate constitution. +She fell into a rapid decline and died. Her husband was seized with a +fever the summer after, and died also, leaving two children, Mark and +Anna. The blacksmith had six motherless children of his own; but he set +out for the West, and brought the orphans home with him. He thenceforth +treated them like his own offspring, manifesting a woman's tenderness as +well as a father's care for them. + +Mark was a comely lad, with the yellow curling hair, the clear blue eyes, +and the marked symmetry of features that belonged to his uncle. He had an +inborn love of reading and study; he was first in his class at every +winter's school, and had devoured all the books within his reach. Then he +borrowed an old copy of Adam's Latin Grammar from Dr. Greenfield, and +committed the rules to memory without a teacher. That was his introduction +to the classics. + +But Mr. Hardwick believed in the duty and excellence of work, and Mark, as +well as his cousins, was trained to make himself useful. So the Grammar +was studied and Virgil read at chance intervals, when a storm interrupted +out-door work, or while waiting at the upper mill for a grist, or of +nights at the shop by the light of the forge fire. The paradigms were +committed to memory with an anvil accompaniment; and long after, he never +could scan a line of Homer, especially the oft-repeated + +[Greek: Tou d'au | Taelema | chos pep | numenos | antion | aeuda], + +without hearing the ringing blows of his uncle's hammer keeping tune to +the verse. + +At sixteen years of age he was ready to enter college, though he had +received little aid in his studies, except when some schoolmaster who was +versed in the humanities chanced to be hired for the winter. But his uncle +was not able to support him at any respectable university, and the lad's +prospects for such an education as he desired seemed to be none of the +best. + +At this point an incident occurred which changed the course of our hero's +life, and as it will serve to explain how he came to give his notes to Mr. +Kinloch, on which the administrators are about to bring suit, it should +properly be related here. + +Mark Davenport was at work on a farm a short distance from the village. He +hoped to enter college the following autumn, and he knew no means to +obtain money for a portion of his outfit except by the labor of his hands. +He could get twenty dollars a month for the summer season. Sixty, or +possibly seventy dollars!--what ideas of opulence were suggested by the +sound of those words! + +It was a damp, drizzly day; there was not a settled rain, yet it was too +wet to work in the corn. Mark was therefore busy in picking loose stones +from the surface of a field cultivated the year before, and now "seeded +down" for grass. A portion of the field bordered on a pond, and the alders +upon its margin formed a dense green palisade, over which might be seen +the gray surface of the water freckled by the tiny drops of rain. Low +clouds trailed their gauzy robes over the top of Mount Quobbin, and flecks +of mist swept across the blue sides of the loftier Mount Elizabeth. + +"What a perfect day for fishing!" thought Mark. "If I had my tackle here, +and a frog's leg or a shiner, I would soon have a pickerel out from +under those lilypads." + +But he kept at work, and, having his basket full of stones, carried them +to the pond and plumped them in. A growl of anger came up from behind the +bushes. + +"What the Devil do you mean, you lubber, throwing stones over here to +scare away the fish?" + +The bushes parted at the same time, showing Hugh Branning sitting in the +end of his boat, and apparently just ready to fling out his line. + +"If I had known you were there fishing," said Mark, "I shouldn't have +thrown the stones into the water. But," he continued, while every fibre +tingled with indignation, "I will have you to know that I am not to be +talked to in that way by you or anybody else." + +"I would like to know how you are going to help yourself," said Hugh, +stepping ashore and advancing. + +"You will find out, Mr. Insolence, if you don't leave this field. You +a'n't on the quarter-deck yet, bullying a tar with his hat off." + +"Bless me! how the young Vulcan talks!" + +"I have talked all I am going to. Now get into your boat and be off!" + +"I don't propose to be in a hurry," said Hugh, with provoking coolness, +standing with his arms a-kimbo. + +The remembrance of Hugh's usual patronizing airs, together with his +insulting language, was too much for Mark's impetuous temper. He was in a +delirium of rage, and he rushed upon his antagonist. Hugh stood warily +upon the defensive, and parried Mark's blows with admirable skill; he had +not the muscle nor the endurance of the young blacksmith, but he had +considerable skill in boxing, and was perfectly cool; and though Mark +finally succeeded in grappling and hurling to the ground his lithe and +resolute foe, it was not until he had been pretty severely pommelled +himself, especially in his face. Mark set his knee on the breast of his +adversary and waited to hear "Enough." Hugh ground his teeth, but there +was no escape; no feint nor sudden movement could reverse their positions; +and, out of breath, he gave up in sullen despair. + +"Let me up," he said, at length. Mark arose, and being by this time +thoroughly sobered, he walked off without a word and picked up his basket. + +Hugh, on the other hand, was more and more angry every minute. The +indignity he had suffered was not to be tamely submitted to. He got into +the boat and took his oar; he looked back and saw Mark commencing work +again; the temptation was too strong. He picked up one of the largest of +the stones that Mark had emptied into the shallow margin of the pond; he +threw it with all his force, and hurriedly pushed off from shore without +stopping to ascertain the extent of the mischief he had done. He knew that +the stone did not miss, for he saw Mark fall heavily to the ground, and +that was enough. The injury was serious. Mark was carried to the farm- +house and was confined to his bed for six weeks with a brain fever, being +delirious for the greater part of the time. Hugh Branning found the town +quite uncomfortable; the eyes of all the people he met seemed to scorch +him. He was bold and self-reliant; but no man can stand up singly against +the indignation of a whole community. He went on a visit to Boston, and +not long after, to the exceeding grief of his mother, entered the navy. + +When Mark was recovering, Mr. Rook, +the clergyman, called and offered to aid him in his college course, if he +would agree to study for the ministry. But the young man declined the +proposal, because he thought himself unfitted for the sacred calling. + +"No," he added, with a smile, "I'm not made for an evangelist; not much +like the beloved disciple at all events, but rather like peppery Peter,-- +ready, if provoked, to whisk off an ignoble ear." + +Mr. Rook returned home sorrowful; and at the next meeting of the sewing- +circle the unfortunate Mark received a full share of attention; for the +offer of aid came partly from this society. When this matter had been the +talk of the village for a day or two, Squire Kinloch made some errand to +the house where Mark was. What passed between them the young man did not +choose to relate, but he showed his Uncle Hardwick the Squire's check for +two hundred and fifty dollars, and told him he should receive a similar +sum each year until he finished his collegiate course. + +The promise was kept; the yearly supply was furnished; and Mark graduated +with honor, having given notes amounting to a thousand dollars. With +cheerful alacrity he commenced teaching in a popular seminary, intending +to pay his debts before studying a profession. + + +CHAPTER V. + +It was Saturday night, and Mr. Hardwick was closing his shop. A customer +was just leaving, his horse's feet newly rasped and white, and a sack of +harrow-teeth thrown across his back. The boys, James and Milton, had been +putting a load of charcoal under cover, for the wind was southerly and +there were signs of rain. Of course they had become black enough with +coal-dust,--not a streak of light was visible, except around their eyes. +They were capering about and contemplating each other's face with +uproarious delight, while the blacksmith, though internally chuckling at +their antics, preserved a decent gravity, and prepared to go to his house. +He drew a bucket of water, and bared his muscular arms, then, after +washing them, soused his curly hair and begrimed face, and came out +wonderfully brightened by the operation. The boys continued their sports, +racing, wrestling, and putting on grotesque grimaces. + +Charlotte, the youngest child, now came to the shop to say that supper was +ready. + +"C-come, boys, you've ha-had play enough," said Mr. Hardwick. "J-James, +put Ch-Charlotte down. M-M-Milton, it's close on to S-Sabba'day. Now w- +wash yourselves." + +Just as the merriment was highest, Charlotte standing on James's +shoulders, and Milton chasing them, while the blacksmith was looking on,-- +his honest face glistening with soap and good-humor,--Mildred Kinloch +passed by on her way home from a walk by the river. She looked towards the +shop-door and bowed to Mr. Hardwick. + +"G-good evenin', M-Miss Mildred," said he; "I'm g-glad to see you lookin' +so ch-cheerful." + +The tone was hearty, and with a dash of chivalrous sentiment rarely heard +in a smithy. His look of half-parental, half-admiring fondness was +touching to see. + +"Oh, Uncle Ralph," she replied, "I am never melancholy when I see you. You +have all the cheerfulness of this spring day in your face." + +"Y-yes, I hev to stay here in the old shop; b-but I hear the b-birds in +the mornin', and all day I f-feel as ef I was out under the b-blue sky, +an' rejoicin' with all livin' creaturs in the sun and the s-sweet air of +heaven." + +"I envy you your happy frame; everything has some form or hue of beauty +for you. I must have you read to me again. I never take up Milton without +thinking of you." + +"I c-couldn't wish to be remembered in any p-pleasanter way." + +"Well, good evening. I must hurry home, for it grows damp here by the + mill-race. Tell Lizzy and Anna to come and see me. We are quite lonesome +now." + +"P-p'raps Mark'll come with 'em." + +"Mark? Is he here? When did he come?" + +"H-he'll be here t-to-night." + +"You surprise me!" + +"'Tis rather s-sudden. He wrote y-yes-terday 't he'd g-got to come on +urgent b-business." + +"Urgent business?" she repeated, thoughtfully. "I wonder if Squire +Clamp"---- + +The blacksmith nodded, with a gesture towards his children, as though he +would not have them hear. + +"Yes," he added, in a low tone, "I g-guess that is it." + +"I must go home," said Mildred, hurriedly. + +"Well, G-God bless you, my daughter! D-don't forgit your old sooty friend. +And ef ever y-you want the help of a s-stout hand, or of an old gray head, +don't fail to come to the ber-blacksmith's shop." + +"Thank you, Uncle Ralph! thank you with all my heart! Good-night!" + +She walked lightly up the hill towards the principal street. But she had +not gone half a dozen yards before a hand grasped her arm. She turned with +a start. + +"Mark Davenport!" she exclaimed, "Is it you? How you frightened me!" + +"Yes, Mildred, it is Mark, your old friend" (with a meaning emphasis). "I +couldn't resist the temptation of giving you a little surprise." + +"But when did you come to town?" + +"I have just reached here from the station at Riverbank. I went to the +house first, and was just going to see Uncle at the shop, when I caught +sight of you." + +Mark drew her arm within his own, and noticed, not without pleasure, how +she yet trembled with agitation. + +"I am very glad to see you," said Mildred; "but isn't your coming sudden?" + +"Yes, I had some news from home yesterday which determined me to come, and +I started this morning." + +"Quick and impetuous as ever!" + +"Yes, I don't deliberate long." + +There was a pause. + +"I wish you had only been here to see father before he died." + +"I wish I might have seen him." + +"I am sure _he_ would never have desired to put you to any trouble." + +"I suppose he would not have _troubled_ me, though I never expected to do +less than repay him the money he was so good as to lend me; but I don't +think he would have been so abrupt and peremptory as Squire Clamp." + +"Why, what has he done?" + +"This is what he has done. A lawyer's clerk, as I supposed him to be, +called upon me yesterday morning with a statement of the debt and +interest, and made a formal demand of payment. I had only about half the +amount in bank, and therefore could not meet it. Then the clerk appeared +in his true character as a sheriff's officer, drew out his papers, and +served a writ upon me, besides a trustee process on the principal of the +school, so as to attach whatever might be due to me." + +"Oh, Mark, were you treated so?" + +"Just so,--entrapped like a wild animal. To be sure, it was a legal +process, but one designed only for extreme cases, and which no gentleman +ever puts in force against another." + +"I don't know what this can mean. Squire Clamp is cruel enough, I know; +but mother, surely, would never approve such conduct." + +"After all, the mortification is the principal thing; for, with what I +have, and what Uncle can raise for me, I can pay the debt. I have said too +much already, Mildred. I don't want to put any of my burdens on your +little shoulders. In fact, I am quite ashamed of having spoken on the +subject at all; but I have so little concealment, that it popped out +before I thought twice." + +They were approaching the house, both silent, neither seeming to be bold +enough to touch the tenderer chords that thrilled in unison. + +"Mildred," said Mark, "I don't know how much is meant by this suit. I +don't know that I shall be able to see you again, unless it be casually, +in the street, as to-night, (blessed accident!)--but remember, that, +whatever may happen, I am always the same that I have been to you." + +Here his voice failed him. With such a crowd of memories,--of hopes and +desires yet unsatisfied,--with the crushing burden of debt and poverty,-- +he could not command himself to say what his heart, nevertheless, ached in +retaining. Here he was, with the opportunity for which during all his +boyhood he had scarcely dared to hope, and yet he was dumb. They were at +the gate, under the dense shade of the maples. + +"Good-night, dear Mildred!" said Mark. + +He took her hand, which was fluttering as by electrical influence, and +raised it tenderly to his lips. + +"Good-night," he said again. + +She did not speak, but grasped his hand with fervor. He walked away slowly +towards his uncle's house, but often stopped and looked back at the +slender figure whose outlines he could barely see in the gateway under the +trees. Then, as he lost sight of her, he remembered with shame the selfish +prominence he had given to his own troubles. He was ashamed, too, of the +cowardice which had kept him from uttering the words which had trembled on +his lips. But in a moment the thought of the future checked that regret. +Gloomy as his own lot might be, he could bear it; but he had no right to +involve another's happiness. Thus he alternated between pride and +abasement, hope and dejection, as many a lover has done before and since. + + +CHAPTER VI. + +Sunday was a great day in Innisfield; for there, as in all Puritan +communities, religion was the central and engrossing idea. As the bell +rang for service, every ear in town heard it, and all who were not sick or +kept at home by the care of young children turned their steps towards the +house of God. The idea that there could be any choice between going to +hear preaching and remaining at home was so preposterous, that it never +entered into the minds of any but the openly wicked. Whatever might be +their inclinations, few had the hardihood to absent themselves from +meeting, still less to ride out for pleasure, or to stroll through the +woods or upon the bank of the river. A steady succession of vehicles-- +"thorough-braced" wagons, a few more stylish carriages with elliptic +springs, and here and there an ancient chaise--tended from all quarters to +the meeting-house. The horses, from the veteran of twenty years' service +down to the untrimmed and half-trained colt, knew what the proprieties of +the day required. They trotted soberly, with faces as sedate as their +drivers', and never stopped to look in the fence-corners as they passed +along, to see what they could find to be frightened at. Nor would they +often disturb worship by neighing, unless they became impatient at the +length of the sermon. + +Mr. Hardwick and his family, as we have before mentioned, went regularly +to meeting; Lizzy and Mark sat with him in the singers' seats, the others +in a pew below. The only guardian of the house on Sundays was a large +ungainly cur, named Caesar. The habits of this dog deserve a brief +mention. On all ordinary occasions he followed his master or others of the +family, seeming to take a human delight in their company. Whenever it was +desirable to have him remain at home, nothing short of tying him would +answer the purpose. After a time he came to know the signs of preparation, +and would skulk. Upon setting out, Mr. Hardwick would tell one of the boys +to catch Caesar so that he should not follow, but he was not to be found; +and in the course of ten minutes he would be trotting after his master as +composedly as if nothing had ever happened to interrupt their friendly +relations. It was impossible to resist such persevering affection, and at +length Mr. Hardwick gave up the contest, and allowed Caesar to travel when +and where he chose. But on Sunday he sat on the front-door step, erect +upon his haunches, with one ear dropping forward, and the other upright +like the point of a starched shirt-collar; and though on week-days he was +fond of paying the usual courtesies to his canine acquaintances, and (if +the truth must be told) of barking at strange horses occasionally, yet +nothing could induce him either to follow any of the family, or accost a +dog, or chase after foreign vehicles, on the day of rest. Once only he +forgot what was due to his character, and gave a few yelps in holy time. +But James, with a glance at his father, who was stoutly orthodox, averred +that Caesar's conduct was justifiable, inasmuch as the man he barked at +was one of a band of new-light fanatics who worshipped in the school- +house, and the horse, moreover, was not shod at a respectable place, but +at a tinker's shop in the verge of the township. A dog with such powers of +discrimination certainly merits a place in this true history. + +The services of Sunday were finished. Those who, with dill and caraway, +had vainly struggled against drowsiness, had waked up with a jerk at the +benediction, and moved with their neighbors along the aisles, a slow and +sluggish stream. The nearest friends passed out side by side with meekly +composed faces, and without greeting each other until they reached the +vestibule. So slow and solemn was the progress out of church, that merry +James Hardwick averred that he saw Deacon Stone, a short fat man, actually +dozing, his eyes softly shutting and opening like a hen's, as he was borne +along by the crowd. The Deacon had been known to sleep while he stood up +in his pew during prayer, but perhaps James's story was rather apocryphal. + +Mark Davenport, of course, had been the object of considerable attention +during the day, and at the meeting-house-door numbers of his old +acquaintances gathered round him. No one was more cordial in manner than +Squire Clamp. His face was wrinkled into what were meant for smiles, and +his voice was even smoother and more insinuating than usual. It was only +by a strong effort that Mark gulped down his rising indignation, and +replied civilly. + +Sunday in Innisfield ended at sunset, though labor was not resumed until +the next day; but neighbors called upon each other in the twilight, and +talked over the sermons of the day, and the affairs of the church and +parish. That evening, while Mr. Hardwick's family were sitting around the +table reading, a long growl was heard from Caesar at the door, followed by +an emphatic "Get out!" The growls grew fiercer, and James went to the door +to see what was the matter. Squire Clamp was the luckless man. The dog had +seized his coat-tail, and had pulled it forward, so that he stood face to +face with the Squire, who was vainly trying to free himself by poking at +his adversary with a great baggy umbrella. James sent away the dog with a +reprimand, but laughed as he followed the angry man into the house. He +always cited this afterwards as a new proof of the sagacity of the grim +and uncompromising Caesar. + +"S-sorry you've had such a t-time with the dog," said Mr. Hardwick; "he +don't g-ginerally bark at pup-people." + +"Oh, no matter," said the Squire, contemplating the measure of damage in +the skirt of his coat. "A good, sound sermon Mr. Rook gave us to-day. The +doctrines of the decrees and sovereignty, and the eternal destruction of +the impenitent, were strongly set forth." + +"Y-yes, I sp-spose so. I d-don't profit so m-much by that inst-struction, +however. I th-think more of the e-every-day religion he u-usually +preaches."--Mr. Hardwick trotted one foot with a leg crossed and with an +air which showed to his children and to Mark plainly enough how impatient +he was of the Squire's beginning so far away from what he came to say. + +"Why, you don't doubt these fundamental points?" asked Mr. Clamp. + +"No, I don't d-doubt, n-nor I don't th-think much about 'em; they're t-too +deep for me, and I ler-let 'em alone. We shall all un-know about these +things in God's goo-good time. I th-think more about keepin' peace among +n-neighbors, bein' kuh-kindly to the poor, h-helpin' on the cause of +eddication, and d-doin' ginerally as I would be done by."--Mr. Hardwick's +emphasis could not be mistaken, and Squire Clamp was a little uneasy. + +"Oh, yes, Mr. Hardwick," he replied, "all the town knows of your practical +religion." Then turning to Mark, he said, blandly, "So you came home +yesterday. How long do you propose to stay?" + +The young man never had the best control of his temper, and it was now +rapidly coming up to the boiling-point. "Mr. Clamp," said he, "if you had +asked a pickerel the same question, he would probably tell you that you +knew best how and when he came on shore, and that for himself he expected +to get back into water as soon as he got the hook out of his jaws." + +"I am sorry to see this warmth," said Mr. Clamp; "I trust you have not +been put to any trouble." + +"Really," said Mark, bitterly, "you have done your best to ruin me in the +place where I earn my living, but 'trust I have not been put to any +trouble'! Your sympathy is as deep as your sincerity." + +"Mark," said Mr. Hardwick, "you're sa-sayin' more than is necess-ssary." + +"Indeed, he is quite unjust," rejoined the lawyer. "I saw an alteration in +his manner to-day, and for that reason I came here. I prefer to keep the +friendship of all men, especially of those of my townsmen and brethren in +the church whose piety and talents I so highly respect." + +"S-sartinly, th-that's right. I don't like to look around, wh-when I take +the ker-cup at the Sacrament, and see any man that I've wronged; an' I +don't f-feel comf'table nuther to see anybody der-drinkin' from the same +cup that I think has tried to w-wrong me or mine." + +"You can save yourself that anxiety about Mr. Clamp, Uncle," said Mark. +"He is not so much concerned about our Christian fellowship as he is about +his fees. He couldn't live here, if he didn't manage to keep on both sides +of every little quarrel in town. Having done me what mischief he could, he +wants now to salve the wound over." + +"My young friend, what is the reason of this heat?" asked Mr. Clamp, +mildly. + +"I don't care to talk further," Mark retorted. "I might as well explain +the pathology of flesh bruises to a donkey who had maliciously kicked me." + +Mr. Clamp wiped his bald head, on which the perspiration was beginning to +gather. His stock of pious commonplaces was exhausted, and he saw no +prospect of calming Mark's rage, or of making any deep impression on the +blacksmith. He therefore rose to depart. "Good evening," said he. "I pray +you may become more reasonable, and less disposed to judge harshly of your +friend and brother." + +Mark turned his back on him. Mr. Hardwick civilly bade him good-night. +Lizzy and Anna, who had retreated during the war of words, came back, and +the circle round the table was renewed. + +"Yer-you'll see one thing," said Mr. Hardwick. "He'll b-bring you, and +p'r'aps me, too, afore the church for this talk." + +"The sooner, the better," said Mark. + +"I d'no," said Mr. Hardwick. "Ef we must live in f-fellowship, a der- +diffi-culty in church isn't per-pleasant. But 'tis uncomf'table for +straight wood to be ker-corded up with such ker-crooked sticks as him." + +[To be continued.] + + + + +A PERILOUS BIVOUAC. + + +It is a pleasant June morning out on the Beauport slopes; the breeze comes +laden with perfume from shady Mount Lilac; and it is good to bask here in +the meadows and look out upon the grand panorama of Quebec, with its +beautiful bay sweeping in bold segments of shoreline to the mouth of the +River St Charles. The king-bird, too lazy to give chase to his proper +quarry, the wavering butterfly, sways to and fro upon a tall weed; and +there, at the bend of the brook, sits an old kingfisher on a dead branch, +gorged with his morning meal, and regardless of his reflected image in the +still pool beneath. The _goguelu_[1] rises suddenly up from his tuft of +grass, and, having sung a few staves of his gurgling song, drops down +again like a cricket-ball and is no more seen. Smooth-plumaged wax-wings +are pruning their feathers in the tamarac-trees; and high up over the +waters of the bay sails a long-winged fish-hawk, taking an extended and +generally liberal view of sundry important matters connected with the +fishery question. + +[Footnote 1: This name is given by the French Canadians to the bobolink or +rice bunting. It is an old, I believe an obsolete, French word, and means +"braggart."] + +Many a year has gone by since I last looked upon this picture, and then it +was a winter scene; for it was near the end of March, which is winter +enough in this region, and the blue water of the bay there was flagged +over with a rough white pavement of crisp snow. I think I see it now, +faintly ruled with two lines of _sapins_, or young fir saplings,--one +marking out the winter road to the Island of Orleans, and the other that +from Quebec to Montmorency; and this memory recalls to me how it fell upon +a certain day, the incidents of which are expanding upon my mind like +those dissolving views that come up out of the dark, I set up a camp-fire +just where that wood-barge nods drowsily at anchor, about a mile this side +of the town. It was a sort of bivouac a man is not likely to forget in a +hurry; not that it makes much of a story, after all,--but a trifling +scratch will sometimes leave its mark on a man for life. I was quartered +in Quebec then; didn't go much into society, though, because I devoted +much of my young energies to shooting and fishing, which were worth any +expenditure of energy in those days. And so I restricted my evening rounds +of duty to one or two houses which were conducted on the always-at-home +principle, walking in and hanging up my wide-awake when it suited me, and +staying away when it didn't,--which was about the oftener. + +In the winter of eighteen hundred and no matter what, I got three months' +leave of absence, with the intention of devoting a great portion of it to +a long-planned expedition, an invasion of the wild mountain-region lying +north of Quebec, towards the head-waters of the Saguenay,--a district +seldom disturbed by the presence of civilized man, but abandoned to the +semi-barbarous hunter and trapper, and frequented much by that prince of +roving bucks, the shy but stately caribou. I need not go into the details +of my two-months' hunt. It was like any other expedition of the sort, +about which so much information has already been given to the world in the +pleasant narratives of the wandering family of MacNimrod. I succeeded in +procuring many hairy and horned trophies of trap and rifle, as well as in +converting myself from some semblance of respectability into the veriest +looking cannibal that ever breakfasted on an underdone enemy. The return +from the chase furnished the little adventure I have alluded to,--a very +small adventure, but deeply impressed upon a memory now a good deal cut up +with tracks and traces of strange beasts of accidents, quaint "vestiges of +creation," ineffaceably stamped upon what poor Andrew Romer used to call +the "old red sandstone," in playful allusion to what his friends well knew +was a heart of hearts. + +The snow lay heavy in the woods, wet and heavy with the breath of coming +spring, as I tramped out of them one March morning, and found myself on +the queen's highway, within short rifle-shot of the rushing Montmorency, +whose roar had reached us through the forest an hour or two before. In the +early days of our hunt I had been so lucky as to run down and kill a large +moose, whose antlered head was a valuable trophy; and so I confided it to +the especial charge of my faithful follower, Zachary Hiver, a _brulé_ or +half-breed of the Chippewa nation, who had hunted buffaloes with me on the +plains of the Saskatchewan and gaffed my salmon in the swift waters of the +Mingan and Escoumains. I had promised him powder and lead enough to +maintain his rifle for the probable remainder of his earthly hunting- +career, if he succeeded in safely conveying to Quebec the hide and horns +of the mammoth stag of the forest. These he had concealed, accordingly, in +a safe hiding-place, or _cache_, to be touched at on our return; and now +as he emerged from the dark pine copse, with his ropy locks tasselling his +flat skull, and a tattered blanket-coat fluttering in ribbons from his +brown and brawny chest, his interest in the venture appeared in the +careful manner in which he drew after him a long, slender _tobaugan_, +heavily packed with the hard-won proceeds of trap and gun. Foremost among +these were displayed the broad antlers of the moose of my affections, +whose skin served as a tarpaulin for the remainder of the baggage, round +which it was snugly tucked in with thongs of kindred material. + +We halted on a broad ledge of rock by the western verge of the bay of the +Falls, glad of an opportunity of enjoying my independence to the last, +unfettered by the conventionalities for which I was beginning to be imbued +with a savage contempt. Here we set up a primitive kitchen-range, and, +having feasted upon cutlets of the caribou, scientifically treated by a +skewer process with which Zach was familiar, we lounged like "lazy +shepherds" in the sun, and the eye of the Indian flashed as I produced +from the folds of my sash a leather-covered flask which did not look as if +it was meant to contain water. During the weeks of the chase I had been +very careful to conceal this treasure from Zach, knowing how helpless an +Indian becomes under the influence of the "fire-water"; and as I had had a +pull at it myself only two or three times, under circumstances of unusual +adversity and hardship, there still remained in it a very respectable +allowance for two, from which I subtracted a liberal measure, handing over +the balance to Zach, who gulped down the _skiltiwauboh_ with a fiendish +grin and a subsequent inhuman grunt. As I lit my pipe after this +satisfactory arrangement, the roar of the mighty Montmorency, whirling +down its turbulent perpendicular flood behind a half-drawn curtain of +green and azure ice, sounded like exquisite music to my ears, and I looked +towards Quebec and blinked at its fire-flashing tin spires and house-tops +burning through the coppery morning fog, until my mind's eye became +telescopic, and my thoughts, unsentimental though I be, reverted to +civilized society and its _agréments_, and particularly to a certain +steep-roofed cottage situated on a suburban road, in the boudoirs of which +I liked to imagine one pined for my return. If memory has its pleasures, +has it not also its glimpses of regret?--and who can say that the former +compensate for the latter? Even now I see her as she used to step out on +the veranda,--the lithe Indian girl, rivalling the choicest "desert- +flower" of Arabia in the rich darkness of her eyes and hair, and in the +warm mantling of her golden-ripe complexion,--unutterably graceful in the +thorough-bred ease of her elastic movements,--Zosime MacGillivray, perfect +type and model of the style and beauty of the _brulée_. She was the only +child of a retired trader of the old North-West Fur Company and his Indian +wife; had been partly educated in England; possessed rather more than the +then average Colonial allowance of accomplishments; and was, altogether, +so much in harmony with my roving forest-inclinations, that I sometimes +thought, half seriously, how pleasant and respectable it would be to have +one such at the head of one's camp-equipage, and how much nicer a +companion she would be on a hunt than that disreputable old scoundrel, +Zach Hiver. + +"Pack the _tobaugan_, Zach! The sun will come out strong by and by, and +the longer we tarry here, the heavier the snow will be for our stretch to +the Citadel. Up, there! _lève-toi, cochon!_" shouted I, in the elegant +terms of address which experience had taught me were the only ones that +had any effect upon the stolid sensibilities of the half-breed,--at the +same time administering to him a kick that produced a _thud_ and a grunt, +as if actually bestowed on the unclean quadruped to which I had just +likened him. The ragamuffin was very slow this time in getting the traps +together on the _tobaugan_, and, if I had not attended to the matter +myself, the moose trophy, at least, would in all probability have been +left to perish, and would never have pointed a moral and adorned a tale, +as it now does, in its exalted position among the reminiscences of things +past. At length we got under way, and, as a walk over the open plain +offered a pleasing variety to a man who had been feeling his way so long +through the dim old woods, I determined to descend from the ridge of +Beauport, and proceed over the snow-covered surface of the bay, in a +bird's-eye line, to our point of destination. Winding down the almost +perpendicular declivity, sometimes sliding down on our snow-shoes, with +the _tobaugan_ running before us, "on its own hook," at a fearful pace, +and sometimes obliged to descend, hand under hand, by the tangled roots +and shrubs, we soon found ourselves on the great white winter-prairie of +the grand St. Lawrence, upon which I strode forward with renewed energy, +steering my course, like the primitive steeple-chasers of my boyhood's +home, upon the highest church-tower looming up from the heterogeneous +huddle of motley houses that just showed their gable-tops over the low +ring of mist which mingled with the smoke of the Lower Town. + +After a progress of about five miles, I found I had very materially +widened the distance between myself and Zach, who, encumbered by the +baggage, and by the spring snow which each moment accumulated in wet heavy +cakes upon his snow-shoes, was now a good mile in my rear. This I was +surprised at, as he generally outwalked me, even when carrying on his back +a heavy load, with perhaps a canoe on his head, cocked-hat fashion, as he +was often obliged to do in our fishing-excursions to the northern lakes. +It now occurred to me, however, that I had incautiously left the brandy- +flask in his charge, and when he came up with me I gathered from his fishy +eye, and the thick dribblings of his macaronic gibberish,--which was +compounded of sundry Indian dialects and French-Canadian _patois_, +coarsely ground up with bits of broken English,--that the modern Circe, +who changes men into beasts, had wrought her spells upon him; a +circumstance at which I was terribly annoyed, as foreboding an ignominious +entry into the city by back-lane and sally-port, instead of my long- +anticipated triumphal progress up St. Louis Street, bearded in splendor, +bristling with knife and rifle, and followed by my wild Indian _coureur- +des-bois_, drawing my antlered trophies after him upon the _tobaugan_ as +upon a festival car. + +"Kaween nishishin! kaw-ween!" howled the big monster, in his mixed-pickle +macaronio,--"je me sens saisi du mal-aux-raquettes, je ne pouvons plus. +Why you go so dam fast, when hot sun he make snow for tire, eh? Sacr-r-ré +raquettes! il me semble qu'ils se grossissent de plus en plus à chaque +démarche. Stop for smoke, eh?--v'là ! good place for camp away there, +kitchee hogeemaus endaut, big chief's house may-be!" grinned he, as he +indicated with Indian instinct and a wavering finger a structure of some +kind that peered through the fog at a short distance on our left. + +We were now within about a mile of Quebec. The Indian's intoxication had +increased to a ludicrous extent, so that to have ventured into the town +with him must have resulted in a reckless exposure of myself to the just +obloquy and derision of the public; while, on the other hand, if I left +him alone upon the wide world of ice, and dragged the _tobaugan_ to town +myself, the unfortunate _brulé_ must inevitably have stepped into some +treacherous snow-drift or air-hole, and thus miserably perished. So I made +up my mind for a camp on the ice; and, diverging from our course in the +direction pointed out by the Indian, we soon arrived at the object +indicated by him, which proved to be a stout framework about twelve feet +square, constructed of good heavy timber solidly covered with deal +boarding, and conveying indubitable evidence, to my thinking, of the +remains of one of the _cabanes_ or shanties commonly erected on the ice by +those engaged in the "tommy-cod" fishery,--portable structures, so fitted +together as to admit of being put up and removed piecemeal, to suit the +convenience of their proprietors. I blessed mentally the careless +individual who had thus unconsciously provided for our especial shelter; +and as the wind had now suddenly arisen sharp from the west, driving the +fog before it with clouds of fine drifting snow, I was glad to get under +the lee of the providential wall, in the hospitable shelter of which, +before two minutes had elapsed, "Stephano, my drunken butler," was snoring +away like a phalanx of bullfrogs, with his head bolstered up somehow +between the great moose-horns, and his brawny limbs rolled carelessly in +the warm but somewhat unsavory skin of the dead monarch of the forest. I +gloried in his calm repose; for the day was yet young, and I flattered +myself that a three-hours' snooze would restore his muddled intellects to +their normal mediocrity of useful instinct, and that I might still achieve +my triumphal entry into the city,--a procession I had been so much in the +habit of picturing to myself over the nocturnal camp-fire, that it had +become a sort of nightmare with me. Indeed, I had idealized it roughly in +my pocket-book, intending to transfer the sketches, for elaboration on +canvas, to Tankerville, the regimental Landseer, whose menagerie of living +models, consisting of two bears, one calf-moose, one _loup-cervier_, three +bloated raccoons, and a bald eagle, formed at once the terror and delight +of the rising generation of the barracks. + +Having got up a small fire with the assistance of the chips and scraps of +wood that were plentifully scattered around, I placed my snow-shoes one on +top of the other, and sat down on them,--a sort of preparatory step in my +transition to civilization, for they had somewhat the effect of a cane- +bottomed chair minus the legs and without a back. Then I filled my short +black pipe from the seal-skin tobacco-pouch, the contents of which had so +often assuaged my troubled spirit when I brooded over griefs which _then_ +were immature, if not imaginary. It was a very pleasant smoke, I +recollect,--so pleasant, that I rather congratulated myself upon my +position; the only drawback to it being that I was shut out from a view of +the town, as the wind and drift rendered it indispensable for comfort in +smoking that I should keep strictly to leeward of my bulwark. Tobacco is +notoriously a promoter of reflection; there must be something essentially +retrospective in the nature of the weed. I retired upon the days of my +boyhood, my legs and feet becoming clairvoyant of the corduroys and +highlows of that happy period of my existence, as the revolving curls of +pale smoke exhibited to me, with marvellous fidelity, many quaint +successive _tableaux_ of the old familiar scenes of home,--sentimental, +some of them,--comic, others,--like the domestic incidents revealed with +exaggerations on the hazy field of a magic-lantern. I thought of my poor +mother, and of the excellent parting advice she gave me,--but more +particularly of the night-caps with strings, which she extracted such a +solemn promise from me to wear carefully every night in all climates, and +which, on the second evening of my sojourn in barracks, were so +unceremoniously reduced to ashes in a noisy _auto-da-fé_. These +retrospective pictures were succeeded by others of more modern date, +coming round in a progressive series, until I had painted myself up to +within a few weeks of my present position, the foreground of my existence. +Then I remembered promises made by me of contributions to a certain +album,--further contributions,--for I had already furnished several pages +of it with food for mind and eye in the form of melancholy verses and +"funny" sketches, with brief dramatic dialogues beneath the latter, to +elucidate the "story." I particularly recollected having volunteered a +translation or imitation of a pretty song in Ruy Blas; and as the fit was +upon me, I produced my pocketbook, to commit to paper a version of it +which I had mentally devised. The leaves of my book were all filled, +however; some with memoranda,--a sort of savage diary it was,--some with +sketches of scenes in the wilderness: there was not a corner vacant. +Turning towards the planking of my bulwark, I perceived that it was +smoothly planed and clean, and to work on it I went, pencil in hand. First +I wrote "Zosime MacGillivray," in several different styles of chirography, +flourished and plain, and even in old text. Then I sketched out a rough +design for an ornamental heading, with a wreath of flowers encircling the +words "To Zozzy," and beneath this work of Art I inscribed the effort of +my muse, which ran thus:-- + + Fields and forests rejoice + In their silver-toned throng; + _I_ hear but the voice + Of the bird in thy song! + + In April's glad shower + Flash petals and leaves, + Less bright than the flower + Round thy heart that weaves! + + Stars waken, stars slumber, + Stars wink in the sky, + Bright numberless number; + But none like thine eye! + + For bird-song and flower + And star from above + Combine in thy bower; + Their union is love! + +My mind being considerably relieved by this gush of sentiment, I felt +myself entitled to unbend a little, and, turning my attention to artistic +pursuits, principally of a humorous character, I developed successively +many long-pent-up imaginings in the way of severe studies of sundry +garrison notables. There was "Bendigo" Phillips, with boxing-gloves +fearfully brandished, appearing in the attitude in which he polished off +young Thurlow of the R.A., under the pretence of giving him a lesson in +the noble art of self-defence, but in reality to revenge himself upon him +for an ill-timed interference in a certain _affaire du coeur_. The agony +of young Thurlow, pretending to look pleased, was depicted by a very +successful stroke of Art. To the extreme right you might have beheld +Vegetable Warren, the staff-surgeon, slightly exaggerated in the semblance +of a South-Down wether nibbling at a gigantic Swedish turnip. Written +lampoons of the fiercest character accompanied the illustrations. But my +boldest effort was an atrocious and libellous cartoon of the commandant of +the garrison, popularly known as "Old Wabbles,"--I believe from the +preternatural manner in which his wide Esquimaux boots vacillated about +his long, lean shanks. This _chef d'oeuvre_ was executed upon a rather +large scale, and I imparted considerable force and breadth to the design +by "coaling in" the shadows with a charred stick. Then calling color to my +aid, as far as my limited means admitted, I scraped from the edges of the +moose-hide a portion of the red-streaked fat, and, having impasted +therewith the bacchanalian nose of my subject, I stepped back a few paces +to contemplate the effect. So ludicrous was the resemblance, that I +laughed outright in the pride of my success,--a transient hilarity, nipped +suddenly in the bud by the loud boom of a cannon, accompanied rather than +followed by a rushing sound a few feet above my head, and a thundering +bump and splutter upon the ice some thirty or forty yards beyond me, as +the heavy shot skipped and ricochetted away with receding bounds to its +vanishing-point somewhere in the neighborhood of the Island of Orleans. +Two strides to the front, and a glance at the broad, black ring emblazoned +on the hitherto disregarded face of my bulwark, and the truth flashed upon +my staggering senses. + +I was encamped in the lee of the bran-new artillery target, and they were +just commencing practice, on this fine bright afternoon, by pitching +thirty-two-pound shot into and about it, at intervals--as I pretty well +knew--of distressingly uncertain duration. With frantic strength I grasped +the Indian by the neck, and, plunging madly through the snow, dragged him +after me a few paces in the direction of our former track; but, hampered +as he was by the moose-trappings, the weight was too much for me, and I +dropped him, instinctively continuing to run with breathless speed, until, +having gained a considerable distance away from any probable line of fire, +I flung myself down upon the snow, and was somewhat startled at finding +Zach very close upon my tracks, tearing along on all fours with a vague +sense of danger of some kind, and looking, in his strange envelope, like +an infuriated bull-moose in the act of charging a hunter. A shot struck +the corner of the target just as we got away from it, slightly splintering +it, so as to give the bewildered Indian a pleasant practical lesson in the +science of gunnery and fortification. + +Two minutes elapsed,--three minutes,--five minutes,--not another shot; but +it might commence again at any moment, and I stood at a respectful +distance from the danger, uncertain what course to pursue for the recovery +of my traps, all of which, rifle, snow-shoes, and _tobaugan_ loaded with +spoils, lay in pledge with the two-faced friend whose treacherous shelter +had no longer any charm for me, when I beheld several sleighs approaching +us from the town at a fearful pace, in the foremost of which, when within +range of rifle, I recognized Old Wabbles, the commandant. + +"Who the Devil are you?" shouted he, as he drove right at us. "Two +Indians, ha!--somebody said it was _one_ Indian with a moose after him, a +man and a moose. Where's Thurlow?--_he_ had the telescope, and asserted +there was a man running round the target and a moose after him. I don't +see the moose." Zach had dropped the hide and horns from his "recreant +limbs," and was seated solemnly upon the snow, in all the majesty of his +native dirt. + +"By Jove, it's Kennedy!" cried Tankerville, whose artistical eye detected +me through my hirsute and fluttering disguise. "What a picturesque +object!--I congratulate you, old fellow!--easiest and pleasantest way in +the world of making a living!--lose no time about it, but send in your +papers at once!--continue assiduously to neglect your person, and you're +worth a guinea an hour for the rest of your prime, as a living model on +the full pay of the Academies!" + +I was soon bewildered by a torrent of inquiries from all sides: as to how +I came behind the target,--what success I had had in the woods,--how many +miles I had come to-day,--whether I had got the martin-skin I had promised +to this one, and the silver fox I undertook to trap for that,--when, +suddenly, a diversion was created by a roar from Phillips, who had +proceeded to inspect my spoils behind the target, and now stood looking at +my portrait-gallery of living celebrities, his great chest heaving with +laughter; and before I could satisfy my inquiring friends, the whole crowd +had rushed pell-mell to the exhibition. + +"Caught, by all that's lovely!" shouted Phillips, repeating my verses at +the top of his voice,-- + + "The bird-song and flower + And star from above + Combine in thy bower; + Their union is love!" + +"Ritoorala loorala loorala loo, ritoorala loorala loorala loo!" chorused +everybody, as he sang the last verse to the vulgar melody of 'Tatter Jack +Welch,' knocking the poetry out of my constitution at once and forever, +like the ashes out of a pipe. "Hooray for Miss Mac! Who should have +thought it, Darby?"--That was _my_ pet name in the regiment. + +"How like!--how very like!--That's Warren there, nibbling the turnip. And +there's Thurlow,--ha! ha! ha! how good! And that--that--that's me, by +Jingo!--he he! he! he!--not so good that, somehow,--neck too long by half +a foot. But the Colonel!--only look at his boots!--He must'n't see this, +though, by Jove!--Choke the Colonel off, boys!--take him round to the +front!--do something!" whispered good-natured Symonds, anxious to keep me +clear of the scrape. + +But it was too late. The last objects that met my view were the ghastly +legs of the Commandant, as he strode through the circle in front of my +Art-exhibition. I saw no more. A soldier is but a mortal man. Rushing to +the nearest cariole,--it was the Commandant's,--I leaped into it, and, +lashing the horse furiously towards the town, never pulled rein until I +got up to my long-deserted quarters in the Citadel. There I barricaded +myself into my own room, directing my servant to proceed to the target +for my scattered property. I had still a month's leave of absence before +me, availing myself of which, I started next morning for New York, +subsequently obtained an extension of leave, sailed for England, and +there negotiating an exchange from a regiment whose facings no longer +suited my taste for colors, I soon found myself gazetted into a less +objectionable one lying at Corfu. + +I have never seen Tankerville's famous picture of my triumphal entry into +Quebec. + + + + +I.--NOVEMBER. + + +The dead leaves their rich mosaics, + Of olive and gold and brown, +Had laid on the rain-wet pavements, + Through all the embowered town. + +They were washed by the Autumn tempest, + They were trod by hurrying feet, +And the maids came out with their besoms + And swept them into the street, + +To be crushed and lost forever + 'Neath the wheels, in the black mire lost,-- +The Summer's precious darlings, + She nurtured at such cost! + +O words that have fallen from me! + O golden thoughts and true! +Must I see in the leaves a symbol + Of the fate which awaiteth you? + + +II.--APRIL. + +Again has come the Spring-time, + With the crocus's golden bloom, +With the smell of the fresh-turned earth-mould, + And the violet's perfume. + +O gardener! tell me the secret + Of thy flowers so rare and sweet!-- +--"I have only enriched my garden + With the black mire from the street." + + + + +THE GAUCHO. + + +What _is_ a Gaucho? + +That is precisely what I am going to tell you. + +Take my hand, if you please. Shod with the shoes of swiftness, we have +annihilated space and time. We are standing in the centre of a boundless +plain. Look north and south and east and west: for five hundred miles +beyond the limit of your vision, the scarcely undulating level stretches +on either hand. Miles, leagues, away from us, the green of the torrid +grass is melting into a misty dun; still further miles, and the misty dun +has faded to a shadowy blue; more miles, it rounds at last away into the +sky. A hundred miles behind us lies the nearest village; two hundred in +another direction will bring you to the nearest town. The swiftest horse +may gallop for a day and night unswervingly, and still not reach a +dwelling-place of man. We are placed in the midst of a vast, unpeopled +circle, whose radii measure a thousand miles. + +But see! a cloud arises in the South. Swiftly it rolls towards us; behind +it there is tumult and alarm. The ground trembles at its approach; the air +is shaken by the bellowing that it covers. Quick! let us stand aside! for, +as the haze is lifted, we can see the hurrying forms of a thousand cattle, +speeding with lowered horns and fiery eyes across the plain. Fortunately, +they do not observe our presence; were it otherwise, we should be trampled +or gored to death in the twinkling of an eye. Onward they rush; at last +the hindmost animals have passed; and see, behind them all there scours a +man! + +He glances at us, as he rushes by, and determines to give us a specimen of +his only art. Shaking his long, wild locks, as he rises in the stirrup and +presses his horse to its maddest gallop, he snatches from his saddle-bow +the loop of a coil of rope, whirls it in his right hand for an instant, +then hurls it, singing through the air, a distance of fifty paces. A jerk +and a strain,--a bellow and a convulsive leap,--his lasso is fast around +the horns of a bull in the galloping herd. The horseman flashes a +murderous knife from his belt, winds himself up to the plunging beast, +severs at one swoop the tendon of its hind leg, and buries the point of +his weapon in the victim's spinal marrow. It falls dead. The man, my +friend, is a Gaucho; and we are standing on the Pampas of the Argentine +Republic. + +Let us examine this dexterous wielder of the knife and cord. _He, Juan de +Dios!_ Come hither, O Centaur of the boundless cattle-plains! We will not +ask you to dismount,--for that you never do, we know, except to eat and +sleep, or when your horse falls dead, or tumbles into a _bizcachero_; but +we want to have a look at your savage self, and the appurtenances +thereunto belonging. + +And first, you say, the meaning of his name. The title, Gaucho, is applied +to the descendants of the early Spanish colonists, whose homes are on the +Pampa, instead of in the town,--to the rich _estanciero_, or owner of +square leagues of cattle, in common with the savage herdsman whom he +employs,--to Generals and Dictators, as well as to the most ragged Pampa- +Cossack in their pay. Our language is incapable of expressing the idea +conveyed by this term; and the Western qualification "backwoodsman" is +perhaps the nearest approach to a synonyme that we can attain. + +The head of our swarthy friend is covered with a species of Neapolitan +cap, (let me confess, in a parenthesis, that my ideas of such head- +coverings are derived from the costume of graceful Signor Brignoli in +"Masaniello,") which was once, in all probability, of scarlet hue, but now +almost rivals in color the jet-black locks which it confines. His face-- +well, we will pass that over, and, on our return to civilized life, will +refer the curious inquirer for a fac-simile to the first best painting of +Salvator, there to select at pleasure the most ferocious bandit +countenance that he can find. And now the remainder of his person. He +wears an open jacket of dirt-crusted serge, covered in front with a +gorgeous eruption of plated buttons, and a waistcoat of the same material, +adorned with equal profuseness, and showing at the neck a substratum of +dubious crimson, supposed to be a flannel shirt. So far, you may say, +there is nothing suspicious or very outlandish about his rig; but +_turpiter desinit formosus superne_,--there is something highly remarkable +_á continuacion_. Do you see that blanket which is drawn tightly up, fore +and aft, toward his waist, and, there confined by means of a belt which +his _querida_ has richly ornamented for him, falls over in uneven folds +like an abbreviated kilt? That is the famous _chiripá_, or Gaucho +petticoat, which, like the _bracae_ of the Northern barbarians some +nineteen hundred years ago, distinguishes him from the inhabitants of +civilized communities. Below the _chiripá_, his limbs are cased in +_calzoncillos_, stout cotton drawers or pantalets, which terminate in a +fringe (you should see the elaborate worsted-work that adorns the hem of +his gala-pair) an inch or two above the ankle. His feet are thrust into a +pair of _botas de potro_, or colt's-foot boots, manufactured from the hide +of a colt's fore-leg, which he strips off whole, chafes in his hand until +it becomes pliable and soft, sews up at the lower extremity,--and puts on, +the best riding-boot that the habitable world can show. Add a monstrous +spur to each heel of this _chaussure_, and you will have fully equipped +the worthy Juan de Dios for active service.--But stay! his accoutrements! +We must not forget that Birmingham-made butcher-knife, which, for a dozen +years, has never been for a moment beyond his reach; nor the coiling +lasso, and the _bolas_, or balls of iron, fastened at each end of a thong +of hide, which he can hurl a distance of sixty feet, and inextricably +entangle around the legs of beast or man; nor the _recado_, or saddle, his +only seat by day, and his pillow when he throws himself upon the ground to +sleep under the canopy of heaven. Neither must we omit the _mate_ gourd +which dangles at his waist, in readiness to receive its infusion of +_yerba_, or Paraguay tea, which he sucks through that tin tube, called +_bombilla_, and looking for all the world like the broken spout of an oil- +can with a couple of pieces of nutmeg-grater soldered on, as strainers, at +the lower end; nor the string of sapless _charque_ beef, nor the pouchful +of villanous tobacco, nor the paper for manufacturing it into +_cigarritos_, nor the cow's-horn filled with tinder, and the flint and +steel attached. Thus mounted, clothed, and equipped, he is ready for a +gallop of a thousand leagues. + +He is a strange individual, this Gaucho Juan. Born in a hut built of mud +and maize-stalks somewhere on the superficies of these limitless plains, +he differs little, in the first two years of his existence, from peasant +babies all the world over; but so soon as he can walk, he becomes an +equestrian. By the time he is four years old there is scarcely a colt in +all the Argentine that he will not fearlessly mount; at six, he whirls a +miniature lasso around the horns of every goat or ram he meets. In those +important years when our American youth are shyly beginning to claim the +title of young men, and are spending anxious hours before the mirror in +contemplation of the slowly-coming down upon their lip, young Juan (who +never saw a dozen printed books, and perhaps has only _heard_ of looking- +glasses) is galloping, like a portion of the beast he rides, over a +thousand miles of prairie, lassoing cattle, ostriches, and guanacos, +fighting single-handed with the jaguar, or lying stiff and stark behind +the heels of some plunging colt that he has too carelessly bestrid. + +At twenty-one he is in his glory. Then we must look for him in the +_pulperÃas_, the bar-rooms of the Pampas, whither he repairs on Sundays +and _fiestas_, to get drunk on _aguardiente_ or on Paraguay rum. There you +may see him seated, listening open-mouthed to the _cantor_, or Gaucho +troubadour, as he sings the marvellous deeds of some desert hero, +persecuted, unfortunately, by the myrmidons of justice for the numerous +_misfortunes_ (_Anglicé_, murders) upon his head,--or narrates in +impassioned strain, to the accompaniment of his guitar, the circumstances +of one in which he has borne a part himself,--or chants the frightful end +of the Gaucho Attila, Quiroga, and the punishment that overtook his +murderer, the daring Santos Perez. When the song is over, the cards are +dealt. Seated upon a dried bull's-hide, each man with his unsheathed knife +placed ostentatiously at his side, the jolly Gauchos commence their game. +Suddenly Manuel exclaims, that Pedro or Estanislao or Antonio is playing +false. Down fly the cards; up flash the blades; a ring is formed. Manuel, +to tell the truth, has accused his friend Pedro only for the sake of a +little sport; he has never _marked_ a man yet, and thinks it high time +that that honor were attained. So the sparks fly from the flashing blades, +and Pedro's nose has got another gash in it, and Manuel is bleeding in a +dozen places, but he will not give in just yet. Unfortunate Gaucho! Pedro +the next moment slips in a sticky pool of his own blood, and Manuel's +knife is buried in his heart! "He is killed! Manuel has had a misfortune!" +exclaim the ring; "fly, Manuel, fly!" In another minute, and just as the +_vigilantes_ are throwing themselves upon their horses to pursue him, he +has galloped out of sight. + +Twenty miles from the _pulperÃa_ he draws rein, dismounts, wipes his +bloody knife on the grass, and slices off a collop of _charque_, which he +munches composedly for his supper. Very likely this _misfortune_ will make +him a _Gaucho malo_. The _Gaucho malo_ is an outlaw, at home only in the +desert, intangible as the wind, sanguinary, remorseless, swift. His +brethren of the _estancia_ pronounce his name occasionally, but in lowered +tones, and with a mixture of terror and respect; he is looked up to by +them as a sort of higher being. His home is a movable point upon an area +of twenty thousand square miles; his horse, the finest steed that he can +find upon the Pampas between Buenos Ayres and the Andes, between the Gran +Chaco and Cape Horn; his food, the first beef that he captures with his +lasso; his dainties, the tongues of cows which he kills, and abandons, +when he has stripped them of his favorite titbit, to the birds of prey. +Sometimes he dashes into a village, drinks a gourdful of _aguardiente_ +with the admiring guests at the _pulperÃa_, and spurs away again into +obscurity, until at length the increasing number of his _desgracias_ +tempts the mounted emissaries of justice to pursue him, in the hope of +extra reward. If suddenly beset by seven or eight of these desert police, +the _Gaucho malo_ slashes right and left with his redoubted knife,--kills +one, maims another, wounds them all. Perhaps he reaches his horse and is +off and away amid a shower of harmless balls;--or he is taken; in which +case, all that remains, the day after, of the _Gaucho malo_, is a lump of +soulless clay. + +Then there is the guide, or _vaqueano_. This man, as one who knows him +well informs us, is a grave and reserved Gaucho, who knows by heart the +peculiarities of twenty thousand leagues of mountain, wood, and plain! He +is the only _map_ that an Argentinian general takes with him in a +campaign; and the _vaqueano_ is never absent from his side. No plan is +formed without his concurrence. The army's fate, the success of a battle, +the conquest of a province, is entirely dependent upon his integrity and +skill; and, strange to say, there is scarcely an instance on record of +treachery on the part of a _vaqueano_. He meets a pathway which crosses +the road upon which he is travelling, and he can tell you the exact +distance of the remote watering-place to which it leads; if he meet with a +thousand similar pathways in a journey of five hundred miles, it will +still be the same. He can point out the fords of a hundred rivers; he can +guide you in safety through a hundred trackless woods. Stand with him at +midnight on the Pampa,--let the track be lost,--no moon or stars; the +_vaqueano_ quietly dismounts, examines the foliage of the trees, if any +are near, and if there are none, plucks from the ground a handful of +roots, chews them, smells and tastes the soil, and tells +you that so many hours' travel due north or south will bring you to your +destination. Do not doubt him; he is infallible. + +A mere _vaqueano_ was General Rivera of Uruguay,--but he knew every tree, +every hillock, every dell, in a region extending over more than 70,000 +square miles! Without his aid, Brazil would have been powerless in the +Banda Oriental; without his aid, the Argentinians would never have +triumphed over Brazil. As a smuggler in 1804, as a custom-house officer a +few years later, as a patriot, a freebooter, a Brazilian general, an +Argentinian commander, as President of Uruguay against Lavalleja, as an +outlaw against General Oribe, and finally against Rosas, allied with +Oribe, as champion of the Banda Oriental del Uruguay, Rivera had certainly +ample opportunities for perfecting himself in that study of which he was +the ardent devotee. + +Cooper has told us how and by what signs, in years that have forever +faded, the Huron tracked his flying foe through the forests of the North; +we read of Cuban bloodhounds, and of their frightful baying on the scent +of the wretched maroon; we know how the Bedouin follows his tribe over +pathless sands;--and yet all these are bunglers, in comparison with the +_Gaucho rastreador_! + +In the interior of the Argentine every Gaucho is a trailer or +_rastreador_. On those vast feeding-grounds of a million cattle, whose +tracks intersect each other in every direction, the herdsman can +distinguish with unerring accuracy the footprints of his own peculiar +charge. When an animal is missing from the herd, he throws himself upon +his horse, gallops to the spot where he remembers having seen it last, +gazes for a moment upon the trampled soil, and then shoots off for miles +across the waste. Every now and then he halts, surveys the trail, and +again speeds onward in pursuit. At last he reaches the limits of another +_estancia_, and the pasturage of a stranger herd. His eagle eye singles +out at a glance the estray; rising in his stirrup, he whirls the lasso for +a moment above his head, launches it through the air, and coolly drags the +recalcitrant beast away on the homeward trail. He is nothing but a common, +comparatively unskilled, _rastreador_. + +The official trailer is of another stamp. Like his kinsman, the +_vaqueano_, he is a personage well convinced of his own importance; grave, +reserved, taciturn, whose word is law. Such a one was the famous Calébar, +the dreaded thief-taker of the Pampas, the Vidocq of Buenos Ayres. This +man during more than forty years exercised his profession in the Republic, +and a few years since was living, at an advanced age, not far from Buenos +Ayres. There appeared to be concentrated in him the acuteness and keen +perceptions of all the brethren of his craft; it was impossible to deceive +him; no one whose trail he had once beheld could hope to escape discovery. +An adventurous vagabond once entered his house, during his temporary +absence on a journey to Buenos Ayres, and purloined his best saddle. When +the robbery was discovered, his wife covered the robber's trail with a +kneading-trough. Two months later Calébar returned, and was shown the +almost obliterated footprint. Months rolled by; the saddle was apparently +forgotten; but a year and a half later, as the _rastreador_ was again at +Buenos Ayres, a footprint in the street attracted his notice. He followed +the trail; passed from street to street and from _plaza_ to _plaza_, and +finally entering a house in the suburbs, laid his hand upon the begrimed +and worn-out saddle which had once been his own _montura de fiesta_! + +In 1830, a prisoner, awaiting the death-penalty, effected his escape from +jail. Calébar, with a detachment of soldiers, was put upon the scent. +Expecting this, and knowing that the gallows lay behind him, the fugitive +had adopted every expedient for baffling his pursuers: he had walked long +distances upon tiptoe; had scrambled along walls; had walked backwards, +crawled, doubled, leaped; but all in vain! Calébar's blood was up; his +reputation was at stake; to fail now would be an indelible disgrace. If +now and then he found himself at fault, he as often recovered the trail, +until the bank of a water-course was reached, to which the flying criminal +had taken. The trail was lost; the soldiers would have turned back; but +Calébar had no such thought. He patiently followed the course of the +_acequia_ for a few rods, and suddenly halting, said to his companions, +"Here is the spot at which he left the canal; there is no trail,--not a +footprint,--but do you see those drops of water upon the grass?" With this +slight clue they were led towards a vineyard. Calébar examined it at every +side, and bade the soldiers enter, saying, "He is there!" The men obeyed +him, but shortly reported that no living being was within the walls. "He +is there!" quietly reiterated Calébar; and, in fact, a second more +thorough examination resulted in the capture of the trembling fugitive, +who was executed on the following day.--There can be no doubt regarding +the literal exactness of this anecdote. + +At another time, we are told, a party of political prisoners, incarcerated +by General Rosas, had contrived a plan of escape, in which they were to be +aided by friends outside. When all was ready, one of the party suddenly +exclaimed,-- + +"But Calébar! you forget him!" + +"Calébar!" echoed his friends; "true, it is useless to escape while he can +pursue us!" + +Nor was any flight attempted until the dreaded trailer had been bribed to +fall ill for a few days, when the prisoners succeeded in making good their +escape. + +He who would learn more of Calébar and his brother-trailers, let him +procure a copy of the little work that now lies before us,[1] in the shape +of a tattered duo-decimo, which has come to us across the Andes and around +Cape Horn, from the most secluded corner of the Argentine Confederation. +Badly printed and barbarously bound, this "Life of Juan Facundo Quiroga" +is nevertheless replete with the evidence of genius, and bears the stamp +of a generously-cultivated mind. Its author, indeed, the poet-patriot- +philosopher, Don Domingo F. Sarmiento, may be called the Lamartine of +South America, whose eventful career may some day invite us to an +examination. Suffice it now to say, that he was expelled by Rosas in 1840 +from Buenos Ayres, and that he took his way to Chile, with the intention +in that hospitable republic of devoting his pen to the service of his +oppressed country. At the baths of Zonda he wrote with charcoal, under a +delineation of the national arms: _On ne tue point les idées_! which +inscription, having been reported to the Gaucho chieftain, a committee was +appointed to decipher and translate it. When the wording of the +significant hint was conveyed to Rosas, he exclaimed,--"Well, what does it +mean?" The answer was conveyed to him in 1852; and the sentence serves as +epigraph to the present life of his associate and victim, Facundo Quiroga. + +[Footnote 1: _Vida de Juan Facundo Quiroga_, etc., por Domingo F. +Sarmiento. Santiago, 1845.] + +In this extraordinary character we see the quintessence of that desert- +life some types of which we have endeavored to delineate. As one who, +rising from the lowest station to heights of uncontrolled power, as a +representative of a class of rulers unfortunately too common in the +republics that descend from Spain, and as a remarkable instance of brutal +force and barbaric stubbornness triumphing over reason, science, +education, and, in a word, civilization, he is admirably portrayed by Sr. +Sarmiento. Ours be the task to condense into a few pages the story of his +life and death. + +The Argentine province of La Rioja embraces vast tracts of sandy desert. +Destitute of rivers, bare of trees, it is only by means of artificial and +scanty irrigation that the peasant can cultivate a narrow strip of land. +Inclosed by these arid wastes lies, nevertheless, a fertile region +entitled the Plains, which, in despite of its name, is broken by ridges of +hills, and supports a luxuriant vegetation with pastures trodden by +unnumbered herds. The character of the people is Oriental; their +appearance actually recalls, as we are told, that of the ancient dwellers +about Jerusalem; their very customs have rather an Arabic than a Spanish +tinge. + +Somewhere upon these _Llanos_, and toward the close of the eighteenth +century, Don Prudencio Quiroga, as a well-to-do _estanciero_ or grazier, +was gladdened (doubtless) by the birth of a lusty son. He called him Juan +Facundo. For the first few years of his existence, we may safely believe, +the future general was scarcely distinguishable from a common baby. +Obstinate he doubtless was, and fierce and cruel in his tiny way; were his +mother still alive, the good woman could doubtless tell us of many a +bitter moment spent in lamenting her infant's waywardness; but we hear +nothing of him until the year 1799, when he was sent to San Juan, a town +then celebrated for its schools and learning, to acquire the rudiments of +knowledge. At the age of eleven the boy already manifested the character +of the future man. Solitary, disdainful, rebellious, his intercourse with +his schoolfellows was limited to the interchange of blows, his only +amusement lay in the annoyance of those with whom he was brought in +contact. He is already a perfect Gaucho; can wield the lasso, and the +_bolas_, and the knife; is a fearless _ginete_, a consummate horseman. One +day at school, the master, irritated beyond endurance, exhibits a new rod, +bought expressly, so he says, "for flogging Facundo." When the boy is +called up to recite, he blunders, stammers, hesitates, on purpose. Down +comes the rod; with a vigorous kick Facundo upsets the pedagogue's rickety +throne, and takes to his heels. After a three-days' search, he is +discovered secreted in a vineyard outside the town. + +This little incident, of so trifling import at the time, was remembered +in after years as an early indication of the ferocious and uncontrollable +_caudillo's_ character. But it was soon eclipsed by the reckless deeds +that followed each other in quick succession between his fifteenth and +twentieth years. He speedily became notorious in the little town for his +wild moroseness, for his savage ferocity when excited, for his inordinate +love of cards. Gaming, a passion with many, was a necessary of life to +him; it was the only pursuit to which he was ever constant; it gave rise +to the quarrel in which, while yet a schoolboy, he for the first time +spilt blood. + +By and by we lose sight of the student of San Juan. He has absolutely +_sunk_ out of sight. Yet, if we peer into filthy _pulperÃas_ here and +there between San Luis and San Juan, we may catch a glimpse of a shaggy, +swarthy savage, gambling, gambling as if for life; and we may also hear of +more than one affray in which his dagger has "come home richer than it +went." A little later, the son of wealthy Don Prudencio has become--not a +common laborer--but a comrade of common laborers. He chooses the most +toilsome, the most unintellectual, but, at the same time, the most +remunerative handicraft,--that of the _tapiador_, or builder of mud +walls. At San Juan, in the orchard of the Godoys,--at Fiambalá, in La +Rioja, in the city of Mendoza,--they will show you walls which the hands +of General Facundo Quiroga, _Comandante de Campaña_, etc., etc., put +together. Wherever he works, he is noted for the ascendency which he +maintains over the other peons. They are entirely subject to his will; +they do nothing without his advice; he is worth, say his employers, a +dozen overseers. Ah, he is yet to rule on a larger scale! + +Did these people ever think,--as they watched the sombre, stubborn Gaucho +sweating over a _tapia_, subjecting a drove of peons to his authority, or, +stretched upon a hide, growing ferocious as the luck went against him at +cards,--that here was one of those forces which mould or overturn the +world? Could it ever have occurred to the Godoys of San Juan, to the +worthy municipality of Mendoza, that this scowling savage was yet to place +his heel upon their prostrate forms, and most thoroughly to exhibit, +through weary, sanguinary years, the reality of that tremendous saying,-- +"The State? _I_ am the State!"? + +Doubtless no. Little as the comrades of Maximin imagined that the +truculent Goth was yet to wear the blood-stained purple, little as the +clients of Robespierre dreamed of the vortex toward which he was being +insensibly hurried by the stream of years, did the men, whose names are +thrown out from their obscurity by the glare of his misdeeds, conceive +that their fortunes, their lives, all things but their souls, were shortly +to depend upon the capricious breath of this servant who so quietly pounds +away upon their mud inclosures. + +He does not long, however, remain the companion of peons. Eighteen hundred +and ten has come, bringing with it liberty, and bloodshed, and universal +discord. The sun of May beams down upon a desolated land. For the mild, +although repressive viceregal sway is substituted that of a swarm of +military chieftains, who, fighting as patriots against Liniers and his +ill-fated troops, as rivals with each other, or as _montanero_-freebooters +against all combined, swept the plains with their harrying lancers from +the seacoast to the base of the Cordillera. + +In this period of anarchy we catch another glimpse of Juan Facundo. He has +worked his way down to Buenos Ayres, nine hundred miles from home, and +enlists in the regiment of _Arribeños_, raised by his countryman, General +Ocampo, to take part in the liberation of Chile. But even the +infinitesimal degree of discipline to which his fellow-soldiers had been +reduced was too much for his wild spirit; already he feels that command, +and not obedience, is his birthright; there is soon a vacancy in the +ranks. + +With three companions Quiroga took to the desert. He was followed and +overtaken by an armed detachment, or _partida_; summoned to surrender; the +odds are overpowering. But this man bids defiance to the world; he is yet, +in this very region, to rout well-appointed and disciplined armies with a +handful of men; and he engages the _partida_. A sanguinary conflict is the +result, in which Quiroga, slaying four or five of his assailants, comes +off victorious, and pursues his journey in the teeth of other bands which +are ordered to arrest him. He reaches his native plains, and, after a +flying visit to his parents, we again lose sight of the _Gaucho malo_. +Blurred rumors of his actions have, indeed, been preserved; accounts of +brutality toward his gray-haired father, of burnings of the dwelling in +which he first saw the light, of endless gaming, and plentiful shedding of +blood; but we hear nothing positive concerning him until the year 1818. +Somewhere in that year he determines to join the band of freebooters under +Ramirez, which was then devastating the eastern provinces. And here--O +deep designs of Fate!--the very means intended to check his mad career +serve only to accelerate its development. Dupuis, governor of San Luis, +through which province he is passing on his way to join Ramirez, arrests +the _Gaucho malo_, and throws him into the common jail, there to rot or +starve as Fortune may direct. + +But she had other things in store for him. A number of Spanish officers, +captured by San Martin in Chile, were confined within the same walls. +Goaded to the energy of despair by their sufferings, and convinced that +after all they could die no more than once, the Spaniards rose one day, +broke open the doors of their prison, and proceeded to that part of the +building where the common malefactors, and among them Juan Facundo, were +confined. No sooner was Facundo set at liberty, than he snatched the bolt +of the prison-gate, from the very hand which had just withdrawn it to set +him free, crushed the Spaniard's skull with the heavy iron, and swung it +right and left, until, according to his own statement, made at a later +date, no less than fourteen corpses were stiffening on the ground. His +example incited his companions to aid him in subduing the revolt of their +fellow-prisoners; and, as a reward for "loyal and heroic conduct," he was +restored to his privileges as a citizen. + +Thus, in the energetic language of his biographer, was his name ennobled, +and cleansed, but with _blood_, from the stains that defiled it. +Persecuted no longer, nay, even caressed by the government, he returned to +his native plains, to stalk with added haughtiness and new titles to +esteem among his brother Gauchos of La Rioja. + +Having in this manner taken a rapid survey of the most salient points in +his private career up to the year 1820, we may pause for a moment, before +studying his public life, to glance at the condition of his native country +in the first decade of its independence. The partial separation from +Spain, which was effected on the 25th May, 1810, was followed by a long +and bloody struggle, in all the southern provinces, between the royal +forces and the adherents of the Provisional Junta. Such framework of +government as had been in existence was practically annihilated, and the +various provinces of the late Viceroyalty of Buenos Ayres fell a prey to +the military chieftains who could attract around them the largest number +of Gaucho cavalry,--while civilization, commerce, and every peaceful art, +declined at a rapid rate. No alteration in this state of affairs was +effected by the final Declaration of Independence, made at Tucuman, July +9, 1816; and in 1820, Buenos Ayres, the seat of the government which +claimed to be supreme, was seized by a confederacy of the provincial +chiefs, who secured, by the destruction of the Directorial Government, +complete and unchallenged independence for themselves. During this +anarchical period, the famous Artigas was harrying the Banda Oriental; +Rosas and Lopez were preparing for their blood-stained careers; Bustos, +Ibarra, and a host of other _caudillos_, ruled the interior provinces; and +Juan Facundo Quiroga was raised to irresponsible power. + +In his native province of La Rioja the mastery had for many years been +disputed by two powerful houses, the Ocampos and the Dávilas, both +descended from noble families in Spain. In the year 1820 the former were +triumphant, and possessed all the authority then wielded in the province. +From them Facundo received the appointment of Sergeant-Major of Militia, +with the powers of _Comandante de Campaña_, or District Commandant. + +In any other country the nomination to such a post of a man rendered +notorious by his contempt for authority, who already boasted of no less +than thirty murders, and who had voluntarily placed himself in the lowest +ranks of society, would be a thing absolutely incredible; but the Ocampos +probably felt the insecurity of their authority, and were sufficiently +sagacious to attempt, at least, to render that man a useful adherent or +ally, who might, if allured by their foes, prove a terrible weapon against +them. But they found in Quiroga no submissive servant. So openly did he +disregard the injunctions of his superiors, that a corps of the principal +officers in the army entreated their general, Ocampo, to seize upon and +execute the rebellious Gaucho, but failed in inducing him to adopt their +advice. It was not long before he had occasion to repent his leniency, or +his weakness. + +A mutiny having occurred among some troops at San Juan, a detachment was +sent against them, and with it Quiroga and his horsemen. The mutineers +proved victorious, and, headed by their ringleaders, Aldao and Corro, +continued their line of march towards the North. While Ocampo with his +beaten troops fell back to wait for reinforcements, Quiroga pursued the +retreating victors, harassed their rear, clogged their every movement, and +proved so formidable to the enemy, that Aldao, abandoning his companion, +made an arrangement with the government of La Rioja, by which he was to be +allowed free passage into San Luis, whither Quiroga was ordered to conduct +him. He joined Aldao. + +And here, close upon the summit of the steep he has so easily ascended, we +cannot help pausing for an instant to reflect upon the singular +manifestation of _destiny_ in his life. History acquaints us with no +similar character who displayed so little forethought with such +astonishing results. He premeditated nothing, unless now and then a +murder. He took no trouble to form a plan of government, yet his authority +was unquestioned during many years in Mendoza, Córdova, and San Juan. Even +his most monstrous acts of perfidy appear to have been committed on the +spur of the moment, with less calculation than he gave to a game at cards. +Thrown upon the world with brutal passions scarcely controlled by a +particle of reason, whirled hither and thither in a general and fearful +cataclysm, he shows us preëminently the wonderful designs of Providence +carried into effect, as it were, by a succession of blind and sudden +impulses. In a community of established order the gallows would have put a +speedy check upon his misdeeds; in the Argentine Confederation of 1820 he +was gradually lifted, by an ever-rising tide of blood, to the eminence of +lawless power. + +Only for a while, however; for the stream did not cease to rise. The flood +that had elevated him alone disregarded his commands. For a few moments he +might maintain his footing upon the fearful peak; and then-- + +But as yet he is only _Comandante de Campaña_, escorting the rebel Aldao +into San Luis. He took no pains to conceal his discontent with the +government of Ocampo, nor was Aldao slow in noticing or availing himself +of his disaffection. He offered Quiroga a hundred men, if he chose to +overturn the government and seize upon La Rioja. Quiroga eagerly accepted, +marched upon the city, took it by surprise, threw the Ocampos and their +subordinates into prison, and sent them confessors, with the order to +prepare for death. The remainder of Aldao's force was subsequently induced +to join his cause, and, on the intercession of some of its leaders, the +incarcerated Ocampos were suffered to escape with their lives. + +Their banished enemy, Don Nicolas Dávila, was called from Tucuman to the +nominal governorship of La Rioja, while Quiroga retained, with his old +title, the actual rule of the province. But Dávila was not long content +with this mere semblance of authority. During the temporary absence of +Quiroga, he concerted with Araya, one of the men of Aldao, a plan for the +capture of their master. Quiroga heard of it,--he heard of everything,-- +and his answer was the assassination of Captain Araya! Summoned by the +government which he himself had created to answer the accusation of +instigated murder, he advanced upon the Dávilas with his Llanista +horsemen. Miguel and Nicolas Dávila hastily assembled a body of troops, +and prepared for a final struggle. While the two armies were in presence +of each other, a commissioner from Mendoza endeavored to effect a +peaceable arrangement between their chiefs. Passing from one camp to the +other with propositions and conditions, he inspired the soldiers of the +Dávilas with a fatal security. Quiroga, falling suddenly upon them in the +midst of the negotiations, routed them with ease, and slew their general, +who, with a small body of devoted followers, made a fierce onslaught upon +him personally, and succeeded in inflicting upon him a severe wound before +he was shot down. Thenceforth,--from the year 1823,--Quiroga was despot +of La Rioja. + +His government was simple enough. His two engrossing objects--if objects, +indeed, he may be said to have possessed--were extortion and the +uprooting of the last vestiges of civilization and law; his instruments, +the dagger and the lash; his amusement, the torture of unwitting +offenders; his serious occupation, the shuffling of cards. For gambling +the man had an insatiable thirst; he played once for forty hours without +intermission; it was death to refuse a game with him; no one might cease +playing without his express commands; no one durst win the stakes; and as +a consequence, he accumulated at cards in a few years almost all the +coined money then existing in the province.[2] Not content with this +source of revenue, he became a farmer of the _diezmo_ or tithes, +appropriated to himself the _mostrenco_ or unbranded cattle, by which +means he speedily became proprietor of many thousand head, even +established a monopoly of beef in his own favor,--and woe to the luckless +fool who should dare to infringe upon the terrible barbarian's +prerogative! + +[Footnote 2: Thus the Monagas, the late rulers of Venezuela, are accused +of denuding their country of specie in order to accumulate a vast treasure +abroad in expectation of a rainy day.] + +What was the state of society, it will undoubtedly be inquired, in which +the defeat of a handful of men could result in such a despotism? We have +already glanced at the people of La Rioja,--at their dreamy, Oriental +character, at their pastoral pursuits. A community of herdsmen, scattered +over an extensive territory, and deprived at one blow of the two great +families to whom they had been accustomed to look up, with infantine +submission, as their God-appointed chiefs,--these were not the men to +stand up, unprompted by a single master-mind, to rid themselves of one +whose oppression was, after all, only a new form of the treatment to +which, for an entire generation, they had been subjected. La Rioja and San +Juan were the only two provinces in which Quiroga's heavy hand was felt +continuously; in the others he ruled rather by influence than in person; +and the Gauchos, as a matter of course, were enthusiastic for a man who +exalted the peasant at the expense of the citizen, whose exactions were +actually burdensome only to the wealthy, and who permitted every license +to his followers, with the single exception of disobedience to himself. + +He was not without--it is impossible that he should have lacked--some of +those instinctive and personal attributes with which almost every savage +chieftain who has maintained so extraordinary an ascendency over his +fellows has been endowed. Sarmiento tells us that he was tall, immensely +powerful, a famous _ginete_ or horseman, a more adroit wielder of the +lasso and the _bolas_ than even his rival, Rosas, capable of great +endurance, and abstinent from intoxicating drinks. + +His eye and voice were dreaded more by his soldiers than the lances of +their antagonists. He could wring a Gaucho's secret from his breast; it +was useless to attempt a subterfuge before him. Some article, we are told, +was once stolen from a company of his troops, and every effort for its +recovery proved fruitless. It was reported to Quiroga. He paraded the men, +and, having procured a number of sticks, exactly equal in length, gave to +each man one, proclaiming that the soldier whose stick should be found +longer than the others next morning had been the thief. Next morning he +again drew up his troops. The sticks were mustered by Quiroga himself. Not +one had grown since the previous day; but there was one which was shorter +than the rest. With a terrible roar, Quiroga seized the trembling Gaucho +to whom the stick belonged. "Thou art the thief!" he exclaimed. It was so; +the fellow had cut off a portion of the wood, hoping thus to escape +detection by its growth![3]-- + +[Footnote 3: Since the above was written, we have heard of the adoption of +an expedient identical with that of Quiroga, under similar circumstances, +and with the same result. The detector was, however, an English seaman, +now captain of a well-known steam-vessel, who forming part of a crew one +of whom had lost a sum of money, broke off ten twigs of equal length from +a broom, and distributed them among his shipmates, with the same +observation as was used by the Argentine chief. Two hours later he +examined them, and found that the negro steward had _shortened_ his +allotted twig. The money was restored.--The coincidence is instructive.] + +Another time, one of his soldiers had been robbed of some trappings, and +no trace of the thief could be discovered. Quiroga ordered the detachment +to file past him, one by one. He stood, himself, with folded arms and +terrible eyes, perusing each man as he passed. At length he darted +forward, pounced upon one of the soldiers, and shouted, "Where is the +_montura_?" "In yonder thicket!" stammered out the self-convicted thief. +"Four musketeers this way!" and the commander was not out of sight before +the wretched Gaucho was a corpse. In these instinctive qualities, so awful +to untutored minds, lay the secret of the power of Quiroga,--and of how +many others of the world's most famous names! + +Already in 1825 he was recognized as a lawful authority by the government +of Buenos Ayres, and invited to take part in a Congress of Generals at +that city. At the same time, however, he received a military errand. The +Province of Tucuman having been seized by a young Buenos Ayrean officer, +Colonel Madrid, Quiroga was requested to march against the successful +upstart, and to restore the cause of law and order,--an undertaking +scarcely congruous with his own antecedents. The chief of La Rioja, +however, eagerly accepted the mission, marched with a small force into +Tucuman, routed Madrid, (and this literally, for his army ran away, +leaving the Colonel to charge Quiroga's force alone, which he did, +escaping by a miracle with his life,) and returned to La Rioja and San +Juan. Into the latter town he made a triumphal entry, through streets +lined on both sides with the principal inhabitants, whom he passed by in +disdainful silence, and who humbly followed the Gaucho tyrant to his +quarters in a clover-field, where he allowed them to stand in anxious +humiliation while he conversed at length with an old negress whom he +seated by his side. Not ten years had elapsed since these very men might +have beheld him pounding _tapias_ on this spot! + +We do not propose following the blood-stained career of Juan Facundo +through all its windings and episodes of cruelty and blood. Suffice it to +say, that, with the title of _Comandante de Campaña_, he retained in La +Rioja every fraction of actual power,--nominating, nevertheless, a shadowy +governor, who, if he attempted any independent action, was instantly +deposed. His influence gradually extended over the neighboring provinces; +thrice he encountered and defeated Madrid; while at home he gambled, +levied contributions, bastinadoed, and added largely to his army. He +excelled his contemporary, Francia, in the art of inspiring terror; he +only fell short of Rosas in the results. A wry look might at any time call +down upon a luckless child a hundred lashes. He once split the skull of +his own illegitimate son for some trifling act of disobedience. A lady, +who once said to him, while he was in a bad humor, _Adios, mi General_, +was publicly flogged. A young girl, who would not yield to his wishes, he +threw down upon the floor, and kicked her with his heavy boots until she +lay in a pool of blood. Truly, a ruler after the Russian sort! + +Dorrego, meanwhile, was at the head of affairs at Buenos Ayres. Opposed to +the "Unitarianism" of Lavalle and Paz, who would have made of their +country, not a republic "one and indivisible," but a confederation after +the model in the North, Dorrego was chiefly anxious to consolidate his +power in the maritime state of Buenos Ayres, leaving the interior +provinces to their own devices, and to the tender mercies of Lopez, +Quiroga, Bustos, with a dozen other Gaucho chiefs. Rosas, the incarnation +of the spirit which was then distracting the entire Confederation, was +made Commandant General by Dorrego, who, however, frequently threatened to +shoot "the insolent boor," but who, unfortunately for his country, never +fulfilled the threat. As for himself, he, indeed, met with that fate at +the hands of Lavalle, who landed with an army from the opposite coast of +Uruguay, defeated Dorrego and Rosas in a pitched battle at the gates of +Buenos Ayres, and entered the city in triumph a few hours later. + +With the ascendency of Lavalle came the inauguration--and, alas! only the +inauguration--of a new system. Paz, one of the few Argentinians who really +deserved the name of General that they bore, was sent to Córdova, with +eight hundred veterans of his old command. He defeated Bustos, the tyrant +of Córdova, took possession of the city, (one of the most important +strategic points upon the Pampas,) and restored that confidence and +security to which its inhabitants had so long been strangers. This action +was at the same time a challenge to Quiroga in his neighboring domain. It +was a warning that right was beginning to assert its supremacy over might; +nor was the hero of La Rioja slow to understand it. Collecting a band of +four thousand Gaucho lancers, he marched upon Córdova with the assurance +of an easy victory. The _boleado_ General! The idea of _his_ opposing the +Tiger of the Plains! + +What followed this movement is a matter of general history. The battle of +the Tablada has had European, and therefore American, celebrity. It is +known to those who think of Chacabuco and Maipú, of Navarro and Monte +Caseros, only as of spots upon the map; let it, therefore, suffice to say +that Quiroga was beaten decisively, unmistakably, terribly. The serried +veterans of Paz, schooled in the Brazilian wars, stood grimly to the death +before the fiery onslaught of Quiroga; in vain did his horsemen shatter +themselves against the Unitarian General's scanty squares; the tactics of +civilized warfare proved for the first time successful on these plains +against wild ferocity and a larger force; Quiroga was driven back at +length with fearful slaughter, with the loss of arms, ammunition, +reputation, and of seventeen hundred men. He returned to La Rioja, with +the disorganized remnant of his band, marking his path with blood and the +infliction of atrocious chastisements. Even in adversity he is terrible +and is obeyed. + +For nearly two years he divided his time between the provinces of San +Juan, Tucuman, and La Rioja, engaged in the prosecution of his designs, +chief among which was the destruction of Paz, who remained at Córdova, +intending to act only on the defensive. At length, in 1830, he considered +himself sufficiently strong for an attack on his recent conqueror. Paz was +unwilling to shed blood a second time; he offered advantageous terms to +Quiroga; but the boastful Gaucho, full of confidence in his savage +lancers, refused to negotiate, and marched against his skilful but +unpresuming antagonist. Paz secretly evacuated Córdova, and, moving +westward, hazarded a feat which is alone sufficient to establish his +character as the best tactician of the New World,--San Martin alone, +perhaps, excepted. Splitting his little army into a dozen brigades, he +occupied the entire mountain-range behind the town, operated, with scarce +five thousand men, upon a front of two hundred miles in extent, held in +his own unwavering grasp the reins which controlled the movements of every +division, and gradually inclosed, as in a net, the forces of Quiroga and +Villafañe. In vain they struggled and blindly sought an exit; every door +was closed; until, finally, after a campaign of fifteen days, the +narrowing battalions of Paz surrounded, engaged, and utterly defeated at +Oncativo the bewildered army on whose success Quiroga had staked his all. + +The Gaucho himself again escaped. After seven years of dictatorial power, +he is once more reduced to the level upon which we saw him standing in +1818, a vagabond at Buenos Ayres, although from that level he may raise +his head a trifle higher. + +And here we might conclude, having seen his rocket-like ascent, and the +swiftly-falling night of his career,--having seen him a laborer, a +deserter, a General, a Dictator, a fugitive; but much remains to be +narrated. Passing over, with the barest mention, his temporary return to +power, which he accomplished by one of those lightning-like expeditions +that even among Gaucho horsemen rendered him conspicuous, let us hasten on +to the great dramatic crisis of his history; and taking no notice of the +five years of marching and countermarching, scheming, fighting, and +negotiating, that intervened between his defeat at the Laguna Larga and +1835, draw to a close our hasty sketch. + +In that year, after taking part in a disorderly and fruitless expedition +planned by Rosas to secure the southern frontier against Indian attacks, +he suddenly made his appearance at Buenos Ayres, with a body of armed +satellites, who inspired the newly-seated Dictator--the famous Juan Manuel +de Rosas, who has been already so often mentioned in these pages--with +vivid apprehensions. Rosas, Quiroga, Lopez--the Triumvirate of La Plata-- +were bound together, it is true, by a potent tie,--by the strongest, +indeed,--that of self-interest; but as each of the three, and especially +Rosas, was in continual dread lest that consideration in his colleagues +should clash with his own intentions, the presence of Quiroga at Buenos + Ayres was far from satisfactory to the remaining two. His influence over +half a dozen of the despotic governors in the interior was still immense; +the Pampa was his own, after all his defeats; and it was shrewdly +suspected that his indifference to power in La Rioja, and his mysterious +visit to the maritime capital, were indications of a design to seize upon +the government of Buenos Ayres itself. Nor were the actions of Quiroga +suited to remove these apprehensions. The sanguinary despot of the +interior bloomed in the Buenos Ayrean _cafés_ into a profound admirer of +Rivadavia, Lavalle, and Paz, his ancient Unitarian enemies; Buenos Ayres, +the Confederation, he loudly proclaimed, must have a Constitution; +conciliation must supplant the iron-heeled tyranny under which the people +had groaned so long; the very jaguar of the Pampa, said the Porteño wits, +--not yet wholly muzzled by the dread _Mazorca_, or Club, of Rosas,--was +to be stripped of his claws, and made to live on _matagusano_ twigs and +thistles! _Redeunt Saturnia regna!_ The reign of blood, according to +Quiroga, its chief evangelist, was approaching its termination. + +In order to form a conception of the effect produced by these +transactions, we must imagine Pelissier or Walewski entertaining, twenty- +three years later, the _cercles_ at Paris with discourses from the beauty +of the last _régime_, with eulogies of Lamartine, and apotheoses of Louis +Blanc; sneering at Espinasse, and eulogizing Cavaignac; vowing that France +can be governed only under a liberal constitution, and paying a visit to +his Majesty, the Elect of December, with a rough-and-tumble suite of +Republican bravos. Assuredly, were such a thing possible in Paris, the +gentlemen in question would very shortly be reviling English hospitality +under its protecting aegis, if not dying of fever at Cayenne. Nor could +Rosas, who was at that time far less firmly seated on his throne than is +at present the man who wields the destinies of France, endure so powerful +a rival in his vicinity. But how to get rid of him? Assassination, by +which a minor offender was so speedily put out of the way, could not +safely be attempted with a man who yet retained a singular mastery over +the minds of thousands of brutal and strong-armed horsemen; a false step +would result in inevitable destruction; and many anxious days were spent +by the gloomy tyrant ere he could decide upon a plan for disposing of his +inconvenient friend. + +In the midst of this perplexity intelligence was received of a +disagreement between the governments of Salta, Tucuman, and Santiago, +provinces of the interior, which threatened to expand into warlike +proceedings. Rosas sent for Quiroga. No one but the hero of La Rioja, he +insinuated, had sufficient influence to bring about a settlement of these +disputes; no one but he had power to prevent a war; would he not, +therefore, hasten to Tucuman, and obviate so dire a calamity? Quiroga +hesitated, refused, consented, wavered, and again declined the task. With +a vacillation to which he had hitherto been a stranger, he remained for +many days undecided; a suspicion of deceit appears to have presented +itself to his mind; but at length he resolved to accept the commission. +His hesitation, meanwhile, had completed his ruin; it had given time for +the maturing of deadly plans. + +In midsummer, 1835, (December 18th,) the Gaucho chieftain commenced his +fateful journey. As he entered the carriage which was to be his home for +many days, and bade farewell to the adherents who were assembled to +witness his departure, he turned toward the city with a wild expression +and words that were remembered afterwards. _Si salgo bien_, he said, _te +volevré á ver; si no, adios para siempre!_ "If I succeed, I shall see thee +again; if not, farewell forever!" Was it a presentiment of the truth which +came upon him, like that which clouded the great mind of the first +Napoleon as he left the Tuileries when the Hundred Days were running out? + +One hour before his departure, a mounted messenger had been dispatched +from Buenos Ayres in the same direction as that he was about to follow; +and the city was scarcely out of sight when Quiroga manifested the most +feverish anxiety to overtake this man. His travelling companions were his +secretary, Dr. Ortiz, and a young man of his acquaintance, bound for +Córdova, to whom he had given a seat in his vehicle. The postilions were +incessantly admonished to make haste. At a shallow stream which they +forded, in the mud of which the wheels became imbedded, resisting every +effort for their release, Quiroga actually hooked the postmaster of the +district, who had hastened to the spot, to the carriage, and made him join +his exertions to those of the horses until the vehicle was extricated, +when he sped onward with fearful velocity, asking at every post-station, +"When did the _chasquÃ_ from Buenos Ayres pass? An hour ago! Forward, +then!" and the carriage swept onward, on unceasingly, across the lonely +Pampa,--racing, as it afterwards proved, with Death. + +At last, Córdova, nearly six hundred miles from his starting-point, was +reached, just one hour after the arrival of the hunted courier. Quiroga +was besought by the cringing magistracy to spend the night in their city. +His only answer was, "Give me horses!" and two hours before midnight he +rolled out of Córdova, having _beaten_ in the grisly race. + +Beaten, inasmuch as he was yet alive. For Córdova was ringing with the +details of his intended assassination. Such and such men were to have done +the deed; at such a shop the pistol had been bought; at such a spot it was +to have been fired;--but the marvellous swiftness of the intended victim +had ruined all. + +Meanwhile, Quiroga sped onward more at ease toward Tucuman. Arrived there, +he speedily arranged the matters in dispute, and was entreated by the +governors of that province and of Santiago to accept of an escort on his +return; he was besought to avoid Córdova, to avoid Buenos Ayres; he was +counselled to throw off the mask of subservience, and to rally his +numerous adherents in La Rioja and San Juan;--but remonstrance and advice +were alike thrown away upon him. In vain was the most circumstantial +account of the preparations for his murder sent by friends from Córdova; +he appeared as foolhardy now in February as in December he had been panic- +stricken. "To Córdova!" he shouted, as he entered his _galera_; and for +Córdova the postilions steered. + +At the little post-hut of Ojos del Agua, in the State of Córdova, Quiroga, +with his secretary, Ortiz, halted one night on the homeward journey. +Shortly before reaching the place, a young man had mysteriously stopped +the carriage, and had warned its hurrying inmates that at a spot called +Barranca Yaco a _partida_, headed by one Santos Perez, was awaiting the +arrival of Quiroga. There the massacre was to take place. The youth, who +had formerly experienced kindness at the hands of Ortiz, begged him to +avoid the danger. The unhappy secretary was rendered almost insane with +terror, but his master sternly rebuked his fears.--"The man is not yet +born," he said, "who shall slay Facundo Quiroga! At a word from me these +fellows will put themselves at my command, and form my escort into +Córdova!" + +The night at Ojos del Agua was passed sleeplessly enough by the unhappy +Ortiz, but Quiroga was not to be persuaded into ordinary precautions. +Confident in his mastery over the minds of men, he set out unguarded, on +the 18th of February, at break of day. The party consisted of the +chieftain and his trembling secretary, a negro servant on horseback, two +postilions,--one of them a mere lad,--and a couple of couriers who were +travelling in the same direction. + +Who that has been on the Pampas but can picture to himself this party as +it left the little mud-hut on the plain? The cumbrous, oscillating +_galera_, with its shaggy, straggling four-in-hand,--the caracoling Gaucho +couriers,--the negro pricking on behind,--the tall grass rolling out on +every side,--the muddy pool that forms the watering-place for beasts and +men scattered over a hundred miles of brookless plain,--the great sun +streaming up from the herbage just in front, awakening the voices of a +million insects and the carols of unnumbered birds in the thickets here +and there! Look long, Quiroga, on that rising sun! listen to the well- +known melody that welcomes his approach! gaze once more upon the rolling +Pampa! look again upon those flying hills! Thou who hast said, "There is +no life but this life," who didst "believe in nothing," shalt know these +things no more! five minutes hence thy statecraft will be over, thy long +apprenticeship will have expired! thou shalt be standing--where thou mayst +learn the secret that the wisest man of all the bookworms thou despisest +will never know alive! + +Barranca Yaco is reached. The warning was well founded. A crack is heard, +--there is a puff of smoke,--and two musket-balls pass each other in the +carriage, yet without inflicting injury on its occupants. From either side +the road, however, the _partida_ dashes forth. In a moment the horses are +disabled, the postilions, the negro, and the couriers cut down. Ortiz +trembles more violently than ever; Quiroga rises above himself. Looking +from the carriage while the butchery is going on, he addresses the +murderers with a few unfaltering words. There is glamour in his speech; +the ensanguined assassins hesitate,--another instant, only one moment +more, and they will be on their knees before him; but Santos Perez, who +was at one side, comes up, raises his piece,--and the body of Juan Fecundo +Quiroga falls in a soulless heap with a bullet in the brain! Ortiz was +immediately hacked to pieces; and the tragedy of Córdova is at an end. + +Such were the life, misdeeds, and death of the Terror of the Pampas. +Having in the most rapid and imperfect manner sketched the career of this +extraordinary Fortune's-child, his rise from the most abject condition to +unbridled power, his ferocious rule, and his almost heroic end, we may +surely exclaim, that "nothing in his life became him like the leaving of +it," and, presenting this bare _résumé_ of facts as a mere outline, a mere +pen-and-ink sketch of the terrible chieftain, refer the curious student to +the impassioned narrative whence our facts are mainly derived. + +It may be well to add, that Santos Perez, who was actively pursued by the +government of Buenos Ayres, which itself had instigated him to the +commission of the crime, was finally, after many hairbreadth escapes, +betrayed by his mistress to the agents of Rosas, and suffered death at +Buenos Ayres with savage fortitude. The Lord have mercy on his soul! + + + + +MADEMOISELLE'S CAMPAIGNS. + + +THE SCENE AND THE ACTORS. + +The heroine of our tale is one so famous in history that her proper name +never appears in it. The seeming paradox is the soberest fact. To us +Americans, glory lies in the abundant display of one's personal +appellation in the newspapers. Our heroine lived in the most gossiping of +all ages, herself its greatest gossip; yet her own name, patronymic or +baptismal, never was talked about. It was not that she sank that name +beneath high-sounding titles; she only elevated the most commonplace of +all titles till she monopolized it, and it monopolized her. Anne Marie +Louise d'Orléans, Souveraine de Dombes, Princesse Dauphine d'Auvergne, +Duchesse de Montpensier, is forgotten, or rather was never remembered; but +the great name of MADEMOISELLE, _La Grande Mademoiselle_, gleams like a +golden thread shot through and through that gorgeous tapestry of crimson +and purple which records for us the age of Louis Quatorze. + +In May of the year 1627, while the Queen and Princess of England lived in +weary exile at Paris,--while the slow tide of events was drawing their +husband and father to his scaffold,--while Sir John Eliot was awaiting in +the Tower of London the summoning of the Third Parliament,--while the +troops of Buckingham lay dying, without an enemy, upon the Isle of Rhé,-- +while the Council of Plymouth were selling their title to the lands of +Massachusetts Bay,--at the very crisis of the terrible siege of Rochelle, +and perhaps during the very hour when the Three Guardsmen of Dumas held +that famous bastion against an army, the heroine of our story was born. +And she, like the Three Guardsmen, waited till twenty years after for a +career. + +The twenty years are over. Richelieu is dead. The strongest will that ever +ruled France has passed away; and the poor, broken King has hunted his +last badger at St. Germain, and meekly followed his master to the grave, +as he had always followed him. Louis XIII., called Louis Le Juste, not +from the predominance of that particular virtue (or any other) in his +character, but simply because he happened to be born under the +constellation of the Scales, has died like a Frenchman, in peace with all +the world except his wife. That beautiful and queenly wife, Anne of +Austria, (Spaniard though she was,)--no longer the wild and passionate +girl who fascinated Buckingham and embroiled two kingdoms,--has hastened +within four days to defy all the dying imprecations of her husband, by +reversing every plan and every appointment he has made. The little prince +has already shown all the Grand Monarque in his childish "Je suis Louis +Quatorze," and has been carried in his bib to hold his first parliament. +That parliament, heroic as its English contemporary, though less +successful, has reached the point of revolution at last. Civil war is +impending. Condé, at twenty-one the greatest general in Europe, after +changing sides a hundred times in a week, is fixed at last. Turenne is +arrayed against him. The young, the brave, the beautiful cluster around +them. The performers are drawn up in line,--the curtain rises,--the play +is "The Wars of the Fronde,"--and into that brilliant arena, like some +fair circus equestrian, gay, spangled, and daring, rides Mademoiselle. + +Almost all French historians, from Voltaire to Cousin, (St. Aulaire being +the chief exception,) speak lightly of the Wars of the Fronde. "La Fronde +n'est pas sérieuse." Of course it was not. If it had been serious, it +would not have been French. Of course, French insurrections, like French +despotisms, have always been tempered by epigrams; of course, the people +went out to the conflicts in ribbons and feathers; of course, over every +battle there pelted down a shower of satire, like the rain at the Eglinton +tournament. More than two hundred pamphlets rattled on the head of Condé +alone, and the collection of _Mazarinades_, preserved by the Cardinal +himself, fills sixty-nine volumes in quarto. From every field the first +crop was glory, the second a _bon-mot_. When the dagger of De Retz fell +from his breast-pocket, it was "our good archbishop's breviary"; and when +his famous Corinthian troop was defeated in battle, it was "the First +Epistle to the Corinthians." While, across the Channel, Charles Stuart was +listening to his doom, Paris was gay in the midst of dangers, Madame de +Longueville was receiving her gallants in mimic court at the Hôtel de +Ville, De Retz was wearing his sword-belt over his archbishop's gown, the +little hunchback Conti was generalissimo, and the starving people were +pillaging Mazarin's library, in joke, "to find something to gnaw upon." +Outside the walls, the maids-of-honor were quarrelling over the straw beds +which annihilated all the romance of martyrdom, and Condé, with five +thousand men, was besieging five hundred thousand. No matter, they all +laughed through it, and through every succeeding turn of the kaleidoscope; +and the "Anything may happen in France," with which La Rochefoucauld +jumped amicably into the carriage of his mortal enemy, was not only the +first and best of his maxims, but the key-note of French history for all +coming time. + +But behind all this sport, as in all the annals of the nation, were +mysteries and terrors and crimes. It was the age of cabalistic ciphers, +like that of De Retz, of which Guy Joli dreamed the solution; of +inexplicable secrets, like the Man in the Iron Mask, whereof no solution +was ever dreamed; of poisons, like that diamond-dust which in six hours +transformed the fresh beauty of the Princess Royal into foul decay; of +dungeons, like that cell at Vincennes which Madame de Rambouillet +pronounced to be "worth its weight in arsenic." War or peace hung on the +color of a ball-dress, and Madame de Chevreuse knew which party was coming +uppermost, by observing whether the binding of Madame de Hautefort's +prayer-book was red or green. Perhaps it was all a little theatrical, but +the performers were all Rachels. + +And behind the crimes and the frivolities stood the Parliaments, calm and +undaunted, with leaders, like Molé and Talon, who needed nothing but +success to make their names as grand in history as those of Pym and +Hampden. Among the Brienne Papers in the British Museum there is a +collection of the manifestoes and proclamations of that time, and they are +earnest, eloquent, and powerful, from beginning to end. Lord Mahon alone +among historians, so far as our knowledge goes, has done fit and full +justice to the French parliaments, those assemblies which refused +admission to the foreign armies which the nobles would gladly have +summoned in,--but fed and protected the banished princesses of England, +when the court party had left those descendants of the Bourbons to die of +cold and hunger in the palace of their ancestors. And we have the +testimony of Henrietta Maria herself, the only person who had seen both +revolutions near at hand, that "the troubles in England never appeared so +formidable in their early days, nor were the leaders of the revolutionary +party so ardent or so united." The character of the agitation was no more +to be judged by its jokes and epigrams, than the gloomy glory of the +English Puritans by the grotesque names of their saints, or the stern +resolution of the Dutch burghers by their guilds of rhetoric and +symbolical melodrama. + +But popular power was not yet developed in France, as it was in England; +all social order was unsettled and changing, and well Mazarin knew it. He +knew the pieces with which he played his game of chess: the king +powerless, the queen mighty, the bishops unable to take a single +straightforward move, and the knights going naturally zigzag; but a host +of plebeian pawns, every one fit for a possible royalty, and therefore to +be used shrewdly, or else annihilated as soon as practicable. True, the +game would not last forever; but after him the deluge. + +Our age has forgotten even the meaning of the word Fronde; but here also +the French and Flemish histories run parallel, and the Frondeurs, like the +Gueux, were children of a sarcasm. The Counsellor Bachaumont one day +ridiculed insurrectionists, as resembling the boys who played with slings +(_frondes_) about the streets of Paris, but scattered at the first glimpse +of a policeman. The phrase organized the party. Next morning all fashions +were _à la fronde_,--hats, gloves, fans, bread, and ballads; and it cost +six years of civil war to pay for the Counsellor's facetiousness. + +That which was, after all, the most remarkable characteristic of these +wars might be guessed from this fact about the fashions. The Fronde was +preëminently "the War of the Ladies." Educated far beyond the Englishwomen +of their time, they took a controlling share, sometimes ignoble, as often +noble, always powerful, in the affairs of the time. It was not merely a +courtly gallantry which flattered them with a hollow importance. De Retz, +in his Memoirs, compares the women of his age with Elizabeth of England. A +Spanish ambassador once congratulated Mazarin on obtaining temporary +repose. "You are mistaken," he replied, "there is no repose in France, for +I have always women to contend with. In Spain, women have only love- +affairs to employ them; but here we have three who are capable of +governing or overthrowing great kingdoms: the Duchess de Longueville, the +Princess Palatine, and the Duchess de Chevreuse." And there were others as +great as these; and the women who for years outwitted Mazarin and +outgeneralled Condé are deserving of a stronger praise than they have yet +obtained, even from the classic and courtly Cousin. + +What men of that age eclipsed or equalled the address and daring of those +delicate and highborn women? What a romance was their ordinary existence! +The Princess Palatine gave refuge to Mme. de Longueville when that alone +saved her from sharing the imprisonment of her brothers Condé and Conti,-- +then fled for her own life, by night, with Rochefoucauld. Mme. de +Longueville herself, pursued afterwards by the royal troops, wished to +embark in a little boat, on a dangerous shore, during a midnight storm so +wild that not a fisherman could at first be found to venture forth; the +beautiful fugitive threatened and implored till they consented; the sailor +who bore her in his arms to the boat let her fall amid the furious surges; +she was dragged senseless to the shore again, and, on the instant of +reviving, demanded to repeat the experiment; but as they utterly refused, +she rode inland beneath the tempest, and travelled for fourteen nights +before she could find another place of embarkation. + +Madame de Chevreuse rode with one attendant from Paris to Madrid, fleeing +from Richelieu, remaining day and night on her horse, attracting perilous +admiration by the womanly loveliness which no male attire could obscure. +From Spain she went to England, organizing there the French exiles into a +strength which frightened Richelieu; thence to Holland, to conspire nearer +home; back to Paris, on the minister's death, to form the faction of the +Importants; and when the Duke of Beaufort was imprisoned, Mazarin said, +"Of what use to cut off the arms while the head remains?" Ten years from +her first perilous escape, she made a second, dashed through La Vendée, +embarked at St. Malo for Dunkirk, was captured by the fleet of the +Parliament, was released by the Governor of the Isle of Wight, unable to +imprison so beautiful a butterfly, reached her port at last, and in a few +weeks was intriguing at Liège again. + +The Duchess de Bouillon, Turenne's sister, purer than those we have named, +but not less daring or determined, after charming the whole population of +Paris by her rebel beauty at the Hôtel de Ville, escaped from her sudden +incarceration by walking through the midst of her guards at dusk, +crouching in the shadow of her little daughter, and afterwards allowed +herself to be recaptured, rather than desert that child's sick-bed. + +Then there was Clémence de Maille, purest and noblest of all, niece of +Richelieu and hapless wife of the cruel ingrate Condé, his equal in daring +and his superior in every other high quality. Married a child still +playing with her dolls, and sent at once to a convent to learn to read and +write, she became a woman the instant her husband became a captive; while +he watered his pinks in the garden at Vincennes, she went through France +and raised an army for his relief. Her means were as noble as her ends. +She would not surrender the humblest of her friends to an enemy, or suffer +the massacre of her worst enemy by a friend. She threw herself between the +fire of two hostile parties at Bordeaux, and, while men were falling each +side of her, compelled them to peace. Her deeds rang through Europe. When +she sailed from Bordeaux for Paris at last, thirty thousand people +assembled to bid her farewell. She was loved and admired by all the world, +except that husband for whom she dared so much,--and the Archbishop of +Taen. The respectable Archbishop complained, that "this lady did not prove +that she had been authorized by her husband, an essential provision, +without which no woman can act in law." And Condé himself, whose heart, +physically twice as large as other men's, was spiritually imperceptible, +repaid this stainless nobleness by years of persecution, and bequeathed +her, as a life-long prisoner, to his dastard son. + +Then, on the royal side, there was Anne of Austria, sufficient unto +herself, Queen Regent, and every inch a queen, (before all but Mazarin,)-- +from the moment when the mob of Paris filed through the chamber of the +boy-king, in his pretended sleep, and the motionless and stately mother +held back the crimson draperies, with the same lovely arm which had waved +perilous farewells to Buckingham,--to the day when the news of the fatal +battle of Gien came to her in her dressing-room, and "she remained +undisturbed before the mirror, not neglecting the arrangement of a single +curl." + +In short, every woman who took part in the Ladies' War became heroic,-- +from Marguerite of Lorraine, who snatched the pen from her weak husband's +hand and gave De Retz the order for the first insurrection, down to the +wife of the commandant of the Porte St. Roche, who, springing from her bed +to obey that order, made the drums beat to arms and secured the barrier; +and fitly, amid adventurous days like these, opened the career of +Mademoiselle. + + +II. + +THE FIRST CAMPAIGN. + +Grandchild of Henri Quatre, niece of Louis XIII., cousin of Louis XIV., +first princess of the blood, and with the largest income in the nation, +(500,000 livres,) to support these dignities, Mademoiselle was certainly +born in the purple. Her autobiography admits us to very gorgeous company; +the stream of her personal recollections is a perfect Pactolus. There is +almost a surfeit of royalty in it; every card is a court-card, and all her +counters are counts. "I wore at this festival all the crown-jewels of +France, and also those of the Queen of England." "A far greater +establishment was assigned to me than any _fille de France_ had ever had, +not excepting any of my aunts, the Queens of England and of Spain, and the +Duchess of Savoy." "The Queen, my grandmother, gave me as a governess the +same lady who had been governess to the late King." Pageant or funeral, it +is the same thing. "In the midst of these festivities we heard of the +death of the King of Spain; whereat the Queens were greatly afflicted, and +we all went into mourning." Thus, throughout, her Memoirs glitter like the +coat with which the splendid Buckingham astonished the cheaper chivalry of +France: they drop diamonds. + +But for any personal career Mademoiselle found at first no opportunity, in +the earlier years of the Fronde. A gay, fearless, flattered girl, she +simply shared the fortunes of the court; laughed at the +festivals in the palace, laughed at the ominous insurrections in the +streets; laughed when the people cheered her, their pet princess; and when +the royal party fled from Paris, she adroitly secured for herself the best +straw-bed at St. Germain, and laughed louder than ever. She despised the +courtiers who flattered her; secretly admired her young cousin Condé, whom +she affected to despise; danced when the court danced, and ran away when +it mourned. She made all manner of fun of her English lover, the future +Charles II., whom she alone of all the world found bashful; and in general +she wasted the golden hours with much excellent fooling. Nor would she, +perhaps, ever have found herself a heroine, but that her respectable +father was a poltroon. + +Lord Mahon ventures to assert, that Gaston, Duke of Orléans, was "the most +cowardly prince of whom history makes mention." A strong expression, but +perhaps safe. Holding the most powerful position in the nation, he never +came upon the scene but to commit some new act of ingenious pusillanimity; +while, by some extraordinary chance, every woman of his immediate kindred +was a natural heroine, and became more heroic through disgust at him. His +wife was Marguerite of Lorraine, who originated the first Fronde +insurrection; his daughter turned the scale of the second. But, +personally, he not only had not the courage to act, but he had not the +courage to abstain from acting; he could no more keep out of parties than +in them; but was always busy, waging war in spite of Mars, and negotiating +in spite of Minerva. + +And when the second war of the Fronde broke out, it was in spite of +himself that he gave his name and his daughter to the popular cause. When +the fate of the two nations hung trembling in the balance, the royal army +under Turenne advancing on Paris, and almost arrived at the city of +Orléans, and that city likely to take the side of the strongest,--then +Mademoiselle's hour had come. All her sympathies were more and more +inclining to the side of Condé and the people. Orléans was her own +hereditary city. Her father, as was his custom in great emergencies, +declared that he was very ill and must go to bed immediately; but it was +as easy for her to be strong as it was for him to be weak; so she wrung +from him a reluctant plenipotentiary power; she might go herself and try +what her influence could do. And so she rode forth from Paris, one fine +morning, March 27, 1652,--rode with a few attendants, half in enthusiasm, +half in levity, aiming to become a second Joan of Arc, secure the city, +and save the nation. "I felt perfectly delighted," says the young girl, +"at having to play so extraordinary a part." + +The people of Paris had heard of her mission, and cheered her as she went. +The officers of the army, with an escort of five hundred men, met her half +way from Paris. Most of them evidently knew her calibre, were delighted to +see her, and installed her at once over a regular council of war. She +entered into the position with her natural promptness. A certain grave M. +de Rohan undertook to tutor her privately, and met his match. In the +public deliberation, there were some differences of opinion. All agreed +that the army should not pass beyond the Loire: this was Gaston's +suggestion, and nevertheless a good one. Beyond this all was left to +Mademoiselle. Mademoiselle intended to go straight to Orléans. "But the +royal army had reached there already." Mademoiselle did not believe it. +"The citizens would not admit her." Mademoiselle would see about that. +Presently the city government of Orléans sent her a letter, in great +dismay, particularly requesting her to keep her distance. Mademoiselle +immediately ordered her coach, and set out for the city. "I was naturally +resolute," she naïvely remarks. + +Her siege of Orléans is perhaps the most remarkable on record. She was +right in one thing; the royal army had not arrived: but it might appear at +any moment; so the magistrates quietly shut all their gates, and waited to +see what would happen. + +Mademoiselle happened. It was eleven in the morning when she reached the +Porte Bannière, and she sat three hours in her state carriage without +seeing a person. With amusing politeness, the governor of the city at last +sent her some confectionery,--agreeing with John Keats, who held that +young women were beings fitter to be presented with sugar-plums than with +one's time. But he took care to explain that the bonbons were not +official, and did not recognize her authority. So she quietly ate them, +and then decided to take a walk outside the walls. Her council of war +opposed this step, as they did every other; but she coolly said (as the +event proved) that the enthusiasm of the populace would carry the city for +her, if she could only get at them. + +So she set out on her walk. Her two beautiful ladies-of-honor, the +Countesses de Fiesque and de Frontenac, went with her; a few attendants +behind. She came to a gate. The people were all gathered inside the +ramparts. "Let me in," demanded the imperious young lady. The astonished +citizens looked at each other and said nothing. She walked on,--the crowd +inside keeping pace with her. She reached another gate. The enthusiasm was +increased. The captain of the guard formed his troops in line and saluted +her. "Open the gate," she again insisted. The poor captain made signs that +he had not the keys. "Break it down, then," coolly suggested the daughter +of the House of Orléans; to which his only reply was a profusion of +profound bows, and the lady walked on. + +Those were the days of astrology, and at this moment it occurred to our +Mademoiselle, that the chief astrologer of Paris had predicted success to +all her undertakings, from the noon of this very day until the noon +following. She had never had the slightest faith in the mystic science, +but she turned to her attendant ladies, and remarked that the matter was +settled; she should get in. On went the three, until they reached the bank +of the river, and saw, opposite, the gates which opened on the quay. The +Orléans boatmen came flocking round her, a hardy race, who feared neither +queen nor Mazarin. They would break down any gate she chose. She selected +one, got into a boat, and sending back her terrified male attendants, that +they might have no responsibility in the case, she was rowed to the other +side. Her new allies were already at work, and she climbed from the boat +upon the quay by a high ladder, of which several rounds were broken away. +They worked more and more enthusiastically, though the gate was built to +stand a siege, and stoutly resisted this one. Courage is magnetic; every +moment increased the popular enthusiasm, as these highborn ladies stood +alone among the boatmen; the crowd inside joined in the attack upon the +gate; the guard looked on; the city government remained irresolute at the +Hôtel de Ville, fairly beleaguered and stormed by one princess and two +maids-of-honor. + +A crash, and the mighty timbers of the Porte Brûlée yield in the centre. +Aided by the strong and exceedingly soiled hands of her new friends, our +elegant Mademoiselle is lifted, pulled, pushed, and tugged between the +vast iron bars which fortify the gate; and in this fashion, torn, +splashed, and dishevelled generally, she makes entrance into her city. The +guard, promptly adhering to the winning side, present arms to the heroine. +The people fill the air with their applauses; they place her in a large, +wooden chair, and bear her in triumph through the streets. "Everybody came +to kiss my hands, while I was dying with laughter to find myself in so odd +a situation." + +Presently our volatile lady told them that she had learned how to walk, +and begged to be put down; then she waited for her countesses, who arrived +bespattered with mud. The drums beat before her, as she set forth again, +and the city government, yielding to the feminine conqueror, came to do +her homage. She carelessly assured them of her clemency. She "had no doubt +that they would soon have opened the gates, but she was naturally of a +very impatient disposition, and could not wait." Moreover, she kindly +suggested, neither party could now find fault with them; and as for the +future, she would save them all trouble, and govern the city herself,-- +which she accordingly did. + +By confession of all historians, she alone saved the city for the Fronde, +and, for the moment, secured that party the ascendency in the nation. Next +day the advance-guard of the royal forces appeared,--a day too late. +Mademoiselle made a speech (the first in her life) to the city government; +then went forth to her own small army, by this time drawn near, and held +another council. The next day she received a letter from her father, +(whose health was now decidedly restored,) declaring that she had "saved +Orléans and secured Paris, and shown yet more judgment than courage." The +next day Condé came up with his forces, compared his fair cousin to +Gustavus Adolphus, and wrote to her that "her exploit was such as she only +could have performed, and was of the greatest importance." + +Mademoiselle staid a little longer at Orléans, while the armies lay +watching each other, or fighting the battle of Bléneau, of which Condé +wrote her an official bulletin, as being generalissimo. She amused herself +easily, went to mass, played at bowls, received the magistrates, stopped +couriers to laugh over their letters, reviewed the troops, signed +passports, held councils, and did many things "for which she should have +thought herself quite unfitted, if she had not found she did them very +well." The enthusiasm she had inspired kept itself unabated, for she +really deserved it. She was everywhere recognized as head of affairs; the +officers of the army drank her health on their knees, when she dined with +them, while the trumpets sounded and the cannons roared; Condé, when +absent, left instructions to his officers, "Obey the commands of +Mademoiselle, as my own"; and her father addressed a despatch from Paris +to her ladies of honor, as Field-Marshals in her army: "À Mesdames les +Comtesses Maréchales de Camp dans l'Armée de ma Fille contre le Mazarin." + + +III. + +CAMPAIGN THE SECOND. + +Mademoiselle went back to Paris. Half the population met her outside the +walls; she kept up the heroine, by compulsion, and for a few weeks held +her court as Queen of France. If the Fronde had held its position, she +might very probably have held hers. Condé, being unable to marry her +himself, on account of the continued existence of his invalid wife, (which +he sincerely regretted,) had a fixed design of marrying her to the young +King. Queen Henrietta Maria cordially greeted her, lamented more than ever +her rejection of the "bashful" Charles II., and compared her to the +original Maid of Orléans,--an ominous compliment from an English source. + +The royal army drew near; on July 1, 1652, Mademoiselle heard their drums +beating outside. "I shall not stay at home to-day," she said to her +attendants, at two in the morning; "I feel convinced that I shall be +called to do some unforeseen act, as I was at Orléans." And she was not +far wrong. The battle of the Porte St. Antoine was at hand. + +Condé and Turenne! The two greatest names in the history of European wars, +until a greater eclipsed them both. Condé, a prophecy of Napoleon, a +general by instinct, incapable of defeat, insatiable of glory, throwing +his marshal's baton within the lines of the enemy, and following it; +passionate, false, unscrupulous, mean. Turenne, the precursor of +Wellington rather, simple, honest, truthful, humble, eating off his iron +camp-equipage to the end of life. If it be true, as the ancients said, +that an army of stags led by a lion is more formidable than an army of +lions led by a stag, then the presence of two such heroes would have given +lustre to the most trivial conflict. But that fight was not trivial upon +which hung the possession of Paris and the fate of France; and between +these two great soldiers it was our Mademoiselle who was again to hold the +balance, and to decide the day. + +The battle raged furiously outside the city. Frenchman fought against +Frenchman, and nothing distinguished the two armies except a wisp of straw +in the hat, on the one side, and a piece of paper on the other. The people +of the metropolis, fearing equally the Prince and the King, had shut the +gates against all but the wounded and the dying. The Parliament was +awaiting the result of the battle, before taking sides. The Queen was on +her knees in the Carmelite Chapel. De Retz was shut up in his palace, and +Gaston of Orléans in his,--the latter, as usual, slightly indisposed; and +Mademoiselle, passing anxiously through the streets, met nobleman after +nobleman of her acquaintance, borne with ghastly wounds to his residence. +She knew that the numbers were unequal; she knew that her friends must be +losing ground. She rushed back to her father, and implored him to go forth +in person, rally the citizens, and relieve Condé. It was quite impossible; +he was so exceedingly feeble; he could not walk a hundred yards. "Then, +Sir," said the indignant Princess, "I advise you to go immediately to bed. +The world had better believe that you cannot do your duty, than that you +will not." + +Time passed on, each moment registered in blood. Mademoiselle went and +came; still the same sad procession of dead and dying; still the same mad +conflict, Frenchman against Frenchman, in the three great avenues of the +Faubourg St. Antoine. She watched it from the city walls till she could +bear it no longer. One final, desperate appeal, and her dastard father +consented, not to act himself, but again to appoint her his substitute. +Armed with the highest authority, she hastened to the Hôtel de Ville, +where the Parliament was in irresolute session. The citizens thronged +round her, as she went, imploring her to become their leader. She reached +the scene, exhibited her credentials, and breathlessly issued demands +which would have made Gaston's hair stand on end. + +"I desire three things," announced Mademoiselle: "first, that the citizens +shall be called to arms." + +"It is done," answered the obsequious officials. + +"Next," she resolutely went on, "that two thousand men shall be sent to +relieve the troops of the Prince." + +They pledged themselves to this also. + +"Finally," said the daring lady, conscious of the mine she was springing, +and reserving the one essential point till the last, "that the army of +Condé shall be allowed free passage into the city." + +The officials, headed by the Maréchal de l'Hôpital, at once exhibited the +most extreme courtesy of demeanor, and begged leave to assure her Highness +that under no conceivable circumstances could this request be granted. + +She let loose upon them all the royal anger of the House of Bourbon. She +remembered the sights she had just seen; she thought of Rochefoucauld, +with his eye shot out and his white garments stained with blood,--of +Guitant shot through the body,--of Roche-Giffard, whom she pitied, "though +a Protestant." Condé might, at that moment, be sharing their fate; all +depended on her; and so Conrart declares, in his Memoirs, that +"Mademoiselle said some strange things to these gentlemen": as, for +instance, that her attendants should throw them out of the window; that +she would pluck off the Marshal's beard; that he should die by no hand but +her's, and the like. When it came to this, the Maréchal de l'Hôpital +stroked his chin with a sense of insecurity, and called the council away +to deliberate; "during which time," says the softened Princess, "leaning +on a window which looked on the St. Esprit, where they were saying mass, I +offered up my prayers to God." At last they came back, and assented to +every one of her propositions. + +In a moment she was in the streets again. The first person she met was +Vallon, terribly wounded. "We are lost!" he said. "You are saved!" she +cried, proudly. "I command to-day in Paris, as I commanded in Orléans." +"Vous me rendez la vie," said the reanimated soldier, who had been with +her in her first campaign. On she went, meeting at every step men wounded +in the head, in the body, in the limbs,--on horseback, on foot, on planks, +on barrows,--besides the bodies of the slain. She reached the windows +beside the Porte St. Antoine, and Condé met her there; he rode up, covered +with blood and dust, his scabbard lost, his sword in hand. Before she +could speak, that soul of fire uttered, for the only recorded time in his +career, the word _Despair_: "Ma cousine, vous voyez un homme au +désespoir,"--and burst into tears. But her news instantly revived him, and +his army with him. "Mademoiselle is at the gate," the soldiers cried; and, +with this certainty of a place of refuge, they could do all things. In +this famous fight, five thousand men defended themselves against twelve +thousand, for eight hours. "Did you see Condé himself?" they asked +Turenne, after it was over. "I saw not one, but a dozen Condés," was the +answer; "he was in every place at once." + +But there was one danger more for Condé, one opportunity more for +Mademoiselle, that day. Climbing the neighboring towers of the Bastille, +she watched the royal party on the heights of Charonne, and saw fresh +cavalry and artillery detached to aid the army of Turenne. The odds were +already enormous, and there was but one course left for her. She was +mistress of Paris, and therefore mistress of the Bastille. She sent for +the governor of the fortress, and showed him the advancing troops. "Turn +the cannon under your charge, Sir, upon the royal army." Without waiting +to heed the consternation she left behind her, Mademoiselle returned to +the gate. The troops had heard of the advancing reinforcements, and were +drooping again; when, suddenly, the cannon of the Bastille, those Spanish +cannon; flamed out their powerful succor, the royal army halted and +retreated, and the day was won. + +The Queen and the Cardinal, watching from Charonne, saw their victims +escape them. But the cannon-shots bewildered them all. "It was probably a +salute to Mademoiselle," suggested some comforting adviser. "No," said the +experienced Maréchal de Villeroi, "if Mademoiselle had a hand in it, the +salute was for us." At this, Mazarin comprehended the whole proceeding, +and coldly consoled himself with a _bon-mot_ that became historic. "Elle a +tué son mari," he said,--meaning that her dreams of matrimony with the +young king must now be ended. No matter; the battle of the Porte St. +Antoine was ended also. + +There have been many narratives of that battle, including Napoleon's; they +are hard to reconcile, and our heroine's own is by no means the clearest; +but all essentially agree in the part they ascribe to her. One brief +appendix to the campaign, and her short career of heroism fades into the +light of common day. + +Yet a third time did Fortune, showering upon one maiden so many +opportunities at once, summon her to arm herself with her father's +authority, that she might go in his stead into that terrible riot which, +two days after, tarnished the glories of Condé, and by its reaction +overthrew the party of the Fronde ere long. None but Mademoiselle dared to +take the part of that doomed minority in the city government, which, for +resisting her own demands, were to be terribly punished on that fourth-of- +July night. "A conspiracy so base," said the generous Talon, "never +stained the soil of France." By deliberate premeditation, an assault was +made by five hundred disguised soldiers on the Parliament assembled in the +Hôtel de Ville; the tumult spread; the night rang with a civil conflict +more terrible than that of the day. Condé and Gaston were vainly summoned; +the one cared not, the other dared not. Mademoiselle again took her place +in her carriage and drove forth amid the terrors of the night. The sudden +conflict had passed its cruel climax, but she rode through streets +slippery with blood; she was stopped at every corner. Once a man laid his +arm on the window, and asked if Condé was within the carriage. She +answered "No," and he retreated, the flambeaux gleaming on a weapon +beneath his cloak. Through these interruptions, she did not reach the +half-burned and smoking Hôtel de Ville till most of its inmates had left +it; the few remaining she aided to conceal, and emerged again amid the +lingering, yawning crowd, who cheered her with, "God bless Mademoiselle! +all she does is well done." + +At four o'clock that morning she went to rest, weary with these days and +nights of responsibility. Sleep soundly, Mademoiselle, you will be +troubled with such no longer. An ignominious peace is at hand; and though +peace, too, has her victories, yours is not a nature grand enough to grasp +them. Last to yield, last to be forgiven, there will yet be little in your +future career to justify the distrust of despots, or to recall the young +heroine of Orléans and St Antoine. + + +IV. + +THE CONCLUSION. + +Like a river which loses itself, by infinite subdivision, in the sands, so +the wars of the Fronde disappeared in petty intrigues at last. As the +fighting ended and manoeuvring became the game, of course Mazarin came +uppermost,--Mazarin, that super-Italian, finessing and fascinating, so +deadly sweet, _l'homme plus agréable du monde_, as Madame de Motteville +and Bussy-Rabutin call him,--flattering that he might win, avaricious that +he might be magnificent, winning kings by jewelry and princesses by +lapdogs,--too cowardly for any avoidable collision,--too cool and +economical in his hatred to waste an antagonist by killing him, but always +luring and cajoling him into an unwilling tool,--too serenely careless of +popular emotion even to hate the mob of Paris, any more than a surgeon +hates his own lancet when it cuts him; he only changes his grasp and holds +it more cautiously. Mazarin ruled. And the King was soon joking over the +fight at the Porte St. Antoine, with Condé and Mademoiselle; the Queen at +the same time affectionately assuring our heroine, that, if she could have +got at her on that day, she would certainly have strangled her, but that, +since it was past, she would love her as ever,--as ever; while +Mademoiselle, not to be outdone, lies like a Frenchwoman, and assures the +Queen that really she did not mean to be so naughty, but "she was with +those who induced her to act against her sense of duty!" + +The day of civil war was over. The daring heroines and voluptuous blonde +beauties of the Frondeur party must seek excitement elsewhere. Some looked +for it in literature; for the female education of France in that age was +far higher than England could show. The intellectual glory of the reign of +the Grand Monarque began in its women. Marie de Médicis had imported the +Italian grace and wit,--Anne of Austria the Spanish courtesy and romance; +the Hôtel de Rambouillet had united the two, and introduced the _genre +précieux_, or stately style, which was superb in its origin, and dwindled +to absurdity in the hands of Mlle. de Scudéry and her valets, before +Molière smiled it away forever. And now that the wars were done, literary +society came up again. Madame de Sablé exhausted the wit and the cookery +of the age in her fascinating entertainments,--_pâtés_ and Pascal, +Rochefoucauld and _ragoûts_,--Mme. de Brégy's Epictetus, Mme. de Choisy's +salads,--confectionery, marmalade, elixirs, Des Cartes, Arnould, +Calvinism, and the barometer. Mme. de Sablé had a sentimental theory that +no woman should eat at the same table with a lover, but she liked to see +her lovers eat, and Mademoiselle, in her obsolete novel of the "Princesse +de Paphlagonie," gently satirizes this passion of her friend. And +Mademoiselle herself finally eclipsed the Sablé by her own entertainments +at her palace of the Luxembourg, where she offered no dish but one of +gossip, serving up herself and friends in a course of "Portraits" so +appetizing that it became the fashion for ten years, and reached +perfection at last in the famous "Characters" of La Bruyère. + +Other heroines went into convents, joined the Carmelites, or those nuns of +Port-Royal of whom the Archbishop of Paris said that they lived in the +purity of angels and the pride of devils. Thither went Madame de Sablé +herself, finally,--"the late Madame," as the dashing young abbés called +her when she renounced the world. Thither she drew the beautiful +Longueville also, and Heaven smiled on one repentance that seemed sincere. +There they found peace in the home of Angélique Arnould and Jacqueline +Pascal. And thence those heroic women came forth again, when religious war +threatened to take the place of civil: again they put to shame their more +timid male companions, and by their labors Jesuit and Jansenist found +peace. + +But not such was to be the career of our Mademoiselle, who, at twenty, had +tried the part of devotee for one week and renounced it forever. No doubt, +at thirty-five, she "began to understand that it is part of the duty of a +Christian to attend High Mass on Sundays and holy days"; and her +description of the deathbed of Anne of Austria is a most extraordinary +jumble of the next world and this. But thus much of devotion was to her +only a part of the proprieties of life, and before the altar of those +proprieties she served, for the rest of her existence, with exemplary +zeal. At forty, she was still the wealthiest unmarried princess in Europe; +fastidious in toilette, stainless in reputation, not lovely in temper, +rigid in etiquette, learned in precedence, an oracle in court traditions, +a terror to the young maids-of-honor, and always quarrelling with her own +sisters, younger, fairer, poorer than herself. Her mind and will were as +active as in her girlhood, but they ground chaff instead of wheat. Whether +her sisters should dine at the Queen's table, when she never had; who +should be her trainbearer at the royal marriage; whether the royal Spanish +father-in-law, on the same occasion, should or should not salute the +Queen-mother; who, on any given occasion, should have a _tabouret_, who a +_pliant_, who a chair, who an arm-chair; who should enter the King's +_ruelle_, or her own, or pass out by the private stairway; how she should +arrange the duchesses at state-funerals: these were the things which tried +Mademoiselle's soul, and these fill the later volumes of that +autobiography whose earlier record was all a battle and a march. From +Condé's "Obey Mademoiselle's orders as my own," we come down to this: "For +my part, I had been worrying myself all day; having been told that the new +Queen would not salute me on the lips, and that the King had decided to +sustain her in this position. I therefore spoke to Monsieur the Cardinal +on the subject, bringing forward as an important precedent in my favor, +that the Queen-mother had always kissed the princesses of the blood"; and +so on through many pages. Thus lapsed her youth of frolics into an old age +of cards. + +It is a slight compensation, that this very pettiness makes her chronicles +of the age very vivid in details. How she revels in the silver brocades, +the violet-colored velvet robes, the crimson velvet carpets, the purple +damask curtains fringed with gold and silver, the embroidered _fleurs de +lis_, the wedding-caskets, the cordons of diamonds, the clusters of +emeralds _en poires_ with diamonds, and the Isabelle-colored linen, +whereby hangs a tale! She still kept up her youthful habit of avoiding the +sick-rooms of her kindred, but how magnificently she mourned them when +they died! Her brief, genuine, but quite unexpected sorrow for her father +was speedily assuaged by the opportunity it gave her to introduce the +fashion of gray mourning, instead of black; it had previously, it seems, +been worn by widows only. Servants and horses were all put in deep black, +however, and "the court observed that I was very _magnifique_ in all my +arrangements." On the other hand, be it recorded, that our Mademoiselle, +chivalrous royalist to the last, was the only person at the French court +who refused to wear mourning for the usurper Cromwell! + +But, if thus addicted to funeral pageants, it is needless to say that +weddings occupied their full proportion of her thoughts. Her schemes for +matrimony fill the larger portion of her history, and are, like all the +rest, a diamond necklace of great names. In the boudoir, as in the field, +her campaigns were superb, but she was cheated of the results. Her picture +should have been painted, like that of Justice, with sword and scales,-- +the one for foes, the other for lovers. She spent her life in weighing +them,--monarch against monarch, a king in hand against an emperor in the +bush. We have it on her own authority, which, in such matters, was +unsurpassable, that she was "the best match in Europe, except the Infanta +of Spain." Not a marriageable prince in Christendom, therefore, can hover +near the French court, but this middle-aged sensitive-plant prepares to +close her leaves and be coy. The procession of her wooers files before our +wondering eyes, and each the likeness of a kingly crown has on: Louis +himself, her bright possibility of twenty years, till he takes her at her +own estimate and prefers the Infanta,--Monsieur, his younger brother, +Philip IV. of Spain, Charles II. of England, the Emperor of Germany, the +Archduke Leopold of Austria,--prospective king of Holland,--the King of +Portugal, the Prince of Denmark, the Elector of Bavaria, the Duke of +Savoy, Condé's son, and Condé himself. For the last of these alone she +seems to have felt any real affection. Their tie was more than cousinly; +the same heroic blood of the early Bourbons was in them, they were trained +by the same precocious successes, only six years apart in age, and +beginning with that hearty mutual aversion which is so often the parent of +love, in impulsive natures like theirs. Their flirtation was platonic, but +chronic; and whenever poor, heroic, desolate Clémence de Maille was sicker +than usual, these cousins were walking side by side in the Tuileries +gardens, and dreaming, almost in silence, of what might be, while Mazarin +shuddered at the thought of mating two such eagles together.--So passed +her life, and at last, like many a matchmaking lady, she baffled all the +gossips, and left them all in laughter when her choice was made. + +The tale stands embalmed forever in the famous letter of Madame de Sévigné +to her cousin, M. de Coulanges, written on Monday, December 15, 1670. It +can never be translated too often, so we will risk it again. + +"I have now to announce to you the most astonishing circumstance, the most +surprising, most marvellous, most triumphant, most bewildering, most +unheard-of, most singular, most extraordinary, most incredible, most +unexpected, most grand, most trivial, most rare, most common, most +notorious, most secret, (till to-day,) most brilliant, most desirable; +indeed, a thing to which past ages afford but one parallel, and that a +poor one; a thing which we can scarcely believe at Paris; how can it be +believed at Lyons? a thing which excites the compassion of all the world, +and the delight of Madame de Rohan and Madame de Hauterive; a thing which +is to be done on Sunday, when those who see it will hardly believe their +eyes; a thing which will be done on Sunday, and which might perhaps be +impossible on Monday: I cannot possibly announce it; guess it; I give you +three guesses; try now. If you will not, I must tell you. M. de Lauzun +marries on Sunday, at the Louvre,--whom now? I give you three guesses,-- +six,--a hundred. Madame de Coulanges says, 'It is not hard to guess; it is +Madame de la Vallière.' Not at all, Madame! 'Mlle. de Retz?' Not a bit; +you are a mere provincial. 'How absurd!' you say; 'it is Mlle. Colbert.' +Not that, either. 'Then, of course, it is Mlle. de Créqui.' Not right yet. +Must I tell you, then? Listen! he marries on Sunday, at the Louvre, by his +Majesty's permission, Mademoiselle,--Mademoiselle de,--Mademoiselle (will +you guess again?)--he marries MADEMOISELLE,--La Grande Mademoiselle,-- +Mademoiselle, daughter of the late Monsieur,--Mademoiselle, grand- +daughter of Henri Quatre,--Mademoiselle d'Eu,--Mademoiselle de Dombes,-- +Mademoiselle de Montpensier,--Mademoiselle d'Orléans,--Mademoiselle, the +King's own cousin,--Mademoiselle, destined for the throne,--Mademoiselle, +the only fit match in France for Monsieur [the King's brother];--there's +a piece of information for you! If you shriek,--if you are beside +yourself,--if you say it is a hoax, false, mere gossip, stuff, and +nonsense,--if, finally, you say hard things about us, we do not complain; +we took the news in the same way. Adieu; the letters by this post will +show you whether we have told the truth." + +Poor Mademoiselle! Madame de Sévigné was right in one thing,--if it were +not done promptly, it might prove impracticable. Like Ralph Roister +Doister, she should ha' been married o' Sunday. Duly the contract was +signed, by which Lauzun took the name of M. de Montpensier and the largest +fortune in the kingdom, surrendered without reservation, all, all to him; +but Mazarin had bribed the notary to four hours' delay, and during that +time the King was brought to change his mind, to revoke his consent, and +to contradict the letters he had written to foreign courts, formally +announcing the nuptials of the first princess of the blood. In reading the +Memoirs of Mademoiselle, one forgets all the absurdity of all her long +amatory angling for the handsome young guardsman, in pity for her deep +despair. When she went to remonstrate with the King, the two royal cousins +fell on their knees, embraced, "and thus we remained for near three +quarters of an hour, not a word being spoken during the whole time, but +both drowned in tears." Reviving, she told the King, with her usual +frankness, that he was "like apes who caress children and suffocate them"; +and this high-minded monarch soon proceeded to justify her remark by +ordering her lover to the Castle of Pignerol, to prevent a private +marriage,--which had probably taken place already. Ten years passed, +before the labors and wealth of this constant and untiring wife could +obtain her husband's release; and when he was discharged at last, he came +out a changed, soured, selfish, ungrateful man. "Just Heaven," she had +exclaimed in her youth, "would not bestow such a woman as myself upon a +man who was unworthy of her." But perhaps Heaven was juster than she +thought. They soon parted again forever, and he went to England, there to +atone for these inglorious earlier days by one deed of heroic loyalty +which it is not ours to tell. + +And then unrolled the gorgeous tapestry of the maturer reign of the Grand +Monarque,--that sovereign whom his priests in their liturgy styled "the +chief work of the Divine hands," and of whom Mazarin said, more honestly, +that there was material enough in him for four kings and one honest man. +The "Moi-même" of his boyish resolution became the "L'état, c'est moi" of +his maturer egotism; Spain yielded to France the mastery of the land, as +she had already yielded to Holland and England the sea; Turenne fell at +Sassbach, Condé sheathed his sword at Chantilly; Bossuet and Bourdaloue, +preaching the funeral sermons of these heroes, praised their glories, and +forgot, as preachers will, their sins; Vatel committed suicide because his +Majesty had not fish enough for breakfast; the Princess Palatine died in a +convent, and the Princess Condé in a prison; the fair Sévigné chose the +better part, and the fairer Montespan the worse; the lovely La Vallière +walked through sin to saintliness, and poor Marie de Mancini through +saintliness to sin; Voiture and Benserade and Corneille passed away, and +Racine and Molière reigned in their stead; and Mademoiselle, who had won +the first campaigns of her life and lost all the rest, died a weary old +woman at sixty-seven. + +Thus wrecked and wasted, her opportunity past, her career a +disappointment, she leaves us only the passing glimpse of what she was, +and the hazy possibility of what she might have been. Perhaps the defect +was, after all, in herself; perhaps the soil was not deep enough to +produce anything but a few stray heroisms, bright and transitory;--perhaps +otherwise. What fascinates us in her is simply her daring, that inborn +fire of the blood to which danger is its own exceeding great reward; a +quality which always kindles enthusiasm, and justly,--but which is a thing +of temperament, not necessarily joined with any other great qualities, and +worthless when it stands alone--But she had other resources,--weapons, at +least, if not qualities; she had birth, wealth, ambition, decision, pride, +perseverance, ingenuity; beauty not slight, though not equalling the +superb Longuevilles and Chevreuses of the age; great personal magnetism, +more than average cultivation for that period, and unsullied chastity. Who +can say what these things might have ended in, under other circumstances? +We have seen how Mazarin, who read all hearts but the saintly, dreaded the +conjunction of herself and Condé; it is scarcely possible to doubt that it +would have placed a new line of Bourbons on the throne. Had she married +Louis XIV., she might not have controlled that steadier will, but there +would have been two Grand Monarques instead of one; had she accepted +Charles II. of England, she might have only increased his despotic +tendencies, but she would easily have disposed of the Duchess of +Portsmouth; had she won Ferdinand III., Germany might have suffered less +by the Peace of Westphalia; had she chosen Alphonso Henry, the House of +Braganza would again have been upheld by a woman's hand. But she did none +of these things, and her only epitaph is that dreary might-have-been. + +Nay, not the only one,--for one visible record of her, at least, the soil +of France cherishes among its chiefest treasures. When the Paris +butterflies flutter for a summer day to the decaying watering-place of +Dieppe, some American wanderer, who flutters with them, may cast perchance +a longing eye to where the hamlet of Eu stands amid its verdant meadows, +two miles away, still lovely as when the Archbishop Laurent chose it out +of all the world for his "place of eternal rest," six centuries ago. But +it is not for its memories of priestly tombs and miracles that the summer +visitor seeks it now, nor because the _savant_ loves its ancient sea- +margin or its Roman remains; nor is it because the little Bresle winds +gracefully through its soft bed, beneath forests green in the sunshine, +glorious in the gloom; it is not for the memories of Rollo and William the +Conqueror, which fill with visionary shapes, grander than the living, the +corridors of its half-desolate château. It is because these storied walls, +often ruined, often rebuilt, still shelter a gallery of historic portraits +such as the world cannot equal; there is not a Bourbon king, nor a Bourbon +battle, nor one great name among the courtier contemporaries of Bourbons, +that is not represented there; the "Hall of the Guises" contains kindred +faces, from all the realms of Christendom; the "Salon des Rois" holds Joan +of Arc, sculptured in marble by the hand of a princess; in the drawing- +room, Père la Chaise and Marion de l'Orme are side by side, and the +angelic beauty of Agnes Sorel floods the great hall with light, like a +sunbeam; and in this priceless treasure-house, worth more to France than +almost fair Normandy itself, this gallery of glory, first arranged at +Choisy, then transferred hither to console the solitude of a weeping +woman, the wanderer finds the only remaining memorial of La Grande +Mademoiselle. + + + + +THE SWAN-SONG OF PARSON AVERY. +1635. + + +When the reaper's task was ended, and the summer wearing late, +Parson Avery sailed from Newbury with his wife and children eight, +Dropping down the river harbor in the shallop Watch and Wait. + +Pleasantly lay the clearings in the mellow summer-morn, +And the newly-planted orchards dropping their fruits first-born, +And the homesteads like brown islands amidst a sea of corn. + +Broad meadows reaching seaward the tided creeks between, +And hills rolled, wave-like, inland, with oaks and walnuts green: +A fairer home, a goodlier land, his eye had never seen. + +Yet away sailed Parson Avery, away where duty led, +And the voice of God seemed calling, to break the living bread +To the souls of fishers starving on the rocks of Marblehead! + +All day they sailed: at nightfall the pleasant land-breeze died, +The blackening sky at midnight its starry lights denied, +And, far and low, the thunder of tempest prophesied. + +Blotted out was all the coast-line, gone were rock and wood and sand; +Grimly anxious stood the helmsman with the tiller in his hand, +And questioned of the darkness what was sea and what was land. + +And the preacher heard his dear ones, nestled round him, weeping sore: +"Never heed, my little children! Christ is walking on before +To the pleasant land of Heaven, where the sea shall be no more!" + +All at once the great cloud parted, like a curtain drawn aside, +To let down the torch of lightning on the terror far and wide; +And the thunder and the whirlwind together smote the tide. + +There was wailing in the shallop, woman's wail and man's despair, +A crash of breaking timbers on the rocks so sharp and bare, +And through it all the murmur of Father Avery's prayer. + +From the struggle in the darkness with the wild waves and the blast, +On a rock, where every billow broke above him as it passed, +Alone of all his household the man of God was cast. + +There a comrade heard him praying in the pause of wave and wind: +"All my own have gone before me, and I linger just behind; +Not for life I ask, but only for the rest thy ransomed find! + +"In this night of death I challenge the promise of thy Word! +Let me see the great salvation of which mine ears have heard! +Let me pass from hence forgiven, through the grace of Christ, our Lord! + +"In the baptism of these waters wash white my every sin, +And let me follow up to Thee my household and my kin! +Open the sea-gate of thy Heaven and let me enter in!" + +The ear of God was open to his servant's last request; +As the strong wave swept him downward the sweet prayer upward pressed, +And the soul of Father Avery went with it to his rest. + +There was wailing on the mainland from the rocks of Marblehead, +In the stricken church of Newbury the notes for prayer were read, +And long by board and hearthstone the living mourned the dead. + +And still the fishers out-bound, or scudding from the squall, +With grave and reverent faces the ancient tale recall, +When they see the white waves breaking on the "Rock of Avery's Fall!" + + + + +THE DENSLOW PALACE. + + +It is the privilege of authors and artists to see and to describe; to "see +clearly and describe vividly" gives the pass on all state occasions. It is +the "cap of darkness" and the _talaria_, and wafts them whither they will. +The doors of boudoirs and senate-chambers open quickly, and close after +them,--excluding the talentless and staring rabble. I, who am one of the +humblest of the seers,--a universal admirer of all things beautiful and +great,--from the commonwealths of Plato and Solon, severally, expulsed, as +poet without music or politic, and a follower of the great,--I, from my +dormitory, or nest, of twelve feet square, can, at an hour's notice, or +less, enter palaces, and bear away, unchecked and unquestioned, those +_imagines_ of Des Cartes which emanate or are thrown off from all forms,-- +and this, not in imagination, but in the flesh. + +Whether it was the "tone of society" which pervaded my "Florentine +letters," or my noted description of the boudoir of Egeria Mentale, I +could not just now determine; but these, and other humble efforts of mine, +made me known in palaces as a painter of beauty and magnificence; and I +have been in demand, to do for wealth what wealth cannot do for itself,-- +namely, make it live a little, or, at least, spread as far, in fame, as +the rings of a stone-plash on a great pond. + +I enjoy friendships and regards which would satisfy the most fastidious. +Are not the Denslows enormously rich? Is not Dalton a sovereign of +elegance? It was I who gave the fame of these qualities to the world, in +true colors, not flattered. And _they_ know it, and love me. Honoria +Denslow is the most beautiful and truly charming woman of society. It was +I who first said it; and she is my friend, and loves me. I defy poverty; +the wealth of all the senses is mine, without effort. I desire not to be +one of those who mingle as principals and sufferers; for they are less +causes than effects. As the Florentine in the Inferno saw the souls of +unfortunate lovers borne upon a whirlwind, so have I seen all things fair +and precious,--outpourings of wealth,--all the talents,--all the offerings +of duty and devotion,--angelic graces of person and of soul,--borne and +swept violently around on the circular gale. Wealth is only an enlargement +of the material boundary, and leaves the spirit free to dash to and fro, +and exhaust itself in vain efforts.--But I am philosophizing,--oddly +enough,--when I should describe. + +An exquisite little note from Honoria, sent at the last moment, asking me +to be present that evening at a "select" party, which was to open the "new +house,"--the little palace of the Denslows,--lay beside me on the table. +It was within thirty minutes of nine o'clock, the hour I had fixed for +going. A howling winter out of doors, a clear fire glowing in my little +grate. My arm-chair, a magnificent present from Honoria, shaming the +wooden fixtures of the poor room, invited to meditation, and perhaps the +composition of some delicate periods. They formed slowly. Time, it is +said, devours all things; but imagination, in turn, devours time,--and, +indeed, swallowed my half-hour at a gulp. The neighboring church-clock +tolled nine. I was belated, and hurried away. + +It was a _reunion_ of only three hundred invitations, selected by my +friend Dalton, the intimate and adviser of Honoria. So happy were their +combinations, scarce a dozen were absent or declined. + +At eleven, the guests began to assemble. Introductions were almost +needless. Each person was a recognized member of "society." One-half of +the number were women,--many of them young, beautiful, accomplished,-- +heiresses, "charming widows," poetesses of real celebrity, and, rarer +still, of good repute,--wives of millionnaires, flashing in satin and +diamonds. The men, on their side, were of all professions and arts, and of +every grade of celebrity, from senator to merchant,--each distinguished by +some personal attribute or talent; and in all was the gift, so rare, of +manners and conversation. It was a company of undoubted gentlemen, as +truly entitled to respect and admiration as if they stood about a throne. +They were the untitled nobility of Nature, wealth, and genius. + +As I stood looking, with placid admiration, from a recess, upon a +brilliant _tableau_ of beautiful women and celebrated men that had +accidentally arranged itself before me, Dalton touched my arm. + +"I have seen," said he, "aristocratic and republican _réunions_ of the +purest mode in Paris, the court and the banker's circle of London, +_conversazioni_ at Rome and Florence. Every face in this room is +intelligent, and nearly all either beautiful, remarkable, or commanding. + Observe those five women standing with Denslow and Adonaïs,--grandeur, +sweetness, grace, form, purity; each has an attribute. It is a rare +assemblage of superior human beings. The world cannot surpass it. And, by +the by, the rooms are superb." + +They were, indeed, magnificent: two grand suites, on either side a central +hall of Gothic structure, in white marble, with light, aërial staircases +and gilded balconies. Each suite was a separate miracle: the height, the +breadth, the columnal divisions; the wonderful delicacy of the arches, +upon which rested ceilings frescoed with incomparable art. In one +compartment the arches and caryatides were of black marble; in another, of +snowy Parian; in a third, of wood, exquisitely carved, and joined like one +piece, as if it were a natural growth; vines rising at the bases of the +walls, and spreading under the roof. There was no forced consistency. +Forms suitable only for the support of heavy masses of masonry, or for the +solemn effects of church interiors, were not here introduced. From +straight window-cornices of dark wood, slenderly gilt, but richly carved, +fell cataracts of gleaming satin, softened in effect with laces of rare +appreciation. + +The frescoes and panel-work were a study by themselves, uniting the +classic and modern styles in allegorical subjects. The paintings, selected +by the taste of Dalton, to overpower the darkness of the rooms by +intensity of color, were incorporated with the walls. There were but few +mirrors. At the end of each suite, one, of fabulous size, without frame, +made to appear, by a cunning arrangement of dark draperies, like a +transparent portion of the wall itself, extended the magnificence of the +apartments. + +Not a flame nor a jet was anywhere visible. Tinted vases, pendent, or +resting upon pedestals, distributed harmonies and thoughts of light rather +than light itself; and yet all was visible, effulgent. The columns which +separated the apartments seemed to be composed of masses of richly-colored +flames, compelled, by some ingenious alchemy, to assume the form and +office of columns. + +In New York, _par excellence_ the city of private gorgeousness and +_petite_ magnificence, nothing had yet been seen equal to the rooms of the +glorious Denslow Palace. Even Dalton, the most capricious and critical of +men, whose nice vision had absorbed the elegancies of European taste, +pronounced them superb. The upholstery and ornamentation were composed +under the direction of celebrated artists. Palmer was consulted on the +marbles. Page (at Rome) advised the cartoons for the frescoes, and gave +laws for the colors and disposition of the draperies. The paintings, +panelled in the walls, were modern, triumphs of the art and genius of the +New World. + +Until the hour for dancing, prolonged melodies of themes modulated in the +happiest moments of the great composers floated in the perfumed air from a +company of unseen musicians, while the guests moved through the vast +apartments, charmed or exalted by their splendor, or conversed in groups, +every voice subdued and intelligent. + +At midnight began the modish music of the dance, and groups of beautiful +girls moved like the atoms of Chladni on the vibrating crystal, with their +partners, to the sound of harps and violins, in pleasing figures or +inebriating spirals. + +When supper was served, the ivory fronts of a cabinet of gems divided +itself in the centre,--the two halves revolving upon silver hinges,--and +discovered a hall of great height and dimensions, walled with crimson +damask, supporting pictures of all the masters of modern art. The dome- +like roof of this hall was of marble variously colored, and the floor +tessellated and mosaicked in grotesque and graceful figures of Vesuvian +lavas and painted porcelain. + +The tables, couches, chairs, and _vis-a-vis_ in this hall were of plain +pattern and neutral dead colors, not to overpower or fade the pictures on +the walls, or the gold and Parian service of the cedar tables. + +But the chief beauty of this unequalled supper-room was an immense bronze +candelabrum, which rose in the centre from a column of black marble. It +was the figure of an Italian elm, slender and of thin foliage, embraced, +almost enveloped, in a vine, which reached out and supported itself in +hanging from all the branches; the twigs bearing fruit, not of grapes, but +of a hundred little spheres of crimson, violet, and golden light, whose +combination produced a soft atmosphere of no certain color. + +Neither Honoria, Dalton, nor myself remained long in the gallery. We +retired with a select few, and were served in an antechamber, separated +from the grand reception-room by an arch, through which, by putting aside +a silk curtain, Honoria could see, at a distance, any that entered, as +they passed in from the hall. + +My own position was such that I could look over her shoulder and see as +she saw. _Vis-a-vis_ with her, and consequently with myself, was Adonaïs, +a celebrated author, and person of the _beau monde_. On his left, Dalton, +always mysteriously elegant and dangerously witty. Denslow and Jeffrey +Lethal, the critic, completed our circle. The conversation was easy, +animated, personal. + +"You are fortunate in having a woman of taste to manage your +entertainments," said Lethal, in answer to a remark of Denslow's,--"but in +bringing these people together she has made a sad blunder." + +"And what may that be?" inquired Dalton, mildly. + +"Your guests are too well behaved, too fine, and on their guard; there are +no butts, no palpable fools or vulgarians; and, worse, there are many +distinguished, but no one great man,--no social or intellectual sovereign +of the occasion." + +Honoria looked inquiringly at Lethal. "Pray, Mr. Lethal, tell me who he +is? I thought there was no such person in America," she added, with a look +of reproachful inquiry at Dalton and myself, as if we should have found +this sovereign and suggested him. + +"You are right, my dear queen; Lethal is joking," responded Dalton; "we +are a democracy, and have only a queen of"---- + +"Water ices," interrupted Lethal; "but, as for the king you seek, as +democracies finally come to that,"---- + +"Good Heavens!" exclaimed Honoria, raising the curtain, "it must be he +that is coming in." + +Honoria frowned slightly, rose, and advanced to meet a new-comer, who had +entered unannounced, and was advancing alone. Dalton followed to support +her. I observed their movements,--Lethal and Adonaïs using my face as a +mirror of what was passing beyond the curtain. + +The masses of level light from the columns on the left seemed to envelope +the stranger, who came toward us from the entrance, as if he had divined +the presence of Honoria in the alcove. + +He was about the middle height, Napoleonic in form and bearing, with +features of marble paleness, firm, and sharply defined. His hair and +magnificent Asiatic beard were jetty black, curling, and naturally +disposed. Under his dark and solid brows gleamed large eyes of abysmal +blackness and intensity. + +"Is it Lord N----?" whispered Lethal, moved from his habitual coldness by +the astonishment which he read in my face. + +"Senator D----, perhaps," suggested Denslow, whose ideas, like his person, +aspired to the senatorial. + +"Dumas," hinted Adonaïs, an admirer of French literature. "I heard he was +expected." + +"No," I answered, "but certainly in appearance the most noticeable man +living. Let us go out and be introduced." + +"Perhaps," said Lethal, "it is the d----." + +All rose instantly at the idea, and we went forward, urged by irresistible +curiosity. + +As we drew near the stranger, who was conversing with Honoria and Dalton, +a shudder went through me. It was a thrill of the universal Boswell; I +seemed to feel the presence of "the most aristocratic man of the age." + +Honoria introduced me. "My Lord Duke, allow me to present my friend, Mr. +De Vere; Mr. De Vere, the Duke of Rosecouleur." + +Was I, then, face to face with, nay, touching the hand of a highness,--and +that highness the monarch of the _ton_? And is this a ducal hand, white as +the albescent down of the eider-duck, which presses mine with a tender +touch, so haughty and so delicately graduated to my standing as "friend" +of the exquisite Honoria? It was too much; I could have wept; my senses +rather failed. + +Dalton fell short of himself; for, though his head stooped to none, unless +conventionally, the sudden and unaccountable presence of the Duke of +Rosecouleur annoyed and perplexed him. His own sovereignty was threatened. + +Lethal stiffened himself to the ordeal of an introduction; the affair +seemed to exasperate him. Denslow alone, of the men, was in his element. +Pompous and soft, he "cottoned" to the grandeur with the instinct of a +born satellite, and his eyes grew brighter, his body more shining and +rotund, his back more concave. His _bon-vivant_ tones, jolly and +conventional, sounded a pure barytone to the clear soprano of Honoria, in +the harmony of an obsequious welcome. + +The Duke of Rosecouleur glanced around him approvingly upon the +apartments. I believed that he had never seen anything more beautiful than +the _petite_ palace of Honoria, or more ravishing than herself. He said +little, in a low voice, and always to one person at a time. His answers +and remarks were simple and well-turned. + +Dalton allowed the others to move on, and by a slight sign drew me to him. + +"It is unexpected," he said, in a thoughtful manner, looking me full in +the eyes. + +"You knew the Duke of Rosecouleur in Europe?" + +"At Paris, yes,--and in Italy he was a travel friend; but we heard lately +that he had retired upon his estates in England; and certainly, he is the +last person we looked for here." + +"Unannounced." + +"That is a part of the singularity." + +"His name was not in the published list of arrivals; but he may have left +England incognito. Is a mistake possible?" + +"No! there is but one such man in Europe;--a handsomer or a richer does +not live." + +"An eye of wonderful depth." + +"Hands exquisite." + +"Feet, ditto." + +"And his dress and manner." + +"Unapproachable!" + +"Not a shadow of pretence;--the essence of good-breeding founded upon +extensive knowledge, and a thorough sense of position and its advantages; +--in fact, the Napoleon of the parlor." + +"But, Dalton," said I, nervously, "no one attends him." + +"No,--I thought so at first; but do you see that Mephistophelean figure, +in black, who follows the Duke a few paces behind, and is introduced to no +one?" + +"Yes. A singular creature, truly!--how thin he is!" + +"That shadow that follows his Highness is, in fact, the famous valet, Rêve +de Noir,--the prince of servants. The Duke goes nowhere without this man +as a shadow. He asserts that Rêve de Noir has no soul; and I believe him. +The face is that of a demon. It is a separate creation, equally wonderful +with the master, but not human. He was condensed out of the atmosphere of +the great world." + +As we were speaking, we observed a crowd of distinguished persons +gathered about and following his Highness, as he moved. He spoke now to +one; now to another. Honoria, fascinated, her beauty every instant +becoming more radiant, just leaned, with the lightest pressure, upon the +Duke's arm. They were promenading through the rooms. The music, soft and +low, continued, but the groups of dancers broke up, the loiterers in the +gallery came in, and as the sun draws his fifty, perhaps his hundreds of +planets, circling around and near him, this noble luminary centred in +himself the attention of all. If they could not speak with him, they could +at least speak of him. If they could not touch his hand, they could pass +before him and give one glance at his eyes. The less aristocratic were +even satisfied for the moment with watching the singular being, Rêve de +Noir,--who caught no one's eye, seemed to see no one but his master,--and +yet was not here nor there, nor in any place,--never in the way, a thing +of air, and not tangible, but only black. + +At a signal, he would advance and present to his master a perfume, a laced +handkerchief, a rose of rubies, a diamond clasp; of many with whom he +spoke the liberal Duke begged the acceptance of some little token, as an +earnest of his esteem. After interchanging a few words with Jeffrey +Lethal,--who dared not utter a sarcasm, though he chafed visibly under the +restraint,--the Duke's tasteful generosity suggested a seal ring, with an +intaglio head of Swift cut in opal, the mineral emblem of wit, which dulls +in the sunlight of fortune, and recovers its fiery points in the shade of +adversity;--Rêve de Noir, with a movement so slight, 'twas like the +flitting of a bat, placed the seal in the hand of the Duke, who, with a +charming and irresistible grace, compelled Lethal to receive it. + +To Denslow, Honoria, Dalton, and myself he offered nothing.--Strange?--Not +at all. Was he not the guest, and had not I been presented to him by +Honoria as her "friend?"--a word of pregnant meaning to a Duke of +Rosecouleur! + +To Adonaïs he gave _a lock of hair_ of the great novelist, Dumas, in a +locket of yellow tourmaline,--a stone usually black. Lethal smiled at +this. He felt relieved. + +"The Duke," thought he, "must be a humorist." + +From my coarse way of describing this, you would suppose that it was a +farcical exhibition of vulgar extravagance, and the Duke a madman or an +impostor; but the effect was different. It was done with grace, and, in +the midst of so much else, it attracted only that side regard, at +intervals, which is sure to surprise and excite awe. + +Honoria had almost ceased to converse with us. It was painful to her to +talk with any person. She followed the Duke with her eyes. When, by some +delicate allusion or attention, he let her perceive that she was in his +thoughts, a mantling color overspread her features, and then gave way to +paleness, and a manner which attracted universal remark. It was then +Honoria abdicated that throne of conventional purity which hitherto she +had held undisputed. Women who were plain in her presence outshone +Honoria, by meeting this ducal apparition, that called itself +Rosecouleur,--and which might have been, for aught they knew, a fume of +the Infernal, shaped to deceive us all,--with calm and haughty propriety. + +The sensation did not subside. The music of the waltz invited a renewal of +that intoxicating whirl which isolates friends and lovers, in whispering +and sighing pairs, in the midst of a great assemblage. All the world +looked on, when Honoria Denslow placed her hand upon the shoulder of the +Duke of Rosecouleur, and the noble and beautiful forms began silently and +smoothly turning, with a dream-like motion. Soon she lifted her lovely +eyes and steadied their rays upon his. She leaned wholly upon his arm, and +the gloved hands completed the magnetic circle. At the close of the first +waltz, she rested a moment, leaning upon his shoulder, and his hand still +held hers,--a liberty often assumed and permitted, but not to the nobles +and the monarchs of society. She fell farther, and her ideal beauty faded +into a sensuous. + +Honoria was lost. Dalton saw it. We retired together to a room apart. He +was dispirited; called for and drank rapidly a bottle of Champagne;--it +was insufficient. + +"De Vere," said he, "affairs go badly." + +"Explain." + +"This cursed thing that people call a duke--it kills me." + +"I saw." + +"Of course you did;--the world saw; the servants saw. Honoria has fallen +to-night. I shall transfer my allegiance." + +"And Denslow?" + +"A born sycophant;--he thinks it natural that his wife should love a duke, +and a duke love his wife." + +"So would you, if you were any other than you are." + +"Faugh! it is human nature." + +"Not so; would you not as soon strangle this Rosecouleur for making love +to your wife in public, as you would another man?" + +"Rather." + +"Pooh! I give you up. If you had + simply said, 'Yes,' it would have satisfied me." + +Dalton seemed perplexed. He called a servant and sent him with an order +for Nalson, the usher, to come instantly to him. + +Nalson appeared, with his white gloves and mahogany face. + +"Nalson, you were a servant of the Duke in England?" + +"Yes, Sir." + +"Is the person now in the rooms the Duke of Rosecouleur?" + +"I have not seen him, Sir." + +"Go immediately, study the man well,--do you hear?--and come to me. Let no +one know your purpose." + +Nalson disappeared. + +I was alarmed. If "the Duke" should prove to be an impostor, we were +indeed ruined. + +In five minutes,--an hour, it seemed,--Nalson stood before us. + +"Is it he?" said Dalton, looking fixedly upon the face of the usher. + +No reply. + +"Speak the truth; you need not be afraid." + +"I cannot tell, Sir." + +"Nonsense! go and look again." + +"It is of no use, Mr. Dalton; you, who are as well acquainted with the +personal appearance of his Highness as I am, you have been deceived,--if I +have." + +"Nalson, do you believe that this person is an impostor?" said Dalton, +pointing at myself. + +"Who? Mr. De Vere, Sir?" + +"If, then, you know at sight that this gentleman is my friend Mr. De Vere, +why do you hesitate about the other?" + +"But the imitation is perfect. And there is Rêve de Noir." + +"Yes, did Rêve de Noir recognize you?" + +"I have not caught his eye. You know, Sir, that this Rêve is not, and +never was, like other men; he is a devil. One knows, and one does not know +him." + +"Were you at the door when the Duke entered?" + +"I think not; at least--I cannot tell. When I first saw him, he was in the +room, speaking with Madam Denslow." + +"Nalson, you have done wrong; no one should have entered unannounced. Send +the doorkeeper to me." + +The doorkeeper came; a gigantic negro, magnificently attired. + +"Jupiter, you were at the door when the Duke of Rosecouleur entered?" + +"Yes, Sir." + +"Did the Duke and his man come in a carriage?" + +"Yes, Sir,--a hack." + +"You may go. They are not devils," said Dalton, musingly, "or they would +not have come in a carriage." + +"You seem to have studied the spiritual mode of locomotion," said I. + +Dalton frowned. "This is serious, De Vere." + +"What mean you?" + +"I mean that Denslow is a bankrupt." + +"Explain yourself." + +"You know what an influence he carries in political circles. The G----rs, +the S----es, and their kind, have more talent, but Denslow enjoys the +secret of popularity." + +"Well, I know it." + +"In the middle counties, where he owns vast estates, and has been liberal +to debtors and tenants, he carries great favor; both parties respect him +for his ignorance and pomposity, which they mistake for simplicity and +power, as usual. The estates are mortgaged three deep, and will not hold +out a year. The shares of the Millionnaire's Hotel and the Poor Man's Bank +in the B----y are worthless. Denslow's railroad schemes have absorbed the +capital of those concerns." + +"But he had three millions." + +"Nominally. This palace has actually sunk his income." + +"Madness!" + +"Wisdom, if you will listen." + +"I am all attention." + +"The use of money is to create and hold power. Denslow was certain of the +popular and county votes; he needed only the aristocratic support, and the +A---- people would have made him Senator." + +"Fool, why was he not satisfied with his money?" + +"Do you call the farmer fool, because he is not satisfied with the soil, +but wishes to grow wheat thereon? Money is the soil of power. For much +less than a million one may gratify the senses; great fortunes are not for +sensual luxuries, but for those of the soul. To the facts, then. The +advent of this mysterious duke,--whom I doubt,--hailed by Denslow and +Honoria as a piece of wonderful good-fortune, has already shaken him and +ruined the _prestige_ of his wife. They are mad and blind." + +"Tell me, in plain prose, the _how_ and the _why_." + +"De Vere, you are dull. There are three hundred people in the rooms of the +Denslow Palace; these people are the 'aristocracy.' They control the +sentiments of the 'better class.' Opinion, like dress, descends from them. +They no longer respect Denslow, and their women have seen the weakness of +Honoria." + +"Yes, but Denslow still has 'the people.'" + +"That is not enough. I have calculated the chances, and mustered all our +available force. We shall have no support among the 'better class,' since +we are disgraced with the 'millionnaires.'" + +At this moment Denslow came in. + +"Ah! Dalton,--like you! I have been looking for you to show the pictures. +Devil a thing I know about them. The Duke wondered at your absence." + +"Where is Honoria?" + +"Ill, ill,--fainted. The house is new; smell of new wood and mortar; +deused disagreeable in Honoria. If it had not been for the Duke, she would +have fallen. That's a monstrous clever fellow, that Rosecouleur. Admires +Honoria vastly. Come,--the pictures." + +"Mr. John Vanbrugen Denslow, you are an ass!" + +The large, smooth, florid millionnaire, dreaming only of senatorial +honors, the shouts of the multitude, and the adoration of a party press, +cowered like a dog under the lash of the "man of society." + +"Rather rough,--ha, De Vere? What have _I_ done? Am I an ass because I +know nothing of pictures? Come, Dalton, you are harsh with your old +friend." + +"Denslow, I have told you a thousand times never to concede position." + +"Yes, but this is a duke, man,--a prince!" + +"This from you? By Jove, De Vere, I wish you and I could live a hundred +years, to see a republican aristocrat. We are still mere provincials," +added Dalton, with a sigh. + +Denslow perspired with mortification. + +"You use me badly,--I tell you, Dalton, this Rosecouleur is a devil. +Condescend to him! be haughty and--what do you call it?--urbane to him! I +defy _you_ to do it, with all your impudence. Why, his valet, that shadow +that glides after him, is too much for me. Try him yourself, man." + +"Who, the valet?" + +"No, the master,--though I might have said the valet." + +"Did I yield in Paris?" + +"No, but you were of the embassy, and--and--_no one really knew us_, you +know." + +Dalton pressed his lips hard together. + +"Come," said he, "De Vere, let us try a fall with this Titan of the +carpet." + +Denslow hastened back to the Duke. I followed Dalton; but as for me, bah! +I am a cipher. + +The room in which we were adjoined Honoria's boudoir, from which a secret +passage led down by a spiral to a panel behind hangings; raising these, +one could enter the drawing-room unobserved. Dalton paused midway in the +secret passage, and through a loop or narrow window concealed by +architectural ornaments, and which overlooked the great drawing-rooms, +made a reconnaissance of the field. + +Nights of Venice! what a scene was there! The vine-branch chandeliers, +crystal-fruited, which depended from the slender ribs of the ceiling, cast +a rosy dawn of light, deepening the green and crimson of draperies and +carpets, making an air like sunrise in the bowers of a forest. Form and +order were everywhere visible, though unobtrusive. Arch beyond arch, to +fourth apartments, lessening in dimension, with increase of wealth;-- +groups of beautiful women, on either hand, seated or half reclined; the +pure or rich hues of their robes blending imperceptibly, or in gorgeous +contrasts, with the soft outlines and colors of their supports; a banquet +for the eyes and the mind; the perfect work of art and culture;--gliding +about and among these, or, with others, springing and revolving in that +monarch of all measures, which blends luxury and purity, until it is +either the one or the other, moved the men. + +"That is my work," exclaimed Dalton, unconsciously. + +"Not _all_, I think." + +"I mean the combinations,--the effect. But see! Honoria will again accept +the Duke's invitation. He is coming to her. Let us prevent it." + +He slipped away; and I, remaining at my post of observation, saw him, an +instant later, passing quickly across the floor among the dancers, toward +Honoria. The Duke of Rosecouleur arrived at the same instant before her. +She smiled sorrowfully upon Dalton, and held out her hand in a languid +manner toward the Duke, and again they floated away upon the eddies of the +music. I followed them with eyes fixed in admiration. It was a vision of +the orgies of Olympus,--Zeus and Aphrodite circling to a theme of Chronos. + +Had Honoria tasted of the Indian drug, the weed of paradise? Her eyes, +fixed upon the Duke's, shone like molten sapphires. A tress of chestnut +hair, escaping from the diamond coronet, sprang lovingly forward and +twined itself over her white shoulder and still fairer bosom. Tints like +flitting clouds, Titianic, the mystery and despair of art, disclosed to +the intelligent eye the feeling that mastered her spirit and her sense. +Admirable beauty! Unrivalled, unhappy! The Phidian idol of gold and ivory, +into which a demon had entered, overthrown, and the worshippers gazing on +it with a scorn unmixed with pity! + +The sullen animal rage of battle is nothing to the livor, the burning +hatred of the drawing-room. Dalton, defeated, cast a glance of deadly +hostility on the Duke. Nor was it lost. While the waltz continued, for ten +minutes, he stood motionless. Fearing some untoward event, I came down and +took my place near him. + +The Duke led Honoria to a sofa. But for his arm she would again have +fallen. Dalton had recovered his courage and natural haughtiness. The tone +of his voice, rich, tender, and delicately expressive, did not change. + +"Honoria, you sent for _me_; and the Duke wishes to see the pictures. The +air of the gallery will relieve your faintness." + +He offered his arm, which she, rising mechanically, accepted. A deep blush +crimsoned her features, at the allusion to her weakness. Several of the +guests moved after us, as we passed into the gallery. The Duke's shadow, +Rêve de Noir, following last, closed the ivory doors. We passed through +the gallery,--where pyramids of sunny fruits, in baskets of fine +porcelain, stood relieved by gold and silver services for wine and coffee, +disposed on the tables,--and thence entered another and smaller room, +devoid of ornament, but the crimson tapestried walls were covered with +works or copies of the great masters of Italy. + +Opposite the entrance there was a picture of a woman seated on a throne, +behind which stood a demon whispering in her ear and pointing to a +handsome youth in the circle of the courtiers. The design and color were +in the style of Correggio. Denslow stood close behind me. In advance were +Honoria, Dalton, and the Duke, whose conversation was addressed +alternately to her and Dalton. The lights of the gallery burst forth in +their full refulgence as we approached the picture. + +The glorious harmony of its colors,--the force of the shadows, which +seemed to be converging in the rays of a single unseen source of light,-- +the unity of sentiment, which drew all the groups together, in the idea;-- +I had seen all this before, but with the eyes of supercilious criticism. +Now the picture smote us with awe. + +"I have the original of this excellent work," said the Duke, "in my house +at A----, but your copy is nearly as good." + +The remark, intended for Honoria, reached the pride of her companion, who +blandly replied,-- + +"Your Highness's exquisite judgment is for once at fault. The piece is +original. It was purchased from a well-known collection in Italy, where +there are none others of the school." + +Honoria was gazing upon the picture, as I was, in silent astonishment. + +"If this," said she, "is a copy, what must have been the genuine work? Did +you never before notice the likeness between the queen, in that picture, +and myself?" she asked, addressing Dalton. + +The remark excited general attention. Every one murmured, "The likeness is +perfect." + +"And the demon behind the queen," said Denslow, insipidly, "resembles your +Highness's valet." + +There was another exclamation. No sooner was it observed, than the +likeness to Rêve de Noir seemed to be even more perfect. + +The Duke made a sign. + +Rêve de Noir placed himself near the canvas. His profile was the +counterpart of that in the painting. He seemed to have stepped out of it. + +"It was I," said the Duke, in a gentle voice, and with a smile which just +disclosed the ivory line under the black moustache, "who caused this +picture to be copied and altered. The beauty of the Hon. Mrs. Denslow, +whom it was my highest pleasure to know, seemed to me to surpass that of +the queen of my original. I first, with great secrecy, unknown to your +wife," continued the Duke, turning to Denslow, "procured a portrait from +the life by memory, which was afterwards transferred to this canvas. The +resemblance to my attendant is, I confess, remarkable and inexplicable." + +"But will you tell us by what accident this copy happened to be in Italy?" +asked Dalton. + +"You will remember," replied the Duke, coldly, "that at Paris, noticing +your expressions of admiration for the picture, which you had seen in my +English gallery, I gave you a history of its purchase at Bologna by +myself. I sent my artist to Bologna, with orders to place the copy in the +gallery and to introduce the portrait of the lady; it was a freak of +fancy; I meant it for a surprise; as I felt sure, that, if you saw the +picture, you would secure it. + +"It seems to me," replied Dalton, "that the _onus_ of proof rests with +your Highness." + +The Duke made a signal to Rêve de Noir, who again stepped up to the +canvas, and, with a short knife or stiletto, removed a small portion of +the outer layer of paint, disclosing a very ancient ground of some other +and inferior work, over which the copy seemed to have been painted. The +proof was unanswerable. + +"Good copies," remarked the Duke, "are often better than originals." + +He offered his arm to Honoria, and they walked through the gallery,--he +entertaining her, and those near him, with comments upon other works. The +crowd followed them, as they moved on or returned, as a cloud of gnats +follow up and down, and to and fro, a branch tossing in the wind. + +"Beaten at every point," I said, mentally, looking on the pale features of +the defeated Dalton. + +"Yes," he replied, seeing the remark in my face; "but there is yet time. I +am satisfied this is the man with whom we travelled; none other could have +devised such a plan, or carried it out. He must have fallen in love with +Honoria at that time; and simply to see her is the object of his visit to +America. He is a connoisseur in pictures as in women; but he must not be +allowed to ruin us by his arrogant assumptions." + +"Excepting his manner and extraordinary personal advantages, I find +nothing in him to awe or astonish." + +"His wealth is incalculable; he is used to victories; and that manner +which you affect to slight,--that is everything. 'Tis power, success, +victory. This man of millions, this prince, does not talk; he has but +little use for words. It is manner, and not words, that achieves social +and amatory conquests." + +"Bah! You are like the politicians, who mistake accidents for principles. +But even you are talking, while this pernicious foreigner is acting. See! +they have left the gallery, and the crowd of fools is following them. You +cannot stem such a tide of folly." + +"I deny that they are fools. Why does that sallow wretch, Lethal, follow +them? Or that enamelled person, Adonaïs? They are at a serpent-charming, +and Honoria is the bird-of-paradise. They watch with delight, and sketch +as they observe, the struggles of the poor bird. The others are +indifferent or curious, envious or amused. It is only Denslow who is +capped and antlered, and the shafts aimed at his foolish brow glance and +wound us." + +We were left alone in the gallery. Dalton paced back and forth, in his +slow, erect, and graceful manner; there was no hurry or agitation. + +"How quickly," said he, as his moist eyes met mine, "how like a dream, +this glorious vision, this beautiful work, will fade and be forgotten! +Nevertheless, I made it," he added, musingly. "It was I who moulded and +expanded the sluggish millions." + +"You will still be what you are, Dalton,--an artist, more than a man of +society. You work with a soft and perishable material." + +"A distinction without a difference. Every _man_ is a politician, but only +every artist is a gentleman." + +"Denslow, then, is ruined." + +"Yes and no;--there is nothing in him to ruin. It is I who am the +sufferer." + +"And Honoria?" + +"It was I who formed her manners, and guided her perceptions of the +beautiful. It was I who married her to a mass of money, De Vere." + +"Did you never love Honoria?" + +He laughed. + +"Loved? Yes; as Praxiteles may have loved the clay he moulded,--for its +smoothness and ductility under the hand." + +"The day has not come for such men as you, Dalton." + +"Come, and gone, and coming. It has come in dream-land. Let us follow your +fools." + +The larger gallery was crowded. The pyramids of glowing fruit had +disappeared; there was a confused murmur of pairs and parties, chatting +and taking wine. The master of the house, his wife, and guest were nowhere +to be seen. Lethal and Adonaïs stood apart, conversing. As we approached +them unobserved, Dalton checked me. "Hear what these people are saying," +said he. + +"My opinion is," said Lethal, holding out his crooked forefinger like a +claw, "that this _soi-disant_ duke--what the deuse is his name?" + +"Rosecouleur," interposed Adonaïs, in a tone of society. + +"Right,--Couleur de Rose is an impostor,--an impostor, a sharper. +Everything tends that way. What an utter sell it would be!" + +"You were with us at the picture scene?" murmured Adonaïs. + +"Yes. Dalton looked wretchedly cut up, when that devil of a valet, who +must be an accomplice, scraped the new paint off. The picture must have +been got up in New York by Dalton and the Denslows." + +"Perhaps the Duke, too, was got up in New York, on the same principle," +suggested Adonaïs. "Such things are possible. Society is intrinsically +rotten, you know, and Dalton"---- + +"Is a fellow of considerable talent," sneered Lethal,--"but has enemies, +who may have planned a duke." + +Adonaïs coughed in his cravat, and hinted,--"How would it do to call him +'Barnum Dalton'?" + +Adonaïs appeared shocked at himself, and swallowed a minim of wine to +cleanse his vocal apparatus from the stain of so coarse an illustration. + +"Do you hear those creatures?" whispered Dalton. "They are arranging +scandalous paragraphs for the 'Illustration.'" + +A moment after, he was gone. I spoke to Lethal and Adonaïs. + +"Gentlemen, you are in error about the picture and the Duke; they are as +they now appear;--the one, an excellent copy, purchased as an original,-- +no uncommon mistake; the other, a genuine highness. How does he strike +you?" + +Lethal cast his eyes around to see who listened. + +"The person," said he, "who is announced here to-night as an English duke +seemed to me, of all men I could select, least like one." + +"Pray, what is your ideal of an English duke, Mr. Lethal?" asked Adonaïs, +with the air of a connoisseur, sure of himself, but hating to offend. + +"A plain, solid person, well dressed, but simple; mutton-chop whiskers; +and the manners of a--a----" + +"Bear!" said a soft female voice. + +"Precisely,--the manners of a bear; a kind of gentlemanly bear, perhaps,-- +but still, ursine and heavy; while this person, who seems to have walked +out of ----- or a novel, affects me, by his ways and appearance, like a-- +a--h'm"---- + +"Gambler!" said the same female voice, in a conclusive tone. + +There was a general soft laugh. Everybody was pleased. All admired, hated, +and envied the Duke. It was settled beyond a doubt that he was an +impostor,--and that the Denslows were either grossly taken in, or were +"selling" their friends. In either case, it was shocking and delightful. + +"The fun of the thing," continued Lethal, raising his voice a little, "is, +that the painter who got up the old picture must have been as much an +admirer of the Hon. Mrs. Denslow as--his--Highness; for, in touching in +the queen, he has unconsciously made it a portrait." + +The blow was final. I moved away, grieved and mortified to the soul, +cursing the intrusion of the mysterious personage whose insolent +superiority had overthrown the hopes of my friends. + +At the door of the gallery I met G----, the painter, just returned from +London. I drew him with me into the inner gallery, to make a thorough +examination of the picture. I called his attention to the wonderful +resemblance of the queen to Honoria. He did not see it; we looked +together, and I began to think that it might have been a delusion. I told +the Duke's story of the picture to G----. He examined the canvas, tested +the layers of color, and pronounced the work genuine and of immense value. +We looked again and again at the queen's head, viewing it in every light. +The resemblance to Honoria had disappeared; nor was the demon any longer a +figure of the Duke's valet. + +"One would think," said G----, laughing, "that you had been mesmerized. If +you have been so deceived in a picture, may you not be equally cheated in +a man? I am loath to offend; but, indeed, the person whom you call +Rosecouleur cannot be the Duke of that title, whom I saw in England. I had +leave to copy a picture in his gallery. He was often present. His manners +were mild and unassuming,--not at all like those of this man, to whom, I +acknowledge, the personal resemblance is surprising. I am afraid our good +friends, the Denslows, and Mr. Dalton,--whom I esteem for their patronage +of art,--have been taken in by an adventurer." + +"But the valet, Rêve de Noir?" + +"The Duke had a valet of that name who attended him, and who may, for +aught I know, have resembled this one; but probability is against +concurrent resemblances. There is also an original of the picture in the +Duke's gallery; in fact, the artist, as was not unusual in those days, +painted two pictures of the same subject. Both, then, are genuine." + +Returning my cordial thanks to the good painter for his timely +explanation, I hastened to find Dalton. Drawing him from the midst of a +group whom he was entertaining, I communicated G----'s account of the two +pictures, and his suspicions in regard to the Duke. + +His perplexity was great. "Worse and worse, De Vere! To be ruined by a +common adventurer is more disgraceful even than the other misfortune. +Besides, our guests are leaving us. At least a hundred of them have gone +away with the first impression, and the whole city will have it. The +journal reporters have been here. Denslow's principal creditors were among +the guests to-night; they went away soon, just after the affair with the +picture; to-morrow will be our dark day. If it had not been for this demon +of a duke and his familiar, whoever they are, all would have gone well. +Now we are distrusted, and they will crush us. Let us fall facing the +enemy. Within an hour I will have the truth about the Duke. Did I ever +tell you what a price Denslow paid for that picture?" + +"No, I do not wish to hear." + +"You are right. Come with me." + +The novel disrespect excited by the scandal of Honoria and the picture +seemed to have inspired the two hundred people who remained with a +cheerful ease. Eating, drinking excessively of Denslow's costly wines, +dancing to music which grew livelier and more boisterous as the musicians +imbibed more of the inspiriting juice, and, catching scraps of the +scandal, threw out significant airs, the company of young persons, +deserted by their scandalized seniors, had converted the magnificent suite +of drawing-rooms into a carnival theatre. Parties of three and four were +junketing in corners; laughing servants rushed to and fro as in a _café_; +the lounges were occupied by reclining beauties or languid fops +overpowered with wine, about whom lovely young women, flushed with +Champagne and mischief, were coquetting and frolicking. + +"I warrant you, these people know it is our last night," said Dalton; "and +see what a use they make of us! Denslow's rich wines poured away like +water; everything soiled, smeared, and overturned; our entertainment, at +first stately and gracious as a queen's drawing-room, ending, with the +loss of _prestige_, in the riot of a _bal masqué_. So fades ambition! But +to this duke." + +Denslow, who had passed into the polite stage of inebriation, evident to +close observers, had arranged a little exclusive circle, which included +three women of fashionable reputation, his wife, the Duke, Jeffrey Lethal, +and Adonaïs. Rêve de Noir officiated as attendant. The _fauteuils_ and +couches were disposed around a pearl table, on which were liquors, coffee, +wines, and a few delicacies for Honoria, who had not supped. They were in +the purple recess adjoining the third drawing-room. Adonaïs talked with +the Duke about Italy; Lethal criticized; while Honoria, in the full +splendor of her beauty, outshining and overpowering, dropped here and +there a few musical words, like service-notes, to harmonize. + +There is no beauty like the newly-enamored. Dalton seemed to forget +himself, as he contemplated her, for a moment. Spaces had been left for +us; the valet placed chairs. + +"Dalton," cried Lethal, "you are in time to decide a question of deep +interest;--your friend, De Vere, will assist you. His Highness has given +preference to the women of America over those of Italy. Adonaïs, the +exquisite and mild, settles his neck-tie against the Duke, and objects in +that bland but firm manner which is his. I am the Duke's bottle-holder; +Denslow and wife accept that function for the chivalrous Adonaïs." + +"I am of the Duke's party," replied Dalton, in his most agreeable manner. +"To be in the daily converse and view of the most beautiful women in +America, as I have been for years, is a privilege in the cultivation of a +pure taste. I saw nothing in Italy, except on canvas, comparable with what +I see at this moment. The Duke is right; but in commending his judgment, I +attribute to him also sagacity. Beauty is like language; its use is to +conceal. One may, under rose-colored commendations, a fine manner, and a +flowing style, conceal, as Nature does with personal advantages in men, +the gross tastes and vulgar cunning of a charlatan." + +Dalton, in saying this, with a manner free from suspicion or excitement, +fixed his eyes upon the Duke's. + +"You seem to have no faith in either men or women," responded the rich +barytone voice of his Highness, the dark upper lip disclosing, as before, +the row of square, sharp, ivory teeth. + +"Little, very little," responded Dalton, with a sigh. "Your Highness will +understand me,--or if not now, presently." + +Lethal trod upon Adonaïs's foot; I saw him do it. Adonaïs exchanged +glances with a brilliant hawk-faced lady who sat opposite. The lady smiled +and touched her companion. Honoria, who saw everything, opened her +magnificent eyes to their full extent. Denslow was oblivious. + +"In fact," continued Dalton, perceiving the electric flash he had excited, +"skepticism is a disease of my intellect. Perhaps the most noticeable and +palpable fact of the moment is the presence and identity of the Duke who +is opposite to me; and yet, doubting as I sometimes do my own existence, +is it not natural, that, philosophically speaking, the presence and +identity of your Highness are at moments a subject of philosophical +doubt?" + +"In cases of this kind," replied the Duke, "we rest upon circumstantial +evidence." + +So saying, he drew from his finger a ring and handed it to Dalton, who +went to the light and examined it closely, and passed it to me. It was a +minute cameo, no larger than a grain of wheat, in a ring of plain gold; a +rare and beautiful work of microscopic art. + +"I seem to remember presenting the Duke of Rosecouleur with a similar +ring, in Italy," said Dalton, resuming his seat; "but the coincidence does +not resolve my philosophic doubt, excited by the affair of the picture. We +all supposed that we saw a portrait of the Hon. Mrs. Denslow in yon +picture; and we seemed to discover, under the management of your valet, +that Denslow's picture, a genuine duplicate of the original by the author, +was a modern copy. Since your Highness quitted the gallery, those +delusions have ceased. The picture appears now to be genuine. The +likeness to Mrs. Denslow has vanished." + +An exclamation of surprise from all present, except the Duke, followed +this announcement. + +"And so," continued Dalton, "it may be with this ring, which now seems to +be the one I gave the Duke at Rome, but to-morrow may be different." + +As he spoke, Dalton gave back the ring to the Duke, who received it with +his usual grace. + +"Who knows," said Lethal, with a deceptive innocence of manner, "whether +aristocracy itself be not founded in mesmerical deceptions?" + +"I think, Lethal," observed Adonaïs, "you push the matter. It would be +impossible, for instance, even for his Highness, to make Honoria Denslow +appear ugly." + +We all looked at Honoria, to whom the Duke leaned over and said,-- + +"Would you be willing for a moment to lose that exquisite beauty?" + +"For my sake, Honoria," said Dalton, "refuse him." + +The request, so simply made, was rewarded by a ravishing smile. + +"Edward, do you know that you have not spoken a kind word to me to-night, +until now?" + +Their eyes met, and I saw that Dalton trembled with a deep emotion. "I +will save you yet," he murmured. + +A tall, black hound, of the slender breed, rose up near Honoria, and, +placing his fore-paws upon the edge of the pearl table, turned and licked +her face and eyes. + +It was the vision of a moment. The dog sprang upon the sofa by the Duke's +side, growling and snapping. + +"Rêve de Noir," cried Lethal and Adonaïs, "drive the dog away!" + +The valet had disappeared. + +"I have no fear of him, gentlemen," said the Duke, patting the head of the +hound; "he is a faithful servant, and has a faculty of reading thoughts. +Go bring my servant, Demon," said the Duke. + +The hound sprang away with a great bound, and in an instant Rêve de Noir +was standing behind us. The dog did not appear again. + +Honoria looked bewildered. "Of what dog were you speaking, Edward?" + +"The hound that licked your face." + +"You are joking. I saw no hound." + +"See, gentlemen," exclaimed Lethal, "his Highness shows us tricks. He is a +wizard." + +The three women gave little shrieks,--half pleasure, half terror. + +Denslow, who had fallen back in his chair asleep, awoke and rubbed his +eyes. + +"What is all this, Honoria?" + +"That his Highness is a wizard," she said, with a forced laugh, glancing +at Dalton. + +"Will his Highness do us the honor to lay aside the mask, and appear in +his true colors?" said Dalton, returning Honoria's glance with an +encouraging look. + +"Gentlemen," said the Duke, haughtily, "I am your guest, and by +hospitality protected from insult." + +"Insult, most noble Duke!" exclaimed Lethal, with a sneer,--"impossible, +under the roof of our friend, the Honorable Walter Denslow, in the small +hours of the night, and in the presence of the finest women in the world. +Dalton, pray, reassure his Highness!" + +"Edward! Edward!" murmured Honoria, "have a care,--even if it be as you +think." + +Dalton remained bland and collected. + +"Pardon, my Lord, the effect of a little wine, and of those wonderful +fantasies you have shown us. Your dog, your servant, and yourself interest +us equally; the picture, the ring,--all are wonderful. In supposing that +you had assumed a mask, and one so noble, I was led into an error by these +miracles, expecting no less than a translation of yourself into the person +of some famous wonder-worker. It is, you know, a day of miracles, and even +kings have their salaried seers, and take counsel of the spiritual world. +More!--let us have more!" + +The circle were amazed; the spirit of superstitious curiosity seized upon +them. + +"Rêve de Noir," said the Duke, "a carafe, and less light." + +The candelabra became dim. The Duke took the carafe of water from the +valet, and, standing up, poured it upon the air; it broke into flames, +which mounted and floated away, singly or in little crowds. Still the Duke +poured, and dashing up the water with his hand, by and by the ceiling was +illuminated with a thousand miniature tongues of violet-colored fire. We +clapped our hands, and applauded,--"Beautiful I marvellous! wonderful, +Duke!--your Highness is the only magician,"--when, on a sudden, the flames +disappeared and the lights rose again. + +"The world is weary of skepticism," remarked Lethal; "there is no +chemistry for that. It is the true magic, doubtless,--recovered from +antiquity by his Highness. Are the wonders exhausted?" + +The Duke smiled again. He stretched out his hand toward Honoria, and she +slept. It was the work of an instant. + +"I have seen that before," said Dalton. + +"Not as we see it," responded his Highness. "Rêve de Noir, less light!" +The room was dark in a moment. Over the head of Honoria appeared a cloud, +at first black, and soon in this a nucleus of light, which expanded and +shaped itself into an image and took the form of the sleeper, nude and +spiritual, a belt of rosy mist enveloping and concealing all but a head +and bust of ravishing beauty. The vision gazed with languid and beseeching +eyes upon Dalton, and a sigh seemed to heave the bosom. In scarce a +breathing-time, it was gone. Honoria waked, unconscious of what had +passed. + +Deep terror and amazement fell upon us all. + +"I have seen enough," said Dalton, rising slowly, and drawing a small +riding-whip, "to know now that this person is no duke, but either a +charlatan or a devil. In either case, since he has intruded here, to +desecrate and degrade, I find it proper to apply a magic more material." + +At the word, all rose exclaiming,--"For God's sake, Dalton!" He pressed +forward and laid his hand upon the Duke. A cry burst from Rêve de Noir +which rent our very souls; and a flash followed, unspeakably bright, which +revealed the demoniacal features of the Duke, who sat motionless, +regarding Dalton's uplifted arm. A darkness followed, profound and +palpable. I listened in terror. There was no sound. Were we transformed? +Silence, darkness, still. I closed my eyes, and opened them again. A pale, +cold light became slowly perceptible, stealing through a crevice, and +revealing the walls and ceiling of my narrow room. The dream still +oppressed me. I went to the window, and let in reality with the morning +light. Yet, for days after, the images of the real Honoria and Dalton, my +friends, remained separated from the creatures of the vision; and the +Denslow Palace of dreamland, the pictures, the revelry, and the magic of +the Demon Duke haunted my memory, and kept with them all their visionary +splendors and regrets. + + + + +MYRTLE FLOWERS + + +Since Love within my heart made nest, + With the fond trust of brooding bird, + I find no all-embracing word +To say how deeply I am blest. + +Though wintry clouds are in the air + And the dead leaves unburied lie, + Nor open is the violet's eye, +I see new beauty everywhere. + +I walk beneath the naked trees, + Where wild streams shiver as they pass, + Yet in the sere and sighing grass +I hear a murmur as of bees,-- + +The bees that in love's morning rise + From tender eyes and lips to drain, + In ecstasies of blissful pain, +The sweets that bloomed in Paradise. + +There twines a joy with every care + That springs within this sacred ground; + But, oh! to give what I have found +Doth thrill me with divine despair. + +If distant, thou dost rise a star + Whose beams are with my being wrought, + And curvest all my teeming thought +With sweet attractions from afar. + +As a winged ship, in calmest hour, + Still moves upon the mighty sea + To some deep ocean melody, +I feel thy spirit and thy power. + + + + +CHESUNCOOK + +[Continued] + + +How far men go for the material of their houses! The inhabitants of the +most civilized cities, in all ages, send into far, primitive forests, +beyond the bounds of their civilization, where the moose and bear and +savage dwell, for their pine-boards for ordinary use. And, on the other +hand, the savage soon receives from cities iron arrow-points, hatchets, +and guns to point his savageness with. + +The solid and well-defined fir-tops, like sharp and regular spear-heads, +black against the sky, gave a peculiar, dark, and sombre look to the +forest. The spruce-tops have a similar, but more ragged outline,--their +shafts also merely feathered below. The firs were somewhat oftener regular +and dense pyramids. I was struck by this universal spiring upward of the +forest evergreens. The tendency is to slender, spiring tops, while they +are narrower below. Not only the spruce and fir, but even the arbor-vitae +and white pine, unlike the soft, spreading second-growth, of which I saw +none, all spire upwards, lifting a dense spear-head of cones to the light +and air, at any rate, while their branches straggle after as they may; as +Indians lift the ball over the heads of the crowd in their desperate game. +In this they resemble grasses, as also palms somewhat. The hemlock is +commonly a tent-like pyramid from the ground to its summit. + +After passing through some long rips and by a large island, we reached an +interesting part of the river called the Pine-Stream Dead-Water, about six +miles below Ragmuff, where the river expanded to thirty rods in width and +had many islands in it, with elms and canoe-birches, now yellowing, along +the shore, and we got our first sight of Katadn. + +Here, about two o'clock, we turned up a small branch three or four rods +wide, which comes in on the right from the south, called Pine Stream, to +look for moose signs. We had gone but a few rods before we saw very recent +signs along the water's edge, the mud lifted up by their feet being quite +fresh, and Joe declared that they had gone along there but a short time +before. We soon reached a small meadow on the east side, at an angle in +the stream, which was for the most part densely covered with alders. As we +were advancing along the edge of this, rather more quietly than usual, +perhaps, on account of the freshness of the signs,--the design being to +camp up this stream, if it promised well,--I heard a slight crackling of +twigs deep in the alders, and turned Joe's attention to it; whereupon he +began to push the canoe back rapidly; and we had receded thus half a dozen +rods, when we suddenly spied two moose standing just on the edge of the +open part of the meadow which we had passed, not more than six or seven +rods distant, looking round the alders at us. They made me think of great +frightened rabbits, with their long ears and half-inquisitive, half- +frightened looks; the true denizens of the forest, (I saw at once,) +filling a vacuum which now first I discovered had not been filled for me, +--_moose-_men, _wood-eaters_, the word is said to mean,--clad in a sort of +Vermont gray, or homespun. Our Nimrod, owing to the retrograde movement, +was now the farthest from the game; but being warned of its neighborhood, +he hastily stood up, and, while we ducked, fired over our heads one barrel +at the foremost, which alone he saw, though he did not know what kind of +creature it was; whereupon this one dashed across the meadow and up a high +bank on the north-east, so rapidly as to leave but an indistinct +impression of its outlines on my mind. At the same instant, the other, a +young one, but as tall as a horse, leaped out into the stream, in full +sight, and there stood cowering for a moment, or rather its +disproportionate lowness behind gave it that appearance, and uttering two +or three trumpeting squeaks. I have an indistinct recollection of seeing +the old one pause an instant on the top of the bank in the woods, look +toward its shivering young, and then dash away again. The second barrel +was levelled at the calf, and when we expected to see it drop in the +water, after a little hesitation, it, too, got out of the water, and +dashed up the hill, though in a somewhat different direction. All this was +the work of a few seconds, and our hunter, having never seen a moose +before, did not know but they were deer, for they stood partly in the +water, nor whether he had fired at the same one twice or not. From the +style in which they went off, and the fact that he was not used to +standing up and firing from a canoe, I judged that we should not see +anything more of them. The Indian said that they were a cow and her calf, +--a yearling, or perhaps two years old, for they accompany their dams so +long; but, for my part, I had not noticed much difference in their size. +It was but two or three rods across the meadow to the foot of the bank, +which, like all the world thereabouts, was densely wooded; but I was +surprised to notice, that, as soon as the moose had passed behind the veil +of the woods, there was no sound of foot-steps to be heard from the soft, +damp moss which carpets that forest, and long before we landed, perfect +silence reigned. Joe said, "If you wound 'em moose, me sure get 'em." + +We all landed at once. My companion reloaded; the Indian fastened his +birch, threw off his hat, adjusted his waistband, seized the hatchet, and +set out. He told me afterward, casually, that before we landed he had seen +a drop of blood on the bank, when it was two or three rods off. He +proceeded rapidly up the bank and through the woods, with a peculiar, +elastic, noiseless, and stealthy tread, looking to right and left on the +ground, and stepping in the faint tracks of the wounded moose, now and +then pointing in silence to a single drop of blood on the handsome, +shining leaves of the Clintonia Borealis, which, on every side, covered +the ground, or to a dry fern-stem freshly broken, all the while chewing +some leaf or else the spruce gum. I followed, watching his motions more +than the trail of the moose. After following the trail about forty rods in +a pretty direct course, stepping over fallen trees and winding between +standing ones, he at length lost it, for there were many other moose- +tracks there, and, returning once more to the last bloodstain, traced it a +little way and lost it again, and, too soon, I thought, for a good hunter, +gave it up entirely. He traced a few steps, also, the tracks of the calf; +but, seeing no blood, soon relinquished the search. + +I observed, while he was tracking the moose, a certain reticence or +moderation in him. He did not communicate several observations of interest +which he made, as a white man would have done, though they may have leaked +out afterward. At another time, when we heard a slight crackling of twigs +and he landed to reconnoitre, he stepped lightly and gracefully, stealing +through the bushes with the least possible noise, in a way in which no +white man does,--as it were, finding a place for his foot each time. + +About half an hour after seeing the moose, we pursued our voyage up Pine +Stream, and soon, coming to a part which was very shoal and also rapid, we +took out the baggage, and proceeded to carry it round, while Joe got up +with the canoe alone. We were just completing our portage and I was +absorbed in the plants, admiring the leaves of the aster macrophyllus, ten +inches wide, and plucking the seeds of the great round-leaved orchis, when +Joe exclaimed from the stream that he had killed a moose. He had found the +cow-moose lying dead, but quite warm, in the middle of the stream, which +was so shallow that it rested on the bottom, with hardly a third of its +body above water. It was about an hour after it was shot, and it was +swollen with water. It had run about a hundred rods and sought the stream +again, cutting off a slight bend. No doubt, a better hunter would have +tracked it to this spot at once. I was surprised at its great size, horse- +like, but Joe said it was not a large cow-moose. My companion went in +search of the calf again. I took hold of the ears of the moose, while Joe +pushed his canoe down stream toward a favorable shore, and so we made out, +though with some difficulty, its long nose frequently sticking in the +bottom, to drag it into still shallower water. It was a brownish black, or +perhaps a dark iron-gray, on the back and sides, but lighter beneath and +in front. I took the cord which served for the canoe's painter, and with +Joe's assistance measured it carefully, the greatest distances first, +making a knot each time. The painter being wanted, I reduced these +measures that night with equal care to lengths and fractions of my +umbrella, beginning with the smallest measures, and untying the knots as I +proceeded; and when we arrived at Chesuncook the next day, finding a two- +foot rule there, I reduced the last to feet and inches; and, moreover, I +made myself a two-foot rule of a thin and narrow strip of black ash which +would fold up conveniently to six inches. All this pains I took because I +did not wish to be obliged to say merely that the moose was very large. Of +the various dimensions which I obtained I will mention only two. The +distance from the tips of the hoofs of the fore-feet, stretched out, to +the top of the back between the shoulders, was seven feet and five inches. +I can hardly believe my own measure, for this is about two feet greater +than the height of a tall horse. The extreme length was eight feet and two +inches. Another cow-moose, which I have since measured in those woods with +a tape, was just six feet from the tip of the hoof to the shoulders, and +eight feet long as she lay. + +When afterward I asked an Indian at the carry how much taller the male +was, he answered, "Eighteen inches," and made me observe the height of a +cross-stake over the fire, more than four feet from the ground, to give +me some idea of the depth of his chest. Another Indian, at Oldtown, told +me that they were nine feet high to the top of the back, and that one +which he tried weighed eight hundred pounds. The length of the spinal +projections between the shoulders is very great. A white hunter, who was +the best authority among hunters that I could have, told me that the male +was _not_ eighteen inches taller than the female; yet he agreed that he +was sometimes nine feet high to the top of the back, and weighed a +thousand pounds. Only the male has horns, and they rise two feet or more +above the shoulders,--spreading three or four, and sometimes six feet,-- +which would make him in all, sometimes, eleven feet high! According to +this calculation, the moose is as tall, though it may not be as large, as +the great Irish elk, Megaceros Hibernicus, of a former period, of which +Mantell says that it "very far exceeded in magnitude any living species, +the skeleton" being "upward of ten feet high from the ground to the +highest point of the antlers." Joe said, that, though the moose shed the +whole horn annually, each new horn has an additional prong; but I have +noticed that they sometimes have more prongs on one side than on the +other. I was struck with the delicacy and tenderness of the hoofs, which +divide very far up, and the one half could be pressed very much behind the +other, thus probably making the animal surer-footed on the uneven ground +and slippery moss-covered logs of the primitive forest. They were very +unlike the stiff and battered feet of our horses and oxen. The bare, horny +part of the fore-foot was just six inches long, and the two portions could +be separated four inches at the extremities. + +The moose is singularly grotesque and awkward to look at. Why should it +stand so high at the shoulders? Why have so long a head? Why have no tail +to speak of? for in my examination I overlooked it entirely. Naturalists +say it is an inch and a half long. It reminded me at once of the +camelopard, high before and low behind,--and no wonder, for, like it, it +is fitted to browse on trees. The upper lip projected two inches beyond +the lower for this purpose. This was the kind of man that was at home +there; for, as near as I can learn, that has never been the residence, but +rather the hunting-ground of the Indian. The moose will perhaps one day +become extinct; but how naturally then, when it exists only as a fossil +relic, and unseen as that, may the poet or sculptor invent a fabulous +animal with similar branching and leafy horns,--a sort of fucus or lichen +in bone,--to be the inhabitant of such a forest as this! + +Here, just at the head of the murmuring rapids, Joe now proceeded to skin +the moose with a pocket-knife, while I looked on; and a tragical business +it was,--to see that still warm and palpitating body pierced with a +knife, to see the warm milk stream from the rent udder, and the ghastly +naked red carcass appearing from within its seemly robe, which was made to +hide it. The ball had passed through the shoulder-blade diagonally and +lodged under the skin on the opposite side, and was partially flattened. +My companion keeps it to show to his grandchildren. He has the shanks of +another moose which he has since shot, skinned and stuffed, ready to be +made into boots by putting in a thick leather sole. Joe said, if a moose +stood fronting you, you must not fire, but advance toward him, for he will +turn slowly and give you a fair shot. In the bed of this narrow, wild, and +rocky stream, between two lofty walls of spruce and firs, a mere cleft in +the forest which the stream had made, this work went on. At length Joe had +stripped off the hide and dragged it trailing to the shore, declaring that +it weighed a hundred pounds, though probably fifty would have been nearer +the truth. He cut off a large mass of the meat to carry along, and +another, together with the tongue and nose, he put with the hide on the +shore to lie there all night, or till we returned. I was surprised that he +thought of leaving this meat thus exposed by the side of the carcass, as +the simplest course, not fearing that any creature would touch it; but +nothing did. This could hardly have happened on the bank of one of our +rivers in the eastern part of Massachusetts; but I suspect that fewer +small wild animals are prowling there than with us. Twice, however, in +this excursion I had a glimpse of a species of large mouse. + +This stream was so withdrawn, and the moose-tracks were so fresh, that my +companions, still bent on hunting, concluded to go farther up it and camp, +and then hunt up or down at night. Half a mile above this, at a place +where I saw the aster puniceus and the beaked hazel, as we paddled along, +Joe, hearing a slight rustling amid the alders, and seeing something black +about two rods off, jumped up and whispered, "Bear!" but before the hunter +had discharged his piece, he corrected himself to "Beaver!"--"Hedgehog!" +The bullet killed a large hedgehog, more than two feet and eight inches +long. The quills were rayed out and flattened on the hinder part of its +back, even as if it had lain on that part, but were erect and long between +this and the tail. Their points, closely examined, were seen to be finely +bearded or barbed, and shaped like an awl, that is, a little concave, to +give the barbs effect. After about a mile of still water, we prepared our +camp on the right side, just at the foot of a considerable fall. Little +chopping was done that night, for fear of scaring the moose. We had moose- +meat fried for supper. It tasted like tender beef, with perhaps more +flavor,--sometimes like veal. + +After supper, the moon having risen, we proceeded to hunt a mile up this +stream, first "carrying" about the falls. We made a picturesque sight, +wending single-file along the shore, climbing over rocks and logs,--Joe, +who brought up the rear, twirling his canoe in his hands as if it were a +feather, in places where it was difficult to get along without a burden. + +We launched the canoe again from the ledge over which the stream fell, but +after half a mile of still water, suitable for hunting, it became rapid +again, and we were compelled to make our way along the shore, while Joe +endeavored to get up in the birch alone, though it was still very +difficult for him to pick his way amid the rocks in the night. We on the +shore found the worst of walking, a perfect chaos of fallen and drifted +trees, and of bushes projecting far over the water, and now and then we +made our way across the mouth of a small tributary on a kind of net-work +of alders. So we went tumbling on in the dark, being on the shady side, +effectually scaring all the moose and bears that might be thereabouts. At +length we came to a standstill, and Joe went forward to reconnoitre; but +he reported that it was still a continuous rapid as far as he went, or +half a mile, with no prospect of improvement, as if it were coming down +from a mountain. So we turned about, hunting back to the camp through the +still water. It was a splendid moonlight night, and I, getting sleepy as +it grew late,--for I had nothing to do,--found it difficult to realize +where I was. This stream was much more unfrequented than the main one, +lumbering operations being no longer carried on in this quarter. It was +only three or four rods wide, but the firs and spruce through which it +trickled seemed yet taller by contrast. Being in this dreamy state, which +the moonlight enhanced, I did not clearly discern the shore, but seemed, +most of the time, to be floating through ornamental grounds,--for I +associated the fir-tops with such scenes;--very high up some Broadway, and +beneath or between their tops, I thought I saw an endless succession of +porticos and columns, cornices and façades, verandas and churches. I did +not merely fancy this, but in my drowsy state such was the illusion. I +fairly lost myself in sleep several times, still dreaming of that +architecture and the nobility that dwelt behind and might issue from it; +but all at once I would be aroused and brought back to a sense of my +actual position by the sound of Joe's birch horn in the midst of all this +silence calling the moose, _ugh, ugh, oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo_, and I prepared +to hear a furious moose come rushing and crashing through the forest, and +see him burst out on to the little strip of meadow by our side. + +But, on more accounts than one, I had had enough of moose-hunting. I had +not come to the woods for this purpose, nor had I foreseen it, though I +had been willing to learn how the Indian manoeuvred; but one moose killed +was as good, if not as bad, as a dozen. The afternoon's tragedy, and my +share in it, as it affected the innocence, destroyed the pleasure of my +adventure. It is true, I came as near as is possible to come to being a +hunter and miss it, myself; and as it is, I think that I could spend a +year in the woods, fishing and hunting, just enough to sustain myself, +with satisfaction. This would be next to living like a philosopher on the +fruits of the earth which you had raised, which also attracts me. But this +hunting of the moose merely for the satisfaction of killing him,--not even +for the sake of his hide,--without making any extraordinary exertion or +running any risk yourself, is too much like going out by night to some +wood-side pasture and shooting your neighbor's horses. These are God's own +horses, poor, timid creatures, that will run fast enough as soon as they +smell you, though they _are_ nine feet high. Joe told us of some hunters +who a year or two before had shot down several oxen by night, somewhere in +the Maine woods, mistaking them for moose. And so might any of the +hunters; and what is the difference in the sport, but the name? In the +former case, having killed one of God's and _your own_ oxen, you strip off +its hide,--because that is the common trophy, and, moreover, you have +heard that it may be sold for moccasins,--cut a steak from its haunches, +and leave the huge carcass to smell to heaven for you. It is no better, at +least, than to assist at a slaughter-house. + +This afternoon's experience suggested to me how base or coarse are the +motives which commonly carry men into the wilderness. The explorers and +lumberers generally are all hirelings, paid so much a day for their labor, +and as such they have no more love for wild nature than wood-sawyers have +for forests. Other white men and Indians who come here are for the most +part hunters, whose object is to slay as many moose and other wild animals +as possible. But, pray, could not one spend some weeks or years in the +solitude of this vast wilderness with other employments than these,-- +employments perfectly sweet and innocent and ennobling? For one that comes +with a pencil to sketch or sing, a thousand come with an axe or rifle. +What a coarse and imperfect use Indians and hunters make of Nature! No +wonder that their race is so soon exterminated. I already, and for weeks +afterward, felt my nature the coarser for this part of my woodland +experience, and was reminded that our life should be lived as tenderly and +daintily as one would pluck a flower. + +With these thoughts, when we reached our camping-ground, I decided to +leave my companions to continue moose-hunting down the stream, while I +prepared the camp, though they requested me not to chop much nor make a +large fire, for fear I should scare their game. In the midst of the damp +fir-wood, high on the mossy bank, about nine o'clock of this bright +moonlight night, I kindled a fire, when they were gone, and, sitting on +the fir-twigs, within sound of the falls, examined by its light the +botanical specimens which I had collected that afternoon, and wrote down +some of the reflections which I have here expanded; or I walked along the +shore and gazed up the stream, where the whole space above the falls was +filled with mellow light. As I sat before the fire on my fir-twig seat, +without walls above or around me, I remembered how far on every hand that +wilderness stretched, before you came to cleared or cultivated fields, and +wondered if any bear or moose was watching the light of my fire; for +Nature looked sternly upon me on account of the murder of the moose. + +Strange that so few ever come to the woods to see how the pine lives and +grows and spires, lifting its evergreen arms to the light,--to see its +perfect success; but most are content to behold it in the shape of many +broad boards brought to market, and deem that its true success! But the +pine is no more lumber than man is, and to be made into boards and houses +is no more its true and highest use than the truest use of a man is to be +cut down and made into manure. There is a higher law affecting our +relation to pines as well as to men. A pine cut down, a dead pine, is no +more a pine than a dead human carcass is a man. Can he who has discovered +only some of the values of whalebone and whale oil be said to have +discovered the true use of the whale? Can he who slays the elephant for +his ivory be said to have "seen the elephant"? These are petty and +accidental uses; just as if a stronger race were to kill us in order to +make buttons and flageolets of our bones; for everything may serve a lower +as well as a higher use. Every creature is better alive than dead, men and +moose and pine-trees, and he who understands it aright will rather +preserve its life than destroy it. + +Is it the lumberman, then, who is the friend and lover of the pine, stands +nearest to it, and understands its nature best? Is it the tanner who has +barked it, or he who has boxed it for turpentine, whom posterity will +fable to have been changed into a pine at last? No! no! it is the poet; he +it is who makes the truest use of the pine,--who does not fondle it with +an axe, nor tickle it with a saw, nor stroke it with a plane,--who knows +whether its heart is false without cutting into it,--who has not bought +the stumpage of the township on which it stands. All the pines shudder and +heave a sigh when _that_ man steps on the forest floor. No, it is the +poet, who loves them as his own shadow in the air, and lets them stand. I +have been into the lumber-yard, and the carpenter's shop, and the tannery, +and the lampblack-factory, and the turpentine clearing; but when at length +I saw the tops of the pines waving and reflecting the light at a distance +high over all the rest of the forest, I realized that the former were not +the highest use of the pine. It is not their bones or hide or tallow that +I love most. It is the living spirit of the tree, not its spirit of +turpentine, with which I sympathize, and which heals my cuts. + +Ere long, the hunters returned, not having seen a moose, but, in +consequence of my suggestions, bringing a quarter of the dead one, which, +with ourselves, made quite a load for the canoe. + +After breakfasting on moose-meat, we returned down Pine Stream on our way +to Chesuncook Lake, which was about five miles distant. We could see the +red carcass of the moose lying in Pine Stream when nearly half a mile off. +Just below the mouth of this stream were the most considerable rapids +between the two lakes, called Pine-Stream Falls, where were large flat +rocks washed smooth, and at this time you could easily wade across above +them. Joe ran down alone while we walked over the portage, my companion +collecting spruce gum for his friends at home, and I looking for flowers. +Near the lake, which we were approaching with as much expectation as if it +had been a university,--for it is not often that the stream of our life +opens into such expansions,--were islands, and a low and meadowy shore +with scattered trees, birches, white and yellow, slanted over the water, +and maples,--many of the white birches killed, apparently by inundations. +There was considerable native grass; and even a few cattle--whose +movements we heard, though we did not see them, mistaking them at first +for moose--were pastured there. + +On entering the lake, where the stream runs southeasterly, and for some +time before, we had a view of the mountains about Katadn, +(_Katahdinauquoh_ one says they are called,) like a cluster of blue fungi +of rank growth, apparently twenty-five or thirty miles distant, in a +southeast direction, their summits concealed by clouds. Joe called some of +them the _Souadneunk_ mountains. This is the name of a stream there, which +another Indian told us meant "Running between mountains." Though some +lower summits were afterward uncovered, we got no more complete view of +Katadn while we were in the woods. The clearing to which we were bound was +on the right of the mouth of the river, and was reached by going round a +low point, where the water was shallow to a great distance from the shore. +Chesuncook Lake extends northwest and southeast, and is called eighteen +miles long and three wide, without an island. We had entered the northwest +corner of it, and when near the shore could see only part way down it. The +principal mountains visible from the land here were those already +mentioned, between southeast and east, and a few summits a little west of +north, but generally the north and northwest horizon about the St. John +and the British boundary was comparatively level. + +Ansell Smith's, the oldest and principal clearing about this lake, +appeared to be quite a harbor for _bateaux_ and canoes; seven or eight of +the former were lying about, and there was a small scow for hay, and a +capstan on a platform, now high and dry, ready to be floated and anchored +to tow rafts with. It was a very primitive kind of harbor, where boats +were drawn up amid the stumps,--such a one, methought, as the Argo might +have been launched in. There were five other huts with small clearings on +the opposite side of the lake, all at this end and visible from this +point. One of the Smiths told me that it was so far cleared that they came +here to live and built the present house four years before, though the +family had been here but a few months. + +I was interested to see how a pioneer lived on this side of the country. +His life is in some respects more adventurous than that of his brother in +the West; for he contends with winter as well as the wilderness, and there +is a greater interval of time at least between him and the army which is +to follow. Here immigration is a tide which may ebb when it has swept away +the pines; there it is not a tide, but an inundation, and roads and other +improvements come steadily rushing after. + +As we approached the log-house, a dozen rods from the lake, and +considerably elevated above it, the projecting ends of the logs lapping +over each other irregularly several feet at the corners gave it a very +rich and picturesque look, far removed from the meanness of weather- +boards. It was a very spacious, low building, about eighty feet long, with +many large apartments. The walls were well clayed between the logs, which +were large and round, except on the upper and under sides, and as visible +inside as out, successive bulging cheeks gradually lessening upwards and +tuned to each other with the axe, like Pandean pipes. Probably the musical +forest-gods had not yet cast them aside; they never do till they are split +or the bark is gone. It was a style of architecture not described by +Vitruvius, I suspect, though possibly hinted at in the biography of +Orpheus; none of your frilled or fluted columns, which have cut such a +false swell, and support nothing but a gable end and their builder's +pretensions,--that is, with the multitude; and as for "ornamentation," one +of those words with a dead tail which architects very properly use to +describe their flourishes, there were the lichens and mosses and fringes +of bark, which nobody troubled himself about. We certainly leave the +handsomest paint and clapboards behind in the woods, when we strip off the +bark and poison ourselves with white-lead in the towns. We get but half +the spoils of the forest. For beauty, give me trees with the fur on. This +house was designed and constructed with the freedom of stroke of a +forester's axe, without other compass and square than Nature uses. +Wherever the logs were cut off by a window or door, that is, were not kept +in place by alternate overlapping, they were held one upon another by very +large pins driven in diagonally on each side, where branches might have +been, and then cut off so close up and down as not to project beyond the +bulge of the log, as if the logs clasped each other in their arms. These +logs were posts, studs, boards, clapboards, laths, plaster, and nails, all +in one. Where the citizen uses a mere sliver or board, the pioneer uses +the whole trunk of a tree. The house had large stone chimneys, and was +roofed with spruce-bark. The windows were imported, all but the casings. +One end was a regular logger's camp, for the boarders, with the usual fir +floor and log benches. Thus this house was but a slight departure from the +hollow tree, which the bear still inhabits,--being a hollow made with +trees piled up, with a coating of bark like its original. + +The cellar was a separate building, like an ice-house, and it answered for +a refrigerator at this season, our moose-meat being kept there. It was a +potato-hole with a permanent roof. Each structure and institution here was +so primitive that you could at once refer it to its source; but our +buildings commonly suggest neither their origin nor their purpose. There +was a large, and what farmers would call handsome, barn, part of whose +boards had been sawed by a whip-saw; and the saw-pit, with its great pile +of dust, remained before the house. The long split shingles on a portion +of the barn were laid a foot to the weather, suggesting what kind of +weather they have there. Grant's barn at Caribou Lake was said to be still +larger, the biggest ox-nest in the woods, fifty feet by a hundred. Think +of a monster barn in that primitive forest lifting its gray back above the +tree-tops! Man makes very much such a nest for his domestic animals, of +withered grass and fodder, as the squirrels and many other wild creatures +do for themselves. + +There was also a blacksmith's shop, where plainly a good deal of work was +done. The oxen and horses used in lumbering operations were shod, and all +the iron-work of sleds, etc., was repaired or made here. I saw them load a +_bateau_ at the Moosehead carry, the next Tuesday, with about thirteen +hundred weight of bar iron for this shop. This reminded me how primitive +and honorable a trade was Vulcan's. I do not hear that there was any +carpenter or tailor among the gods. The smith seems to have preceded these +and every other mechanic at Chesuncook as well as on Olympus, and his +family is the most widely dispersed, whether he be christened John or +Ansell. + +Smith owned two miles down the lake by half a mile in width. There were +about one hundred acres cleared here. He cut seventy tons of English hay +this year on this ground, and twenty more on another clearing, and he uses +it all himself in lumbering operations. The barn was crowded with pressed +hay and a machine to press it. There was a large garden full of roots, +turnips, beets, carrots, potatoes, etc., all of great size. They said that +they were worth as much here as in New York. I suggested some currants for +sauce, especially as they had no apple-trees set out, and showed how +easily they could be obtained. + +There was the usual long-handled axe of the primitive woods by the door, +three and a half feet long,--for my new black-ash rule was in constant +use,--and a large, shaggy dog, whose nose, report said, was full of +porcupine quills. I can testify that he looked very sober. This is the +usual fortune of pioneer dogs, for they have to face the brunt of the +battle for their race, and act the part of Arnold Winkelried without +intending it. If he should invite one of his town friends up this way, +suggesting moose-meat and unlimited freedom, the latter might pertinently +inquire, "What is that sticking in your nose?" When a generation or two +have used up all the enemies' darts, their successors lead a comparatively +easy life. We owe to our fathers analogous blessings. Many old people +receive pensions for no other reason, it seems to me, but as a +compensation for having lived a long time ago. No doubt, our town dogs +still talk, in a snuffling way, about the days that tried dogs' noses. How +they got a cat up there I do not know, for they are as shy as my aunt +about entering a canoe. I wondered that she did not run up a tree on the +way; but perhaps she was bewildered by the very crowd of opportunities. + +Twenty or thirty lumberers, Yankee and Canadian, were coming and going,-- +Aleck among the rest,--and from time to time an Indian touched here. In +the winter there are sometimes a hundred men lodged here at once. The most +interesting piece of news that circulated among them appeared to be, that +four horses belonging to Smith, worth seven hundred dollars, had passed by +further into the woods a week before. + +The white-pine-tree was at the bottom or further end of all this. It is a +war against the pines, the only real Aroostook or Penobscot war. I have no +doubt that they lived pretty much the same sort of life in the Homeric +age, for men have always thought more of eating than of fighting; then, as +now, their minds ran chiefly on the "hot bread and sweet cakes"; and the +fur and lumber trade is an old story to Asia and Europe. I doubt if men +ever made a trade of heroism. In the days of Achilles, even, they +delighted in big barns, and perchance in pressed hay, and he who possessed +the most valuable team was the best fellow. + +We had designed to go on at evening up the Caucomgomoc, whose mouth was a +mile or two distant, to the lake of the same name, about ten miles off; +but some Indians of Joe's acquaintance, who were making canoes on the +Caucomgomoc, came over from that side, and gave so poor an account of the +moose-hunting, so many had been killed there lately, that my companions +concluded not to go there. Joe spent this Sunday and the night with his +acquaintances. The lumberers told me that there were many moose +hereabouts, but no caribou or deer. A man from Oldtown had killed ten or +twelve moose, within a year, so near the house that they heard all his +guns. His name may have been Hercules, for aught I know, though I should +rather have expected to hear the rattling of his club; but, no doubt, he +keeps pace with the improvements of the age, and uses a Sharpe's rifle +now; probably he gets all his armor made and repaired at Smith's shop. One +moose had been killed and another shot at within sight of the house within +two years. I do not know whether Smith has yet got a poet to look after +the cattle, which, on account of the early breaking up of the ice, are +compelled to summer in the woods, but I would suggest this office to such +of my acquaintances as love to write verses and go a-gunning. + +After a dinner, at which apple-sauce was the greatest luxury to me, but +our moose-meat was oftenest called for by the lumberers, I walked across +the clearing into the forest, southward, returning along the shore. For my +dessert, I helped myself to a large slice of the Chesuncook woods, and +took a hearty draught of its waters with all my senses. The woods were as +fresh and full of vegetable life as a lichen in wet weather, and contained +many interesting plants; but unless they are of white pine, they are +treated with as little respect here as a mildew, and in the other case +they are only the more quickly cut down. The shore was of coarse, flat, +slate rocks, often in slabs, with the surf beating on it. The rocks and +bleached drift-logs, extending some way into the shaggy woods, showed a +rise and fall of six or eight feet, caused partly by the dam at the +outlet. They said that in winter the snow was three feet deep on a level +here, and sometimes four or five,--that the ice on the lake was two feet +thick, clear, and four feet, including the snow-ice. Ice had already +formed in vessels. + +We lodged here this Sunday night in a comfortable bed-room, apparently the +best one; and all that I noticed unusual in the night--for I still kept +taking notes, like a spy in the camp--was the creaking of the thin split +boards, when any of our neighbors stirred. + +Such were the first rude beginnings of a town. They spoke of the +practicability of a winter-road to the Moosehead carry, which would not +cost much, and would connect them with steam and staging and all the busy +world. I almost doubted if the lake would be there,--the self-same lake,-- +preserve its form and identity, when the shores should be cleared and +settled; as if these lakes and streams which explorers report never +awaited the advent of the citizen. + +The sight of one of these frontier-houses, built of these great logs, +whose inhabitants have unflinchingly maintained their ground many summers +and winters in the wilderness, reminds me of famous forts, like +Ticonderoga, or Crown Point, which have sustained memorable sieges. They +are especially winter-quarters, and at this season this one had a +partially deserted look, as if the siege were raised a little, the snow- +banks being melted from before it, and its garrison accordingly reduced. I +think of their daily food as rations,--it is called "supplies"; a Bible +and a great coat are munitions of war, and a single man seen about the +premises is a sentinel on duty. You expect that he will require the +countersign, and will perchance take you for Ethan Allen, come to demand +the surrender of his fort in the name of the Continental Congress. It is a +sort of ranger service. Arnold's expedition is a daily experience with +these settlers. They can prove that they were out at almost any time; and +I think that all the first generation of them deserve a pension more than +any that went to the Mexican war. + +[To be continued.] + + + + +THE AUTOCRAT OF THE BREAKFAST-TABLE. + +EVERY MAN HIS OWN BOSWELL. + +_Aquà está encerrada el alma del licenciado +Pedro Garcias_. + + +If I should ever make a little book out of these papers, which I hope you +are not getting tired of, I suppose I ought to save the above sentence for +a motto on the title-page. But I want it now, and must use it. I need not +say to you that the words are Spanish, nor that they are to be found in +the short Introduction to "Gil Blas," nor that they mean, "Here lies +buried the soul of the licentiate Pedro Garcias." + +I warned all young people off the premises when I began my notes referring +to old age. I must be equally fair with old people now. They are earnestly +requested to leave this paper to young persons from the age of twelve to +that of four-score years and ten, at which latter period of life I am sure +that I shall have at least one youthful reader. You know well enough what +I mean by youth and age;--something in the soul, which has no more to do +with the color of the hair than the vein of gold in a rock has to do with +the grass a thousand feet above it. + +I am growing bolder as I write. I think it requires not only youth, but +genius, to read this paper. I don't mean to imply that it required any +whatsoever to talk what I have here written down. It did demand a certain +amount of memory, and such command of the English tongue as is given by a +common school education. So much I do claim. But here I have related, at +length, a string of trivialities. You must have the imagination of a poet +to transfigure them. These little colored patches are stains upon the +windows of a human soul; stand on the outside, they are but dull and +meaningless spots of color; seen from within, they are glorified shapes +with empurpled wings and sunbright aureoles. + +My hand trembles when I offer you this. Many times I have come bearing +flowers such as my garden grew; but now I offer you this poor, brown, +homely growth, you may cast it away as worthless. And yet--and yet--it is +something better than flowers; it is a _seed-capsule_. Many a gardener +will cut you a bouquet of his choicest blossoms for small fee, but he does +not love to let the seeds of his rarest varieties go out of his own hands. + +It is by little things that we know ourselves; a soul would very probably +mistake itself for another, when once disembodied, were it not for +individual experiences that differed from those of others only in details +seemingly trifling. All of us have been thirsty thousands of times, and +felt, with Pindar, that water was the best of things. I alone, as I think, +of all mankind, remember one particular pailful of water, flavored with +the white-pine of which the pail was made, and the brown mug out of which +one Edmund, a red-faced and curly-haired boy, was averred to have bitten a +fragment in his haste to drink; it being then high summer, and little +full-blooded boys feeling very warm and porous in the low-"studded" +school-room where Dame Prentiss, dead and gone, ruled over young children, +many of whom are old ghosts now, and have known Abraham for twenty or +thirty years of our mortal time. + +Thirst belongs to humanity, everywhere, in all ages; but that white-pine +pail and that brown mug belong to me in particular; and just so of my +special relationships with other things and with my race. One could never +remember himself in eternity by the mere fact of having loved or hated any +more than by that of having thirsted; love and hate have no more +individuality in them than single waves in the ocean;--but the accidents +or trivial marks which distinguished those whom we loved or hated make +their memory our own forever, and with it that of our own personality +also. + +Therefore, my aged friend of five-and-twenty, or thereabouts, pause at the +threshold of this particular record, and ask yourself seriously whether +you are fit to read such revelations as are to follow. For observe, you +have here no splendid array of petals such as poets offer you,--nothing +but a dry shell, containing, if you will get out what is in it, a few +small seeds of poems. You may laugh at them, if you like. I shall never +tell you what I think of you for so doing. But if you can read into the +heart of these things, in the light of other memories as slight, yet as +dear to your soul, then you are neither more nor less than a POET, and can +afford to write no more verses during the rest of your natural life,-- +which abstinence I take to be one of the surest marks of your meriting the +divine name I have just bestowed upon you. + +[May I beg of you who have begun this paper, nobly trusting to your own +imagination and sensibilities to give it the significance which it does +not lay claim to without your kind assistance,--may I beg of you, I say, +to pay particular attention to the _brackets_ which enclose certain +paragraphs? I want my "asides," you see, to whisper loud to you who read +my notes, and sometimes I talk a page or two to you without pretending +that I said a word of it to our boarders. You will find a very long +"aside" to you almost as soon as you begin to read. And so, dear young +friend, fall to at once, taking such things as I have provided for you; +and if you turn them, by the aid of your powerful imagination, into a fair +banquet, why, then, peace be with you, and a summer by the still waters of +some quiet river, or by some yellow beach, where, as my friend, the +Professor, says, you can sit with Nature's wrist in your hand and count +her ocean-pulses.] + +I should like to make a few intimate revelations relating especially to my +early life, if I thought you would like to hear them. + +[The schoolmistress turned a little in +her chair, and sat with her face directed partly towards me.--Half- +mourning now;--purple ribbon. That breastpin she wears has _gray_ hair in +it; her mother's, no doubt;--I remember our landlady's daughter telling +me, soon after the school-mistress came to board with us, that she had +lately "buried a payrent." That's what made her look so pale,--kept the +poor sick thing alive with her own blood. Ah! long illness is the real +vampyrism; think of living a year or two after one is dead, by sucking the +life-blood out of a frail young creature at one's bedside!--Well, souls +grow white, as well as cheeks, in these holy duties; one that goes in a +nurse may come out an angel.--God bless all good women!--to their soft +hands and pitying hearts we must all come at last!----The schoolmistress +has a better color than when she came.---- ---- Too late!----"It might +have been."----Amen! + +----How many thoughts go to a dozen heart-beats, sometimes! There was no +long pause after my remark addressed to the company, but in that time I +had the train of ideas and feelings I have just given flash through my +consciousness sudden and sharp as the crooked red streak that springs out +of its black sheath like the creese of a Malay in his death-rage, and +stabs the earth right and left in its blind rage. + +I don't deny that there was a pang in it,--yes, a stab; but there was a +prayer, too,--the "Amen" belonged to that.--Also, a vision of a four-story +brick house, nicely furnished,--I actually saw many specific articles,-- +curtains, sofas, tables, and others, and could draw the patterns of them +at this moment,--a brick house, I say, looking out on the water, with a +fair parlor, and books and busts and pots of flowers and bird-cages, all +complete; and at the window, looking on the water, two of us.--"Male and +female created He them."--These two were standing at the window, when a +little boy that was playing near them looked up at me with such a look +that I---- ----poured out a glass of water, drank it all down, and then +continued.] + +I said I should like to tell you some things, such as people commonly +never tell, about my early recollections. Should you like to hear them? + +Should we _like_ to hear them?--said the schoolmistress;--no, but we +should _love_ to. + +[The voice was a sweet one, naturally, and had something very pleasant in +its tone, just then.--The four-story brick house, which had gone out like +a transparency when the light behind it is quenched, glimmered again for a +moment; parlor, books, busts, flower-pots, bird-cages, all complete,--and +the figures as before.] + +We are waiting with eagerness, Sir,--said the divinity-student. + +[The transparency went out as if a flash of black lightning had struck +it.] + +If you want to hear my confessions, the next thing--I said--is to know +whether I can trust you with them. It is only fair to say that there are a +great many people in the world that laugh at such things. _I_ think they +are fools, but perhaps you don't all agree with me. + +Here are children of tender age talked to as if they were capable of +understanding Calvin's "Institutes," and nobody has honesty or sense +enough to tell the plain truth about the little wretches: that they are as +superstitious as naked savages, and such miserable spiritual cowards--that +is, if they have any imagination--that they will believe anything which is +taught them, and a great deal more which they teach themselves. + +I was born and bred, as I have told you twenty times, among books and +those who knew what was in books. I was carefully instructed in things +temporal and spiritual. But up to a considerable maturity of childhood I +believed Raphael and Michel Angelo to have been super-human beings. The +central doctrine of the prevalent religious faith of Christendom was +utterly confused and neutralized in my mind for years by one of those too +common stories of actual life, which I overheard repeated in a whisper.-- +Why did I not ask? you will say.--You don't remember the rosy pudency of +sensitive children. The first instinctive movement of the little creatures +is to make a _cache_, and bury in it beliefs, doubts, dreams, hopes, and +terrors. I am uncovering one of these _caches_. Do you think I was +necessarily a greater fool and coward than another? + +I was afraid of ships. Why, I could never tell. The masts looked +frightfully tall,--but they were not so tall as the steeple of our old +yellow meeting-house. At any rate, I used to hide my eyes from the sloops +and schooners that were wont to lie at the end of the bridge, and I +confess that traces of this undefined terror lasted very long.--One other +source of alarm had a still more fearful significance. There was a great +wooden HAND,--a glove-maker's sign, which used to swing and creak in the +blast, as it hung from a pillar before a certain shop a mile or two +outside of the city. Oh, the dreadful hand! Always hanging there ready to +catch up a little boy, who would come home to supper no more, nor yet to +bed,--whose porringer would be laid away empty thenceforth, and his half- +worn shoes wait until his small brother grew to fit them. + +As for all manner of superstitious observances, I used once to think I +must have been peculiar in having such a list of them, but I now believe +that half the children of the same age go through the same experiences. No +Roman soothsayer ever had such a catalogue of _omens_ as I found in the +Sibylline leaves of my childhood. That trick of throwing a stone at a tree +and attaching some mighty issue to hitting or missing, which you will find +mentioned in one or more biographies, I well remember. Stepping on or over +certain particular things or spots--Dr. Johnson's especial weakness--I got +the habit of at a very early age.--I won't swear that I have not some +tendency to these not wise practices even at this present date. [How many +of you that read these notes can say the same thing!] + +With these follies mingled sweet delusions, which I loved so well I would +not outgrow them, even when it required a voluntary effort to put a +momentary trust in them. Here is one which I cannot help telling you. + +The firing of the great guns at the Navy-yard is easily heard at the place +where I was born and lived. "There is a ship of war come in," they used to +say, when they heard them. Of course, I supposed that such vessels came in +unexpectedly, after indefinite years of absence,--suddenly as falling +stones; and that the great guns roared in their astonishment and delight +at the sight of the old warship splitting the bay with her cutwater. Now, +the sloop-of-war the Wasp, Captain Blakely, after gloriously capturing the +Reindeer and the Avon, had disappeared from the face of the ocean, and was +supposed to be lost. But there was no proof of it, and, of course, for a +time, hopes were entertained that she might be heard from. Long after the +last real chance had utterly vanished, I pleased myself with the fond +illusion that somewhere on the waste of waters she was still floating, and +there were _years_ during which I never heard the sound of the great guns +booming inland from the Navy-yard without saying to myself, "The Wasp has +come!" and almost thinking I could see her, as she rolled in, crumpling +the water before her, weather-beaten, barnacled, with shattered spars and +threadbare canvas, welcomed by the shouts and tears of thousands. This was +one of those dreams that I nursed and never told. Let me make a clean +breast of it now, and say, that, so late as to have outgrown childhood, +perhaps to have got far on towards manhood, when the roar of the cannon +has struck suddenly on my ear, I have started with a thrill of vague +expectation and tremulous delight, and the long-unspoken words have +articulated themselves in the mind's dumb whisper, _The Wasp has come!_ + +----Yes, children believe plenty of queer things. I suppose all of you +have had the pocket-book fever when you were little?--What do I mean? Why, +ripping up old pocket-books in the firm belief that bank-bills to an +immense amount were hidden in them.--So, too, you must all remember some +splendid unfulfilled promise of somebody or other, which fed you with +hopes perhaps for years, and which left a blank in your life which nothing +has ever filled up.--O.T. quitted our household carrying with him the +passionate regrets of the more youthful members. He was an ingenious +youngster; wrote wonderful copies, and carved the two initials given above +with great skill on all available surfaces. I thought, by the way, they +were all gone; but the other day I found them on a certain door which I +will show you some time. How it surprised me to find them so near the +ground! I had thought the boy of no trivial dimensions. Well, O.T. when he +went, made a solemn promise to two of us. I was to have a ship, and the +other a mar_tin_-house (last syllable pronounced as in the word _tin_). +Neither ever came; but, oh, how many and many a time I have stolen to the +corner,--the cars pass close by it at this time,--and looked up that long +avenue, thinking that he must be coming now, almost sure, as I turned to +look northward, that there he would be, trudging toward me, the ship in +one hand and the mar_tin_-house in the other! + +[You must not suppose that all I am going to say, as well as all I have +said, was told to the whole company. The young fellow whom they call John +was in the yard, sitting on a barrel and smoking a cheroot, the fumes of +which came in, not ungrateful, through the open window. The divinity- +student disappeared in the midst of our talk. The poor relation in black +bombazine, who looked and moved as if all her articulations were elbow- +joints, had gone off to her chamber, after waiting with a look of soul- +subduing decorum at the foot of the stairs until one of the male sort had +passed her and ascended into the upper regions. This is a famous point of +etiquette in our boarding-house; in fact, between ourselves, they make +such an awful fuss about it, that I, for one, had a great deal rather have +them simple enough not to think of such matters at all. Our land-lady's +daughter said, the other evening, that she was going to "retire"; where- +upon the young fellow called John took up a lamp and insisted on lighting +her to the foot of the staircase. Nothing would induce her to pass by him, +until the schoolmistress, saying in good plain English that it was her +bed-time, walked straight by them both, not seeming to trouble herself +about either of them. + +I have been led away from what I meant the portion included in these +brackets to inform my readers about. I say, then, most of the boarders had +left the table about the time when I began telling some of these secrets +of mine, all of them, in fact, but the old gentleman opposite and the +schoolmistress. I understand why a young woman should like to hear these +homely but genuine experiences of early life, which are, as I have said, +the little brown seeds of what may yet grow to be poems with leaves of +azure and gold; but when the old gentleman pushed up his chair nearer to +me, and slanted round his best ear, and once, when I was speaking of some +trifling, tender reminiscence, drew a long breath, with such a tremor in +it that a little more and it would have been a sob, why, then I felt there +must be something of nature in them which redeemed their seeming +insignificance. Tell me, man or woman with whom I am whispering, have you +not a small store of recollections, such as these I am uncovering, buried +beneath the dead leaves of many summers, perhaps under the unmelting snows +of fast-returning winters,--a few such recollections, which, if you +should write them all out, would be swept into some careless editor's +drawer, and might cost a scanty half-hour's lazy reading to his +subscribers,--and yet, if Death should cheat you of them, you would not +know yourself in eternity?] + +----I made three acquaintances at a +very early period of life, my introduction to whom was never forgotten. +The first unequivocal act of wrong that has left its trace in my memory +was this: it was refusing a small favor asked of me,--nothing more than +telling what had happened at school one morning. No matter who asked it; +but there were circumstances which saddened and awed me. I had no heart to +speak;--I faltered some miserable, perhaps petulant excuse, stole away, +and the first battle of life was lost. What remorse followed I need not +tell. Then and there; to the best of my knowledge, I first consciously +took Sin by the hand and turned my back on Duty. Time has led me to look +upon my offence more leniently; I do not believe it or any other childish +wrong is infinite, as some have pretended, but infinitely finite. Yet, oh +if I had but won that battle! + +The great Destroyer, whose awful shadow it was that had silenced me, came +near me,--but never, so as to be distinctly seen and remembered, during my +tender years. There flits dimly before me the image of a little girl, +whose name even I have forgotten, a schoolmate, whom we missed one day, +and were told that she had died. But what death was I never had any very +distinct idea, until one day I climbed the low stone wall of the old +burial-ground and mingled with a group that were looking into a very deep, +long, narrow hole, dug down through the green sod, down through the brown +loam, down through the yellow gravel, and there at the bottom was an +oblong red box, and a still, sharp, white face of a young man seen through +an opening at one end of it. When the lid was closed, and the gravel and +stones rattled down pell-mell, and the woman in black, who was crying and +wringing her hands, went off with the other mourners, and left him, then I +felt that I had seen Death, and should never forget him. + +One other acquaintance I made at an earlier period of life than the habit +of romancers authorizes.--Love, of course.--She was a famous beauty +afterwards.--I am satisfied that many children rehearse their parts in the +drama of life before they have shed all their milk-teeth.--I think I won't +tell the story of the golden blonde.--I suppose everybody has had his +childish fancies; but sometimes they are passionate impulses, which +anticipate all the tremulous emotions belonging to a later period. Most +children remember seeing and adoring an angel before they were a dozen +years old. + +[The old gentleman had left his chair opposite and taken a seat by the +schoolmistress and myself, a little way from the table.--It's true, it's +true,--said the old gentleman.--He took hold of a steel watch-chain, which +carried a large, square gold key at one end and was supposed to have some +kind of timekeeper at the other. With some trouble he dragged up an +ancient-looking, thick, silver, bull's-eye watch. He looked at it for a +moment,--hesitated,--touched the inner corner of his right eye with the +pulp of his middle finger,--looked at the face of the watch,--said it was +getting into the forenoon,--then opened the watch and handed me the loose +outside case without a word.--The watch-paper had been pink once, and had +a faint tinge still, as if all its tender life had not yet quite faded +out. Two little birds, a flower, and, in small school-girl letters, a +date,--17...--no matter.--Before I was thirteen years old,--said the old +gentleman.--I don't know what was in that young schoolmistress's head, nor +why she should have done it; but she took out the watch-paper and put it +softly to her lips, as if she were kissing the poor thing that made it so +long ago. The old gentleman took the watch-paper carefully from her, +replaced it, turned away and walked out, holding the watch in his hand. I +saw him pass the window a moment after with that foolish white hat on his +head; he couldn't have been thinking what he was about when he put it on. +So the schoolmistress and I were left alone. I drew my chair a shade +nearer to her, and continued.] + +And since I am talking of early recollections, I don't know why I +shouldn't mention some others that still cling to me,--not that you will +attach any very particular meaning to these same images so full of +significance to me, but that you will find something parallel to them in +your own memory. You remember, perhaps, what I said one day about smells. +There were certain _sounds_ also which had a mysterious suggestiveness to +me,--not so intense, perhaps, as that connected with the other sense, but +yet peculiar, and never to be forgotten. + +The first was the creaking of the wood-sleds, bringing their loads of oak +and walnut from the country, as the slow-swinging oxen trailed them along +over the complaining snow, in the cold, brown light of early morning. +Lying in bed and listening to their dreary music had a pleasure in it akin +to that which Lucretius describes in witnessing a ship toiling through the +waves while we sit at ease on shore, or that which Byron speaks of as to +be enjoyed in looking on at a battle by one "who hath no friend, no +brother there." + +There was another sound, in itself so sweet, and so connected with one of +those simple and curious superstitions of childhood of which I have +spoken, that I can never cease to cherish a sad sort of love for it.--Let +me tell the superstitious fancy first. The Puritan "Sabbath," as everybody +knows, began at "sundown" on Saturday evening. To such observance of it I +was born and bred. As the large, round disk of day declined, a stillness, +a solemnity, a somewhat melancholy hush came over us all. It was time for +work to cease, and for playthings to be put away. The world of active life +passed into the shadow of an eclipse, not to emerge until the sun should +sink again beneath the horizon. + +It was in this stillness of the world without and of the soul within that +the pulsating lullaby of the evening crickets used to make itself most +distinctly heard,--so that I well remember I used to think that the +purring of these little creatures, which mingled with the batrachian hymns +from the neighboring swamp, was peculiar to Saturday evenings. I don't +know that anything could give a clearer idea of the quieting and subduing +effect of the old habit of observance of what was considered holy time, +than this strange, childish fancy. + +Yes, and there was still another sound which mingled its solemn cadences +with the waking and sleeping dreams of my boyhood. It was heard only at +times,--a deep, muffled roar, which rose and fell, not loud, but vast,--a +whistling boy would have drowned it for his next neighbor, but it must +have been heard over the space of a hundred square miles. I used to wonder +what this might be. Could it be the roar of the thousand wheels and the +ten thousand footsteps jarring and tramping along the stones of the +neighboring city? That would be continuous; but this, as I have said, rose +and fell in regular rhythm. I remember being told, and I suppose this to +have been the true solution, that it was the sound of the waves, after a +high wind, breaking on the long beaches many miles distant. I should +really like to know whether any observing people living ten miles, more or +less, inland from long beaches,--in such a town, for instance, as +Cantabridge, in the eastern part of the Territory of the Massachusetts,-- +have ever observed any such sound, and whether it was rightly accounted +for as above. + +Mingling with these inarticulate sounds in the low murmur of memory, are +the echoes of certain voices I have heard at rare intervals. I grieve to +say it, but our people, I think, have not generally agreeable voices. The +marrowy organisms, with skins that shed water like the backs of ducks, +with smooth surfaces neatly padded beneath, and velvet linings to their +singing-pipes, are not so common among us as that other pattern of +humanity with angular outlines and plane surfaces, arid integuments, hair +like the fibrous covering of a cocoa-nut in gloss and suppleness as well +as color, and voices at once thin and strenuous,--acidulous enough to +produce effervescence with alkalis, and stridulous enough to sing duets +with the katydids. I think our conversational soprano, as sometimes +overheard in the cars, arising from a group of young persons, who may have +taken the train at one of our great industrial centres, for instance,-- +young persons of the female sex, we will say, who have bustled in full- +dressed, engaged in loud strident speech, and who, after free discussion, +have fixed on two or more double seats, which having secured, they proceed +to eat apples and hand round daguerreotypes,--I say, I think the +conversational soprano, heard under these circumstances, would not be +among the allurements the old Enemy would put in requisition, were he +getting up a new temptation of St. Anthony. + +There are sweet voices among us, we all know, and voices not musical, it +may be, to those who hear them for the first time, yet sweeter to us than +any we shall hear until we listen to some warbling angel in the overture +to that eternity of blissful harmonies we hope to enjoy.--But why should I +tell lies? If my friends love me, it is because I try to tell the truth. I +never heard but two voices in my life that frightened me by their +sweetness. + +----Frightened you?--said the school-mistress.--Yes, frightened me. They +made me feel as if there might be constituted a creature with such a chord +in her voice to some string in another's soul, that, if she but spoke, he +would leave all and follow her, though it were into the jaws of Erebus. +Our only chance to keep our wits is, that there are so few natural chords +between others' voices and this string in our souls, and that those which +at first may have jarred a little by and by come into harmony with it.-- +But I tell you this is no fiction. You may call the story of Ulysses and +the Sirens a fable, but what will you say to Mario and the poor lady who +followed him? + +----Whose were those two voices that bewitched me so?--They both belonged +to German women. One was a chambermaid, not otherwise fascinating. The key +of my room at a certain great hotel was missing, and this Teutonic maiden +was summoned to give information respecting it. The simple soul was +evidently not long from her mother-land, and spoke with sweet uncertainty +of dialect. But to hear her wonder and lament and suggest, with soft, +liquid inflexions, and low, sad murmurs, in tones as full of serious +tenderness for the fate of the lost key as if it had been a child +that had strayed from its mother, was so winning, that, had her features +and figure been as delicious as her accents,--if she had looked like the +marble Clytie, for instance,--why, all I can say is---- + +[The schoolmistress opened her eyes so wide, that I stopped short.] + +I was only going to say that I should have drowned myself. For Lake Erie +was close by, and it is so much better to accept asphyxia, which takes +only three minutes by the watch, than a _mésalliance_, that lasts fifty +years to begin with, and then passes along down the line of descent, +(breaking out in all manner of boorish manifestations of feature and +manner, which, if men were only as short-lived as horses, could be readily +traced back through the square-roots and the cube-roots of the family +stem, on which you have hung the armorial bearings of the De Champignons +or the De la Morues, until one came to beings that ate with knives and +said "Haow?") that no person of right feeling could have hesitated for a +single moment. + +The second of the ravishing voices I have heard was, as I have said, that +of another German woman.--I suppose I shall ruin myself by saying that +such a voice could not have come from any Americanized human being. + +----What was there in it?--said the schoolmistress,--and, upon my word, +her tones were so very musical, that I almost wished I had said three +voices instead of two, and not made the unpatriotic remark above +reported.--Oh, I said, it had so much _woman_ in it,--_muliebrity_, as +well as _femineity_;--no self-assertion, such as free suffrage introduces +into every word and movement; large, vigorous nature, running back to +those huge-limbed Germans of Tacitus, but subdued by the reverential +training and tuned by the kindly culture of fifty generations. Sharp +business habits, a lean soil, independence, enterprise, and east winds, +are not the best things for the larynx. Still, you hear noble voices among +us,--I have known families famous for them,--but ask the first person you +meet a question, and ten to one there is a hard, sharp, metallic, matter- +of-business clink in the accents of the answer, that produces the effect +of one of those bells which small trades-people connect with their shop- +doors, and which spring upon your ear with such vivacity, as you enter, +that your first impulse is to retire at once from the precincts. + +----Ah, but I must not forget that dear little child I saw and heard in a +French hospital. Between two and three years old. Fell out of her chair +and snapped both thigh-bones. Lying in bed, patient, gentle. Rough +students round her, some in white aprons, looking fearfully business-like; +but the child placid, perfectly still. I spoke to her, and the blessed +little creature answered me in a voice of such heavenly sweetness, with +that reedy thrill in it which you have heard in the thrush's even-song, +that I hear it at this moment, while I am writing, so many, many years +afterwards.--_C'est tout comme un serin_, said the French student at my +side. + +These are the voices which struck the key-note of my conceptions as to +what the sounds we are to hear in heaven will be, if we shall enter +through one of the twelve gates of pearl. There must be other things +besides aërolites that wander from their own spheres to ours; and when we +speak of celestial sweetness or beauty, we may be nearer the literal truth +than we dream. If mankind generally are the shipwrecked survivors of some +pre-Adamitic cataclysm, set adrift in these little open boats of humanity +to make one more trial to reach the shore,--as some grave theologians have +maintained,--if, in plain English, men are the ghosts of dead devils who +have "died into life," (to borrow an expression from Keats,) and walk the +earth in a suit of living rags that lasts three or four score summers,-- +why, there must have been a few good spirits sent to keep them company, +and these sweet voices I speak of must belong to them. + +----I wish you could once hear my sister's voice,--said the +schoolmistress. + +If it is like yours, it must be a pleasant one,--said I. + +I never thought mine was anything,--said the schoolmistress. + +How should you know?--said I.--People never hear their own voices,--any +more than they see their own faces. There is not even a looking-glass for +the voice. Of course, there is something audible to us when we speak; but +that something is not our own voice as it is known to all our +acquaintances. I think, if an image spoke to us in our own tones, we +should not know them in the least.--How pleasant it would be, if in +another state of being we could have shapes like our former selves for +playthings,--we standing outside or inside of them, as we liked, and they +being to us just what we used to be to others! + +----I wonder if there will be nothing like what we call "play," after our +earthly toys are broken,--said the schoolmistress. + +Hush,--said I,--what will the divinity-student say? + +[I thought she was hit, that time;--but the shot must have gone over her, +or on one side of her; she did not flinch.] + +Oh,--said the schoolmistress,--he must look out for my sister's heresies; +I am afraid he will be too busy with them to take care of mine. + +Do you mean to say,--said I,--that it is _your sister_ whom that +student---- + +[The young fellow commonly known as John, who had been sitting on the +barrel, smoking, jumped off just then, kicked over the barrel, gave it a +push with his foot that set it rolling, and stuck his saucy-looking face +in at the window so as to cut my question off in the middle; and the +schoolmistress leaving the room a few minutes afterwards, I did not have a +chance to finish it. + +The young fellow came in and sat down in a chair, putting his heels on the +top of another. + +Pooty girl,--said he. + +A fine young lady,--I replied. + +Keeps a fust-rate school, according to accounts,--said he,--teaches all +sorts of things,--Latin and Italian and music. Folks rich once,--smashed +up. She went right ahead as smart as if she'd been born to work. That's +the kind o' girl I go for. I'd marry her, only two or three other girls +would drown themselves, if I did. + +I think the above is the longest speech of this young fellow's which I +have put on record. I do not like to change his peculiar expressions, for +this is one of those cases in which the style is the man, as M. de Buffon +says. The fact is, the young fellow is a good-hearted creature enough, +only too fond of his jokes,--and if it were not for those heat-lightning +winks on one side of his face, I should not mind his fun much.] + +[Some days after this, when the company were together again, I talked a +little.] + +----I don't think I have a genuine hatred for anybody. I am well aware +that I differ herein from the sturdy English moralist and the stout +American tragedian. I don't deny that I hate _the sight_ of certain +people; but the qualities which make me tend to hate the man himself are +such as I am so much disposed to pity, that, except under immediate +aggravation, I feel kindly enough to the worst of them. It is such a sad +thing to be born a sneaking fellow, so much worse than to inherit a hump- +back or a couple of club-feet, that I sometimes feel as if we ought to +love the crippled souls, if I may use this expression, with a certain +tenderness which we need not waste on noble natures. One who is born with +such congenital incapacity that nothing can make a gentleman of him is +entitled, not to our wrath, but to our profoundest sympathy. But as we +cannot help hating the sight of these people, just as we do that of +physical deformities, we gradually eliminate them from our society,--we +love them, but open the window and let them go. By the time decent people +reach middle age they have weeded their circle pretty well of these +unfortunates, unless they have a taste for such animals; in which case, no +matter what their position may be, there is something, you may be sure, in +their natures akin to that of their wretched parasites. + +----The divinity-student wished to know what I thought of affinities, as +well as of antipathies; did I believe in love at first sight? + +Sir,--said I,--all men love all women. That is the _primâ-facie_ aspect of +the case. The Court of Nature assumes the law to be, that all men do so; +and the individual man is bound to show cause why he does not love any +particular woman. A man, says one of my old black-letter law-books, may +show divers good reasons, as thus; He hath not seen the person named in +the indictment; she is of tender age, or the reverse of that; she hath +certain personal disqualifications,--as, for instance, she is a +blackamoor, or hath an ill-favored countenance; or, his capacity of loving +being limited, his affections are engrossed by a previous comer; and so of +other conditions. Not the less is it true that he is bound by duty and +inclined by nature to love each and every woman. Therefore it is that each +woman virtually summons every man to show cause why he doth not love her. +This is not by written document, or direct speech, for the most part, but +by certain signs of silk, gold, and other materials, which say to all +men,--Look on me and love, as in duty bound. Then the man pleadeth his +special incapacity, whatsoever that may be,--as, for instance, +impecuniosity, or that he hath one or many wives in his household, or that +he is of mean figure, or small capacity; of which reasons it may be noted, +that the first is, according to late decisions, of chiefest authority.--So +far the old law-book. But there is a note from an older authority, saying +that every woman doth also love each and every man, except there be some +good reason to the contrary; and a very observing friend of mine, a young +unmarried clergyman, tells me, that, so far as his experience goes, he has +reason to think the ancient author had fact to justify his statement. + +I'll tell you how it is with the pictures of women we fall in love with at +first sight. + +----We a'n't talking about pictures,--said the landlady's daughter,-- +we're talking about women. + +I understood that we were speaking of love at sight,--I remarked, mildly. +--Now, as all a man knows about a woman whom he looks at is just what a +picture as big as a copper, or a "nickel," rather, at the bottom of his +eye can teach him, I think I am right in saying we are talking about the +pictures of women.--Well, now, the reason why a man is not desperately in +love with ten thousand women at once is just that which prevents all our +portraits being distinctly seen upon that wall. They all _are_ painted +there by reflection from our faces, but because _all_ of them are painted +on each spot, and each on the same surface, and many other objects at the +same time, no one is seen as a picture. But darken a chamber and let a +single pencil of rays in through a key-hole, then you have a picture on +the wall. We never fall in love with a woman in distinction from women, +until we can get an image of her through a pin-hole; and then we can see +nothing else, and nobody but ourselves can see the image in our mental +camera-obscura. + +----My friend, the Poet, tells me he has to leave town whenever the +anniversaries come round. + +What's the difficulty?--Why, they all want him to get up and make +speeches, or songs, or toasts; which is just the very thing he doesn't +want to do. He is an old story, he says, and hates to show on these +occasions. But they tease him, and coax him, and can't do without him, and +feel all over his poor weak head until they get their fingers on the +_fontanelle_, (the Professor will tell you what this means,--he says the +one at the top of the head always remains open in poets,) until, by gentle +pressure on that soft pulsating spot, they stupefy him to the point of +acquiescence. + +There are times, though, he says, when it is a pleasure, before going to +some agreeable meeting, to rush out into one's garden and clutch up a +handful of what grows there,--weeds and violets together,--not cutting +them off, but pulling them up by the roots with the brown earth they grow +in sticking to them. That's his idea of a post-prandial performance. Look +here, now. These verses I am going to read you, he tells me, were pulled +up by the roots just in that way, the other day.--Beautiful entertainment, +--names there on the plates that flow from all English-speaking tongues as +familiarly as _and_ or _the_; entertainers known wherever good poetry and +fair title-pages are held in esteem; guest a kind-hearted, modest, genial, +hopeful poet, who sings to the hearts of his countrymen, the British +people, the songs of good cheer which the better days to come, as all +honest souls trust and believe, will turn into the prose of common life. +My friend, the Poet, says you must not read such a string of verses too +literally. If he trimmed it nicely below, you wouldn't see the roots, he +says, and he likes to keep them, and a little of the soil clinging to +them. + +This is the farewell my friend, the Poet, read to his and our friend, the +Poet:-- + + +A GOOD TIME GOING! + +Brave singer of the coming time, + Sweet minstrel of the joyous present, +Crowned with the noblest wreath of rhyme, + The holly-leaf of Ayrshire's peasant, +Good-bye! Good-bye!--Our hearts and hands, + Our lips in honest Saxon phrases, +Cry, God be with him, till he stands + His feet among the English daisies! + +'Tis here we part;--for other eyes + The busy deck, the fluttering streamer, +The dripping arms that plunge and rise, + The waves in foam, the ship in tremor, +The kerchiefs waving from the pier, + The cloudy pillar gliding o'er him, +The deep blue desert, lone and drear, + With heaven above and home before him! + +His home!--the Western giant smiles, + And twirls the spotty globe to find it;-- +This little speck the British Isles? + 'Tis but a freckle,--never mind it!-- +He laughs, and all his prairies roll, + Each gurgling cataract roars and chuckles, +And ridges stretched from pole to pole + Heave till they crack their iron knuckles! + +But Memory blushes at the sneer, + And Honor turns with frown defiant, +And Freedom, leaning on her spear, + Laughs louder than the laughing giant:-- +"An islet is a world," she said, + "When glory with its dust has blended, +And Britain keeps her noble dead + Till earth and seas and skies are rended!" + +Beneath each swinging forest-bough + Some arm as stout in death reposes,-- +From wave-washed foot to heaven-kissed brow + Her valor's life-blood runs in roses; +Nay, let our brothers of the West + Write smiling in their florid pages, +One-half her soil has walked the rest + In poets, heroes, martyrs, sages! + +Hugged in the clinging billow's clasp, + From sea-weed fringe to mountain heather, +The British oak with rooted grasp + Her slender handful holds together;-- +With cliffs of white and bowers of green, + And Ocean narrowing to caress her, +And hills and threaded streams between,-- + Our little mother isle, God bless her! + +In earth's broad temple where we stand, + Fanned by the eastern gales that brought us, +We hold the missal in our hand, + Bright with the lines our Mother taught us; +Where'er its blazoned page betrays + The glistening links of gilded fetters, +Behold, the half-turned leaf displays + Her rubric stained in crimson letters! + +Enough! To speed a parting friend + 'Tis vain alike to speak and listen;-- +Yet stay,--these feeble accents blend + With rays of light from eyes that glisten. +Good-bye! once more,--and kindly tell + In words of peace the young world's story,-- +And say, besides,--we love too well + Our mother's soil, our fathers' glory! + + +When my friend, the Professor, found that my friend, the Poet, had been +coming out in this full-blown style, he got a little excited, as you may +have seen a canary, sometimes, when another strikes up. The Professor says +he knows he can lecture, and thinks he can write verses. At any rate, he +has often tried, and now he was determined to try again. So when some +professional friends of his called him up, one day, after a feast of +reason and a regular "freshet" of soul which had lasted two or three +hours, he read them these verses. He introduced them with a few remarks, +he told me, of which the only one he remembered was this: that he had +rather write a single line which one among them should think worth +remembering than set them all laughing with a string of epigrams. It was +all right, I don't doubt; at any rate, that was his fancy then, and +perhaps another time he may be obstinately hilarious; however, it may be +that he is growing graver, for time is a fact so long as clocks and +watches continue to go, and a cat can't be a kitten always, as the old +gentleman opposite said the other day. + +You must listen to this seriously, for I think the Professor was very much +in earnest when he wrote it. + + +THE TWO ARMIES. + +As Life's unending column pours, + Two marshalled hosts are seen,-- +Two armies on the trampled shores + That Death flows black between. + +One marches to the drum-beat's roll, + The wide-mouthed clarion's bray, +And bears upon a crimson scroll, + "Our glory is to slay." + +One moves in silence by the stream, + With sad, yet watchful eyes, +Calm as the patient planet's gleam + That walks the clouded skies. + +Along its front no sabres shine, + No blood-red pennons wave; +Its banner bears the single line, + "Our duty is to save." + +For those no death-bed's lingering shade; + At Honor's trumpet-call, +With knitted brow and lifted blade + In Glory's arms they fall. + +For these no clashing falchions bright, + No stirring battle-cry; +The bloodless stabber calls by night,-- + Each answers, "Here am I!" + +For those the sculptor's laurelled bust, + The builder's marble piles, +The anthems pealing o'er their dust + Through long cathedral aisles. + +For these the blossom-sprinkled turf + That floods the lonely graves, +When Spring rolls in her sea-green surf + In flowery-foaming waves. + +Two paths lead upward from below, + And angels wait above, +Who count each burning life-drop's flow, + Each falling tear of Love. + +Though from the Hero's bleeding breast + Her pulses Freedom drew, +Though the white lilies in her crest + Sprang from that scarlet dew,-- + +While Valor's haughty champions wait + Till all their scars are shown, +Love walks unchallenged through the gate + To sit beside the Throne! + + + + +THE AMERICAN TRACT SOCIETY. + + +There was no apologue more popular in the Middle Ages than that of the +hermit, who, musing on the wickedness and tyranny of those whom the +inscrutable wisdom of Providence had intrusted with the government of the +world, fell asleep and awoke to find himself the very monarch whose abject +life and capricious violence had furnished the subject of his moralizing. +Endowed with irresponsible power, tempted by passions whose existence in +himself he had never suspected, and betrayed by the political necessities +of his position, he became gradually guilty of all the crimes and the +luxury which had seemed so hideous to him in his hermitage over a dish of +water-cresses. + +The American Tract Society from small beginnings has risen to be the +dispenser of a yearly revenue of nearly half a million. It has become a +great establishment, with a traditional policy, with the distrust of +change and the dislike of disturbing questions (especially of such +as would lessen its revenues) natural to great establishments. It had been +poor and weak; it has become rich and powerful. The hermit has become +king. + +If the pious men who founded the American Tract Society had been told that +within forty years they would be watchful of their publications, lest, by +inadvertence, anything disrespectful might be spoken of the African Slave- +trade,--that they would consider it an ample equivalent for compulsory +dumbness on the vices of Slavery, that their colporteurs could awaken the +minds of Southern brethren to the horrors of St. Bartholomew,--that they +would hold their peace about the body of Cuffee dancing to the music of +the cart-whip, provided only they could save the soul of Sambo alive by +presenting him a pamphlet, which he could not read, on the depravity of +the double-shuffle,--that they would consent to be fellow-members in the +Tract Society with him who sold their fellow-members in Christ on the +auction-block, if he agreed with them in condemning Transubstantiation, +(and it would not be difficult for a gentleman who ignored the real +presence of God in his brother man to deny it in the sacramental wafer,)-- +if those excellent men had been told this, they would have shrunk in +horror, and exclaimed, "Are thy servants dogs, that they should do these +things?" + +Yet this is precisely the present position of the Society. + +There are two ways of evading the responsibility of such inconsistency. +The first is by an appeal to the Society's Constitution, and by claiming +to interpret it strictly in accordance with the rules of law as applied to +contracts, whether between individuals or States. The second is by denying +that Slavery is opposed to the genius of Christianity, and that any moral +wrongs are the necessary results of it. We will not be so unjust to the +Society as to suppose that any of its members would rely on this latter +plea, and shall therefore confine ourselves to a brief consideration of +the other. + +In order that the same rules of interpretation should be considered +applicable to the Constitution of the Society and to that of the United +States, we must attribute to the former a solemnity and importance which +involve a palpable absurdity. To claim for it the verbal accuracy and the +legal wariness of a mere contract is equally at war with common sense and +the facts of the case; and even were it not so, the party to a bond who +should attempt to escape its ethical obligation by a legal quibble of +construction would be put in Coventry by all honest men. In point of fact, +the Constitution was simply the minutes of an agreement among certain +gentlemen, to define the limits within which they would accept trust- +funds, and the objects for which they should expend them. + +But if we accept the alternative offered by the advocates of strict +construction, we shall not find that their case is strengthened. Claiming +that where the meaning of an instrument is doubtful, it should be +interpreted according to the contemporary understanding of its framers, +they argue that it would be absurd to suppose that gentlemen from the +Southern States would have united to form a society that included in its +objects any discussion of the moral duties arising from the institution of +Slavery. Admitting the first part of their proposition, we deny the +conclusion they seek to draw from it. They are guilty of a glaring +anachronism in assuming the same opinions and prejudices to have existed +in 1825 which are undoubtedly influential in 1858. The Antislavery +agitation did not begin until 1831, and the debates in the Virginia +Convention prove conclusively that six years after the foundation of the +Tract Society, the leading men in that State, men whose minds had been +trained and whose characters had been tempered in that school of action +and experience which was open to all during the heroic period of our +history, had not yet suffered such distortion of the intellect through +passion, and such deadening of the conscience through interest, as would +have prevented their discussing either the moral or the political aspects +of Slavery, and precluded them from uniting in any effort to make the +relation between master and slave less demoralizing to the one and less +imbruting to the other. + +Again, it is claimed that the words of the Constitution are conclusive, +and that the declaration that the publications of the Society shall be +such as are "satisfactory to all Evangelical Christians" forbids by +implication the issuing of any tract which could possibly offend the +brethren in Slave States. The Society, it is argued, can publish only on +topics about which all Evangelical Christians are agreed, and must, +therefore, avoid everything in which the question of politics is involved. +But what are the facts about matters other than Slavery? Tracts have been +issued and circulated in which Dancing is condemned as sinful; are all +Evangelical Christians agreed about this? On the Temperance question; +against Catholicism;--have these topics never entered into our politics? +The simple truth is, that Slavery is the only subject about which the +Publishing Committee have felt Constitutional scruples. Till this question +arose, they were like me in perfect health, never suspecting that they had +any constitution at all; but now, like hypochondriacs, they feel it in +every pore, at the least breath from the eastward. + +If a strict construction of the words "all Evangelical Christians" be +insisted on, we are at a loss to see where the Committee could draw the +dividing line between what might be offensive and what allowable. The +Society publish tracts in which the study of the Scriptures is enforced +and their denial to the laity by Romanists assailed. But throughout the +South it is criminal to teach a slave to read; throughout the South, no +book could be distributed among the servile population more incendiary +than the Bible, if they could only read it. Will not our Southern brethren +take alarm? The Society is reduced to the dilemma of either denying that +the African has a soul to be saved, or of consenting to the terrible +mockery of assuring him that the way of life is to be found only by +searching a book which he is forbidden to open. + +If we carry out this doctrine of strict construction to its legitimate +results, we shall find that it involves a logical absurdity. What is the +number of men whose outraged sensibilities may claim the suppression of a +tract? Is the _taboo_ of a thousand valid? Of a hundred? Of ten? Or are +tracts to be distributed only to those who will find their doctrine +agreeable, and are the Society's colporteurs to be instructed that a +Temperance essay is the proper thing for a total-abstinent infidel, and a +sermon on the Atonement for a distilling deacon? If the aim of the Society +be only to convert men from sins they have no mind to, and to convince +them of errors to which they have no temptation, they might as well be +spending their money to persuade schoolmasters that two and two make four, +or mathematicians that there cannot be two obtuse angles in a triangle. If +this be their notion of the way in which the gospel is to be preached, we +do not wonder that they have found it necessary to print a tract upon the +impropriety of sleeping in church. + +But the Society are concluded by their own action; for in 1857 they +unanimously adopted the following resolution: "That those moral duties +which grow out of the existence of Slavery, as well as those moral evils +and vices which it is known to promote, and which are condemned in +Scripture, and so much deplored by Evangelical Christians, undoubtedly do +fall within the province of this Society, and can and ought to be +discussed in a fraternal and Christian spirit." The Society saw clearly +that it was impossible to draw a Mason and Dixon's line in the world of +ethics, to divide Duty by a parallel of latitude. The only line which +Christ drew is that which parts the sheep from the goats, that great +horizon-line of the moral nature of man which is the boundary between +light and darkness. The Society, by yielding (as they have done in 1858) +to what are pleasantly called the "objections" of the South, (objections +of so forcible a nature that we are told the colporteurs were "forced to +flee,") virtually exclude the black man, if born to the southward of a +certain arbitrary line, from the operation of God's providence, and +thereby do as great a wrong to the Creator as the Episcopal Church did to +the artist when they published Ary Scheffer's _Christus Consolator_ with +the figure of the slave left out. + +The Society is not asked to disseminate antislavery doctrines, but simply +to be even-handed between master and slave, and, since they have +recommended Sambo and Toney to be obedient to Mr. Legree, to remind him in +turn that he also has duties toward the bodies and souls of his bondmen. +But we are told that the time has not yet arrived, that at present the +ears of our Southern brethren are closed against all appeals, that God in +his good time will turn their hearts, and that then, and not till then, +will be the fitting occasion to do something in the premises. But if the +Society is to await this golden opportunity with such exemplary patience +in one case, why not in all? If it is to decline any attempt at converting +the sinner till after God has converted him, will there be any special +necessity for a tract society at all? Will it not be a little +presumptuous, as well as superfluous, to undertake the doing over again of +what He has already done? We fear that the studies of Blackstone, upon +which the gentlemen who argue thus have entered in order to fit themselves +for the legal and constitutional argument of the question, have confused +their minds, and that they are misled by some fancied analogy between a +tract and an action of trover, and conceive that the one, like the other, +cannot be employed till after an actual conversion has taken place. + +The resolutions reported by the Special Committee at the annual meeting of +1857, drawn up with great caution and with a sincere desire to make whole +the breach in the Society, have had the usual fate of all attempts to +reconcile incompatibilities by compromise. They express confidence in the +Publishing Committee, and at the same time impliedly condemn them by +recommending them to do precisely what they had all along scrupulously +avoided doing. The result was just what might have been expected. Both +parties among the Northern members of the Society, those who approved the +former action of the Publishing Committee, and those who approved the new +policy recommended in the resolutions, those who favored silence and those +who favored speech on the subject of Slavery, claimed the victory, while +the Southern brethren, as usual, refused to be satisfied with anything +short of unconditional submission. The word Compromise, as far as Slavery +is concerned, has always been of fatal augury. The concessions of the +South have been like the "With all my worldly goods I thee endow" of a +bankrupt bridegroom, who thereby generously bestows all his debts upon his +wife, and as a small return for his magnanimity consents to accept all her +personal and a life estate in all her real property. The South is willing +that the Tract Society should expend its money to convince the slave that +he has a soul to be saved so far as he is obedient to his master, but not +to persuade the master that he has a soul to undergo a very different +process so far as he is unmerciful to his slave. + +We Americans are very fond of this glue of compromise. Like so many quack +cements, it is advertised to make the mended parts of the vessel stronger +than those which have never been broken, but, like them, it will not stand +hot water,--and as the question of Slavery is sure to plunge all who +approach it, even with the best intentions, into that fatal element, the +patched-up brotherhood, which but yesterday was warranted to be better +than new, falls once more into a heap of incoherent fragments. The last +trial of the virtues of the Patent Redintegrator by the Special Committee +of the Tract Society has ended like all the rest, and as all attempts to +buy peace at too dear a rate must end. Peace is an excellent thing, but +principle and pluck are better; and the man who sacrifices them to gain it +finds at last that he has crouched under the Caudine yoke to purchase only +a contemptuous toleration that leaves him at war with his own self-respect +and the invincible forces of his higher nature. + +But the peace which Christ promised to his followers was not of this +world; the good gift he brought them was not peace, but a sword. It was no +sword of territorial conquest, but that flaming blade of conscience and +self-conviction which lightened between our first parents and their lost +Eden,--that sword of the Spirit that searcheth all things,--which severs +one by one the ties of passion, of interest, of self-pride, that bind the +soul to earth,--whose implacable edge may divide a man from family, from +friends, from whatever is nearest and dearest,--and which hovers before +him like the air-drawn dagger of Macbeth, beckoning him, not to crime, but +to the legitimate royalties of self-denial and self-sacrifice, to the +freedom which is won only by surrender of the will. Christianity has never +been concession, never peace; it is continual aggression; one province of +wrong conquered, its pioneers are already in the heart of another. The +mile-stones of its onward march down the ages have not been monuments of +material power, but the blackened stakes of martyrs, trophies of +individual fidelity to conviction. For it is the only religion which is +superior to all endowment, to all authority,--which has a bishopric and a +cathedral wherever a single human soul has surrendered itself to God. That +very spirit of doubt, inquiry, and fanaticism for private judgment, with +which Romanists reproach Protestantism, is its stamp and token of +authenticity,--the seal of Christ, and not of the Fisherman. + +We do not wonder at the division which has taken place in the Tract +Society, nor do we regret it. The ideal life of a Christian is possible to +very few, but we naturally look for a nearer approach to it in those who +associate together to disseminate the doctrines which they believe to be +its formative essentials, and there is nothing which the enemies of +religion seize on so gladly as any inconsistency between the conduct and +the professions of such persons. Though utterly indifferent to the wrongs +of the slave, the scoffer would not fail to remark upon the hollowness of +a Christianity which was horror-stricken at a dance or a Sunday-drive, +while it was blandly silent about the separation of families, the putting +asunder whom God had joined, the selling Christian girls for Christian +harems, and the thousand horrors of a system which can lessen the agonies +it inflicts only by debasing the minds and souls of the race on whom it +inflicts them. Is your Christianity, then, he would say, a respecter of +persons, and does it condone the sin because the sinner can contribute to +your coffers? Was there ever a Simony like this,--that does not sell, but +withholds, the gift of God for a price? + +The world naturally holds the Society to a stricter accountability than it +would insist upon in ordinary cases. Were they only a club of gentlemen +associated for their own amusement, it would be very natural and proper +that they should exclude all questions which would introduce controversy, +and that, however individually interested in certain reforms, they should +not force them upon others who would consider them a bore. But a society +of professing Christians, united for the express purpose of carrying both +the theory and the practice of the New Testament into every household in +the land, has voluntarily subjected itself to a graver responsibility, and +renounced all title to fall back upon any reserved right of personal +comfort or convenience. + +We say, then, that we are glad to see this division in the Tract Society, +--not glad because of the division, but because it has sprung from an +earnest effort to relieve the Society of a reproach which was not only +impairing its usefulness, but doing an injury to the cause of truth and +sincerity everywhere. We have no desire to impugn the motives of those who +consider themselves conservative members of the Society; we believe them +to be honest in their convictions, or their want of them; but we think +they have mistaken notions as to what conservatism is, and that they are +wrong in supposing it to consist in refusing to wipe away the film on +their spectacle-glasses which prevents their seeing the handwriting on the +wall, or in conserving reverently the barnacles on their ship's bottom and +the dry-rot in its knees. We yield to none of them in reverence for the +Past; it is there only that the imagination can find repose and seclusion; +there dwells that silent majority whose experience guides our action and +whose wisdom shapes our thought in spite of ourselves;--but it is not +length of days that can make evil reverend, nor persistence in +inconsistency that can give it the power or the claim of orderly +precedent. Wrong, though its title-deeds go back to the days of Sodom, is +by nature a thing of yesterday,--while the right, of which we became +conscious but an hour ago, is more ancient than the stars, and of the +essence of Heaven. If it were proposed to establish Slavery to-morrow, +should we have more patience with its patriarchal argument than with the +parallel claim of Mormonism? That Slavery is old is but its greater +condemnation; that we have tolerated it so long, the strongest plea for +our doing so no longer. There is one institution to which we owe our first +allegiance, one that is more sacred and venerable than any other,--the +soul and conscience of Man. + +What claim has Slavery to immunity from discussion? We are told that +discussion is dangerous. Dangerous to what? Truth invites it, courts the +point of the Ithuriel-spear, whose touch can but reveal more clearly the +grace and grandeur of her angelic proportions. The advocates of Slavery +have taken refuge in the last covert of desperate sophism, and affirm that +their institution is of Divine ordination, that its bases are laid in the +nature of man. Is anything, then, of God's contriving endangered by +inquiry? Was it the system of the universe, or the monks, that trembled at +the telescope of Galileo? Did the circulation of the firmament stop in +terror because Newton laid his daring finger on its pulse? But it is idle +to discuss a proposition so monstrous. There is no right of sanctuary for +a crime against humanity, and they who drag an unclean thing to the horns +of the altar bring it to vengeance and not to safety. + +Even granting that Slavery were all that its apologists assume it to be, +and that the relation of master and slave were of God's appointing, would +not its abuses be just the thing which it was the duty of Christian men to +protest against, and, as far as might be, to root out? Would our courts +feel themselves debarred from interfering to rescue a daughter from a +parent who wished to make merchandise of her purity, or a wife from a +husband who was brutal to her, by the plea that parental authority and +marriage were of Divine ordinance? Would a police-justice discharge a +drunkard who pleaded the patriarchal precedent of Noah? or would he not +rather give him another month in the House of Correction for his +impudence? + +The Antislavery question is not one which the Tract Society can exclude by +triumphant majorities, nor put to shame by a comparison of +respectabilities. Mixed though it has been with politics, it is in no +sense political, and springing naturally from the principles of that +religion which traces its human pedigree to a manger, and whose first +apostles were twelve poor men against the whole world, it can dispense +with numbers and earthly respect. The clergyman may ignore it in the +pulpit, but it confronts him in his study; the church-member, who has +suppressed it in parish-meeting, opens it with the pages of his Testament; +the merchant, who has shut it out of his house and his heart, finds it +lying in wait for him, a gaunt fugitive, in the hold of his ship; the +lawyer, who has declared that it is no concern of his, finds it thrust +upon him in the brief of the slave-hunter; the historian, who had +cautiously evaded it, stumbles over it at Bunker Hill. And why? Because it +is not political, but moral,--because it is not local, but national, +--because it is not a test of party, but of individual honesty and honor. +The wrong which we allow our nation to perpetrate we cannot localize, +if we would; we cannot hem it within the limits of Washington or Kansas; +sooner or later, it will force itself into the conscience and sit by the +hearthstone of every citizen. + +It is not partisanship, it is not fanaticism, that has forced this matter +of Anti-slavery upon the American people; it is the spirit of +Christianity, which appeals from prejudices and predilections to the moral +consciousness of the individual man; that spirit elastic as air, +penetrative as heat, invulnerable as sunshine, against which creed after +creed and institution after institution have measured their strength and +been confounded; that restless spirit which refuses to crystallize in any +sect or form, but persists, a Divinely-commissioned radical and +reconstructor, in trying every generation with a new dilemma between case +and interest on the one hand, and duty on the other. Shall it be said that +its kingdom is not of this world? In one sense, and that the highest, it +certainly is not; but just as certainly Christ never intended those words +to be used as a subterfuge by which to escape our responsibilities in the +life of business and politics. Let the cross, the sword, and the arena +answer, whether the world, that then was, so understood its first +preachers and apostles. Caesar and Flamen both instinctively dreaded it, +not because it aimed at riches or power, but because it strove to conquer +that other world in the moral nature of mankind, where it could establish +a throne against which wealth and force would be weak and contemptible. No +human device has ever prevailed against it, no array of majorities or +respectabilities; but neither Caesar nor Flamen ever conceived a scheme so +cunningly adapted to neutralize its power as that graceful compromise +which accepts it with the lip and denies it in the life, which marries it +at the altar and divorces it at the church-door. + + + + +NOTE TO THE CATACOMBS OF ROME. + + +In our first article on the Roman Catacombs we expressed the belief that +"a year was now hardly likely to pass without the discovery" of new +burial-places of the early Christians,--the fresh interest in Christian +archaeology leading to fresh explorations in the hollow soil of the +Campagna. A letter to us from Rome, of the 2lst of April, confirms the +justness of this expectation. We quote from it the following interesting +passage:-- + +"The excavations on the Via Appia Nuova, which I mentioned in a former +letter, prove very interesting, and have already resulted in most +important discoveries. The spot is at the second milestone outside of the +gate of St. John Lateran. The field is on the left of the road going +towards Albano, and in it are several brick tombs of beautiful fine work, +now or formerly used as dwellings or barns. You and I crossed the very +field on a certain New Year's Day, and lingered to admire the almost +unrivalled view of the Campagna, the mountains, and Rome, which it +affords. + +"The first discovery was an ancient basilica, satisfactorily ascertained +to be the one dedicated to St. Stephen, built by Santa Demetria,--the +first nun,--at the instigation of the pope, St. Leo the Great. [A.D. 440- +461.] Sig. Fortunati, who made the discovery and directs the excavations, +told me at great length how he was led to the investigation; but as he has +published this and much more in a pamphlet, which I shall send to you, I +will not repeat it here. + +"Twenty-two columns have been found, many of rare and beautiful marble, +one of _verde antico_, most superb, others of _breccia_ and of _cipollino +marino_, said to be rare, and certainly very beautiful. Forty bases and +over thirty capitals of various styles have also been found, as well as +architectural ornaments without number, many of them carved with Greek or +Roman crosses. The rare and superb fragments of marble show that there +must have been costly and beautiful linings and finish. There are also +numerous inscriptions of great interest, which connect this church with +illustrious families and famous martyrs. + +"Subsequently, portions of villas were found, with ruined baths, and +mosaics and frescoes, with various pieces of sculpture, some perfect and +of most excellent style. There is also a sarcophagus with bas-relief of a +Bacchic procession, remarkably fine. The government has bought all for the +Museum, and intends spending a large sum in building a basilica over the +remains of the old one, in honor of St. Stephen. + +"But the most remarkable discovery is an old Roman tomb, by far the finest +I have seen in its preservation and perfection. It is about eighteen feet +square, has been lined and paved with white marble, some of which still +remains. The lofty ceiling is covered with bas-reliefs in stucco, of +charming grace and spirit, representing various mythological subjects, in +square compartments united by light and elegant arabesques. They are +really of wonderful merit, and so perfectly preserved, so fresh, that they +seem as if done last year. A massive marble doorway, beautifully corniced, +gives entrance to this superb chamber, in which were found three huge +sarcophagi, containing the bones of nine bodies;--which bones are left to +lie exposed, because the bones of pagans! These sarcophagi are of splendid +workmanship, but, unhappily, broken by former barbarians. Present +barbarians (said to be Inglesi and Americani) have stolen two skulls, and +pick up everything not closely watched. Opposite to this chamber is +another, smaller and more modest in adornment, and by the side of this +descend two flights of steps in perfect repair. Many vases of colored +glass and two very handsome rings were found at the foot of these steps. +This tomb is supposed to be of about 160 of our era. + +"These stairways descend from the ancient Via Latina, which has been +excavated for some distance, and is found with wide sidewalks of stone +(lava) similar to the sidewalks in Pompeii. The narrow carriage-way is +deeply rutted, which makes one think that the old Romans had hard bumps to +contend with. + +"Another tomb with perfect stairway has been discovered, but it is much +more plain. Foundations of villas, and baths with leaden pipes in great +quantity, have been exposed. I hear to-day that the government has ordered +the excavation of a mile and a half of the old Via Latina in this +neighborhood, and much interesting discovery is anticipated." + +We will only add to our correspondent's account the fact that the Basilica +of St. Stephen had been sought for in vain previously to this discovery by +Signor Fortunati. The great explorer, Bosio, failed to find it, and +Aringhi, writing just two hundred years ago, says, "Formerly upon the Via +Latina stood the church erected with great pains in honor of the most +blessed Stephen, the first martyr, by Demetria, a woman of pristine piety; +of which the Bibliothecarius, in his account of Pope Leo the First, thus +makes mention: 'In these days, Demetria, the handmaid of God, made the +Basilica of St. Stephen on the Latin Way, at the third mile-stone, on her +estate:... which afterward, being decayed and near to ruin through the +long course of years, was restored by Pope Leo the Third.' Of this most +noble church, which was one of the chief monuments of the Christian +religion, as well as an ornament of the city of Rome, no vestige at this +day remains." + +It is remarkable that a church restored so late as the time of Leo III. +[A.D. 795-816] should have been so lost without being utterly destroyed, +and so buried under the slowly-accumulating soil of the Campagna, that the +very tradition of the existence of its remains should have disappeared, +and its discovery have been the result of scientific archæeological +investigation. + +The disappearance and the forgetting of the Church of St. Alexander were +less remarkable, because of its far greater distance from the city, and +its comparative inconspicuousness and poverty. Scarcely a more striking +proof exists of the misery and lowness of Rome during many generations in +the Dark Ages than that she should thus have forgotten the very sites of +the churches which had stood around her walls, the outpost citadels of her +faith. + + + + +LITERARY NOTICES. + + +_The Aquarium: An Unveiling of the Wonders of the Deep Sea_. By P.H. +GOSSE. Second Edition, revised and enlarged. With Illustrations. London: +1866. + +_The Common Objects of the Seashore; including Hints for an Aquarium_. By +the REV. J.G. WOOD. With Illustrations. London: Routledge & Co. 1857. + +We trust that many of our readers, stimulated by the account of an +Aquarium which was given in our number for February, are proposing to set +one up for themselves. + +Let no one who has been to Barnum's Museum, to look at what the naming +advertisement elegantly and grammatically terms "an aquaria," fancy that +he has seen the beauty of the real aquarium. The sea will not show its +treasures in a quarter of an hour, or be made a sight of for a quarter of +a dollar. An aquarium is not to be exhausted in a day, but, if favorably +placed where it may have sufficient direct sunshine, and well stocked with +various creatures, day after day developes within it new beauties and +unexpected sights. It becomes like a secret cave in the ocean, where the +processes of Nature go on in wonderful and silent progression, and the coy +sea displays its rarer beauties of life, of color, and of form before the +watching eyes. Look at it on some clear day, when the sun is bright, and +see the broad leaves of ulva, their vivid green sparkling with the +brilliant bubbles of oxygen which float up to the surface like the bubbles +of Champagne; see the glades of the pink coralline, or the purple Iceland- +moss covered with its plum-like down, in the midst of which the +transparent bodies of the shrimps or the yellow or banded shells of the +sea-snails are lying half hid. See on the brown rock, whose surface is +covered with the softest growth, the white anemone stretching its crown of +delicate tentacles to the light; or the long winding case of the serpula, +from the end of which appear the purple, brown, or yellow feathers that +decorate the head of its timid occupant. Or watch the scallop with his +turquoise eyes; or the comic crabs, or the minnows playing through the +water, in and out of the recesses of the rocks or the thickets of the +seaweed. There is no end of the pleasant sights. And day after day the +creatures will grow more tame, the serpula will not dart back into his +case when you approach, nor the pecten close his beautiful shell as your +shadow passes over it. Moreover, the habits of the creatures grow more +entertaining as you become familiar with them, and even the dull oyster +begins at last to show some signs of individual character. + +And it is easy to have all this away from the seashore. The best tanks, so +far as we know, that are made in this country, are those of Mr. C.E. +Hammett, of Newport, Rhode Island. But the tank is of little importance, +if one cannot get the water, the seaweed, and the stock; and therefore Mr. +Hammett undertakes to supply these also. He will send, not the water +itself, but the salts obtained by evaporation from the quantity of water +necessary for each aquarium. These are to be dissolved in clear spring- +water, (previously boiled, to insure its containing no injurious living +matter,) and then the aquarium, having first had a bed of cleanly-washed +sand put upon its bottom for about an inch or an inch and a half in depth, +and this in turn covered with a thin layer of small pebbles,--though these +last are not essential,--is to be filled with it. Then the seaweed, which +is sent so packed as to preserve its freshness, is to be put in. It will +be attached to small bits of rock, and these should be supported by or +laid upon other pieces of stone, so raised as to secure a free passage for +the water about them, and so afford places of retreat for the animals. The +stock will be sent, if it is to go to any distance, in jars, and anemones, +crabs, shell-fish of various kinds, and many other creatures, will be +found among it. The seaweed should be a day or two in the tank before the +creatures are put into it. + +And now, having got the aquarium in order, comes the point how to keep it +in order,--how to keep the creatures alive, and how to prevent the water +from growing cloudy and thick. The main rule is to secure sunlight,--hot +enough to raise the water to a temperature above that of the outer air,-- +to remove all dirt and floating scum, and to furnish the tank on every +cloudy day with a supply of air and with motion by means of a syringe. The +creatures should never be fed in warm weather with any animal substance, +its decay being certain to corrupt the water. A little meal or a few +crumbs of bread may now and then be given; but even this is not necessary; +for Nature furnishes all the food that is needed, in the spores thrown off +by the seaweed, in the seaweed itself, whose growth is generally +sufficiently rapid to make up for the ravages committed upon it, and in +the host of infusoria constantly produced in the water. If any of the +creatures die, their bodies should be immediately removed,--though +sometimes the omnivorous crabs will do this work rapidly enough. As the +water evaporates, it should be filled up to its original level with fresh +spring-water,--the salts in it undergoing no diminution by evaporation. +If, suddenly, the water should grow thick, it should be taken from the +tank, a portion at a time, and filtered back into it slowly through +pounded charcoal, the process being repeated till the purity seems to be +returning, and at the same time the rocks and seaweed should be removed +and carefully washed in fresh water. If, however, the water should by any +ill chance grow tainted and emit a bad odor, nothing can be done to +restore it, and, unless it is at once changed, the creatures will die. To +meet such an emergency, which is of rare occurrence, it is well to have a +double quantity of the salts sent with the tank to secure a new supply of +water. But we have known aquariums that have kept in order for more than +a year with no change of the water, a supply of spring-water being put in +from time to time as we have directed; and at this moment, as we write, +there is an aquarium at our side which has been in active operation for +six months, and the water is as clear as it was the day it was put in. If, +spite of everything, the seawater fail, then try a fresh-water aquarium. +Use your tank for the pond instead of the ocean; and in the spotted newt, +the tortoise, the tadpole, the caddis-worm, and the thousand other +inhabitants of our inland ponds and brooks, with the weeds among which +they live, you will find as much entertainment as in watching the wonders +of the great sea. + +A camel's-hair brush, a bent spoon on a long handle, a sponge tied to a +stick, and one or two other instruments which use will suggest, are all +that are needed for keeping the sides of the tank free from growth or +removing obnoxious substances from its bottom. + +If, on receiving the animals, any of them should appear exhausted by the +journey, they may sometimes be revived by aerating the water in which they +are by means of a syringe. It should always be remembered, that, though +living in the water, they need a constant supply of air. And it would be +well, in getting an aquarium, to have the tank and the seaweeds sent a few +days in advance of the stock, so that on the arrival of the creatures they +may be at once transferred to their new abode. + +There are no American books upon the subject, and, in the present want of +them, the two whose names are given above are the best that can be +obtained. Mr. Gosse's is expensive, costing between four and five dollars. +"The Common Objects of the Seashore," to be got for a quarter of a dollar, +contains much accurate, unpretending, and pleasant information. + + +_The American Drawing-Book: a Manual for the Amateur, and a Basis of Study +for the Professional Artist_. Especially adapted to the Use of Public and +Private Schools, as well as Home Instruction. By J.G. CHAPMAN, N.A. New +York: J.S. Redfield. 4to. pp. 304. + +Drawing-books, in general, deserve to be put into the same category with +the numerous languages "without a master" which have deluded so many +impatient aspirants to knowledge by royal (and cheap) roads. A drawing- +book, at its very best, is only a partial and lame substitute for a +teacher, giving instruction empirically; so that, be it ever so correct in +principle, it must lack adaptation to the momentary and most pressing +wants of the pupil and to his particular frame of mind; it is too +Procrustean to be of any ultimate use to anybody, except in comparatively +unimportant matters. It is well enough for those who need only amusement +in their drawing, and whose highest idea of Art is copying prints and +pictures; but for those who want assistance from Art in order to the +better understanding of Nature, no man, be he ever so wise, can, by the +drawing-book plan, do much to smooth the way of study. + +All that another mind could do for us by way of teaching Art would be to +save us time,--first, by its experience, in anticipating our failures; +second, by its trained accuracy, to correct our errors of expression more +promptly than our afterthought would do it,--and to systematize our +perceptions for us by showing us the relative and comparative importance +of truths in Nature. In the first two respects, which are merely +practical, the drawing-book, if judiciously prepared, might do somewhat to +assist us; but in the last and most important, only the experienced and +thoughtful artist, standing with us before Nature, can give us further +insight into her system of expression. A good picture may do a little, but +it is Nature's own face we need to study, and that neither book nor +picture can very deeply interpret for our proper and peculiar perception. + +In the practical part, again, the drawing-book can give us no real +assistance in regard to color. And thus the efficacy of it is reduced to +the communication of methods of drawing in white and black. This Chapman's +book does to the best purpose possible under the circumstances, in what is +technically termed the right-line system of drawing,--that is, the +reduction of all forms to their approximate geometrical figures in order +to facilitate the measurements of the eye. Thus, it is easier by far to +determine the proportion which exists between the sides of a triangle +formed by the lines connecting the three principal points in any figure +than any curvilinear connections whatever. The application of the +rectilinear system consists in the use, as a basis of the drawing, of such +a series of triangles as shall at once show the exact relation of the +points of definition or expression to each other; but the successful +application of this depends much on the assistance of the trained eye and +hand of a master watching every step we make. + +When we leave this section of the "American Drawing-Book," we leave all +that is of practical value to the young artist. The prescription of any +particular mode of execution is always injurious, (if in any degree +effective,) for the reason that the student must not think of execution at +all, but simply what the form is which he wants to draw, and how he can +draw it most plainly and promptly. Decision of execution should always be +the result of complete knowledge of the thing to be drawn; if from any +other source, it will assuredly be only heedless scrawling, bad in +proportion as it is energetic and decided. + +The chapter on Perspective is full and well illustrated, and useful to +architectural or mechanical draughtsmen, may-be, but little so to artists. +There are, indeed, no laws of perspective which the careful draughtsman +from Nature need ever apply, for his eye will show him the tendency of +lines and the relative magnitude of bodies quicker than he can find them +by the application of the rules of perspective,--and with much better +result, since all application of science _directly_ to artistic work +endangers its poetic character, and almost invariably gives rise to a +hardness and formalism the reverse of artistic, leading the artist to +depend on what he knows ought to be rather than on what he really sees, a +tendency more to be deprecated than any want of correctness in drawing. + +The book contains chapters on artistic processes and technical matters +generally, making it a useful hand-book to amateurs; but all that is +really valuable to a young student of Art might be compressed into a very +few pages of this ponderous book. To follow its prescriptions _seriatim_ +would be to him a serious loss of time and heart. + + +_The New American Cyclopaedia_. A Popular Dictionary of General Knowledge, +Edited by GEORGE RIPLEY and CHAS. A. DANA. Vol. II. New York: D. Appleton +& Co. 8vo. + +We have spoken so fully of the purpose and general character of this work, +in noticing the first volume, that it is hardly necessary for us to speak +at length of the second. In a rapid glance at its contents, it appears +fully to bear out the promise of the first. We have noticed a few +omissions, and some mistakes of judgment. It is, perhaps, impossible to +preserve the gradation of reputations in such a work; but a zoologist must +be puzzled when he sees Von Baer, the great embryologist, who made a +classification of animals, founded on their development, which +substantially agrees with that of Cuvier, founded on their structure, +occupy about one tenth of the space devoted to Peter T. Barnum; however, +we suppose, that, as Barnum created new animals, he is a more wonderful +personage than Von Baer, who simply classified old ones. These occasional +omissions and disturbances of the scale of reputations are, however, more +than offset by the new information the editors have been able to +incorporate into most of their biographies of the living, and not a few of +those of the dead. Many persons who were mere names to the majority of the +public are here, for the first time, recognized as men engaged in living +lives as well as in writing books. Some of these biographies must have +been obtained at the expense of much time and correspondence. Samuel +Bayley, the author of "Essays on the Formation of Opinions," is one of +these well-known names but unknown men; but in the present volume he has +been compelled to come out of his mysterious seclusion, and present to the +public those credentials of dates and incidents which prove him to be a +positive existence on the planet. + +The papers on Arboriculture, Architecture, Arctic Discovery, Armor, Army, +Asia, Atlantic Ocean, Australia, Balance of Power, Bank, and Barometer, +are excellent examples of compact and connected statement of facts and +principles. The biographies of Aristotle, Aristophanes, Augustine, +Ariosto, and Arnold, and the long article on Athens, are among the most +striking and admirable papers in the volume. As the purpose of the work is +to supply a Cyclopaedia for popular use, it is inevitable that students of +special sciences or subjects should be occasionally disappointed at the +comparatively meagre treatment of their respective departments of +knowledge. In regard to the articles in the present volume, it may be said +that such subjects as Astronomy and the Association of Ideas should have +occupied more space, even if the wants of the ordinary reader were alone +consulted. But still, when we consider the vast range and variety of +topics included in this volume, and the fact that it comprehends a dozen +subjects which a dozen octavos devoted to each would not exhaust, we are +compelled to award praise to the editors for contriving to compress into +so small a space an amount of information so great. + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 10079 *** diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. 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..51be38c --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #10079 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10079) diff --git a/old/10079-8.txt b/old/10079-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..bd19b5d --- /dev/null +++ b/old/10079-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9182 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Number 9, +July, 1858, by Various + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Number 9, July, 1858 + +Author: Various + +Release Date: November 14, 2003 [eBook #10079] +[Date last updated: June 8, 2005] + +Language: English + +Chatacter set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY, VOLUME 2, +NUMBER 9, JULY, 1858*** + + +E-text prepared by Anne Soulard, Cornell University, Joshua Hutchinson, +and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team + + + +THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + +A MAGAZINE OF LITERATURE, ART, AND POLITICS. + +VOL. II.--JULY, 1858.--NO. IX. + + + + + + +THE CATACOMBS OF ROME. +[Concluded.] + +--fessoque Sacrandum +Supponato capiti lapidem, Curistoque quiescam. +PAULINUS OF NOLL + +Et factus est in pace locus ejus et halitatio in Sion. +Ps. LXXV. 2 + +V. + +Rome is preëminently the city of monuments and inscriptions, and the +lapidary style is the one most familiar to her. The Republic, the Empire, +the Papacy, the Heathens, and the Christians have written their record +upon marble. But gravestones are proverbially dull reading, and +inscriptions are often as cold as the stone upon which they are engraved. + +The long gallery of the Vatican, through which one passes to enter the +famous library, and which leads to the collection of statues, is lined on +one side with heathen inscriptions, of miscellaneous character, on the +other with Christian inscriptions, derived chiefly from the catacombs, but +arranged with little order. The comparison thus exhibited to the eye is an +impressive one. The contrast of one class with the other is visible even +in external characteristics. The old Roman lines are cut with precision +and evenness; the letters are well formed, the words are rightly spelt, +the construction of the sentences is grammatical. But the Christian +inscriptions bear for the most part the marks of ignorance, poverty, and +want of skill. Their lines are uneven, the letters of various sizes, the +words ill-spelt, the syntax often incorrect. Not seldom a mixture of Greek +and Latin in the same sentence betrays the corrupt speech of the lower +classes, and the Latin itself is that of the common people. But defects of +style and faults of engraving are insufficient to hide the feeling that +underlies them. + +Besides this great collection of the Vatican, there is another collection +now being formed in the _loggia_ of the Lateran Palace, in immediate +connection with the Christian Museum. Arranged as the inscriptions will +here be in historic sequence and with careful classification, it will be +chiefly to this collection that the student of Christian antiquity will +hereafter resort. It in in the charge of the Cavaliere de Rossi, who is +engaged in editing the Christian inscriptions of the first six centuries, +and whose extraordinary learning and marvellous sagacity in deciphering +and determining the slightest remains of ancient stone-cutting give him +unexampled fitness for the work. Of these inscriptions, about eleven +thousand are now known, and of late some forty or fifty have been added +each year to the number previously recorded. But a very small proportion +of the eleven thousand remain _in situ_ in the catacombs, and besides the +great collections of the Vatican and the Lateran, there are many smaller +ones in Rome and in other Italian cities, and many inscriptions originally +found in the subterranean cemeteries are now scattered in the porticos or +on the pavements of churches in Rome, Ravenna, Milan, and elsewhere. From +the first period of the desecration of the catacombs, the engraved tablets +that had closed the graves were almost as much an object of the greed of +pious or superstitious marauders as the more immediate relics of the +saints. Hence came their dispersion through Italy, and hence, too, it has +happened that many very important and interesting inscriptions belonging +to Rome are now found scattered through the Continent. + +It has been, indeed, sometimes the custom of the Roman Church to enhance +the value of a gift of relics by adding to it the gift of the inscription +on the grave from which they were taken. A curious instance of this kind, +connected with the making of a very popular saint, occurred not many years +since. In the year 1802 a grave was found in the Cemetery of St. +Priscilla, by which were the remains of a glass vase that had held blood, +the indication of the burial-place of a martyr. The grave was closed by +three tiles, on which were the following words painted in red letters: +LVMENA PAXTE CVMFL. There were also rudely painted on the tiles two +anchors, three darts, a torch, and a palm-branch. The bones found within +the grave, together with the tiles bearing the inscription, were placed in +the Treasury of Relics at the Lateran. + +On the return of Pius VII., one of the deputation of Neapolitan clergy +sent to congratulate him sought and received from the Pope these relics +and the tiles as a gift for his church. The inscription had been read by +placing the first tile after the two others, thus,--PAX TECUM FILUMENA, +_Peace be with thee, Filumena_; and Filumena was adopted as a new saint in +the long list of those to whom the Roman Church has given this title. It +was supposed, that, in the haste of closing the grave, the tiles had been +thus misplaced. + +Very soon after the gift, a priest, who desired not to be named _on +account of his great humility_, had a vision at noonday, in which the +beautiful virgin with the beautiful name appeared to him and revealed to +him that she had suffered death rather than yield her chastity to the will +of the Emperor, who desired to make her his wife. Thereupon a young +artist, whose name is also suppressed, likewise had a vision of St. +Filomena, who told him that the emperor was Diocletian; but as history +stands somewhat opposed to this statement, it has been suggested that the +artist mistook the name, and that the Saint said Maximian. However this +may be, the day of her martyrdom was fixed on the 10th of August, 303. Her +relics were carried to Naples with great reverence; they were inclosed, +after the Neapolitan fashion, in a wooden doll of the size of life, +dressed in a white satin skirt and a red tunic, with a garland of flowers +on its head, and a lily and a dart in its hand. This doll, with the red- +lettered tiles, was soon transferred to its place in the church of +Mugnano, a small town not far from Naples. Many miracles were wrought on +the way, and many have since been wrought in the church itself. The fame +of the virgin spread through Italy, and chapels were dedicated to her +honor in many distant churches; from Italy it reached Germany and France, +and it has even crossed the Atlantic to America. Thus a new saint, a new +story, and a new exhibition of credulity had their rise not long ago from +a grave and three words in the catacombs. + +One of the first differences which are obvious, in comparing the Christian +with the heathen mortuary inscriptions, is the introduction in the former +of some new words, expressive of the new ideas that prevailed among them. +Thus, in place of the old formula which had been in most common use upon +gravestones, D.M., or, in Greek, [Greek: TH.K.], standing for _Dis +Manibus_, or [Greek: _Theois karachthoniois_], a dedication of the stone +to the gods of death, we find constantly the words _In pace_. The exact +meaning of these words varies on different inscriptions, but their general +significance is simple and clear. When standing alone, they seem to mean +that the dead rests in the peace of God; sometimes they are preceded by +_Requiescat_, "May he rest in peace"; sometimes there is the affirmation, +_Dormit in pace_, "He sleeps in peace"; sometimes a person is said +_recessisse in pace_, "to have departed in peace." Still other forms are +found, as, for instance, _Vivas in pace_, "Live in peace," or _Suscipiatur +in pace_, "May he be received into peace,"--all being only variations of +the expression of the Psalmist's trust, "I will lay me down in peace and +sleep, for thou, Lord, only makest me dwell in safety." It is a curious +fact, however, that on some of the Christian tablets the same letters +which were used by the heathens have been found. One inscription exists +beginning with the words _Dis Manibus_, and ending with the words _in +pace_. But there is no need of finding a difficulty in this fact, or of +seeking far for an explanation of it. As we have before remarked, in +speaking of works of Art, the presence of some heathen imagery and ideas +in the multitude of the paintings and inscriptions in the catacombs is not +so strange as the comparatively entire absence of them. Many professing +Christians must have had during the early ages but an imperfect conception +of the truth, and can have separated themselves only partially from their +previous opinions, and from the conceptions that prevailed around them in +the world. To some the letters of the heathen gravestones, and the words +which they stood for, probably appeared little more than a form expressive +of the fact of death, and, with the imperfect understanding natural to +uneducated minds, they used them with little thought of their absolute +significance.[1] + +[Footnote 1: It is probable that most of the gravestones upon which this +heathen formula is found are not of an earlier date than the middle of the +fourth century. At this time Christianity became the formal religion of +many who were still heathen in character and thought, and cared little +about the expression of a faith which they had adopted more from the +influence of external motives than from principle or conviction.] + +Another difference in words which is very noticeable, running through the +inscriptions, is that of _depositus_, used by the Christians to signify +the _laying away_ in the grave, in place of the heathen words _situs, +positus, sepultus, conditus_. The very name of _coemeterium_, adopted by +the Christians for their burial-places, a name unknown to the ancient +Romans, bore a reference to the great doctrine of the Resurrection. Their +burial-ground was a _cemetery_, that is, a _sleeping-place_; they regarded +the dead as put there to await the awakening; the body was _depositus_, +that is, _intrusted to_ the grave, while the heathen was _situs_ or +_sepultus, interred_ or _buried_,--the words implying a final and +definitive position. And as the Christian _dormit_ or _quiescit, sleeps_ +or _rests_ in death, so the heathen is described as _abreptus_, or +_defunctus, snatched away_ or _departed_ from life. + +Again, the contrast between the inscriptions is marked, and in a sadder +way, by the difference of the expressions of mourning and grief. No one +who has read many of the ancient gravestones but remembers the bitter +words that are often found on them,--words of indignation against the +gods, of weariness of life, of despair and unconsoled melancholy. Here is +one out of many:-- + + PROCOPE MANVS LEBO CONTRA + DEVM QVI ME INNOCENTEM SVS + TVLIT QVAE VIXI ANNOS XX. + POS. PROCLVS. + + I, Procope, who lived twenty years, lift up + my hands against God, who took me away innocent. + Proclus set up this. + +But among the Christian inscriptions of the first centuries there is not +one of this sort. Most of them contain no reference to grief; they are the +very short and simple words of love, remembrance, and faith,--as in the +following from the Lateran:-- + + ADEODATE DIGNAE ET MERITAE VIRGINI + ETQVIESCE HIC IN PACE IVBENTE XPO EJUS + + To Adeodata, a worthy and deserving Virgin, + and rests here in peace, her Christ commanding. + +On a few the word _dolens_ is found, simply telling of grief. On one to +the memory of a sweetest daughter the word _irreparable_ is used, _Filiae +dulcissimae inreparabili_. Another is, "To Dalmatius, sweetest son, whom +his _unhappy_ father was not permitted to enjoy for even seven years." +Another inscription, in which something of the feeling that was unchecked +among the heathens finds expression in Christian words, is this: "Sweet +soul. To the incomparable child, who lived seventeen years, and +_undeserving_ [of death] gave up life in the peace of the Lord." Neither +the name of the child nor of the parents is on the stone, and the word +_immeritus_, which is used here, and which is common in heathen use, is +found, we believe, on only one other Christian grave. One inscription, +which has been interpreted as being an expression of unresigned sorrow, is +open to a very different signification. It is this:-- + + INNOCENTISSISSIMÆ ETATIS + DVLCISSIMO FILIO + JOVIANO QVI VIXIT ANN· VII + ET MENSES VI NON MERENTES + THEOCTISTVS ET THALLVSA PARENTES + + To their sweetest boy Jovian, of the most + innocent age, who lived seven years and six + months, his undeserving [or unlamenting] parents + Theoctistus and Thallusa. + +Here, without forcing the meaning, _non merentes_ might be supposed to +refer to the parents' not esteeming themselves worthy to be left in +possession of such a treasure; but the probability is that _merentes_ is +only a misspelling of _maerentes_ for otherwise _immerentes_ would have +been the natural word. + +But it is thus that the Christian inscriptions must be sifted, to find +expressions at variance with their usual tenor, their general composure +and trust. The simplicity and brevity of the greater number of them are, +indeed, striking evidence of the condition of feeling among those who set +them upon the graves. Their recollections of the dead feared no fading, +and Christ, whose coming was so near at hand, would know and reunite his +own. Continually we read only a name with _in pace_, without date, age, or +title, but often with some symbol of love or faith hastily carved or +painted on the stone or tiles. Such inscriptions as the following are +common:-- + + FELICISSIMVS DVLCIS,--GAVDENTIA IN PACE, + --SEVERA IN DEO VIVAS,-- + +or, with a little more fulness of expression,-- + + DVLCISSIMO FILIO ENDELECIO + BENEMERENTI QVI VIXIT + ANNOS II MENSE VNV + DIES XX IN PACE + + To the sweetest son Endelechius, the well- + deserving, who lived two years, one month, + twenty days. In peace. + +The word _benemerenti_ is of constant recurrence. It is used both of the +young and the old; and it seems to have been employed, with comprehensive +meaning, as an expression of affectionate and grateful remembrance. + +Here is another short and beautiful epitaph. The two words with which it +begins are often found. + + ANIMA DVLCIS AVFENIA VIRGO + BENEDICTA QVE VIXIT ANN: XXX + DORMIT IN PACE + + Sweet Soul. The Blessed Virgin Aufenia, + who lived thirty years. She sleeps in peace. + +But the force and tenderness of such epitaphs as these is hardly to be +recognized in single examples. There is a cumulative pathos in them, as +one reads, one after another, such as these that follow:-- + + ANGELICE BENE IN PACE + + To Angelica well in peace. + + CVRRENTIO SERVO DEI DEP. D. XVI. KAL + NOVEM. + + To Currentius, the servant of God, laid in + the grave on the sixteenth of the Kalends of + November. + + MAXIMINVS QVI VIXIT ANNOS XXIII + AMICVS OMNIVM + + Maximin, who lived twenty-three years, the + friend of all. + + SEPTIMVS MARCIANE + IN PACE QUE BICSIT MECV + ANNOS XVII. DORMIT IN PACE + + Septimus to Marciana in peace. Who lived + with me seventeen years. She sleeps in peace. + + GAVDENTIA + PAVSAT DVLCIS + SPIRITVS ANNORVM II + MENSORVM TRES. + + Gaudentia rests. Sweet spirit of two years + and three months. + +Here is a gravestone with the single word VIATOR; here one that tells only +that Mary placed it for her daughter; here one that tells of the light of +the house,--[Greek: To phos thaes Oikias]. + +Nor is it only in these domestic and intimate inscriptions that the +habitual temper and feeling of the Christians is shown, but even still +more in those that were placed over the graves of such members of the +household of faith as had made public profession of their belief, and +shared in the sufferings of their Lord. There is no parade of words on the +gravestones of the martyrs. Their death needed no other record than the +little jar of blood placed in the mortar, and the fewest words were enough +where this was present. Here is an inscription in the rudest letters from +a martyr's grave:-- + + SABATIVS BENEMERENTI QVI VIXIT ANNOS XL + + To the well-deserving Sabatias, who lived + forty years. + +And here another:-- + + PROSPERO INNOCENTI ANIMAE IN PACE. + + To Prosperus, innocent soul, in peace. + +And here a third, to a child who had died as one of the Innocents:-- + + MIRAE INNOCENTIAE ANIMA DULCIS AEMILEANVS + QVI VIXIT ANNO VNO, MENS. VIII D. XXVIII + DORMIT IN PACE + + Aemilian, sweet soul of marvellous innocence, + who lived one year, eight months, twenty-eight + days. He sleeps in peace. + +At this grave was found the vase of blood, and on the gravestone was the +figure of a dove. + +Another inscription, which preserves the name of one of those who suffered +in the most severe persecution to which the ancient Church was exposed, +and which, if genuine, is, so far as known, the only monument of the kind, +is marked by the same simplicity of style:-- + + LANNVS XPI MA + RTIR HC*[Hic?] REQVIESC + IT SVR [E-P-S] DIOCLITI ANO PASSVS + + Lannus Martyr of Christ here rests. He + suffered under Diocletian. + +The three letters EPS have been interpreted as standing for the words _et +posteris suis_, and as meaning that the grave was also for his successors. +Not yet, then, had future saints begun to sanctify their graves, and to +claim the exclusive possession of them. + +But there is another point of contrast between the inscriptions of the un- +Christianized and the Christian Romans, which illustrates forcibly the +difference in the regard which they paid to the dead. To the one the dead +were still of this world, and the greatness of life, the distinctions of +class, the titles of honor still clung to them; to the other the past life +was as nothing to that which had now begun. The heathen epitaphs are +loaded with titles of honor, and with the names of the offices which the +dead had borne, and, like the modern Christian (?) epitaphs whose style +has been borrowed from them, the vanity of this world holds its place +above the grave. But among the early Christian inscriptions of Rome +nothing of this kind is known. Scarcely a title of rank or a name of +office is to be found among them. A military title, or the name of priest +or deacon, or of some other officer in the Church, now and then is met +with; but even these, for the most part, would seem to belong to the +fourth century, and never contain any expression of boastfulness or +flattery. + + FL. OLIVS PATERNVS + CENTVRIO CHOR. X VRB. + QVI VIXIT AH XXVII + IN PACE + + Flavius Olius Paternus, Centurion of the + Tenth Urban Cohort, who lived twenty-seven + years. In peace. + +It is true, no doubt, that among the first Christians there were very few +of the rich and great. The words of St. Paul to the Corinthians were as +true of the Romans as of those to whom they were specially addressed: "For +ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, +not many mighty, not many noble are called." Still there is evidence +enough that even in the first two centuries some of the mighty and some of +the noble at Rome were among those called, but that evidence is not to be +gathered from the gravestones of the catacombs. We have seen, in a former +article, that even the grave of one of the early bishops,--the highest +officer of the Church,--and one who had borne witness to the truth in his +death, was marked by the words, + + CORNELIVS MARTYR + EP. + + The Martyr Cornelius, Bishop. + +Compare this with the epitaphs of the later popes, as they are found on +their monuments in St. Peter's,--"flattering, false insculptions on a +tomb, and in men's hearts reproach,"--epitaphs overweighted with +superlatives, ridiculous, were it not for their impiety, and full of the +lies and vanities of man in the very house of God. + +With this absence of boastfulness and of titles of rank on the early +Christian graves two other characteristics of the inscriptions are closely +connected, which bear even yet more intimate and expressive relation to +the change wrought by Christianity in the very centre of the heathen +world. + +"One cannot study a dozen monuments of pagan Rome," says Mr. Northcote, in +his little volume on the catacombs, "without reading something of _servus_ +or _libertus, libertis libertabusque posterisque eorum_; and I believe the +proportion in which they are found is about three out of every four. Yet, +in a number of Christian inscriptions exceeding eleven thousand, and all +belonging to the first six centuries of our era, scarcely six have been +found containing any allusion whatever--and even two or three of these are +doubtful--to this fundamental division of ancient Roman society. + +"No one, we think, will be rash enough to maintain, either that this +omission is the result of mere accident, or that no individual slave or +freedman was ever buried in the catacombs. Rather, these two cognate +facts, the absence from ancient Christian epitaphs of all titles of rank +and honor on the one hand, or of disgrace and servitude on the other, can +only be adequately explained by an appeal to the religion of those who +made them. The children of the primitive Church did not record upon their +monuments titles of earthly dignity, because they knew that with the God +whom they served 'there was no respect of persons'; neither did they care +to mention the fact of their bondage, or of their deliverance from +bondage, to some earthly master, because they thought only of that higher +and more perfect liberty wherewith Christ had set them free; remembering +that 'he that was called, being a bondman, was yet the freeman of the +Lord, and likewise he that was called, being free, was still the bondman +of Christ.' + +"And this conclusion is still further confirmed by another remarkable fact +which should be mentioned, namely, that there are not wanting in the +catacombs numerous examples of another class of persons, sometimes ranked +among slaves, but the mention of whose servitude, such as it was, served +rather to record an act of Christian charity than any social degradation; +I allude to the alumni, or foundlings, as they may be called. The laws of +pagan Rome assigned these victims of their parents' crimes or poverty to +be the absolute property of any one who would take charge of them. As +nothing, however, but compassion could move a man to do this, children +thus acquired were not called _servi_, as though they were slaves who had +been bought with money, nor _vernae_, as though they had been the children +of slaves born in the house, but _alumni_, a name simply implying that +they had been brought up (_ab alendo_) by their owners. Now it is a very +singular fact, that there are actually more instances of _alumni_ among +the sepulchral inscriptions of Christians than among the infinitely more +numerous inscriptions of pagans, showing clearly that this was an act of +charity to which the early Christians were much addicted; and the +_alumni_, when their foster-parents died, very properly and naturally +recorded upon their tombs this act of charity, to which they were +themselves so deeply indebted." + +So far Mr. Northcote. It is still further to be noted, as an expression of +the Christian temper, as displayed in this kind of charity, that it never +appears in the inscriptions as furnishing a claim for praise, or as being +regarded as a peculiar merit. There is no departure from the usual +simplicity of the gravestones in those of this class. + + [Greek: + PETROS + THREPTOS + RAUKUTA + TOS EN THEO] + + Peter, sweetest foster-child, in God. + +And a dove is engraved at either side of +this short epitaph. + + VITALIANO ALVMNO KARO + EVTROPIVS FECIT. + + Eutropius made this for the dear foster-child + Vitalian. + + ANTONIVS DISCOLIVS FILIVS ET BIBIVS + FELLICISSIMVS ALVMNVS VALERIE CRESTENI + MATRI BIDVE ANORVM XVIII INTET SANCTOS + + Antonius Discolius her son, and Bibius Felicissimus + her foster-child, to Valeria Crestina + their mother, a widow for eighteen years. + [Her grave is] among the holy.[2] + +[Footnote 2: This inscription is not of earlier date than the fourth +century, as is shown by the words, _Inter sancios_,--referring, as we +heretofore stated, to the grave being made near that of some person +esteemed a saint.] + +These inscriptions lead us by a natural transition to such as contain some +reference to the habits of life or to the domestic occupations and +feelings of the early Christians. Unfortunately for the gratification of +the desire to learn of these things, this class of inscriptions is far +from numerous,--and the common conciseness is rarely, in the first +centuries, amplified by details. But here is one that tells a little story +in itself:-- + + DOMNINAE +INNOCENTISSINAE ET DVLCISSIMAE COIVGI + QVAE VIXIT ANN XVI M. IIII ET FVIT + IMARITATA ANN. DVOBVS M. IIII D. VIIII + CVM QVA SON LICVIT FVISSE PROPTER + CAVSAS PEREGRINATIONIS + NISI MENEIE VI +QVO TEMPORE VT EGO SENSI ET EXHBVI + AMOREM MEVM + NVLLI SV ALII SIC DILEXERVNT + DEPOSIT XV KAL. IVN. + + To Domnina, my most innocent and sweetest + wife; who lived sixteen years and four + months, and was married two years, four + months, and nine days; with whom, on account + of my journeys, I was permitted to be + only six months; in which time, as I felt, so + I showed my love. No others have so loved + one another. Placed in the grave the 15th + of the Kalends of June. + +Who was this husband whose far-off journeys had so separated him from his +lately married wife? Who were they who so loved as no others had loved? +The tombstone gives only the name of Domnina. But in naming her, and in +the expression of her husband's love, it gives evidence, which is +confirmed by many other tokens in the catacombs, of the change introduced +by Christianity in the position of women, and in the regard paid to them. +Marriage was invested with a sanctity which redeemed it from sensuality, +and Christianity became the means of uniting man and woman in the bonds of +an immortal love. + +Here is an inscription which, spite of the rudeness of its style, +preserves the pleasant memory of a Roman child:-- + + ISPIRITO SANTO BONO + FLORENTIO QVI VIXIT ANIS XIII + QVAM SI FILIVM SVVM ET COTDEVS + MATER FILIO BENEMERETI FECERVNT. + + To the good and holy spirit Florentius, who + lived thirteen years, Coritus, his master, who + loved him more than if he were his own son, + and Cotdeus, his mother, have made this for + her well-deserving son.[3] + +[Footnote 3: Compare an inscription from a heathen tomb:-- + + C. JVLIVS MAXIMVS + ANN. II. M. V. + + ATROX O FORTVNA TRVCI QVAE FVNERR GAVDES + QVID MIHI TAM SVBITO MAXIMVS ERIPITVR + QVI MODO JVCVNDVS GREMIO SVPERESSE SOLEBAT + HIC LAPIS TN TVMVLO NVNC JACET ECCE MATER + + C. Julius Maximus, + Two years, five months old. + + Harsh Fortune, that in cruel death finds't joy, + Why is my Maximus thus sudden reft, + So late the pleasant burden of my breast? + Now in the grave this stone lies: lo, his mother!] + +And Coritus, his master, and Cotdeus, his mother, might have rejoiced in +knowing that their poor, rough tablet would keep the memory of her boy +alive for so many centuries; and that long after they had gone to the +grave, the good spirit of Florentius should still, through these few +words, remain to work good upon the earth.--Note in this inscription (as +in many others) the Italianizing of the old Latin,--the _ispirito_, and +the _santo_; note also the mother's strange name, reminding one of Puritan +appellations,--Cotdeus being the abbreviation of _Quod vult Deus_, "What +God wills."[4] + +[Footnote 4: Other names of this kind were _Deogratias_, _Habetdeum_, and +_Adeodatus_.] + +Here is an inscription set up by a husband to his wife, Dignitas, who was +a woman of great goodness and entire purity of life:-- + + QUE SINE LESIONE ANIMI MEI VIXI MECVM + ANNOS XV FILIOS AVTEM PROCREAVIT VII + EX QVIBVS SECV ABET AD DOMINVM IIII + + Who, without ever wounding my soul, lived + with me for fifteen years, and bore seven + children, four of whom she has with her in + the Lord. + +We have already referred to the inscriptions which bear the name of some +officer of the early Church; but there is still another class, which +exhibits in clear letters others of the designations and customs familiar +to the first Christians. Thus, those who had not yet been baptized and +received into the fold, but were being instructed in Christian doctrine +for that end, were called _catechumens_; those who were recently baptized +were called _neophytes_; and baptism itself appears sometimes to have +been designated by the word _illuminatio_. Of the use of these names the +inscriptions give not infrequent examples. It was the custom also among +the Christians to afford support to the poor and to the widows of their +body. Thus we read such inscriptions as the following:-- + + RIGINE VENEMEREMTI FILIA SVA FECIT + VENERIGINE MATRI VIDVAE QVE SE + DIT VIDVA ANNOS LX ET ECLESA + VIXIT ANNOS LXXX MESIS V + DIES XXVI + + Her daughter Reneregina made this for her + well-deserving mother Regina, a widow, who + sat a widow sixty years, and never burdened + the church, the wife of one husband, who lived + eighty years, five months, twenty-six days. + +The words of this inscription recall to mind those of St. Paul, in his +First Epistle to Timothy, (v. 3-16,) and especially the verse, "If any man +or woman that believeth have widows, let them relieve them, and let not +the church be charged." + +Some of the inscriptions preserve a record of the occupation or trade of +the dead, sometimes in words, more often by the representation of the +implements of labor. Here, for instance, is one which seems like the +advertisement of a surviving partner:-- + + DE BIANOBA + POLLECLA QVE ORDEV BENDET DE + BIANOBA + + From New Street. Pollecla, who sold barley + on New Street. + +Others often bear a figure which refers to the name of the deceased, an +_armoirie parlante_ as it were, which might be read by those too ignorant +to read the letters on the stone. Thus, a lion is scratched on the grave +of a man named Leo; a little pig on the grave of the little child +Porcella, who had lived not quite four years; on the tomb of Dracontius is +a dragon; and by the side of the following charming inscription is found +the figure of a ship:-- + + NABIRA IN PACE ANIMA DULCIS + QVI BIXIT ANOS XVI M V + ANIMA MELEIEA + TITVLV FACTV + APARENTES SIGNVM NABE + + Navira in peace. Sweet soul, who lived sixteen + years, five months. Soul honey-sweet. + This inscription made by her parents. The + sign a ship. + +The figures that are most frequent upon the sepulchral slabs are, however, +not such as bear relation to a name or profession, but the commonly +adopted symbols of the faith, similar in design and character to those +exhibited in the paintings of the catacombs. The Good Shepherd is thus +often rudely represented; the figure of Jonah is naturally, from its +reference to the Resurrection, also frequently found; and the figure of a +man or woman with arms outstretched, in the attitude of prayer, occurs on +many of the sepulchral slabs. The anchor, the palm, the crown, and the +dove, as being simpler in character and more easily represented, are still +more frequently found. The varying use of symbols at different periods has +been one of the means which have assisted in determining approximate dates +for the inscriptions upon which they are met with. It is a matter of +importance, in many instances, to fix a date to an inscription. Historical +and theological controversies hang on such trifles. Most of the early +gravestones bear no date; and it was not till the fourth century, that, +with many other changes, the custom of carving a date upon them became +general. The century to which an inscription belongs may generally be +determined with some confidence, either by the style of expression and the +nature of the language, or by the engraved character, or some other +external indications. Among these latter are the symbols. It has, for +instance, been recently satisfactorily proved by the Cavaliere de Rossi +that the use of the emblem of the fish in the catacombs extended only to +the fourth century, so that the monuments upon which it is found may, with +scarcely an exception, be referred to the preceding period. As this emblem +went out of use, owing perhaps to the fact that the Christians were no +longer forced to seek concealment for their name and profession, the +famous monogram of Christ, [Symbol] the hieroglyphic, not only of his +name, but of his cross, succeeded to it, and came, indeed, into far more +general use than that which the fish had ever attained. The monogram is +hardly to be found before the time of Constantine, and, as it is very +frequently met with in the inscriptions from the catacombs, it affords an +easy means, in the absence of a more specific date, for determining a +period earlier than which any special inscription bearing it cannot have +originated. Its use spread rapidly during the fourth century. It "became," +says Gibbon, with one of his amusing sneers, "extremely fashionable in the +Christian world." The story of the vision of Constantine was connected +with it, and the Labarum displayed its form in the front of the imperial +army. It was thus not merely the emblem of Christ, but that also of the +conversion of the Emperor and of the fatal victory of the Church. + +It is a remarkable fact, and one which none of the recent Romanist +authorities attempt to controvert, that the undoubted earlier inscriptions +afford no evidence of any of the peculiar doctrines of the Roman Church. +There is no reference to the doctrine of the Trinity to be found among +them; nothing is to be derived from them in support of the worship of the +Virgin; her name even is not met with on any monument of the first three +centuries; and none of the inscriptions of this period give any sign of +the prevalence of the worship of saints. There is no support of the claim +of the Roman Church to supremacy, and no reference to the claim of the +Popes to be the Vicars of Christ. As the third century advances to its +close, we find the simple and crude beginning of that change in Christian +faith which developed afterward into the broad idea of the intercessory +power of the saints. Among the earlier inscriptions prayers to God or to +Christ are sometimes met with, generally in short exclamatory expressions +concerning the dead. Thus we find at first such words as these:-- + + AMERIMNVS + RVFINAE COIV + GI CARISSIME + BENEMEREN + TI SPIRITVM + TVVM DEVS + REFRIGERET + + Amerimnus to his dearest wife Rufina well- + deserving. May God refresh thy spirit! + +And, in still further development,-- + + [Greek: AUR. AIANOS PAPHLAGON THEOU + DOULOS PISTOS + EKOIMNON EN EIPNIN MINSON + AUTOU + O THEOS EIS TOUS AIONAS] + + Aurelius Aelianus, a Paphlagonian, faithful + servant of God. He sleeps in peace. Remember + him, O God, forever! + +Again, two sons ask for their mother,-- + + DOMINE NE QVANDO + ADVMBRETVR SPIRITVS + VENERES + + O Lord, let not the spirit of Venus be shadowed + at any time! + +From such petitions as these we come by a natural transition to such as +are addressed to the dead themselves, as being members of the same +communion with the living, and uniting in prayers with those they had left +on earth and for their sake. + + VIBAS IN PACE ET PETE PRO NOBIS + + Mayst thou live in peace and ask for us! + +Or, as in another instance,-- + + PETE PRO PARENTES TVOS + MATRONATA MATRONA + QVE VIXIT AN. I. DI. LII. + + Pray for thy parents, Matronata Matrona! + Who lived one year, fifty-two days. + +And as we have seen how in the fourth century the desire arose of being +buried near the graves of those reputed holy, so by a similar process we +find this simple and affectionate petition to the dead passing into a +prayer for the dead to those under whose protection it was hoped that they +might be. In the multitude of epitaphs, however, these form but a small +number. Here is one that begins with a heathen formula:-- + + SOMNO HETERNALI + AVRELIVS GEMELLVS QVI BIXIT AN-- + ET MESES VIII DIES XVIII MATER FILIO + CARISSIMO BENAEMERENTI FECIT IN PA-- + [C]ONMANDO BASSILA INNOCENTIA GEMELLI + + In Eternal Sleep. Aurelius Gemellus, who + lived --- years, and eight months, eighteen + days. His mother made this for her dearest + well-deserving son in peace. I commend to + Basilla the innocence of Gemellus. + +Basilla was one of the famous martyrs of the time of Valerian and +Gallienus. + +Here again is another inscription of a curious character, as interposing a +saint between the dead and his Saviour. The monogram marks its date. + + RVTA OMNIBVS SVBDITA ET ATFABI + LIS BIBET IN NOMINE PETRI + IN PACE + + Ruta, subject and affable to all, shall live in + the name of Peter, in the peace of Christ. + +But it would seem from other inscriptions as if the new practice of +calling upon the saints were not adopted without protest. Thus we read, in +contrast to the last epitaph, this simple one:-- + + ZOSIME VIVAS IN NOMINE XTI + + O Zosimus, mayst thou live in the name of Christ! + +And again, in the strongest and most direct words:-- + + SOLVS DEVS ANIMAM TVAM + DEFENDAD ALEXANDRE + + May God alone protect thy spirit, Alexander! + +One more inscription and we have done; it well closes the long list:-- + + QVI LEGERIT VIVAT IN CHRISTO + + Whoever shall read this, may he live in Christ! + +As the fourth century advanced, the character of the inscriptions +underwent great change. They become less simple; they exhibit less faith, +and more worldliness; superlatives abound in them; and the want of feeling +displays itself in the abundance of words. + +We end here our examinations of the testimony of the catacombs regarding +the doctrine, the faith, and the lives of the Christians of Rome in the +first three centuries. The evidence is harmonious and complete. It leaves +no room for skepticism or doubt. There are no contradictions in it. From +every point of view, theologic, historic, artistic, the results coincide +and afford mutual support. The construction of the catacombs, the works of +painting found within them, the inscriptions on the graves, all unite in +bearing witness to the simplicity of the faith, the purity of the +doctrine, the strength of the feeling, the change in the lives of the vast +mass of the members of the early church of Christ. A light had come into +the world, and the dark passages of the underground cemeteries were +illuminated by it, and manifest its brightness. Wherever it reached, the +world was humanized and purified. To the merely outward eye it might at +first have seemed faint and dim, but "the kingdom of God cometh not with +observation." + + + + +THREE OF US. + + +Such a spring day as it was!--the sky all one mild blue, hazy on the +hills, warm with sunshine overhead; a soft south-wind, expressive, and +full of new impulses, blowing up from the sea, and spreading the news of +life all over our brown pastures and leaf-strewn woods. The crocuses in +Friend Allis's garden-bed shot up cups of gold and sapphire from the dark +mould; slight long buds nestled under the yellow-green leafage of the +violet-patch; white and sturdy points bristled on the corner that in May +was thick with lilies-of-the-valley, crisp, cool, and fragrant; and in a +knotty old apricot-tree two bluebirds and a robin did heralds' duty, +singing of summer's procession to come; and we made ready to receive it +both in our hearts and garments. + +Josephine Boyle, Letty Allis, and I, Sarah Anderson, three cousins as we +were, sat at the long window of Friend Allis's parlor, pretending to sew, +really talking. Mr. Stepel, a German artist, had just left us; and a +little trait of Miss Josephine's, that had occurred during his call, +brought out this observation from Cousin Letty:-- + +"Jo, how could thee let down thy hair so before that man?" + +Jo laughed. "Thee is a little innocent, Letty, with your pretty dialect! +Why did I let my hair down? For Mr. Stepel to see it, of course." + +"That is very evident," interposed I; "but Letty is not so innocent or so +wise as to have done wondering at your caprices, Jo; expound, if you +please, for her edification." + +"I do not pretend to be wise or simple, Sarah; but I didn't think Cousin +Josephine had so much vanity." + +"You certainly shall have a preacher-bonnet, Letty. How do you know it was +vanity, my dear? I saw you show Mr. Stepel your embroidery with the +serenest satisfaction; now you made your crewel cherries, and I didn't +make my hair; which was vain?" + +Letty was astounded. "Thee has a gift of speech, certainly, Jo." + +"I have a gift of honesty, you mean. My hair is very handsome, and I knew +Mr. Stepel would admire it with real pleasure, for it is a rare color. I +took down those curls with quite as simple an intention as you brought him +that little picture of Cole's to see." + +Josephine was right,--partly, at least. Her hair was perfect; its tint the +exact hue of a new chestnut-skin, with golden lights, and shadows of deep +brown; not a tinge of red libelled it as auburn; and the light broke on +its glittering waves as it does on the sea, tipping the undulations with +sunshine, and scattering rays of gold through the long, loose curls, and +across the curve of the massive coil, that seemed almost too heavy for her +proud and delicate head to bear. Mr. Stepel was excusably enthusiastic +about its beauty, and Jo as cool as if it had been a wig. Sometimes I +thought this peculiar hair was an expression of her own peculiar +character. + +Letty said truly that Jo had a gift of speech; and she, having said her +say about the hair, dismissed the matter, with no uneasy recurring to it, +and took up a book from the table, declaring she was tired of her seam;-- +she always was tired of sewing! Presently she laughed. + +"What is it, Jo?" said I. + +"Why, it is 'Jane Eyre,' with Letty Allis's name on the blank leaf. That +is what I call an anachronism, spiritually. What do you think about the +book, Letty?" said she, turning her lithe figure round in the great chair +toward the little Quakeress, whose pretty red head and apple-blossom of a +face bloomed out of her gray attire and prim collar with a certain +fascinating contrast. + +"I think it has a very good moral tendency, Cousin Jo." + +The clear, hazel eyes flashed a most amused comment at me. + +"Well, what do you call the moral, Letty?" + +"Why,--I should think,--I do not quite know that the moral is stated, +Josephine,--but I think thee will allow it was a great triumph of +principle for Jane Eyre to leave Mr. Rochester when she discovered that he +was married." + +Jo flung herself back impatiently in the chair, and began an harangue. + +"That is a true world's judgment! And you, you innocent little Quaker +girl! think it is the height of virtue not to elope with a married man, +who has entirely and deliberately deceived you, and adds to the wrong of +deceit the insult of proposing an elopement! Triumph of principle! I +should call it the result of common decency, rather,--a thing that the +instinct of any woman would compel her to do. My only wonder is how Jane +Eyre could continue to love him." + +"My dear young friend," said I, rather grimly, "when a woman loves a man, +it is apt, I regret to say, to become a fact, not a theory; and facts are +stubborn things, you know. It is not easy to set aside a real affection." + +"I know that, ma'am," retorted Jo, in a slightly sarcastic tone; "it is a +painful truth; still, I do think a deliberate deceit practised on me by +any man would decapitate any love I had for him, quite inevitably." + +"So it might, in your case," replied I; "for you never will love a man, +only your idea of one. You will go on enjoying your mighty theories and +dreams till suddenly the juice of that 'little western flower' drips on +your eyelids, and then I shall have the pleasure of seeing you caress 'the +fair large ears' of some donkey, and hang rapturously upon its bray, till +you perhaps discover that he has pretended, on your account solely, to +like roses, when he has a natural proclivity to thistles; and then, +pitiable child! you will discover what you have been caressing, and--I +spare you conclusions; only, for my part, I pity the animal! Now Jane Eyre +was a highly practical person; she knew the man she loved was only a man, +and rather a bad specimen at that; she was properly indignant at this +further development of his nature, but reflecting in cool blood, +afterward, that it was only his nature, and finding it proper and legal to +marry him, she did so, to the great satisfaction of herself and the +public. _You_ would have made a new ideal of St. John Rivers, who was +infinitely the best material of the two, and possibly gone on to your +dying day in the belief that his cold and hard soul was only the adamant +of the seraph, encouraged in that belief by his real and high principle,-- +a thing that went for sounding brass with that worldly-wise little +philosopher, Jane, because it did not act more practically on his inborn +traits." + +"Bah!" said Josephine, "when did you turn gypsy, Sally? You ought to sell +_dukkeripen_, and make your fortune. Why don't you unfold Letty's fate?" + +"No," said I, laughing. "Don't you know that the afflatus always exhausts +the priestess? You may tell Letty's fortune, or mine, if you will; but my +power is gone." + +"I can tell yours easily, O Sibyl!" replied she. "You will never marry, +neither for real nor ideal. You should have fallen in love in the orthodox +way, when you were seventeen. You are adaptive enough to have moulded +yourself into any nature that you loved, and constant enough to have clung +to it through good and evil. You would have been a model wife, and a +blessed mother. But now--you are too old, my dear; you have seen too +much; you have not hardened yourself, but you have learned to see too +keenly into other people. You don't respect men, 'except exceptions'; and +you have seen so much matrimony that is harsh and unlovable, that you +dread it; and yet--Don't look at me that way, Sarah! I shall cry!--My +dear! my darling! I did not mean to hurt you.--I am a perfect fool!--Do +please look at me with your old sweet eyes again!--How could I!"---- + +"Look at Letty," said I, succeeding at last in a laugh. And really Letty +was comical to look at; she was regarding Josephine and me with her eyes +wide open like two blue larkspur flowers, her little red lips apart, and +her whole pretty surface face quite full of astonishment. + +"Wasn't that a nice little tableau, Letty?" said Josephine, with +preternatural coolness. "You looked so sleepy, I thought I'd wake you up +with a bit of a scene from 'Lara Aboukir, the Pirate Chief'; you know we +have a great deal of private theatricals at Baltimore; you should see me +in that play as Flashmoria, the Bandit's Bride." + +Letty rubbed her left eye a little, as if to see whether she was sleepy or +not, and looked grave; for me, the laugh came easily enough now. Jo saw +she had not quite succeeded, so she turned the current another way. + +"Shall I tell your fortune now, Letty? Are you quite waked up?" said she. + +"No, thee needn't, Cousin Jo; thee don't tell very good ones, I think." + +"No, Letty, she shall not vex your head with nonsense. I think your fate +is patent; you will grow on a little longer like a pink china-aster, safe +in the garden, and in due time marry some good Friend,--Thomas Dugdale, +very possibly,--and live a tranquil life here in Slepington till you +arrive at a preacher-bonnet, and speak in meeting, as dear Aunt Allis did +before you." + +Letty turned pale with rage. I did not think her blonde temperament held +such passion. + +"I won't! I won't! I never will!" she cried out. "I hate Thomas Dugdale, +Sarah! Thee ought to know better about me! thee knows I cannot endure him, +the old thing!" + +This climax was too much for Jo. With raised brows and a round mouth, she +had been on the point of whistling ever since Letty began; it was an old, +naughty trick of hers; but now she laughed outright. + +"No sort of inspiration left, Sally! I must patch up Letty's fate myself. +Flatter not yourself that she is going to be a good girl and marry in +meeting; not she! If there's a wild, scatter-brained, handsome, +dissipated, godless youth in all Slepington, it is on him that testy +little heart will fix,--and think him not only a hero, but a prodigy of +genius. Friend Allis will break her heart over Letty; but I'd bet you a +pack of gloves, that in three years you'll see that juvenile Quakeress in +a scarlet satin hat and feather, with a blue shawl, and green dress, on +the arm of a fast young man with black hair, and a cigar in his mouth." + +"Why! where _did_ thee ever see him, Josey?" exclaimed Letty, now rosy +with quick blushes. + +The question was irresistible. Jo and I burst into a peal of laughter that +woke Friend Allis from her nap, and, bringing her into the parlor, forced +us to recover our gravity; and presently Jo and I took leave. + +Letty was an orphan, and lived with her cousin, Friend Allis. I, too, was +alone; but I kept a tiny house in Slepington, part of which I rented, and +Jo was visiting me. + +As we walked home, along the quiet street overhung with willows and +sycamores, I said to her, "Jo, how came you to know Letty's secret?" + +"My dear, I did not know it any more than you; but I drew the inference of +her tastes from her character. She is excitable,--even passionate; but her +formal training has allowed no scope for either trait, and suppression has +but concentrated them. She really pines for some excitement;--what, then, +could be more natural than that her fancy should light upon some person +utterly diverse from what she is used to see? That is simple enough. I hit +upon the black hair on the same principle, 'like in difference.' The cigar +seemed wonderful to the half-frightened, all-amazed child; but who ever +sees a fast young man without a cigar?" + +"I am afraid it is Henry Malden," said I, meditatively; "he is all you +describe, but he is also radically bad; besides, having been in the +Mexican war, he will have the prestige of a hero to Letty. How can the +poor girl be undeceived before it is quite too late?" + +"What do you want to undeceive her for, Sally? Do you suppose that will +prevent her marrying Mr. Malden?" + +"I should think so, most certainly!" + +"Not in the least. If you want Letty to marry him, just judiciously oppose +it. Go to her, and say you come as a friend to tell her Mr. Malden's +faults, and the result will be, she will hate you, and be deeper in love +with him than ever." + +"You don't give her credit for common sense, Jo." + +"Just as much as any girl of her age has in love. Did you ever know a +woman who gave up a man she loved because she was warned against him?--or +even if she knew his character well, herself? I don't know but there are +women who could do it, from sheer religious principle. I believe you +might, Sarah. It would be a hard struggle, and wear you to a shadow in +mind and body; but you have a conscience, and, for a woman with a heart as +soft as pudding, the most thoroughly rigid streak of duty in you; none of +which Letty has to depend on. No; if you want to save her, take her away +from Slepington; take her to Saratoga, to Newport, to Washington; turn her +small head with gayety: she is pretty enough to have a dozen lovers at any +watering-place; it is only propinquity that favors Mr. Malden here." + +"I can't do that, Josephine. I have not the means, and Miss Allis would +not have the will, even if she believed in your prescription." + +"Then Letty must stay here and bide her time. You believe in a special +Providence, Sarah, don't you?" + +"Yes, of course I do." + +"Then cannot you leave her to that care? Circumstances do not work for +you. Perhaps it is best that she should marry him, suffer, live, love, and +be refined by fire." + +My heart sunk at the prospect of these possibilities. Josephine put her +arm round me. "Sally," said she, in her softest tone, "I grieved you, +dear, this afternoon. I did not mean to. I grieved myself most. Please +forgive me!" + +"I haven't anything to forgive, Jo," said I. "What you said to me was +true, painfully true,--and, being so, for a moment pained me. I should +have been much happier to be married, I know; but now I daren't think of +it. I have lost a great deal. I have + + "--'lost _my_ place, + _My_ sweet, safe corner by the household fire, + Behind the heads of children'; + +"and yet I do not know that I have not gained a little. It is something, +Jo, to know that I am not in the power of a bad, or even an ill-tempered +man. I can sit by my fire and know that no one will come home to fret at +me,--that I shall encounter no cold looks, no sneers, no bursts of anger, +no snarl of stinginess, no contempt of my opinion and advice. I know that +now men treat me with respect and attention, such as their wives rarely, +if ever, receive from them. Sensitive and fastidious as I am, I do not +know whether my gain is not, to me, greater than my loss. I know it ought +not to be so,--that it argues a vicious, an unchristian, almost an +uncivilized state of society; but that does not affect the facts." + +"You frighten me, Sarah. I cannot believe this is always true of men and +their wives." + +"Neither is it. Some men are good and kind and gentle, gentle-men, even in +their families; and every woman believes the man she is to marry is that +exception. Jo,--bend your ear down closer,--I thought once I knew such a +man,--and,--dear,--I loved him." + +"My darling!--but, Sarah, why"-- + +"Because, as you said, Josey, I was too old; I had seen too much; I would +not give way to an impulse. I bent my soul to know him; I rang the metal +on more than one stone, and every time it rang false. I knew, if I married +him, I should live and die a wretched woman. Was it not better to live +alone?" + +"But, Sarah,--if he loved you?" + +"He did not,--not enough to hurt himself; he could not love anything so +much better than his ease as to suffer, Josey: he was safe. He thought, or +said, he loved me; but he was mistaken." + +"Safe, indeed! He ought to have been shot!" + +"Hush, dear!" + +There was a long pause. It was as when you lift a wreck from the tranquil +sea and let it fall again to the depths, useless to wave or shore; the +black and ghastly hulk is covered; it is seen no more; but the water +palpitates with circling rings, trembles above the grave, dashes quick and +apprehensive billows upon the sand, and is long in regaining its quiet +surface. + +"I wonder if there ever was a perfect man," said Jo, at length, drawing a +deep sigh. + +"You an American girl, Jo, and don't think at once of Washington?" + +"My dear, I am bored to death with Washington _à l'Américain_. A man!-- +how dare you call him a man?--don't you know he is a myth, an abstraction, +a plaster-of-Paris cast? Did you ever hear any human trait of his noticed? +Weren't you brought up to regard him as a species of special seraph, a +sublime and stainless figure, inseparable from a grand manner and a +scroll? Did you ever dare suppose he ate, or drank, or kissed his wife? +You started then at the idea: I saw you!" + +"You are absurd, Jo. It is true that he is exactly, among us, what +demigods were to the Greeks,--only less human than they. But when I once +get my neck out of the school-yoke, I do not start at such suggestions as +yours; I believe he did comport himself as a man of like passions with +others, and was as far from being a hero to his _valet-de-chambre_ as +anybody." + +By this time we were at home, and Jo flung her parasol on the bench in the +porch, and sat down beside it with a gesture of weariness and disgust +mingled. + +"Why will you, of all people, Sarah, quote that tinkling, superficial +trash of a proverb, so palpably French, when the true reason why a man is +not a hero to his lackey is only because he is seen with a lackey's eyes, +--the sight of a low, convention-ridden, narrow, uneducated mind, unable +to take a broad enough view to see that a man is a hero because he is a +man, because he overleaps the level of his life, and is greater than his +race, being one of them? If he were of the heroic race, what virtue in +being heroic? it is the assertion of his trivial life that makes his +speciality evident,--the shadow that throws out the bas-relief. We chatter +endlessly about the immense good of Washington's example: I believe its +good would be more than doubled, could we be made, nationally, to see him +as a human being, living on 'human nature's daily food,' having mortal and +natural wants, tastes, and infirmities, but building with and over all, by +the help of God and a good will, the noble and lofty edifice of a patriot +manhood, a pure life of duty and devotion, sublime for its very strength +and simpleness, heroic because manly and human." + +The day had waned, and the sunset lit Josephine's excited eyes with fire: +she was not beautiful, but now, if ever, beauty visited her with a +transient caress. She looked up and met my eyes fixed on her. + +"What is it, Sally?--what do I look like?" + +"Very pretty, just now, Jo; your eyes are bright and your cheek flushed: +the sunshine suits you. I admire you tonight." + +"I am glad," said she, naively. "I often wish to be pretty." + +"A waste wish, Jo!--and yet I have entertained it myself." + +"It's not so much matter for you, Sarah; for people love you. And besides, +you have a certain kind of beauty: your eyes are beautiful,--rather too +sad, perhaps, but fine in shape and tint; and you have a good head, and a +delicately outlined face. Moreover, you are picturesque: people look at +you, and then look again,--and, any way, love you, don't they?" + +"People are very good to me, Jo." + +"Oh, yes! we all know that people as a mass are kindly, considerate, and +unselfish; that they are given to loving and admiring disagreeable and +ugly people; in short, that the millennium has come. Sally, my dear, you +are a small hypocrite,--or else--But I think we won't establish a mutual- +admiration society to-night, as there are only two of us; besides, I am +hungry: let us have tea." + +The next day, Josephine left me. As we walked together toward the landing +of the steamer, Letty Allis emerged from a green lane to say good-bye, and +down its vista I discerned the handsome, lazy person of Henry Malden, but +I did not inform Letty of my discovery. + +A year passed away,--to me with the old monotonous routine; full of work, +not wanting in solace; barren, indeed, of household enjoyments and +vicissitudes; solitary, sometimes desolate, yet peaceful even in monotony. +But this new spring had not come with such serene neglect to the other two +of us three. Against advice, remonstrance, and entreaty from her good +friends, Letty Allis had married Henry Malden, and, in attire more +tasteful, but quite as far from Quakerism as Josephine had predicted, +beamed upon the inhabitants of Slepington from the bow-window, or open +door, of a cottage very _ornée_ indeed; while the odor of a tolerable +cigar served as Mr. Malden's exponent, wherever he abode. And to Josephine +had come a loss no annual resurrection should repair: her mother was dead; +she, too, was orphaned,--for she had never known her father; her only +sister was married far away; and I kept an old promise in going to her for +a year's stay at least. + +Aunt Boyle's property had consisted chiefly in large cotton mills owned by +herself and her twin brother,--who, dying before her, left her all his own +share in them. These mills were on a noisy little river in the western +part of Massachusetts,--in a valley, narrow, but picturesque, and so far +above the level of the sea that the air was keen and pure as among +mountains. Mrs. Boyle had removed here from Baltimore, a few years before +her own death, that she might be with her brother through his long and +fatal illness; and, finding her health improved by change of air, had +occupied his house ever since, until one of those typhoid fevers that +infest such river-gorges at certain seasons of the year entered the +village about the mills, when, in visiting the sick, she took the epidemic +herself and died. Josephine still retained the house endeared to her by +sad and glad recollections; and it was there I found her, when, after +renting the whole of my little tenement at Slepington, I betook myself to +Valley Mills at her request. + +The cottage where she lived was capacious enough for her wants, and though +plain, even to an air of superciliousness, without, was most luxurious +within,--made to use and live in; for Mr. Brown, her uncle, was an +Englishman, and had never arrived at that height of Transatlantic _ton_ +which consists in shrouding and darkening all the pleasant rooms in the +house, and skulking through life in the basement and attic. Sunshine, +cushions, and flowers were Mr. Brown's personal tastes; and plenty of +these characterized the cottage. A green terrace between hill and river +spread out before the door for lawn and garden, and a tiny conservatory +abutted upon the brink of the terrace slope, from a bay-window in the +library, that opened sidewise into this winter-garden. + +I found Jo more changed than I had expected: this last year of country +life had given strength and elasticity to the tall and slender figure; a +steady rose of health burned on either cheek; and sorrow had subdued and +calmed her quick spirits. + +I was at home directly, and a sweeter summer never glowed and blushed over +earth than that which installed me in the Nook Cottage. Out of doors the +whole country was beautiful, and attainable; within, I had continual +resources in my usual work and in Jo's society: for she was one of those +persons who never are uninteresting, never fatiguing; a certain salient +charm pervaded her conversation, and a simplicity quite original startled +you continually in her manner and ways. I liked to watch her about the +house; dainty and fastidious in the extreme about some things, utterly +careless about others, you never knew where or when either trait would +show itself next. She was scrupulous as to the serving of meals, for +instance,--almost to a fault; no carelessness, no slight neglect, was +admitted here, and always on the spotless damask laid with quaint china +stood a tapered vase of white Venice glass, with one, or two, or three +blossoms, sometimes a cluster of leaves, the spray of a wild vine, or the +tasselled branch of a larch-tree jewelled with rose-red cones, arranged +therein with an artist's taste and skill: but perhaps, while she sharply +rebuked the maid for a dim spot on her chocolate-pitcher or a grain of +sugar spilt on the salver, her white India shawl lay trailed over the +divan half upon the floor, and her gloves fluttered on the doorstep till +the wind carried them off to find her parasol hanging in the honeysuckle +boughs. + +But, happily, it is not one's duty to make other people uncomfortable by +perpetually tinkering at that trait in them which most offends our own +nature; and I thought it more for my good and hers to learn patience +myself than undertake to beat her into order; the result of which was +peace and good-will that vindicated my wisdom to myself; and I found her, +faults and all, sufficiently fascinating and lovable. + +A year passed away serenely; and when spring came again, Josephine refused +to let me leave her. Our life was quiet enough, but, with such beautiful +Nature, and plenty to do, we were not lonely,--less so because Jo's hands +were as open as her heart, and to her all the sick and poor looked, not +only for help, but for the rarer consolations of living sympathy and +counsel. Her shrewd common sense, her practical capacity, her kindly, +cheerful face, her power of appreciating a position of want and perplexity +and seeing the best way out of it, and, above all, her deep and fervent +religious feeling, made her an invaluable friend to just that class who +most needed her. + +In the course of this spring we gained an addition to our society, in the +person of Mr. Waring, the son of the gentleman who had bought the mills at +Mrs. Boyle's death, but who had hitherto conducted them by an overseer. He +had recently bought a little island in the middle of the river, just below +the dam, and proposed erecting a new mill upon it; but as the Tunxis (the +Indian name of our river) was liable to rapid and destructive freshets, +the mill required a deep and secure foundation and a lower story of stone. + +This implied some skilful engineering, and Mr. Arthur Waring, having +studied this subject fully abroad, came on from Boston, and took up his +abode in Valley Mills village. Of course, we being his only hope of +society in the place, he made our acquaintance early. I rather liked him; +his manner was good, his perceptions acute, his tastes refined, and he had +a certain strength of will that gave force to a character otherwise +common-place. Josephine liked him at once; she laid his shyness and +_brusquerie_, which were only the expression of a dominant self- +consciousness, to genuine modesty. He was depressed and moody, because he +was bored for want of acquaintance, and missed the adulation and caresses +that he received at home as an only child; but Jo's swift imagination +painted this as the trait of a reflective and melancholy nature disgusted +with the world, and pitied him accordingly; a mild way of misanthropic +speech, that is apt to infest young men, added to this delusion; and, with +all the energy of her sweet, earnest disposition, Josephine undertook his +education,--undertook to teach him faith and hope and charity, to set +right his wayward soul, to renovate his bitter opinions, to make him a +better and a happier man. + +It is a well-known fact in the philosophy of the human mind, that it is +apt to gain more by imparting than by receiving; and since philosophy, +where it becomes fact, does not mercifully adjust its results to +circumstance, but rushes on in implacable grooves, and clears its own +track of whatever lies thereon by the summary process of crushing it to +dust, it did not pause now for the pure intentions and tender heart which, +in teaching another love to men, taught herself love to a man, and learnt +far better than her pupil. + +Mr. Waring was but a man; he did not love Josephine,--he admired her; he +loved nothing but himself, his quiet, his pleasure; and while she +ministered to either, he regarded her with a species of affection that put +on the mask of a diviner passion and used its language. A thousand little +things showed the man fully to me, a cool spectator; but she who needed +most the discerning eye regarded this gay bubble as if it had been a +jewel. + +Perhaps I blame him too severely, for it was against the very heart of my +heart that he sinned; possibly I do not allow for the temptation it was to +a young man, quite alone in a country village, without resources, and +accustomed to the flattery and caresses of a devoted mother, to find +himself agreeable in the eyes of a noble and lovable woman. Possibly, in +his place, a better man might have sought her society, drawn her out of +her reserve for his own delectation, confided in her, worked upon her +pity, claimed her care, played on her simplicity and ignorance of the +world, crept into her heart and won its strength of emotion and its +generous affection,--in short, made love to her, without saying so, +honestly and openly. Yet there are some men who would not have done it; +and even yet, while I try to regard Arthur Waring with Christian charity, +I feel that I cannot trust him, that I do not respect him,--that, if I +dared despise anything God has made, my first contempt would light on him. + +In the autumn, while all this was going on, I received a painful and +wretched letter from Letty Malden, begging me to come to her. I could not +resist such an appeal; and one of Josephine's little nieces having come to +spend the winter with her, I hurried to Slepington,--not, I am sure, in +the least regretted by Mr. Waring, who had begun to look at me with uneasy +and sometimes defiant eyes. + +I found a miserable household here. Mr. Malden had in no way reformed. +When did marriage ever reform a bad man? On the contrary, he was more +dissipated than ever; and whenever he came home, the welcome that waited +for him was one little calculated to make home pleasant; for Letty's quick +temper blazed up in reproach and reviling that drew out worse +recrimination; and even the little, wailing, feeble baby, that filled +Letty's arms and consoled her in his absence, was only further cause of +strife between her and her husband. Often, as I came down the street and +saw the pretty outside of the cottage, waving with creepers, and hedged +about with thorns, whose gay berries decked it as if for a festival, I +thought of what a good old preacher among the Friends once said to me: +"Sarah, thee will live to find shows are often seems; thee sees many a +quiet house, with gay windows, that is hell inside." + +I soon found that I must stay all winter at Slepington. I had a hard task +before me,--to try and teach Letty that she had no right to neglect her +own duties because her husband ignored his. But six months of continual +dropping seemed to wear a tiny channel of perception; and my presence, as +well as the efforts we made together to preserve order, if not serenity, +in the house, restored a certain dim hope to Letty's mind, and I began to +see that the "purification by fire" was doing its work, in slow pain, but +to a sure end. + +Selfish as it was, I cannot say that I felt sorry to return to Jo, who +wrote for me in April, urging me to come as soon as I could, for Mr. +Waring had fallen from the mill-wall and broken his leg, and the workmen, +in their confusion, had carried him to her house, and she wanted me to +help her. I learned, on reaching Valley Mills, that the new building on +the island had not been completed far enough to resist a heavy freshet, +that had swept away part of the first story, where the mortar was not yet +hardened; and it was in traversing these wet stones to ascertain the +extent of the damage that Mr. Waring had slipped, and, unable to recover +his footing, fallen on a heap of stones and received his injury. + +My first question to Josephine was, "Where is Mr. Waring's mother?" + +"He would not send for her, Sally," said she, "because she is not well, +and he feared to startle her." + +"H'm!" said I, very curtly. + +Josephine looked at me with innocent, grave eyes,--dear, simple child!-- +and yet, for anybody but herself she would have been sufficiently +discerning. This love seemed to have remodelled her nature, to have taken +from her all the serpent's wisdom, to have destroyed her common sense, and +distorted her view of everything in which Arthur Waring was concerned. She +had certainly got on very fast in my absence. I had returned too late. + +I had little to do with the care of the invalid; that devolved on Jo; my +offers of service were kindly received, but always declined. Nobody could +read to him so well as Miss Boyle. Nobody else understood his moods, his +humors, his whims; she knew his tastes with ominous exactness. It was she +who arranged his meals on the salver with such care and grace, nay, even +cooked them at times; for Jo believed, like a rational woman, that +intellect and cultivation increase one's capacity for every office,--that +a woman of intelligence should be able to excel an ignorant servant in +every household duty, by just so much as she excels her in mind. In fact, +this was a pleasant life to two persons, but harassing enough for me. Had +I been confident of Arthur Waring's integrity, I should have regarded him +with friendly and cordial interest; but I had every reason to distrust +him. I perceived he had so far insinuated himself into Jo's confidence, +that his whole artillery of expressive looks, broken sentences, even +caresses, were received by her with entire good faith; but when I asked +her seriously if I was to regard Mr. Waring as her lover, she burst into +indignant denial, colored scarlet, and was half inclined to be angry with +me,--though a certain tremulous key, into which her usually sweet and +steady voice broke while she declared he had never spoken to her of love, +it was only friendship, witnessed against her that she was apprehensive, +sad, perhaps visited with a tinge of that causeless shame which even in a +pure and good woman conventionality constrains, when she has loved a man +before he says in plain English, "I love you," though every act and look +and tone of his may have carried that significance unmistakably for years. +Thank God, there is a day of sure judgment coming, when conventions and +shields of usage will save no man from the due vengeance of truth upon +falsehood, justice upon smooth and plausible duplicity! + +In due time Mr. Waring recovered. If there was any change in his manner to +Jo, it was too slight to be seen, though it was felt, and was, after all, +the carelessness of a person certain of his foothold in her good graces, +rather than the evident withdrawal of attention,--which I could have +pardoned even then, had it been the result of honest regret for past +carelessness, and stern resolution to repair that past. Whatever it was, +Jo perceived that her ideal man was become a real man; but, with a +tenacity of nature, for which in my fate-telling I had not given her +credit, she was as constant to the substance as she had been to the dream; +and while she lost both health and spirits in the contemplation of Arthur +Waring's fitful and heedless manner toward her, and was evidently pained +by the discovery of his selfish and politic traits,--to call them by no +harsher name,--it was inexpressibly touching to hear the excuses she made +for him, to see the all-shielding love with which she veiled his faults, +and kept him as a mother would keep her graceless, yet dearest child from +animadversion and reproach. + +In the mean time I heard often from Letty,--no good news of her husband, +but that her child grew more and more a comfort, that her friends were +very kind, and always in a tiny postscript some such phrase as this: "I +try to be patient, Sarah," or "I don't scold Harry so much as I did, +dear." I hoped for Letty, for she persevered. + +That summer we saw less than ever of Mr. Waring; he was very busy at the +mill in order that it might be far enough advanced to resist the +inevitable spring freshets; and besides, we were absent from the Valley +some weeks, endeavoring to recruit Jo's failing health at the sea-side. +But this was a vain endeavor; that which sapped the springs of her life +was past outward cure. She inherited her father's delicate and unreliable +constitution, and a nervous organization, whose worst disease is ever the +preying of doubt, anxiety, or regret. As winter drew on, she grew no +better; a dim, dreamy abstraction brooded over her. She said to me often, +with a vague alarm, "Sally, how far off you seem! Do come nearer!" She +ceased to talk when we were alone, her step grew languid, her eye deeper, +--and its bright expression, when you roused her, was longer in shooting +back into the clouded sphere than ever before. She sat for hours by the +window, her lovely head resting on its casement, looking out, always out +and away, beyond the hills, into the deep spaces of blue air, past cloud +and vapor, to the stars. Sudden noises startled her to an extreme degree; +a quick step flushed her cheek with fire and fluttered her breath. How I +longed for spring! I hoped all from the delicate ministrations of Nature; +though the physician we called gave me no hope of her final recovery. Mr. +Waring himself seemed struck with her aspect, and many little signs of +friendly interest came from him. As often as he could, he returned to his +old haunts; and while the pleasure of his presence and the excitement of +his undisguised anxiety wrought on her, Jo became almost her old self for +the moment, gay, cheerful, blooming,--alas! with the bloom of feverishness +and vain hope. + +So spring drew near. The mill was nearly finished. One day in March a warm +south-wind "quieted the earth" after a long rain, the river began to stir, +its mail of ice to crack and heave under the sun's rays. I persuaded Jo to +take a little drive, and once in the carriage the air reanimated her; she +rested against me and talked more than I had known her for weeks. + +"What a lovely day!" said she; "how balmy the air is! there is such an +expression of rest without despair, such calm expectation! I always think +of heaven such days, Sally!--they are like the long sob with which a child +finishes weeping. Only to think of never more knowing tears!--that is life +indeed!" + +A keen pang pierced me at the vibration of her voice as she spoke. I +thought to soothe her a little, and said, "Heaven can be no more than +love, Jo, and we have a great deal of that on earth." + +"Do we?" answered she, in a tone of grief just tipped with irony,--and +then went on: "I believe you love me, Sally. I would trust you with--my +heart, if need were. I think you love me better than any one on earth +does." + +"I love you enough, dear," said I; more words would have choked me in the +utterance. + +Soon we turned homeward. + +"Tell John to drive down by the river," said Josephine,--"I want to see +the new mill." + +"But you cannot see it from the road, Jo; the hemlocks stand between." + +"Never mind, Sally; I shall just walk through them; don't deny me! I want +to see it all again; and perhaps the arbutus is in bloom." + +"Not yet, Jo." + +"I can get some buds, then; I want to have some just once." + +We left the carriage, and on my arm Jo strolled through the little thicket +of hemlock-trees, green and fragrant. She seemed unusually strong. I began +to hope. After much searching, we found the budded flowers; she loved most +of all wild blossoms; no scent breathed from the closed petals; they were +not yet kissed by the odor-giving south-wind into life and expression; but +Jo looked at them with sad, far-reaching eyes. I think she silently said +good-bye to them. + +Presently we came out on the steep bank of the river, directly opposite +the mill. A heavy timber was thrown across from the shore to the island, +on which the workmen from the west side had passed and repassed; it was +firm enough for its purpose, but now, wet with the morning's rain, and +high above the grinding ice, it seemed a hazardous bridge. As we stood +looking over at the new mill, listening to the slight stir within it, +apparently the setting to rights by some lingering workman of such odds +and ends as remain after finishing the great whole of such a building, +suddenly the cool wind, which had shifted to the north, brought on its +waft a most portentous roar. We stood still to listen. Nearer and nearer +it swelled, crashing and hissing as it approached. Josephine grasped my +arm with convulsive energy, and at that instant we perceived Mr. Waring's +plaid cap pass an open casement. She turned upon me like a wild creature +driven to bay. I looked up-stream;--the ice had gathered in one high +barrier mixed with flood-wood and timber, and, bearing above all the +uprooted trunk of a huge sycamore, was coming down upon the dam like a +battering-ram. Jo gasped. "The river is broken up and Arthur is on the +island," said she, in a fearfully suppressed tone, and, swifter than I +could think or guess her meaning, she had reached the timber, she was on +it,--and with light, untrembling steps half across, when both she and I +simultaneously caught sight of Mr. Waring running for dear life to the +other and stronger bridge. Jo turned to come back; but the excitement was +past that had sustained her; she trembled, she tottered. I ran to meet and +aid her. Just then the roots of the great sycamore thundered against the +dam; the already heavily pressed structure gave way; with the freed roar +of a hurricane, the barrier, the dam, the foot-bridge swept down toward +us. She had all but reached the end of the timber,--I stood there to grasp +her hand,--when the old tree, whirled down by the torrent, struck the +other end of the beam and threw Josephine forward to the bank, dashing her +throbbing, panting breast, with all the force of her fall, against the +hard ground. I lifted her in my arms. She was white with pain. Presently +she opened her eyes and looked up, a flush of rapture glowed all over her +face, and then the awful mist of death, gray and rigid, veiled it. Her +head dropped on my shoulder; a sharp cry and a rush of scarlet blood +passed her lips together; the head lay more heavily,--she was dead. But +Arthur Waring never knew how or for what she died! + +Five years have passed since that day. Still I live at Nook Cottage; but +not alone. Of us three, Josephine is in heaven. Letty is still troubled +upon earth; her husband tests her patience and her temper every hour, but +both temper and patience are in good training; and if ever Henry Malden is +reclaimed, as I begin to see reasons to hope he will be, he will owe it to +the continual example and gentle goodness of his wife, who has grown from +a petulant, thoughtless girl into a lovely, unselfish, religious woman, a +devoted mother and wife, "refined by fire." For me, the last,--whenever +now I say, as I used to say, "Three of us," I mean a new three,--Paul, +baby, and me; for Jo was not a prophet. Four years ago, while my heart- +ache for her was fresh and torturing, a new pastor came to the little +village church of Valley Mills. Mr. Lyman was very good; I have seen other +men with as fine natural traits, but I have never seen a man or woman so +entirely good. He came to me to console me; for he, too, had just lost a +sister, and in listening to his story I for a moment forgot my own, as he +meant I should. But I did not love him,--no, not till I discovered, months +afterward, that he suffered incessantly from ill-health, and was all alone +in the world. I was too much a woman to resist such a plea. I pitied him; +I tried to take care of him; and when he asked me if I liked the office of +sick-nurse, I told him I liked it well enough to wish it were for life; +and now, when he wants to light my eyes out of that dreamy expression that +tells him I am re-living the past, and thinking of the dead, he tells me, +for the sake of the flash that follows, that I offered myself to him! +Perhaps I did. But he is well now; the air of the Tunxis hills, and the +rest of a quiet life, partly, I hope, good care also, have restored to him +his lost health. And I am what Jo said I should have been,--a blessed +mother, as well as a happy wife. The baby that lies across my lap has +traits that endear her to me doubly,--traits of each of us three cousins: +Josephine's hair on her little nestling head, Letty's apple-blossom +complexion, and my eyes, except that they are serene when they are not +smiling. I ask only of the love that has given me all this unexpected joy, +that my little Jo may have one better trait,--her father's heart; a +stronger, tenderer, and purer heart than belonged to any one among "Three +of us!" + + + + +WHAT A WRETCHED WOMAN SAID TO ME. + + +All the broad East was laced with tender rings + Of widening light; the Daybreak shone afar; +Deep in the hollow, 'twixt her fiery wings, + Fluttered the morning star. + +A cloud, that through the time of darkness went + With wanton winds, now, heavy-hearted, came +And fell upon the sunshine, penitent, + And burning up with shame. + +The grass was wet with dew; the sheep-fields lay + Lapping together far as eye could see; +And the great harvest hung the golden way + Of Nature's charity. + +My house was full of comfort; I was propped + With life's delights, all sweet as they could be, +When at my door a wretched woman stopped, + And, weeping, said to me,-- + +"Its rose-root in youth's seasonable hours + Love in thy bosom set, so blest wert thou; +Hence all the pretty little red-mouthed flowers + That climb and kiss thee now! + +"_I_ loved, but _I_ must stifle Nature's cries + With old dry blood, else perish, I was told; +Hence the young light shrunk up within my eyes, + And left them blank and bold. + +"I take my deeds, all, bad as they have been,-- + The way was dark, the awful pitfall bare;-- +In my weak hands, up through the fires of sin, + I hold them for my prayer." + +"The thick, tough husk of evil grows about + Each soul that lives," I mused, "but doth it kill? +When the tree rots, the imprisoned wedge falls out, + Rusted, but iron still. + +"Shall He who to the daisy has access, + Reaching it down its little lamp of dew +To light it up through earth, do any less, + Last and best work, for you?" + + + + +SONGS OF THE SEA. + + +Not Dibdin's; not Barry Cornwall's; not Tom Campbell's; not any of the +"Pirate's Serenades" and "I'm afloats!" which appear in the music-shop- +windows, illustrated by lithographic vignettes of impossible ships in +impracticable positions. These are sung by landsmen yachting in still +waters and in sight of green fields, by romantic young ladies in +comfortable and unmoving drawing-rooms to the tinkling of Chickering's +pianos. What are the songs the sailor sings to the accompaniment of the +thrilling shrouds, the booming double-bass of the hollow topsails, and the +multitudinous chorus of Ocean? What does the coaster, in his brief walk +"three steps and overboard," hum to himself, as he tramps up and down his +little deck through the swathing mists of a Bank fog? What sings the cook +at the galley-fire in doleful unison with the bubble of his coppers? +Surely not songs that exult in the life of the sea. Certainly not, my +amateur friend, anything that breathes of mastery over the elements. The +sea is a real thing to him. He never is familiar with it, or thinks of it +or speaks of it as his slave. It is "a steed that knows his rider," and, +like many another steed which the men of the forecastle have mounted, +knows that it can throw its rider at pleasure, and the riders know it too. +Now and then a sailor will utter some fierce imprecation upon wind or sea, +but it is in the impotence of despair, and not in the conscious, boastful +mastery which the land-songs attribute to him. What, then, does the sailor +sing?--and does he sing at all? + +Certainly the sailor sings. Did you ever walk through Ann Street, Boston, +or haunt the purlieus of the Fulton Market? and when there did you never +espy a huckster's board covered with little slips of printed paper of the +size and shape of the bills-of-fare at the Commonwealth Hotel? They are +printed on much coarser paper, and are by no means as typographically +exact as the aforesaid _carte_, or as this page of the "Atlantic Monthly," +but they are what the sailor sings. I know they are there, for I once +spent a long summer's day in the former place, searching those files for a +copy of the delightful ballad sung (or attempted to be sung) by Dick +Fletcher in Scott's "Pirate,"--the ballad beginning + + "It was a ship, and a ship of fame, + Launched off the stocks, bound for the main." + +I did not find my ballad, and to this day remain in ignorance of what fate +befell the "hundred and fifty brisk young men" therein commemorated. But I +found what the sailor does sing. It was a miscellaneous collection of +sentimental songs, the worn-out rags of the stage and the parlor, or +ditties of highwaymen, or ballad narratives of young women who ran away +from a rich "parient" with "silvier and gold" to follow the sea. The truth +of the story was generally established by the expedient of putting the +damsel's name in the last verse,--delicately suppressing all but the +initial and final letters. The only sea-songs that I remember were other +ballads descriptive of piracies, of murders by cruel captains, and of +mutinies, with a sprinkling of sea-fights dating from the last war with +England. + +The point of remark is, that all of these depend for their interest upon a +human association. Not one of them professes any concern with the sea or +ships for their own sake. The sea is a sad, solemn reality, the theatre +upon which the seaman acts his life's tragedy. It has no more of +enchantment to him than the "magic fairy palace" of the ballet has to a +scene-shifter. + +But other songs the sailor sings. The Mediterranean sailor is popularly +supposed to chant snatches of opera over his fishing-nets; but, after all, +his is only a larger sort of lake, with water of a questionable saltness. +It can furnish dangerous enough storms upon occasion, and, far worse than +storms, the terrible white-squall which lies ambushed under sunny skies, +and leaps unawares upon the doomed vessel. But the Mediterranean is not +the deep sea, nor has it produced the best and boldest navigators. +Therefore, although we still seek the sources of our maritime law amid the +rock-poised huts (once palaces) of Amalfi, we must go elsewhere for our +true sea-songs. + +The sailor does not lack for singing. He sings at certain parts of his +work;--indeed, he must sing, if he would work. On vessels of war, the drum +and fife or boatswain's whistle furnish the necessary movement-regulator. +There, where the strength of one or two hundred men can be applied to one +and the same effort, the labor is not intermittent, but continuous. The +men form on either side of the rope to be hauled, and walk away with it +like firemen marching with their engine. When the headmost pair bring up +at the stern or bow, they part, and the two streams flow back to the +starting-point, outside the following files. Thus in this perpetual +"follow-my-leader" way the work is done, with more precision and +steadiness than in the merchant-service. Merchant-men are invariably +manned with the least possible number, and often go to sea shorthanded, +even according to the parsimonious calculations of their owners. The only +way the heavier work can be done at all is by each man doing his utmost at +the same moment. This is regulated by the song. And here is the true +singing of the deep sea. It is not recreation; it is an essential part of +the work. It mastheads the topsail-yards, on making sail; it starts the +anchor from the domestic or foreign mud; it "rides down the main tack with +a will"; it breaks out and takes on board cargo; it keeps the pumps (the +ship's,--not the sailor's) going. A good voice and a new and stirring +chorus are worth an extra man. And there is plenty of need of both. + +I remember well one black night in the mid-Atlantic, when we were beating +up against a stiff breeze, coming on deck near midnight, just as the ship +was put about. When a ship is tacking, the tacks and sheets (ropes which +confine the clews or lower corners of the sails) are let run, in order +that the yards may be swung round to meet the altered position of the +ship. They must then be hauled taut again, and belayed, or secured, in +order to keep the sails in their place and to prevent them from shaking. +When the ship's head comes up in the wind, the sail is for a moment or two +edgewise to it, and then is the nice moment, as soon as the head-sails +fairly fill, when the main-yard and the yards above it can be swung +readily, and the tacks and sheets hauled in. If the crew are too few in +number, or too slow at their work, and the sails get fairly filled on the +new tack, it is a fatiguing piece of work enough to "board" the tacks and +sheets, as it is called. You are pulling at one end of the rope, but the +gale is tugging at the other. The advantages of lungs are all against you, +and perhaps the only thing to be done is to put the helm down a little, +and set the sails shaking again before they can be trimmed properly.--It +was just at such a time that I came on deck, as above mentioned. Being +near eight bells, the watch on deck had been not over spry; and the +consequence was that our big main-course was slatting and flying out +overhead with a might that shook the ship from stem to stern. The flaps of +the mad canvas were like successive thumps of a giant's fist upon a mighty +drum. The sheets were jerking at the belaying-pins, the blocks rattling in +sharp snappings like castanets. You could hear the hiss and seething of +the sea alongside, and see it flash by in sudden white patches of +phosphorescent foam, while all overhead was black with the flying scud. +The English second-mate was stamping with vexation, and, with all his +ills misplaced, storming at the men:--"'An'somely the weather main- +brace,--'an'somely, I tell you!--'Alf a dozen of you clap on to the main +sheet here,--down with 'im!--D'y'see 'ere's hall like a midshipman's +bag,--heverythink huppermost and nothing 'andy.--'Aul 'im in, Hi say!" +--But the sail wouldn't come, though. All the most forcible expressions of +the Commination-Service were liberally bestowed on the watch. "Give us +the song, men!" sang out the mate, at last,--"pull with a will! +--together, men!--haltogether now!"--And then a cracked, melancholy voice +struck up this chant: + + "Oh, the bowline, bully bully bowline, + Oh, the bowline, bowline, HAUL!" + +At the last word every man threw his whole strength into the pull,--all +singing it in chorus, with a quick, explosive sound. And so, jump by jump, +the sheet was at last hauled taut.--I dare say this will seem very much +spun out to a seafarer, but landsmen like to hear of the sea and its ways; +and as more landsmen than seamen, probably, read the "Atlantic Monthly," I +have told them of one genuine sea-song, and its time and place. + +Then there are pumping-songs. "The dismal sound of the pumps is heard," +says Mr. Webster's Plymouth-Rock Oration; but being a part of the daily +morning duty of a well-disciplined merchant-vessel,--just a few minutes' +spell to keep the vessel free and cargo unharmed by bilge-water,--it is +not a dismal sound at all, but rather a lively one. It was a favorite +amusement with us passengers on board the ---- to go forward about +pumping-time to the break of the deck and listen. Any quick tune to which +you might work a fire-engine will serve for the music, and the words were +varied with every fancy. "Pay me the money down," was one favorite chorus, +and the verse ran thus:-- + + _Solo._ Your money, young man, is no object to me. + + _Chorus._ Pay me the money down! + + _Solo._ Half a crown's no great amount. + + _Chorus._ Pay me the money down! + + _Solo and Chorus. (Bis)_ Money down, money down, pay me the money down! + +Not much sense in all this, but it served to man and move the brakes +merrily. Then there were other choruses, which were heard from time to +time,--"And the young gals goes a-weepin',"--"O long storm, storm along +stormy"; but the favorite tune was "Money down," at least with our crew. +They were not an avaricious set, either; for their parting ceremony, on +embarking, was to pitch the last half-dollars of their advance on to the +wharf, to be scrambled for by the land-sharks. But "Money down" was the +standing chorus. I once heard, though not on board that ship, the lively +chorus of "Off she goes, and off she must go,"-- + + "Highland day and off she goes, + Off she goes with a flying fore-topsail, + Highland day and off she goes." + +It is one of the most spirited things imaginable, when well sung, and, +when applied to the topsail-halyards, brings the yards up in grand style. + +These are some of the working-songs of the sea. They are not chosen for +their sense, but for their sound. They must contain good mouth-filling +words, with the vowels in the right place, and the rhythmic ictus at +proper distances for chest and hand to keep true time. And this is why the +seaman beats the wind in a trial of strength. The wind may whistle, but it +cannot sing. The sailor does not whistle, on shipboard at least, but does +sing. + +Besides the working-day songs, there are others for the forecastle and +dog-watches, which have been already described. But they are seldom of the +parlor pattern. I remember one lovely moonlight evening, off the Irish +coast, when our ship was slipping along before a light westerly air,--just +enough of it for everything to draw, and the ship as steady as Ailsa Crag, +so that everybody got on deck, even the chronically sea-sick passengers of +the steerage. There was a boy on board, a steerage passenger, who had been +back and forth several times on this Liverpool line of packets. He was set +to singing, and his sweet, clear voice rang out with song after song,-- +almost all of them sad ones. At last one of the crew called on him for a +song which he made some demur at singing. I remember the refrain well (for +he _did_ sing it at last); it ran thus:-- + + "My crew are tried, my bark's my pride, +I'm the Pirate of the Isles." + +It was no rose-water piracy that the boy sang of; it was the genuine +pirate of the Isle of Pines,--the gentleman who before the days of +California and steamers was the terror of the Spanish Main. He was +depicted as falling in deadly combat with a naval cruiser, after many +desperate deeds. What was most striking to us of the cabin was, that the +sympathy of the song, and evidently of the hearers, was all on the side of +the defier of law and order. There was no nonsense in it about "islands on +the face of the deep where the winds never blow and the skies never weep," +which to the parlor pirate are the indications of a capital station for +wood and water, and for spending his honeymoon. It was downright cutting +of throats and scuttling of ships that our youngster sang of, and the grim +faces looked and listened approvingly, as you might fancy Ulysses's +veterans hearkening to a tale of Troy. + +There is another class of songs, half of the sea, half of the shore, which +the fishermen and coasters croon in their lonely watches. Such is the +rhyme of "Uncle Peleg," or "Pillick," as it is pronounced,--probably an +historical ballad concerning some departed worthy of the Folger family of +Nantucket. It begins-- + + "Old Uncle Pillick he built him a boat + On the ba-a-ck side of Nantucket P'int; + He rolled up his trowsers and set her afloat + From the ba-a-ck side of Nantucket P'int." + +Like "Christabel," this remains a fragment. Not so the legend of "Captain +Cottington," (or Coddington,) which perhaps is still traditionally known +to the young gentlemen at Harvard. It is marked by a bold and ingenious +metrical novelty. + + "Captain Cottington he went to sea, + Captain Cottington he went to sea, + Captain Cottington he went to sea-e-e, + Captain Cottington he went to sea." + +The third verse of the next stanza announces that he didn't go to sea in a +schoo-oo-ooner,--of the next that he went to sea in a bri-i-ig,--and so +on. We learn that he got wrecked on the "Ba-ha-ha-hamys," that he swam +ashore with the papers in his hat, and, I believe, entered his protest at +the nearest "Counsel's" (_Anglicé_. Consul's) dwelling. + +For the amateur of genuine ballad verse, here is a field quite as fertile +as that which was reaped by Scott and Ritson amid the border peels and +farmhouses of Liddesdale. It is not unlikely that some treasures may thus +be brought to light. The genuine expression of popular feeling is always +forcible, not seldom poetic. And at any rate, these wild bits of verse are +redolent of the freshness of the sea-breeze, the damps of the clinging +fog, the strange odors of the caboose-cookery, of the curing of cod, and +of many another "ancient and fish-like smell." Who will tell us of these +songs, not indeed of the deep sea, but of soundings? What were the stanzas +which Luckie Mucklebackit sang along the Portanferry Sands? What is the +dredging-song which the oyster "come of a gentle kind" is said to love? + +These random thoughts may serve to indicate to the true seeker new and +unworked mines of rhythmic ore. We are crying continually, that we have no +national literature, that we are a nation of imitators and plagiarists. +Why will not some one take the trouble to learn what we have? This does +not mean that amateurs should endeavor to write such ballad fragments and +popular songs,--because that cannot be done; such things grow,--they are +not made. If the sea wants songs, it will have them. It is only suggested +here that we look about us and ascertain of what lyric blessings we may +now be the unconscious possessors. Can it be that oars have risen and +fallen, sails flapped, waves broken in thunder upon our shores in vain? +that no whistle of the winds, or moan of the storm-foreboding seas has +waked a responsive chord in the heart of pilot or fisherman? If we are so +poor, let us know our poverty. + +And now to bring these desultory remarks to a practical conclusion. I have +written these seemingly trifling fragments with a serious purpose. It is +to show that the seaman has little or no art or part in the poetry of the +seas. I have put down facts, have given what experience I have had of some +of the idiosyncrasies of the forecastle. The poetry of the sea has been +written on shore and by landsmen. Falconer's "Shipwreck" is a clever +nautical tract, written in verse,--or if it be anything more, it is but +the solitary exception which proves and enforces the rule. Midshipmen have +written ambitious verses about the sea; but by the time the young +gentlemen were promoted to the ward-room they have dropped the habit or +found other themes for their stanzas. In truth, the stern manliness of his +calling forbids the seaman to write poetry. He acts it. His is a +profession which leaves no room for any assumed feeling or for any +reflective tendencies. His instincts are developed, rather than his +reason. He has no time to speculate. He must be prepared to lay his hand +on the right rope, let the night be the darkest that ever came down upon +the waves. He obeys orders, heedless of consequences; he issues commands +amid the uproar and tumult of pressing emergencies. There is no chance for +quackery in his work. The wind and the wave are infallible tests of all +his knots and splices. He cannot cheat them. The gale and the lee-shore +are not pictures, but fierce realities, with which he has to grapple for +life or death. The soldier and the fireman may pass for heroes upon an +assumed stock of courage; but the seaman must be a brave man in his +calling, or Nature steps in and brands him coward. Therefore he cares +little about the romance of his duties. If you would win his interest and +regard, it must be on the side of his personal and human sensibilities. +Cut off during his whole active life from any but the most partial +sympathy with his kind, he yearns for the life of the shore, its social +pleasures and its friendly greetings. Captains, whose vessels have been +made hells-afloat by their tyranny, have found abundant testimony in the +courts of law to their gentle and humane deportment on land. Therefore, +when you would address seamen effectively, either in acts or words, let it +be by no shallow mimicry of what you fancy to be their life afloat. It +will be at best but "shop" to them, and we all know how distasteful that +is in the mouth of a stranger to our pursuits. They laugh at your clumsy +imitations, or are puzzled by your strange misconceptions. It is painful +to see the forlorn attempts which are made to raise the condition of this +noble race of men, to read the sad nonsense that is perpetrated for their +benefit. If you wish really to benefit them, it must be by raising their +characters as men; and to do this, you must address them as such, +irrespectively of the technicalities of their calling. + + + + +THE KINLOCH ESTATE, AND HOW IT WAS SETTLED. + + +CHAPTER I. + +"Mildred, my daughter, I am faint. Run and get me a glass of cordial from +the buffet." + +The girl looked at her father as he sat in his bamboo chair on the piazza, +his pipe just let fall on the floor, and his face covered with a deadly +pallor. She ran for the cordial, and poured it out with a trembling hand. + +"Shan't I go for the doctor, father?" she asked. + +"No, my dear, the spasm will pass off presently." But his face grew more +ashy pale, and his jaw drooped. + +"Dear father," said the frightened girl, "what shall I do for you? Oh, +dear, if mother were only at home, or Hugh, to run for the doctor!" + +"Mildred, my daughter," he gasped with difficulty, "the blacksmith,--send +for Ralph Hardwick,--quick! In the ebony cabinet, middle drawer, you will +find----Oh! oh!--God bless you, my daughter!--God bless"---- + +The angels, only, heard the conclusion of the sentence; for the speaker, +Walter Kinloch, was dead, summoned to the invisible world without a +warning and with hardly a struggle. + +But Mildred thought he had fainted, and, raising the window, called loudly +for Lucy Ransom, the only female domestic then in the house. + +Lucy, frightened out of her wits at the sudden call, came rushing to the +piazza, flat-iron in hand, and stood riveted to the spot where she first +saw the features on which the awful shadow of death had settled. + +"Rub his hands, Lucy!" said Mildred. "Run for some water! Get me the +smelling-salts!" + +Lucy attempted to obey all three orders at once, and therefore did +nothing. + +Mildred held the unresisting hand. "It is warm," she said. "But the +pulse,--I can't find it." + +"Deary, no," said Lucy, "you won't find it." + +"Why, you don't mean"---- + +"Yes, Mildred, he's dead!" And she let fall her flat-iron, and covered her +face with her apron. + +But Mildred kept chafing her father's temples and hands,--calling +piteously, in hopes to get an answer from the motionless lips. Then she +sank down at his feet, and clasped his knees in an agony of grief. + +A carriage stopped at the door, and a hasty step came up the walk. + +"Lucy Ransom," said Mrs. Kinloch, (for it was she, just returned from her +drive,) "Lucy Ransom, what are you blubbering about? Here on the piazza, +and with your flat-iron! What is the matter?" + +"Matter enough!" said Lucy. "See!--see Mr."----But the sobs were too +frequent. She became choked, and fell into an hysterical paroxysm. + +By this time Mrs. Kinloch had stepped upon the piazza, and saw the +drooping head, the dangling arms, and the changed face of her husband. +"Dead! dead!" she exclaimed. "My God! what has happened? Mildred, who was +with him? Was the doctor sent for? or Squire Clamp? or Mr. Rook? What did +he say to you, dear?" And she tried to lift up the sobbing child, who +still clung to the stiffening knees where she had so often climbed for a +kiss. + +"Oh, mother! _is_ he dead?--no life left?" + +"Calm yourself, my dear child," said Mrs. Kinloch. "Tell me, did he say +anything?" + +Mildred replied, "He was faint, and before I could give him the cordial he +asked for he was almost gone. 'The blacksmith,' he said, 'send for Ralph +Hardwick'; then he said something of the ebony cabinet, but could not +speak the words which were on his lips." She could say no more, but gave +way to uncontrollable tears and sobs. + +By this time, Mrs. Kinloch's son, Hugh Branning, who had been to the +stable with the horse and carriage, came whistling through the yard, and +cutting off weeds or twigs along the path with sharp cuts of his whip. + +"Which way is the wind now?" said he, as he approached; "the governor +asleep, Mildred crying, and you scolding, mother?" In a moment, however, +the sight of the ghastly face transfixed the thoughtless youth, as it had +done his mother; and, dropping his whip, he stood silent, awe-struck, in +the presence of the dead. + +"Hugh," said Mrs. Kinloch, speaking in a very quiet tone, "go and tell +Squire Clamp to come over here." + +In a few minutes the dead body was carried into the house by George, the +Asiatic servant, aided by a villager who happened to pass by. Squire +Clamp, the lawyer of the town, came and had a conference with Mrs. Kinloch +respecting the funeral. Neighbors came to offer sympathy, and aid, if need +should be. Then the house was put in order, and crape hung on the door- +handle. The family were alone with their dead. + +On the village green the boys were playing a grand game of "round ball," +for it was a half-holiday. The clear, silvery tones of the bell were +heard, and we stopped to listen. Was it a fire? No, the ringing was not +vehement enough. A meeting of the church? In a moment we should know. As +the bell ceased, we looked up to the white taper spire to catch the next +sound. One stroke. It was a death, then,--and of a man. We listened for +the age tolled from the belfry. Fifty-five. Who had departed? The sexton +crossed the green on his way to the shop to make the coffin, and informed +us. Our bats and balls had lost their interest for us; we did not even ask +our tally-man, who cut notches for us on a stick, how the game stood. For +Squire Walter Kinloch was the most considerable man in our village of +Innisfield. Without being highly educated, he was a man of reading and +intelligence. In early life he had amassed a fortune in the China trade, +and with it he had brought back a deeply bronzed complexion, a scar from +the creese of a Malay pirate, and the easy manners which travel always +gives to observant and sensible men. But his rather stately carriage +produced no envy or ill-will among his humbler neighbors, for his +superiority was never questioned. Men bowed to him with honest good-will, +and boys, who had been flogged at school for confounding Congo and +Coromandel, and putting Borneo in the Bight of Benin, made an awkward +obeisance and stared wonderingly, as they met the man who had actually +sailed round the world, and had, in his own person, illustrated the +experiment of walking with his head downwards among the antipodes. His +house had no rival in the country round, and his garden was considered a +miracle of art, having, in popular belief, all the fruits, flowers, and +shrubs that had been known from the days of Solomon to those of Linnaeus. +Prodigious stories were told of his hoard of gold, and some of the less +enlightened thought that even the outlandish ornaments of the balustrade +over the portico were carven silver. Curious vases adorned the hall and +side-board; and numberless quaint trinkets, whose use the villagers could +not even imagine, gave to the richly-furnished rooms an air of Oriental +magnificence. Tropical birds sang or chattered in cages, and a learned but +lawless parrot talked, swore, or made mischief, as he chose. The tawny +servant George, brought by Mr. Kinloch from one of the islands of the +Pacific, completed his claims upon the admiration of the untravelled. + +He was just ready to enjoy the evening of life, when the night of death +closed upon him with tropic suddenness. He left one child only, his +daughter Mildred, then just turned of eighteen; and as Mrs. Kinloch had +only one son to claim her affection, the motherless girl would seem to be +well provided for. Mildred was sweet-tempered, and her step-mother had +hitherto been discreet and kind. + +The funeral was over, and the townspeople recovered from the shock which +the sudden death had caused. Administration was granted to the widow +conjointly with Squire Clamp, the lawyer, and the latter was appointed +guardian for Mildred during her minority. + +Squire Clamp was an ill-favored man, heavy-browed and bald, and with a +look which, in a person of less consequence, would have been called "hang- +dog,"--owing partly, no doubt, to the tribulation he had suffered from his +vixen spouse, whose tongue was now happily silenced. He was the town's +only lawyer, (a fortunate circumstance,) so that he could frequently +manage to receive fees for advice from both parties in a controversy. He +made all the wills, deeds, and contracts, and settled all the estates he +could get hold of. But no such prize as the Kinloch property had ever +before come into his hands. + +If Squire Clamp's reputation for shrewdness had belonged to an irreligious +man, it would have been of questionable character; but as he was a zealous +member of the church, he was protected from assaults upon his integrity. +If there were suspicions, they were kept close, not bruited abroad. + +He was now an almost daily visitor at the widow Kinloch's. What was the +intricate business that required the constant attention of a legal +adviser? The settlement of the estate, so far as the world knew, was an +easy matter. The property consisted of the dwelling-house, a small tract +of land near the village, a manufactory at the dam, by the side of Ralph +Hardwick's blacksmith's shop, and money, plate, furniture, and stocks. +There were no debts. There was but one child, and, after the assignment of +the widow's dower, the estate was Mildred's. Nothing, therefore, could be +simpler for the administrators. The girl trusted to the good faith of her +stepmother and the justice of the lawyer, who now stood to her in the +place of a father. She was an orphan, and her innocence and childlike +dependence would doubtless be a sufficient spur to the consciences of her +protectors. So the girl thought, if she thought at all,--and so all +charitable people were bound to think. + +How wearily the days passed during the month after the funeral! The shadow +of death seemed to darken everything. Doors creaked dismally when they +were opened. The room where the body had been laid seemed to have grown a +century older than the other parts of the once bright and cheerful house, +--its atmosphere was so stagnant and full of mould. The family spoke only +in suppressed tones; their countenances were as sad as their garments. All +this was terrible to the impressible, imaginative, and naturally buoyant +temper of Mildred. It was like dwelling in a tomb, and her heart cried out +for very loneliness. She must do something to take her mind out of the +sunless vault,--she must resume her relations with the dwellers in the +upper air. All at once she thought of her father's last words,--of Ralph +Hardwick, and the ebony cabinet. It was in the next room. She opened the +door, half expecting to see some bodiless presence in the silent space. +She could hear her own heart beat between the tickings of the great Dutch +clock, as she stepped across the floor. How still was everything! The air +tingled in her ears as though now disturbed for the first time. + +She opened the cabinet, which was not locked, and pulled out the middle +drawer. She found nothing but a dried rose-bud and a lock of sunny hair +wrapped in a piece of yellowed paper. Was it her mother's hair? As +Mildred remembered her mother, the color of her hair was dark, not golden. +Still it might have been cut in youth, before its hue had deepened. And +what a world of mystery, of feeling, of associations there was in that +scentless and withered rose-bud! What fair hand had first plucked it? What +pledge did it carry? Was the subtile aroma of love ever blended with its +fragrance? Had her father borne it with him in his wanderings? The secret +was in his coffin. The struggling lips could not utter it before they were +stiffened into marble. Yet she could not believe that these relics were +the sole things to which he had referred. There must have been something +that more nearly concerned her,--something in which the blacksmith or his +nephew was interested. + + +CHAPTER II. + +In order to show the position of Mrs. Kinloch and her son in our story, it +will be necessary to make the reader acquainted with some previous +occurrences. + +Six years before this date, Mrs. Kinloch was the Widow Branning. Her +husband's small estate had melted like a snow-bank in the liquidation of +his debts. She had only one child, Hugh, to support; but in a country town +there is generally little that a woman can do to earn a livelihood; and +she might often have suffered from want, if the neighbors had not relieved +her. If she left her house for any errand, (locks were but seldom used in +Innisfield,) she would often on her return find a leg of mutton, a basket +of apples or potatoes, or a sack of flour, conveyed there by some unknown +hands. In winter nights she would hear the voices of Ralph Hardwick, the +village blacksmith, and his boys, as they drew sled-loads of wood, ready +cut and split, to keep up her kitchen fire. Other friends ploughed and +planted her garden, and performed numberless kind offices. But, though +aided in this way by charity, Mrs. Branning never lost her self-respect +nor her standing in the neighborhood. + +Everybody knew that she was poor, and she knew that everybody knew it; yet +so long as she was not in absolute want, and the poor-house, that bugbear +of honest poverty, was yet far distant, she managed to keep a cheerful +heart, and visited her neighbors on terms of entire equality. + +At this period Walter Kinloch's wife died, leaving an only child. During +her sickness, Mrs. Branning had been sent for to act as nurse and +temporary house-keeper, and, at the urgent request of the widower, +remained for a time after the funeral. Weeks passed, and her house was +still tenantless. Mildred had become so much attached to the motherly +widow and her son, that she would not allow the servants to do anything +for her. So, without any definite agreement, their relations continued. +By-and-by the village gossips began to query and surmise. At the sewing- +society the matter was fully discussed. + +Mrs. Greenfield, the doctor's wife, admitted that it would be an excellent +match, "jest a child apiece, both on 'em well brought up, used to good +company, and all that; but, land's sakes! he, with his mint o' money, +a'n't a-goin' to marry a poor widder that ha'n't got nothin' but her +husband's pictur' and her boy,--not he!" + +Others insinuated that Mrs. Branning knew what she was about when she went +to Squire Kinloch's, and his wife was 'most gone with consumption. +"'Twasn't a mite strange that little Mildred took to her so kindly; plenty +of women could find ways to please a child, if so be they could have such +a chance to please themselves." + +The general opinion seemed to be that Mrs. Branning would marry the +Squire, if she could get him; but that as to his intentions, the matter +was quite doubtful. Nevertheless, after being talked about for a year, the +parties were duly published, married, and settled down into the quiet +routine of country life. + +Doubtless the accident of daily contact was the secret of the match. Had +Mrs. Branning been living in her own poorly-furnished house, Mr. Kinloch +would hardly have thought of going to seek her. But as mistress of his +establishment she had an opportunity to display her house-wifely +qualities, as well as to practise those nameless arts by which almost any +clever woman knows how to render herself agreeable. + +The first favorable impression deepened, until the widower came to believe +that the whole parish did not contain so proper a person to be the +successor of Mrs. Kinloch, as his housekeeper. Their union, though +childless, was as happy as common; there was nothing of the romance of a +first attachment,--little of the tenderness that springs from fresh +sensibilities, for she at least was of a matter-of-fact turn. But there +was a constant and hearty good feeling, resulting from mutual kindness and +deference. + +If the step-mother made any difference in her treatment of the two +children, it was in favor of the gentle Mildred. And though the Squire +naturally felt more affection for his motherless daughter, yet he was +proud of his step-son, gave him the advantages of the best schools, and +afterwards sent him for a year to college. But the lad's spirits were too +buoyant for the sober notions of the Faculty. He was king in the +gymnasium, and was minutely learned in the natural history and botany of +the neighborhood; at least, he knew all the haunts of birds, rabbits, and +squirrels, as well as the choicest orchards of fruit. + +After repeated admonitions without effect, a letter was addressed to his +stepfather by vote at a Faculty-meeting. A damsel at service in the +President's house overheard the discussion, and found means to warn the +young delinquent of his danger; for she, as well as most people who came +within the sphere of his attraction, felt kindly toward him. + +The stage-coach that conveyed the next morning's mail to Innisfield +carried Hugh Branning as a passenger. Alighting at the post-office, he +took out the letter superscribed in the well-known hand of the President, +pocketed it, and returned by the next stage to college. This prank only +moved the Squire to mirth, when he heard of it. He knew that Hugh was a +lad of spirit,--that in scholarship he was by no means a dunce; and as +long as there was no positive tendency to vice, he thought but lightly of +his boyish peccadilloes. But it was impossible for such irregularities to +continue, and after a while Mr. Kinloch yielded to his step-son's request +and took him home. + +Next year it was thought best that the young man should go to sea, and a +midshipman's commission was procured for him. Now, for the second time, +after an absence of three years, Hugh was at home in all the dignity of +navy blue, anchor buttons, glazed cap, and sword. + + +CHAPTER III. + +"I have brought you the statement of the property, Mrs. Kinloch," said Mr. +Clamp. "It is merely a legal form, embracing the items which you gave to +me; it must be returned at the next Probate term." + +Mrs. Kinloch took the paper and glanced over it. + +"This statement must be sworn to, Mrs. Kinloch." + +"By you?" + +"We are joined in the administration, and both must swear to it." + +There was a pause. Mrs. Kinloch, resting her hands on her knee, tossed the +hem of her dress with her foot, as though meditating. + +"I shall of course readily make oath to the schedule," he continued,--"at +least, after you have done so; for I have no personal knowledge of the +effects of the deceased." + +His manner was decorous, but he regarded her keenly. She changed the +subject. + +"People seem to think I have a mint in the house; and _such_ bills as come +in! Sawin, the cabinet-maker, has sent his to-day, as soon as my husband +is fairly under ground: forty dollars for a cherry coffin, which he made +in one day. Cleaver, the butcher, too, has sent a bill running back for +five years or more. Now I _know_ that Mr. Kinloch never had an ounce of +meat from him that he didn't pay for. If they all go on in this way, I +sha'n't have a cent left. Everybody tries to cheat the widow"---- + +"And orphan," interposed Mr. Clamp. + +She looked at him quietly; but he was imperturbable. + +"We must begin to collect what is due," she continued. + +"Did you refer to the notes from Ploughman?" asked Mr. Clamp. "He is +perfectly good; and he will pay the interest till we want to use the +money." + +"I wasn't thinking of Ploughman," she replied, "but of Mark Davenport, +Uncle Ralph Hardwick's nephew. They say he is a teacher in one of the +fashionable schools in New York,--and he must be able to pay, if he's ever +going to." + +"Well, when he comes on here, I will present the notes." + +"But I don't intend to wait till he comes; can't you send the demands to a +lawyer where he is?" + +"Certainly, if you wish it; but that course will necessarily be attended +with some expense." + +"I choose to have it done," said Mrs. Kinloch, decisively. "Mildred, who +has always been foolishly partial to the young upstart, insists that her +father intended to give up the notes to Mark, and she thinks that was what +he wanted to send for Uncle Ralph about, just before he died. I don't +believe it, and I don't intend to fling away _my_ money upon such folks." + +"You are quite right, ma'am," said the lawyer. "The inconsiderate +generosity of school-children would be a poor basis for the transactions +of business." + +"And besides," continued Mrs. Kinloch, "I want the young man to remember +the blacksmith's shop that he came from, and get over his ridiculous +notion of looking up to our family." + +"Oh ho!" said Mr. Clamp, "that is it? Well, you are a sagacious woman,"-- +looking at her with unfeigned admiration. + +"I _can_ see through a millstone, when there is a hole in it," said Mrs. +Kinloch. "And I mean to stop this nonsense." + +"To be sure,--it would be a very unequal match in every way. Besides, I'm +told that he isn't well-grounded in doctrine. He even goes to Brooklyn to +hear Torchlight preach." And Mr. Clamp rolled up his eyes, interlocking +his fingers, as he was wont when at church-meeting he rose to exhort. + +"I don't pretend to be a judge of doctrine, further than the catechism +goes," said the widow; "but Mr. Rook says that Torchlight is a dangerous +man, and will lead the churches off into infidelity." + +"Yes, Mrs. Kinloch, the free-thinking of this age is the fruitful parent +of all evil,--of Mormonism, Unitarianism, Spiritualism, and of all those +forms of error which seek to overthrow"---- + +There was a crash in the china-closet. Mrs. Kinloch went to the door, and +leading out Lucy Ransom, the maid, by the ear, exclaimed, "You hussy, what +were you there for? I'll teach you to be listening about in closets," +(giving the ear a fresh tweak,) "you eavesdropper!" + +"Quit!" cried Lucy. "I didn't mean to listen. I was there rubbin' the +silver 'fore you come. Then I didn't wanter come out, for I was afeard." + +"What made the smash, then?" demanded Mrs. Kinloch. + +"I was settin' things on the top shelf, and the chair tipped over." + +"Don't make it worse by fibbing! If that was so, how came the chair to tip +the way it did? You were trying to peep over the door. Go to the kitchen!" + +Lucy went out with fallen plumes. Mr. Clamp took his hat to go also. + +"Don't go till I get you the notes," said Mrs. Kinloch. + +As she brought them, he said, "I will send these by the next mail, with +instructions to collect." + +While his hand was on the latch, she spoke again:-- + +"Mr. Clamp, did you ever look over the deed of the land we own about the +dam where the mill stands?" + +"No, ma'am, I have never seen it." + +"I wish you would have the land surveyed according to this title," she +said. "Quite privately, you know. Just have the line run, and let me know +about it. Perhaps it will be as well to send over to Riverbank and get +Gunter to do it; he will keep quiet about it." + +Mr. Clamp stood still a moment. Here was a woman whom he was expecting to +lead like a child, but who on the other hand had fairly bridled and +saddled _him_, so that he was driven he knew not whither. + +"Why do you propose this, may I ask, Mrs. Kinloch?" + +"Oh, I have heard," she replied, carelessly, "that there was some error in +the surveys. Mr. Kinloch often talked of having it corrected, but, like +most men, put it off. Now, as we may sell the property, we shall want to +know what we have got." + +"Certainly, Mrs. Kinloch, I will follow your prudent suggestions,"--adding +to himself, as he walked away, "I shall have to be tolerably shrewd to get +ahead of that woman. I wonder what she is driving at." + + +CHAPTER IV. + +Ralph Hardwick was the village blacksmith. His shop stood on the bank of +the river, not far from the dam. The great wheel below the flume rolled +all day, throwing over its burden of diamond drops, and tilting the +ponderous hammer with a monotonous clatter. What a palace of wonders to +the boys was that grim and sooty shop!--the roar of the fires, as they +were fed by the laboring bellows; the sound of water, rushing, gurgling, +or musically dropping, heard in the pauses; the fiery shower of sparkles +that flew when the trip-hammer fell; and the soft and glowing mass held by +the smith's tongs with firm grasp, and turning to some form of use under +his practised eye! How proud were the young amateur blacksmiths when the +kind-hearted owner of the shop gave them liberty to heat and pound a bit +of nail-rod, to mend a skate or a sled-runner, or sharpen a pronged fish- +spear! Still happier were they, when, at night, with his sons and nephew, +they were allowed to huddle on the forge, sitting on the bottoms of old +buckets or boxes, and watching the fire, from the paly blue border of +flame in the edge of the damp charcoal, to the reddening, glowing column +that shot with an arrowy stream of sparks up the wide-throated chimney. +How the dark rafters and nail-pierced roof grew ruddy as the white-hot +ploughshare or iron bar was drawn from the fire!--what alternations of +light and shadow! No painter ever drew figure in such relief as the +blacksmith presented in that wonderful light, with his glistening face, +his tense muscles, and his upraised arm. + +Alas! the hammer is still; the wheel dashes no more the glittering spray; +the fire has died out in the forge; the blacksmith's long day's work is +done! + +He settled in Innisfield when it was but a district attached to a +neighboring town. There were but three or four houses in the now somewhat +populous village. He came on foot, driving his cow; his wife following in +the wagon, with their little stock of household goods,--not forgetting his +hammer, more potent than Prospero's wand. The minister, the doctor, and +Squire Kinloch, who constituted the aristocracy, yielded precedence in +date to Ralph Hardwick, Knight of the Ancient Order of the Anvil. + +So he toiled, faithful to his calling. By day the din of his hammer rarely +ceased, and by night the flame and sparks from his chimney were a Pharos +to all travellers approaching the town. Children were born to him, for +which he blessed God, and worked the harder. He attained a moderate +prosperity, secure from want, but still dependent upon labor for bread. At +length his wife died; he wept like a true and faithful husband as he was, +and thenceforth was both mother and father to his babes. + +During all his life he kept Sunday with religious scrupulousness, and with +his family went to the house of worship in all weathers. From the very +first he had been leader of the choir, and had given the pitch with a fork +hammered and tuned by his own hands. With a clear and sympathetic voice, +he had such an instinctive taste and power of expression, that his song of +penitence or praise was far more devotional than the labored efforts of +many more highly cultivated singers. Music and poetry flowed smoothly and +naturally from his lips, but in uttering the common prose of daily life +his organs were rebellious. The truth must be spoken,--he stammered badly, +incurably. Whether it was owing to the attempt to overcome his impediment +by making his speech musical, or to the cadences of his hammer beating +time while his brain was shaping its airy fancies, his thoughts ran +naturally in verse. + +Do not smile at the thought of Vulcan's callused fingers touching the +chords of the lyre to delicate music. The sun shone as lovingly upon the +swart face of the blacksmith in his shop-door, as upon the scholar at his +library-window. "Poetry was an angel in his breast," making his heart glad +with her heavenly presence; he did not "make her his drudge, his maid-of- +all-work," as professional verse-makers do. + +Mr. Hardwick's younger sister was married to a hard-working, stern, +puritanical man named Davenport, (not her first love,) who removed to a +Western State when it was almost a wilderness, cleared for himself a farm, +and built a log-house. The toil and privations of frontier life soon +wrought their natural effects upon Mrs. Davenport's delicate constitution. +She fell into a rapid decline and died. Her husband was seized with a +fever the summer after, and died also, leaving two children, Mark and +Anna. The blacksmith had six motherless children of his own; but he set +out for the West, and brought the orphans home with him. He thenceforth +treated them like his own offspring, manifesting a woman's tenderness as +well as a father's care for them. + +Mark was a comely lad, with the yellow curling hair, the clear blue eyes, +and the marked symmetry of features that belonged to his uncle. He had an +inborn love of reading and study; he was first in his class at every +winter's school, and had devoured all the books within his reach. Then he +borrowed an old copy of Adam's Latin Grammar from Dr. Greenfield, and +committed the rules to memory without a teacher. That was his introduction +to the classics. + +But Mr. Hardwick believed in the duty and excellence of work, and Mark, as +well as his cousins, was trained to make himself useful. So the Grammar +was studied and Virgil read at chance intervals, when a storm interrupted +out-door work, or while waiting at the upper mill for a grist, or of +nights at the shop by the light of the forge fire. The paradigms were +committed to memory with an anvil accompaniment; and long after, he never +could scan a line of Homer, especially the oft-repeated + +[Greek: Tou d'au | Taelema | chos pep | numenos | antion | aeuda], + +without hearing the ringing blows of his uncle's hammer keeping tune to +the verse. + +At sixteen years of age he was ready to enter college, though he had +received little aid in his studies, except when some schoolmaster who was +versed in the humanities chanced to be hired for the winter. But his uncle +was not able to support him at any respectable university, and the lad's +prospects for such an education as he desired seemed to be none of the +best. + +At this point an incident occurred which changed the course of our hero's +life, and as it will serve to explain how he came to give his notes to Mr. +Kinloch, on which the administrators are about to bring suit, it should +properly be related here. + +Mark Davenport was at work on a farm a short distance from the village. He +hoped to enter college the following autumn, and he knew no means to +obtain money for a portion of his outfit except by the labor of his hands. +He could get twenty dollars a month for the summer season. Sixty, or +possibly seventy dollars!--what ideas of opulence were suggested by the +sound of those words! + +It was a damp, drizzly day; there was not a settled rain, yet it was too +wet to work in the corn. Mark was therefore busy in picking loose stones +from the surface of a field cultivated the year before, and now "seeded +down" for grass. A portion of the field bordered on a pond, and the alders +upon its margin formed a dense green palisade, over which might be seen +the gray surface of the water freckled by the tiny drops of rain. Low +clouds trailed their gauzy robes over the top of Mount Quobbin, and flecks +of mist swept across the blue sides of the loftier Mount Elizabeth. + +"What a perfect day for fishing!" thought Mark. "If I had my tackle here, +and a frog's leg or a shiner, I would soon have a pickerel out from +under those lilypads." + +But he kept at work, and, having his basket full of stones, carried them +to the pond and plumped them in. A growl of anger came up from behind the +bushes. + +"What the Devil do you mean, you lubber, throwing stones over here to +scare away the fish?" + +The bushes parted at the same time, showing Hugh Branning sitting in the +end of his boat, and apparently just ready to fling out his line. + +"If I had known you were there fishing," said Mark, "I shouldn't have +thrown the stones into the water. But," he continued, while every fibre +tingled with indignation, "I will have you to know that I am not to be +talked to in that way by you or anybody else." + +"I would like to know how you are going to help yourself," said Hugh, +stepping ashore and advancing. + +"You will find out, Mr. Insolence, if you don't leave this field. You +a'n't on the quarter-deck yet, bullying a tar with his hat off." + +"Bless me! how the young Vulcan talks!" + +"I have talked all I am going to. Now get into your boat and be off!" + +"I don't propose to be in a hurry," said Hugh, with provoking coolness, +standing with his arms a-kimbo. + +The remembrance of Hugh's usual patronizing airs, together with his +insulting language, was too much for Mark's impetuous temper. He was in a +delirium of rage, and he rushed upon his antagonist. Hugh stood warily +upon the defensive, and parried Mark's blows with admirable skill; he had +not the muscle nor the endurance of the young blacksmith, but he had +considerable skill in boxing, and was perfectly cool; and though Mark +finally succeeded in grappling and hurling to the ground his lithe and +resolute foe, it was not until he had been pretty severely pommelled +himself, especially in his face. Mark set his knee on the breast of his +adversary and waited to hear "Enough." Hugh ground his teeth, but there +was no escape; no feint nor sudden movement could reverse their positions; +and, out of breath, he gave up in sullen despair. + +"Let me up," he said, at length. Mark arose, and being by this time +thoroughly sobered, he walked off without a word and picked up his basket. + +Hugh, on the other hand, was more and more angry every minute. The +indignity he had suffered was not to be tamely submitted to. He got into +the boat and took his oar; he looked back and saw Mark commencing work +again; the temptation was too strong. He picked up one of the largest of +the stones that Mark had emptied into the shallow margin of the pond; he +threw it with all his force, and hurriedly pushed off from shore without +stopping to ascertain the extent of the mischief he had done. He knew that +the stone did not miss, for he saw Mark fall heavily to the ground, and +that was enough. The injury was serious. Mark was carried to the farm- +house and was confined to his bed for six weeks with a brain fever, being +delirious for the greater part of the time. Hugh Branning found the town +quite uncomfortable; the eyes of all the people he met seemed to scorch +him. He was bold and self-reliant; but no man can stand up singly against +the indignation of a whole community. He went on a visit to Boston, and +not long after, to the exceeding grief of his mother, entered the navy. + +When Mark was recovering, Mr. Rook, +the clergyman, called and offered to aid him in his college course, if he +would agree to study for the ministry. But the young man declined the +proposal, because he thought himself unfitted for the sacred calling. + +"No," he added, with a smile, "I'm not made for an evangelist; not much +like the beloved disciple at all events, but rather like peppery Peter,-- +ready, if provoked, to whisk off an ignoble ear." + +Mr. Rook returned home sorrowful; and at the next meeting of the sewing- +circle the unfortunate Mark received a full share of attention; for the +offer of aid came partly from this society. When this matter had been the +talk of the village for a day or two, Squire Kinloch made some errand to +the house where Mark was. What passed between them the young man did not +choose to relate, but he showed his Uncle Hardwick the Squire's check for +two hundred and fifty dollars, and told him he should receive a similar +sum each year until he finished his collegiate course. + +The promise was kept; the yearly supply was furnished; and Mark graduated +with honor, having given notes amounting to a thousand dollars. With +cheerful alacrity he commenced teaching in a popular seminary, intending +to pay his debts before studying a profession. + + +CHAPTER V. + +It was Saturday night, and Mr. Hardwick was closing his shop. A customer +was just leaving, his horse's feet newly rasped and white, and a sack of +harrow-teeth thrown across his back. The boys, James and Milton, had been +putting a load of charcoal under cover, for the wind was southerly and +there were signs of rain. Of course they had become black enough with +coal-dust,--not a streak of light was visible, except around their eyes. +They were capering about and contemplating each other's face with +uproarious delight, while the blacksmith, though internally chuckling at +their antics, preserved a decent gravity, and prepared to go to his house. +He drew a bucket of water, and bared his muscular arms, then, after +washing them, soused his curly hair and begrimed face, and came out +wonderfully brightened by the operation. The boys continued their sports, +racing, wrestling, and putting on grotesque grimaces. + +Charlotte, the youngest child, now came to the shop to say that supper was +ready. + +"C-come, boys, you've ha-had play enough," said Mr. Hardwick. "J-James, +put Ch-Charlotte down. M-M-Milton, it's close on to S-Sabba'day. Now w- +wash yourselves." + +Just as the merriment was highest, Charlotte standing on James's +shoulders, and Milton chasing them, while the blacksmith was looking on,-- +his honest face glistening with soap and good-humor,--Mildred Kinloch +passed by on her way home from a walk by the river. She looked towards the +shop-door and bowed to Mr. Hardwick. + +"G-good evenin', M-Miss Mildred," said he; "I'm g-glad to see you lookin' +so ch-cheerful." + +The tone was hearty, and with a dash of chivalrous sentiment rarely heard +in a smithy. His look of half-parental, half-admiring fondness was +touching to see. + +"Oh, Uncle Ralph," she replied, "I am never melancholy when I see you. You +have all the cheerfulness of this spring day in your face." + +"Y-yes, I hev to stay here in the old shop; b-but I hear the b-birds in +the mornin', and all day I f-feel as ef I was out under the b-blue sky, +an' rejoicin' with all livin' creaturs in the sun and the s-sweet air of +heaven." + +"I envy you your happy frame; everything has some form or hue of beauty +for you. I must have you read to me again. I never take up Milton without +thinking of you." + +"I c-couldn't wish to be remembered in any p-pleasanter way." + +"Well, good evening. I must hurry home, for it grows damp here by the + mill-race. Tell Lizzy and Anna to come and see me. We are quite lonesome +now." + +"P-p'raps Mark'll come with 'em." + +"Mark? Is he here? When did he come?" + +"H-he'll be here t-to-night." + +"You surprise me!" + +"'Tis rather s-sudden. He wrote y-yes-terday 't he'd g-got to come on +urgent b-business." + +"Urgent business?" she repeated, thoughtfully. "I wonder if Squire +Clamp"---- + +The blacksmith nodded, with a gesture towards his children, as though he +would not have them hear. + +"Yes," he added, in a low tone, "I g-guess that is it." + +"I must go home," said Mildred, hurriedly. + +"Well, G-God bless you, my daughter! D-don't forgit your old sooty friend. +And ef ever y-you want the help of a s-stout hand, or of an old gray head, +don't fail to come to the ber-blacksmith's shop." + +"Thank you, Uncle Ralph! thank you with all my heart! Good-night!" + +She walked lightly up the hill towards the principal street. But she had +not gone half a dozen yards before a hand grasped her arm. She turned with +a start. + +"Mark Davenport!" she exclaimed, "Is it you? How you frightened me!" + +"Yes, Mildred, it is Mark, your old friend" (with a meaning emphasis). "I +couldn't resist the temptation of giving you a little surprise." + +"But when did you come to town?" + +"I have just reached here from the station at Riverbank. I went to the +house first, and was just going to see Uncle at the shop, when I caught +sight of you." + +Mark drew her arm within his own, and noticed, not without pleasure, how +she yet trembled with agitation. + +"I am very glad to see you," said Mildred; "but isn't your coming sudden?" + +"Yes, I had some news from home yesterday which determined me to come, and +I started this morning." + +"Quick and impetuous as ever!" + +"Yes, I don't deliberate long." + +There was a pause. + +"I wish you had only been here to see father before he died." + +"I wish I might have seen him." + +"I am sure _he_ would never have desired to put you to any trouble." + +"I suppose he would not have _troubled_ me, though I never expected to do +less than repay him the money he was so good as to lend me; but I don't +think he would have been so abrupt and peremptory as Squire Clamp." + +"Why, what has he done?" + +"This is what he has done. A lawyer's clerk, as I supposed him to be, +called upon me yesterday morning with a statement of the debt and +interest, and made a formal demand of payment. I had only about half the +amount in bank, and therefore could not meet it. Then the clerk appeared +in his true character as a sheriff's officer, drew out his papers, and +served a writ upon me, besides a trustee process on the principal of the +school, so as to attach whatever might be due to me." + +"Oh, Mark, were you treated so?" + +"Just so,--entrapped like a wild animal. To be sure, it was a legal +process, but one designed only for extreme cases, and which no gentleman +ever puts in force against another." + +"I don't know what this can mean. Squire Clamp is cruel enough, I know; +but mother, surely, would never approve such conduct." + +"After all, the mortification is the principal thing; for, with what I +have, and what Uncle can raise for me, I can pay the debt. I have said too +much already, Mildred. I don't want to put any of my burdens on your +little shoulders. In fact, I am quite ashamed of having spoken on the +subject at all; but I have so little concealment, that it popped out +before I thought twice." + +They were approaching the house, both silent, neither seeming to be bold +enough to touch the tenderer chords that thrilled in unison. + +"Mildred," said Mark, "I don't know how much is meant by this suit. I +don't know that I shall be able to see you again, unless it be casually, +in the street, as to-night, (blessed accident!)--but remember, that, +whatever may happen, I am always the same that I have been to you." + +Here his voice failed him. With such a crowd of memories,--of hopes and +desires yet unsatisfied,--with the crushing burden of debt and poverty,-- +he could not command himself to say what his heart, nevertheless, ached in +retaining. Here he was, with the opportunity for which during all his +boyhood he had scarcely dared to hope, and yet he was dumb. They were at +the gate, under the dense shade of the maples. + +"Good-night, dear Mildred!" said Mark. + +He took her hand, which was fluttering as by electrical influence, and +raised it tenderly to his lips. + +"Good-night," he said again. + +She did not speak, but grasped his hand with fervor. He walked away slowly +towards his uncle's house, but often stopped and looked back at the +slender figure whose outlines he could barely see in the gateway under the +trees. Then, as he lost sight of her, he remembered with shame the selfish +prominence he had given to his own troubles. He was ashamed, too, of the +cowardice which had kept him from uttering the words which had trembled on +his lips. But in a moment the thought of the future checked that regret. +Gloomy as his own lot might be, he could bear it; but he had no right to +involve another's happiness. Thus he alternated between pride and +abasement, hope and dejection, as many a lover has done before and since. + + +CHAPTER VI. + +Sunday was a great day in Innisfield; for there, as in all Puritan +communities, religion was the central and engrossing idea. As the bell +rang for service, every ear in town heard it, and all who were not sick or +kept at home by the care of young children turned their steps towards the +house of God. The idea that there could be any choice between going to +hear preaching and remaining at home was so preposterous, that it never +entered into the minds of any but the openly wicked. Whatever might be +their inclinations, few had the hardihood to absent themselves from +meeting, still less to ride out for pleasure, or to stroll through the +woods or upon the bank of the river. A steady succession of vehicles-- +"thorough-braced" wagons, a few more stylish carriages with elliptic +springs, and here and there an ancient chaise--tended from all quarters to +the meeting-house. The horses, from the veteran of twenty years' service +down to the untrimmed and half-trained colt, knew what the proprieties of +the day required. They trotted soberly, with faces as sedate as their +drivers', and never stopped to look in the fence-corners as they passed +along, to see what they could find to be frightened at. Nor would they +often disturb worship by neighing, unless they became impatient at the +length of the sermon. + +Mr. Hardwick and his family, as we have before mentioned, went regularly +to meeting; Lizzy and Mark sat with him in the singers' seats, the others +in a pew below. The only guardian of the house on Sundays was a large +ungainly cur, named Caesar. The habits of this dog deserve a brief +mention. On all ordinary occasions he followed his master or others of the +family, seeming to take a human delight in their company. Whenever it was +desirable to have him remain at home, nothing short of tying him would +answer the purpose. After a time he came to know the signs of preparation, +and would skulk. Upon setting out, Mr. Hardwick would tell one of the boys +to catch Caesar so that he should not follow, but he was not to be found; +and in the course of ten minutes he would be trotting after his master as +composedly as if nothing had ever happened to interrupt their friendly +relations. It was impossible to resist such persevering affection, and at +length Mr. Hardwick gave up the contest, and allowed Caesar to travel when +and where he chose. But on Sunday he sat on the front-door step, erect +upon his haunches, with one ear dropping forward, and the other upright +like the point of a starched shirt-collar; and though on week-days he was +fond of paying the usual courtesies to his canine acquaintances, and (if +the truth must be told) of barking at strange horses occasionally, yet +nothing could induce him either to follow any of the family, or accost a +dog, or chase after foreign vehicles, on the day of rest. Once only he +forgot what was due to his character, and gave a few yelps in holy time. +But James, with a glance at his father, who was stoutly orthodox, averred +that Caesar's conduct was justifiable, inasmuch as the man he barked at +was one of a band of new-light fanatics who worshipped in the school- +house, and the horse, moreover, was not shod at a respectable place, but +at a tinker's shop in the verge of the township. A dog with such powers of +discrimination certainly merits a place in this true history. + +The services of Sunday were finished. Those who, with dill and caraway, +had vainly struggled against drowsiness, had waked up with a jerk at the +benediction, and moved with their neighbors along the aisles, a slow and +sluggish stream. The nearest friends passed out side by side with meekly +composed faces, and without greeting each other until they reached the +vestibule. So slow and solemn was the progress out of church, that merry +James Hardwick averred that he saw Deacon Stone, a short fat man, actually +dozing, his eyes softly shutting and opening like a hen's, as he was borne +along by the crowd. The Deacon had been known to sleep while he stood up +in his pew during prayer, but perhaps James's story was rather apocryphal. + +Mark Davenport, of course, had been the object of considerable attention +during the day, and at the meeting-house-door numbers of his old +acquaintances gathered round him. No one was more cordial in manner than +Squire Clamp. His face was wrinkled into what were meant for smiles, and +his voice was even smoother and more insinuating than usual. It was only +by a strong effort that Mark gulped down his rising indignation, and +replied civilly. + +Sunday in Innisfield ended at sunset, though labor was not resumed until +the next day; but neighbors called upon each other in the twilight, and +talked over the sermons of the day, and the affairs of the church and +parish. That evening, while Mr. Hardwick's family were sitting around the +table reading, a long growl was heard from Caesar at the door, followed by +an emphatic "Get out!" The growls grew fiercer, and James went to the door +to see what was the matter. Squire Clamp was the luckless man. The dog had +seized his coat-tail, and had pulled it forward, so that he stood face to +face with the Squire, who was vainly trying to free himself by poking at +his adversary with a great baggy umbrella. James sent away the dog with a +reprimand, but laughed as he followed the angry man into the house. He +always cited this afterwards as a new proof of the sagacity of the grim +and uncompromising Caesar. + +"S-sorry you've had such a t-time with the dog," said Mr. Hardwick; "he +don't g-ginerally bark at pup-people." + +"Oh, no matter," said the Squire, contemplating the measure of damage in +the skirt of his coat. "A good, sound sermon Mr. Rook gave us to-day. The +doctrines of the decrees and sovereignty, and the eternal destruction of +the impenitent, were strongly set forth." + +"Y-yes, I sp-spose so. I d-don't profit so m-much by that inst-struction, +however. I th-think more of the e-every-day religion he u-usually +preaches."--Mr. Hardwick trotted one foot with a leg crossed and with an +air which showed to his children and to Mark plainly enough how impatient +he was of the Squire's beginning so far away from what he came to say. + +"Why, you don't doubt these fundamental points?" asked Mr. Clamp. + +"No, I don't d-doubt, n-nor I don't th-think much about 'em; they're t-too +deep for me, and I ler-let 'em alone. We shall all un-know about these +things in God's goo-good time. I th-think more about keepin' peace among +n-neighbors, bein' kuh-kindly to the poor, h-helpin' on the cause of +eddication, and d-doin' ginerally as I would be done by."--Mr. Hardwick's +emphasis could not be mistaken, and Squire Clamp was a little uneasy. + +"Oh, yes, Mr. Hardwick," he replied, "all the town knows of your practical +religion." Then turning to Mark, he said, blandly, "So you came home +yesterday. How long do you propose to stay?" + +The young man never had the best control of his temper, and it was now +rapidly coming up to the boiling-point. "Mr. Clamp," said he, "if you had +asked a pickerel the same question, he would probably tell you that you +knew best how and when he came on shore, and that for himself he expected +to get back into water as soon as he got the hook out of his jaws." + +"I am sorry to see this warmth," said Mr. Clamp; "I trust you have not +been put to any trouble." + +"Really," said Mark, bitterly, "you have done your best to ruin me in the +place where I earn my living, but 'trust I have not been put to any +trouble'! Your sympathy is as deep as your sincerity." + +"Mark," said Mr. Hardwick, "you're sa-sayin' more than is necess-ssary." + +"Indeed, he is quite unjust," rejoined the lawyer. "I saw an alteration in +his manner to-day, and for that reason I came here. I prefer to keep the +friendship of all men, especially of those of my townsmen and brethren in +the church whose piety and talents I so highly respect." + +"S-sartinly, th-that's right. I don't like to look around, wh-when I take +the ker-cup at the Sacrament, and see any man that I've wronged; an' I +don't f-feel comf'table nuther to see anybody der-drinkin' from the same +cup that I think has tried to w-wrong me or mine." + +"You can save yourself that anxiety about Mr. Clamp, Uncle," said Mark. +"He is not so much concerned about our Christian fellowship as he is about +his fees. He couldn't live here, if he didn't manage to keep on both sides +of every little quarrel in town. Having done me what mischief he could, he +wants now to salve the wound over." + +"My young friend, what is the reason of this heat?" asked Mr. Clamp, +mildly. + +"I don't care to talk further," Mark retorted. "I might as well explain +the pathology of flesh bruises to a donkey who had maliciously kicked me." + +Mr. Clamp wiped his bald head, on which the perspiration was beginning to +gather. His stock of pious commonplaces was exhausted, and he saw no +prospect of calming Mark's rage, or of making any deep impression on the +blacksmith. He therefore rose to depart. "Good evening," said he. "I pray +you may become more reasonable, and less disposed to judge harshly of your +friend and brother." + +Mark turned his back on him. Mr. Hardwick civilly bade him good-night. +Lizzy and Anna, who had retreated during the war of words, came back, and +the circle round the table was renewed. + +"Yer-you'll see one thing," said Mr. Hardwick. "He'll b-bring you, and +p'r'aps me, too, afore the church for this talk." + +"The sooner, the better," said Mark. + +"I d'no," said Mr. Hardwick. "Ef we must live in f-fellowship, a der- +diffi-culty in church isn't per-pleasant. But 'tis uncomf'table for +straight wood to be ker-corded up with such ker-crooked sticks as him." + +[To be continued.] + + + + +A PERILOUS BIVOUAC. + + +It is a pleasant June morning out on the Beauport slopes; the breeze comes +laden with perfume from shady Mount Lilac; and it is good to bask here in +the meadows and look out upon the grand panorama of Quebec, with its +beautiful bay sweeping in bold segments of shoreline to the mouth of the +River St Charles. The king-bird, too lazy to give chase to his proper +quarry, the wavering butterfly, sways to and fro upon a tall weed; and +there, at the bend of the brook, sits an old kingfisher on a dead branch, +gorged with his morning meal, and regardless of his reflected image in the +still pool beneath. The _goguelu_[1] rises suddenly up from his tuft of +grass, and, having sung a few staves of his gurgling song, drops down +again like a cricket-ball and is no more seen. Smooth-plumaged wax-wings +are pruning their feathers in the tamarac-trees; and high up over the +waters of the bay sails a long-winged fish-hawk, taking an extended and +generally liberal view of sundry important matters connected with the +fishery question. + +[Footnote 1: This name is given by the French Canadians to the bobolink or +rice bunting. It is an old, I believe an obsolete, French word, and means +"braggart."] + +Many a year has gone by since I last looked upon this picture, and then it +was a winter scene; for it was near the end of March, which is winter +enough in this region, and the blue water of the bay there was flagged +over with a rough white pavement of crisp snow. I think I see it now, +faintly ruled with two lines of _sapins_, or young fir saplings,--one +marking out the winter road to the Island of Orleans, and the other that +from Quebec to Montmorency; and this memory recalls to me how it fell upon +a certain day, the incidents of which are expanding upon my mind like +those dissolving views that come up out of the dark, I set up a camp-fire +just where that wood-barge nods drowsily at anchor, about a mile this side +of the town. It was a sort of bivouac a man is not likely to forget in a +hurry; not that it makes much of a story, after all,--but a trifling +scratch will sometimes leave its mark on a man for life. I was quartered +in Quebec then; didn't go much into society, though, because I devoted +much of my young energies to shooting and fishing, which were worth any +expenditure of energy in those days. And so I restricted my evening rounds +of duty to one or two houses which were conducted on the always-at-home +principle, walking in and hanging up my wide-awake when it suited me, and +staying away when it didn't,--which was about the oftener. + +In the winter of eighteen hundred and no matter what, I got three months' +leave of absence, with the intention of devoting a great portion of it to +a long-planned expedition, an invasion of the wild mountain-region lying +north of Quebec, towards the head-waters of the Saguenay,--a district +seldom disturbed by the presence of civilized man, but abandoned to the +semi-barbarous hunter and trapper, and frequented much by that prince of +roving bucks, the shy but stately caribou. I need not go into the details +of my two-months' hunt. It was like any other expedition of the sort, +about which so much information has already been given to the world in the +pleasant narratives of the wandering family of MacNimrod. I succeeded in +procuring many hairy and horned trophies of trap and rifle, as well as in +converting myself from some semblance of respectability into the veriest +looking cannibal that ever breakfasted on an underdone enemy. The return +from the chase furnished the little adventure I have alluded to,--a very +small adventure, but deeply impressed upon a memory now a good deal cut up +with tracks and traces of strange beasts of accidents, quaint "vestiges of +creation," ineffaceably stamped upon what poor Andrew Romer used to call +the "old red sandstone," in playful allusion to what his friends well knew +was a heart of hearts. + +The snow lay heavy in the woods, wet and heavy with the breath of coming +spring, as I tramped out of them one March morning, and found myself on +the queen's highway, within short rifle-shot of the rushing Montmorency, +whose roar had reached us through the forest an hour or two before. In the +early days of our hunt I had been so lucky as to run down and kill a large +moose, whose antlered head was a valuable trophy; and so I confided it to +the especial charge of my faithful follower, Zachary Hiver, a _brulé_ or +half-breed of the Chippewa nation, who had hunted buffaloes with me on the +plains of the Saskatchewan and gaffed my salmon in the swift waters of the +Mingan and Escoumains. I had promised him powder and lead enough to +maintain his rifle for the probable remainder of his earthly hunting- +career, if he succeeded in safely conveying to Quebec the hide and horns +of the mammoth stag of the forest. These he had concealed, accordingly, in +a safe hiding-place, or _cache_, to be touched at on our return; and now +as he emerged from the dark pine copse, with his ropy locks tasselling his +flat skull, and a tattered blanket-coat fluttering in ribbons from his +brown and brawny chest, his interest in the venture appeared in the +careful manner in which he drew after him a long, slender _tobaugan_, +heavily packed with the hard-won proceeds of trap and gun. Foremost among +these were displayed the broad antlers of the moose of my affections, +whose skin served as a tarpaulin for the remainder of the baggage, round +which it was snugly tucked in with thongs of kindred material. + +We halted on a broad ledge of rock by the western verge of the bay of the +Falls, glad of an opportunity of enjoying my independence to the last, +unfettered by the conventionalities for which I was beginning to be imbued +with a savage contempt. Here we set up a primitive kitchen-range, and, +having feasted upon cutlets of the caribou, scientifically treated by a +skewer process with which Zach was familiar, we lounged like "lazy +shepherds" in the sun, and the eye of the Indian flashed as I produced +from the folds of my sash a leather-covered flask which did not look as if +it was meant to contain water. During the weeks of the chase I had been +very careful to conceal this treasure from Zach, knowing how helpless an +Indian becomes under the influence of the "fire-water"; and as I had had a +pull at it myself only two or three times, under circumstances of unusual +adversity and hardship, there still remained in it a very respectable +allowance for two, from which I subtracted a liberal measure, handing over +the balance to Zach, who gulped down the _skiltiwauboh_ with a fiendish +grin and a subsequent inhuman grunt. As I lit my pipe after this +satisfactory arrangement, the roar of the mighty Montmorency, whirling +down its turbulent perpendicular flood behind a half-drawn curtain of +green and azure ice, sounded like exquisite music to my ears, and I looked +towards Quebec and blinked at its fire-flashing tin spires and house-tops +burning through the coppery morning fog, until my mind's eye became +telescopic, and my thoughts, unsentimental though I be, reverted to +civilized society and its _agréments_, and particularly to a certain +steep-roofed cottage situated on a suburban road, in the boudoirs of which +I liked to imagine one pined for my return. If memory has its pleasures, +has it not also its glimpses of regret?--and who can say that the former +compensate for the latter? Even now I see her as she used to step out on +the veranda,--the lithe Indian girl, rivalling the choicest "desert- +flower" of Arabia in the rich darkness of her eyes and hair, and in the +warm mantling of her golden-ripe complexion,--unutterably graceful in the +thorough-bred ease of her elastic movements,--Zosime MacGillivray, perfect +type and model of the style and beauty of the _brulée_. She was the only +child of a retired trader of the old North-West Fur Company and his Indian +wife; had been partly educated in England; possessed rather more than the +then average Colonial allowance of accomplishments; and was, altogether, +so much in harmony with my roving forest-inclinations, that I sometimes +thought, half seriously, how pleasant and respectable it would be to have +one such at the head of one's camp-equipage, and how much nicer a +companion she would be on a hunt than that disreputable old scoundrel, +Zach Hiver. + +"Pack the _tobaugan_, Zach! The sun will come out strong by and by, and +the longer we tarry here, the heavier the snow will be for our stretch to +the Citadel. Up, there! _lève-toi, cochon!_" shouted I, in the elegant +terms of address which experience had taught me were the only ones that +had any effect upon the stolid sensibilities of the half-breed,--at the +same time administering to him a kick that produced a _thud_ and a grunt, +as if actually bestowed on the unclean quadruped to which I had just +likened him. The ragamuffin was very slow this time in getting the traps +together on the _tobaugan_, and, if I had not attended to the matter +myself, the moose trophy, at least, would in all probability have been +left to perish, and would never have pointed a moral and adorned a tale, +as it now does, in its exalted position among the reminiscences of things +past. At length we got under way, and, as a walk over the open plain +offered a pleasing variety to a man who had been feeling his way so long +through the dim old woods, I determined to descend from the ridge of +Beauport, and proceed over the snow-covered surface of the bay, in a +bird's-eye line, to our point of destination. Winding down the almost +perpendicular declivity, sometimes sliding down on our snow-shoes, with +the _tobaugan_ running before us, "on its own hook," at a fearful pace, +and sometimes obliged to descend, hand under hand, by the tangled roots +and shrubs, we soon found ourselves on the great white winter-prairie of +the grand St. Lawrence, upon which I strode forward with renewed energy, +steering my course, like the primitive steeple-chasers of my boyhood's +home, upon the highest church-tower looming up from the heterogeneous +huddle of motley houses that just showed their gable-tops over the low +ring of mist which mingled with the smoke of the Lower Town. + +After a progress of about five miles, I found I had very materially +widened the distance between myself and Zach, who, encumbered by the +baggage, and by the spring snow which each moment accumulated in wet heavy +cakes upon his snow-shoes, was now a good mile in my rear. This I was +surprised at, as he generally outwalked me, even when carrying on his back +a heavy load, with perhaps a canoe on his head, cocked-hat fashion, as he +was often obliged to do in our fishing-excursions to the northern lakes. +It now occurred to me, however, that I had incautiously left the brandy- +flask in his charge, and when he came up with me I gathered from his fishy +eye, and the thick dribblings of his macaronic gibberish,--which was +compounded of sundry Indian dialects and French-Canadian _patois_, +coarsely ground up with bits of broken English,--that the modern Circe, +who changes men into beasts, had wrought her spells upon him; a +circumstance at which I was terribly annoyed, as foreboding an ignominious +entry into the city by back-lane and sally-port, instead of my long- +anticipated triumphal progress up St. Louis Street, bearded in splendor, +bristling with knife and rifle, and followed by my wild Indian _coureur- +des-bois_, drawing my antlered trophies after him upon the _tobaugan_ as +upon a festival car. + +"Kaween nishishin! kaw-ween!" howled the big monster, in his mixed-pickle +macaronio,--"je me sens saisi du mal-aux-raquettes, je ne pouvons plus. +Why you go so dam fast, when hot sun he make snow for tire, eh? Sacr-r-ré +raquettes! il me semble qu'ils se grossissent de plus en plus à chaque +démarche. Stop for smoke, eh?--v'là! good place for camp away there, +kitchee hogeemaus endaut, big chief's house may-be!" grinned he, as he +indicated with Indian instinct and a wavering finger a structure of some +kind that peered through the fog at a short distance on our left. + +We were now within about a mile of Quebec. The Indian's intoxication had +increased to a ludicrous extent, so that to have ventured into the town +with him must have resulted in a reckless exposure of myself to the just +obloquy and derision of the public; while, on the other hand, if I left +him alone upon the wide world of ice, and dragged the _tobaugan_ to town +myself, the unfortunate _brulé_ must inevitably have stepped into some +treacherous snow-drift or air-hole, and thus miserably perished. So I made +up my mind for a camp on the ice; and, diverging from our course in the +direction pointed out by the Indian, we soon arrived at the object +indicated by him, which proved to be a stout framework about twelve feet +square, constructed of good heavy timber solidly covered with deal +boarding, and conveying indubitable evidence, to my thinking, of the +remains of one of the _cabanes_ or shanties commonly erected on the ice by +those engaged in the "tommy-cod" fishery,--portable structures, so fitted +together as to admit of being put up and removed piecemeal, to suit the +convenience of their proprietors. I blessed mentally the careless +individual who had thus unconsciously provided for our especial shelter; +and as the wind had now suddenly arisen sharp from the west, driving the +fog before it with clouds of fine drifting snow, I was glad to get under +the lee of the providential wall, in the hospitable shelter of which, +before two minutes had elapsed, "Stephano, my drunken butler," was snoring +away like a phalanx of bullfrogs, with his head bolstered up somehow +between the great moose-horns, and his brawny limbs rolled carelessly in +the warm but somewhat unsavory skin of the dead monarch of the forest. I +gloried in his calm repose; for the day was yet young, and I flattered +myself that a three-hours' snooze would restore his muddled intellects to +their normal mediocrity of useful instinct, and that I might still achieve +my triumphal entry into the city,--a procession I had been so much in the +habit of picturing to myself over the nocturnal camp-fire, that it had +become a sort of nightmare with me. Indeed, I had idealized it roughly in +my pocket-book, intending to transfer the sketches, for elaboration on +canvas, to Tankerville, the regimental Landseer, whose menagerie of living +models, consisting of two bears, one calf-moose, one _loup-cervier_, three +bloated raccoons, and a bald eagle, formed at once the terror and delight +of the rising generation of the barracks. + +Having got up a small fire with the assistance of the chips and scraps of +wood that were plentifully scattered around, I placed my snow-shoes one on +top of the other, and sat down on them,--a sort of preparatory step in my +transition to civilization, for they had somewhat the effect of a cane- +bottomed chair minus the legs and without a back. Then I filled my short +black pipe from the seal-skin tobacco-pouch, the contents of which had so +often assuaged my troubled spirit when I brooded over griefs which _then_ +were immature, if not imaginary. It was a very pleasant smoke, I +recollect,--so pleasant, that I rather congratulated myself upon my +position; the only drawback to it being that I was shut out from a view of +the town, as the wind and drift rendered it indispensable for comfort in +smoking that I should keep strictly to leeward of my bulwark. Tobacco is +notoriously a promoter of reflection; there must be something essentially +retrospective in the nature of the weed. I retired upon the days of my +boyhood, my legs and feet becoming clairvoyant of the corduroys and +highlows of that happy period of my existence, as the revolving curls of +pale smoke exhibited to me, with marvellous fidelity, many quaint +successive _tableaux_ of the old familiar scenes of home,--sentimental, +some of them,--comic, others,--like the domestic incidents revealed with +exaggerations on the hazy field of a magic-lantern. I thought of my poor +mother, and of the excellent parting advice she gave me,--but more +particularly of the night-caps with strings, which she extracted such a +solemn promise from me to wear carefully every night in all climates, and +which, on the second evening of my sojourn in barracks, were so +unceremoniously reduced to ashes in a noisy _auto-da-fé_. These +retrospective pictures were succeeded by others of more modern date, +coming round in a progressive series, until I had painted myself up to +within a few weeks of my present position, the foreground of my existence. +Then I remembered promises made by me of contributions to a certain +album,--further contributions,--for I had already furnished several pages +of it with food for mind and eye in the form of melancholy verses and +"funny" sketches, with brief dramatic dialogues beneath the latter, to +elucidate the "story." I particularly recollected having volunteered a +translation or imitation of a pretty song in Ruy Blas; and as the fit was +upon me, I produced my pocketbook, to commit to paper a version of it +which I had mentally devised. The leaves of my book were all filled, +however; some with memoranda,--a sort of savage diary it was,--some with +sketches of scenes in the wilderness: there was not a corner vacant. +Turning towards the planking of my bulwark, I perceived that it was +smoothly planed and clean, and to work on it I went, pencil in hand. First +I wrote "Zosime MacGillivray," in several different styles of chirography, +flourished and plain, and even in old text. Then I sketched out a rough +design for an ornamental heading, with a wreath of flowers encircling the +words "To Zozzy," and beneath this work of Art I inscribed the effort of +my muse, which ran thus:-- + + Fields and forests rejoice + In their silver-toned throng; + _I_ hear but the voice + Of the bird in thy song! + + In April's glad shower + Flash petals and leaves, + Less bright than the flower + Round thy heart that weaves! + + Stars waken, stars slumber, + Stars wink in the sky, + Bright numberless number; + But none like thine eye! + + For bird-song and flower + And star from above + Combine in thy bower; + Their union is love! + +My mind being considerably relieved by this gush of sentiment, I felt +myself entitled to unbend a little, and, turning my attention to artistic +pursuits, principally of a humorous character, I developed successively +many long-pent-up imaginings in the way of severe studies of sundry +garrison notables. There was "Bendigo" Phillips, with boxing-gloves +fearfully brandished, appearing in the attitude in which he polished off +young Thurlow of the R.A., under the pretence of giving him a lesson in +the noble art of self-defence, but in reality to revenge himself upon him +for an ill-timed interference in a certain _affaire du coeur_. The agony +of young Thurlow, pretending to look pleased, was depicted by a very +successful stroke of Art. To the extreme right you might have beheld +Vegetable Warren, the staff-surgeon, slightly exaggerated in the semblance +of a South-Down wether nibbling at a gigantic Swedish turnip. Written +lampoons of the fiercest character accompanied the illustrations. But my +boldest effort was an atrocious and libellous cartoon of the commandant of +the garrison, popularly known as "Old Wabbles,"--I believe from the +preternatural manner in which his wide Esquimaux boots vacillated about +his long, lean shanks. This _chef d'oeuvre_ was executed upon a rather +large scale, and I imparted considerable force and breadth to the design +by "coaling in" the shadows with a charred stick. Then calling color to my +aid, as far as my limited means admitted, I scraped from the edges of the +moose-hide a portion of the red-streaked fat, and, having impasted +therewith the bacchanalian nose of my subject, I stepped back a few paces +to contemplate the effect. So ludicrous was the resemblance, that I +laughed outright in the pride of my success,--a transient hilarity, nipped +suddenly in the bud by the loud boom of a cannon, accompanied rather than +followed by a rushing sound a few feet above my head, and a thundering +bump and splutter upon the ice some thirty or forty yards beyond me, as +the heavy shot skipped and ricochetted away with receding bounds to its +vanishing-point somewhere in the neighborhood of the Island of Orleans. +Two strides to the front, and a glance at the broad, black ring emblazoned +on the hitherto disregarded face of my bulwark, and the truth flashed upon +my staggering senses. + +I was encamped in the lee of the bran-new artillery target, and they were +just commencing practice, on this fine bright afternoon, by pitching +thirty-two-pound shot into and about it, at intervals--as I pretty well +knew--of distressingly uncertain duration. With frantic strength I grasped +the Indian by the neck, and, plunging madly through the snow, dragged him +after me a few paces in the direction of our former track; but, hampered +as he was by the moose-trappings, the weight was too much for me, and I +dropped him, instinctively continuing to run with breathless speed, until, +having gained a considerable distance away from any probable line of fire, +I flung myself down upon the snow, and was somewhat startled at finding +Zach very close upon my tracks, tearing along on all fours with a vague +sense of danger of some kind, and looking, in his strange envelope, like +an infuriated bull-moose in the act of charging a hunter. A shot struck +the corner of the target just as we got away from it, slightly splintering +it, so as to give the bewildered Indian a pleasant practical lesson in the +science of gunnery and fortification. + +Two minutes elapsed,--three minutes,--five minutes,--not another shot; but +it might commence again at any moment, and I stood at a respectful +distance from the danger, uncertain what course to pursue for the recovery +of my traps, all of which, rifle, snow-shoes, and _tobaugan_ loaded with +spoils, lay in pledge with the two-faced friend whose treacherous shelter +had no longer any charm for me, when I beheld several sleighs approaching +us from the town at a fearful pace, in the foremost of which, when within +range of rifle, I recognized Old Wabbles, the commandant. + +"Who the Devil are you?" shouted he, as he drove right at us. "Two +Indians, ha!--somebody said it was _one_ Indian with a moose after him, a +man and a moose. Where's Thurlow?--_he_ had the telescope, and asserted +there was a man running round the target and a moose after him. I don't +see the moose." Zach had dropped the hide and horns from his "recreant +limbs," and was seated solemnly upon the snow, in all the majesty of his +native dirt. + +"By Jove, it's Kennedy!" cried Tankerville, whose artistical eye detected +me through my hirsute and fluttering disguise. "What a picturesque +object!--I congratulate you, old fellow!--easiest and pleasantest way in +the world of making a living!--lose no time about it, but send in your +papers at once!--continue assiduously to neglect your person, and you're +worth a guinea an hour for the rest of your prime, as a living model on +the full pay of the Academies!" + +I was soon bewildered by a torrent of inquiries from all sides: as to how +I came behind the target,--what success I had had in the woods,--how many +miles I had come to-day,--whether I had got the martin-skin I had promised +to this one, and the silver fox I undertook to trap for that,--when, +suddenly, a diversion was created by a roar from Phillips, who had +proceeded to inspect my spoils behind the target, and now stood looking at +my portrait-gallery of living celebrities, his great chest heaving with +laughter; and before I could satisfy my inquiring friends, the whole crowd +had rushed pell-mell to the exhibition. + +"Caught, by all that's lovely!" shouted Phillips, repeating my verses at +the top of his voice,-- + + "The bird-song and flower + And star from above + Combine in thy bower; + Their union is love!" + +"Ritoorala loorala loorala loo, ritoorala loorala loorala loo!" chorused +everybody, as he sang the last verse to the vulgar melody of 'Tatter Jack +Welch,' knocking the poetry out of my constitution at once and forever, +like the ashes out of a pipe. "Hooray for Miss Mac! Who should have +thought it, Darby?"--That was _my_ pet name in the regiment. + +"How like!--how very like!--That's Warren there, nibbling the turnip. And +there's Thurlow,--ha! ha! ha! how good! And that--that--that's me, by +Jingo!--he he! he! he!--not so good that, somehow,--neck too long by half +a foot. But the Colonel!--only look at his boots!--He must'n't see this, +though, by Jove!--Choke the Colonel off, boys!--take him round to the +front!--do something!" whispered good-natured Symonds, anxious to keep me +clear of the scrape. + +But it was too late. The last objects that met my view were the ghastly +legs of the Commandant, as he strode through the circle in front of my +Art-exhibition. I saw no more. A soldier is but a mortal man. Rushing to +the nearest cariole,--it was the Commandant's,--I leaped into it, and, +lashing the horse furiously towards the town, never pulled rein until I +got up to my long-deserted quarters in the Citadel. There I barricaded +myself into my own room, directing my servant to proceed to the target +for my scattered property. I had still a month's leave of absence before +me, availing myself of which, I started next morning for New York, +subsequently obtained an extension of leave, sailed for England, and +there negotiating an exchange from a regiment whose facings no longer +suited my taste for colors, I soon found myself gazetted into a less +objectionable one lying at Corfu. + +I have never seen Tankerville's famous picture of my triumphal entry into +Quebec. + + + + +I.--NOVEMBER. + + +The dead leaves their rich mosaics, + Of olive and gold and brown, +Had laid on the rain-wet pavements, + Through all the embowered town. + +They were washed by the Autumn tempest, + They were trod by hurrying feet, +And the maids came out with their besoms + And swept them into the street, + +To be crushed and lost forever + 'Neath the wheels, in the black mire lost,-- +The Summer's precious darlings, + She nurtured at such cost! + +O words that have fallen from me! + O golden thoughts and true! +Must I see in the leaves a symbol + Of the fate which awaiteth you? + + +II.--APRIL. + +Again has come the Spring-time, + With the crocus's golden bloom, +With the smell of the fresh-turned earth-mould, + And the violet's perfume. + +O gardener! tell me the secret + Of thy flowers so rare and sweet!-- +--"I have only enriched my garden + With the black mire from the street." + + + + +THE GAUCHO. + + +What _is_ a Gaucho? + +That is precisely what I am going to tell you. + +Take my hand, if you please. Shod with the shoes of swiftness, we have +annihilated space and time. We are standing in the centre of a boundless +plain. Look north and south and east and west: for five hundred miles +beyond the limit of your vision, the scarcely undulating level stretches +on either hand. Miles, leagues, away from us, the green of the torrid +grass is melting into a misty dun; still further miles, and the misty dun +has faded to a shadowy blue; more miles, it rounds at last away into the +sky. A hundred miles behind us lies the nearest village; two hundred in +another direction will bring you to the nearest town. The swiftest horse +may gallop for a day and night unswervingly, and still not reach a +dwelling-place of man. We are placed in the midst of a vast, unpeopled +circle, whose radii measure a thousand miles. + +But see! a cloud arises in the South. Swiftly it rolls towards us; behind +it there is tumult and alarm. The ground trembles at its approach; the air +is shaken by the bellowing that it covers. Quick! let us stand aside! for, +as the haze is lifted, we can see the hurrying forms of a thousand cattle, +speeding with lowered horns and fiery eyes across the plain. Fortunately, +they do not observe our presence; were it otherwise, we should be trampled +or gored to death in the twinkling of an eye. Onward they rush; at last +the hindmost animals have passed; and see, behind them all there scours a +man! + +He glances at us, as he rushes by, and determines to give us a specimen of +his only art. Shaking his long, wild locks, as he rises in the stirrup and +presses his horse to its maddest gallop, he snatches from his saddle-bow +the loop of a coil of rope, whirls it in his right hand for an instant, +then hurls it, singing through the air, a distance of fifty paces. A jerk +and a strain,--a bellow and a convulsive leap,--his lasso is fast around +the horns of a bull in the galloping herd. The horseman flashes a +murderous knife from his belt, winds himself up to the plunging beast, +severs at one swoop the tendon of its hind leg, and buries the point of +his weapon in the victim's spinal marrow. It falls dead. The man, my +friend, is a Gaucho; and we are standing on the Pampas of the Argentine +Republic. + +Let us examine this dexterous wielder of the knife and cord. _He, Juan de +Dios!_ Come hither, O Centaur of the boundless cattle-plains! We will not +ask you to dismount,--for that you never do, we know, except to eat and +sleep, or when your horse falls dead, or tumbles into a _bizcachero_; but +we want to have a look at your savage self, and the appurtenances +thereunto belonging. + +And first, you say, the meaning of his name. The title, Gaucho, is applied +to the descendants of the early Spanish colonists, whose homes are on the +Pampa, instead of in the town,--to the rich _estanciero_, or owner of +square leagues of cattle, in common with the savage herdsman whom he +employs,--to Generals and Dictators, as well as to the most ragged Pampa- +Cossack in their pay. Our language is incapable of expressing the idea +conveyed by this term; and the Western qualification "backwoodsman" is +perhaps the nearest approach to a synonyme that we can attain. + +The head of our swarthy friend is covered with a species of Neapolitan +cap, (let me confess, in a parenthesis, that my ideas of such head- +coverings are derived from the costume of graceful Signor Brignoli in +"Masaniello,") which was once, in all probability, of scarlet hue, but now +almost rivals in color the jet-black locks which it confines. His face-- +well, we will pass that over, and, on our return to civilized life, will +refer the curious inquirer for a fac-simile to the first best painting of +Salvator, there to select at pleasure the most ferocious bandit +countenance that he can find. And now the remainder of his person. He +wears an open jacket of dirt-crusted serge, covered in front with a +gorgeous eruption of plated buttons, and a waistcoat of the same material, +adorned with equal profuseness, and showing at the neck a substratum of +dubious crimson, supposed to be a flannel shirt. So far, you may say, +there is nothing suspicious or very outlandish about his rig; but +_turpiter desinit formosus superne_,--there is something highly remarkable +_á continuacion_. Do you see that blanket which is drawn tightly up, fore +and aft, toward his waist, and, there confined by means of a belt which +his _querida_ has richly ornamented for him, falls over in uneven folds +like an abbreviated kilt? That is the famous _chiripá_, or Gaucho +petticoat, which, like the _bracae_ of the Northern barbarians some +nineteen hundred years ago, distinguishes him from the inhabitants of +civilized communities. Below the _chiripá_, his limbs are cased in +_calzoncillos_, stout cotton drawers or pantalets, which terminate in a +fringe (you should see the elaborate worsted-work that adorns the hem of +his gala-pair) an inch or two above the ankle. His feet are thrust into a +pair of _botas de potro_, or colt's-foot boots, manufactured from the hide +of a colt's fore-leg, which he strips off whole, chafes in his hand until +it becomes pliable and soft, sews up at the lower extremity,--and puts on, +the best riding-boot that the habitable world can show. Add a monstrous +spur to each heel of this _chaussure_, and you will have fully equipped +the worthy Juan de Dios for active service.--But stay! his accoutrements! +We must not forget that Birmingham-made butcher-knife, which, for a dozen +years, has never been for a moment beyond his reach; nor the coiling +lasso, and the _bolas_, or balls of iron, fastened at each end of a thong +of hide, which he can hurl a distance of sixty feet, and inextricably +entangle around the legs of beast or man; nor the _recado_, or saddle, his +only seat by day, and his pillow when he throws himself upon the ground to +sleep under the canopy of heaven. Neither must we omit the _mate_ gourd +which dangles at his waist, in readiness to receive its infusion of +_yerba_, or Paraguay tea, which he sucks through that tin tube, called +_bombilla_, and looking for all the world like the broken spout of an oil- +can with a couple of pieces of nutmeg-grater soldered on, as strainers, at +the lower end; nor the string of sapless _charque_ beef, nor the pouchful +of villanous tobacco, nor the paper for manufacturing it into +_cigarritos_, nor the cow's-horn filled with tinder, and the flint and +steel attached. Thus mounted, clothed, and equipped, he is ready for a +gallop of a thousand leagues. + +He is a strange individual, this Gaucho Juan. Born in a hut built of mud +and maize-stalks somewhere on the superficies of these limitless plains, +he differs little, in the first two years of his existence, from peasant +babies all the world over; but so soon as he can walk, he becomes an +equestrian. By the time he is four years old there is scarcely a colt in +all the Argentine that he will not fearlessly mount; at six, he whirls a +miniature lasso around the horns of every goat or ram he meets. In those +important years when our American youth are shyly beginning to claim the +title of young men, and are spending anxious hours before the mirror in +contemplation of the slowly-coming down upon their lip, young Juan (who +never saw a dozen printed books, and perhaps has only _heard_ of looking- +glasses) is galloping, like a portion of the beast he rides, over a +thousand miles of prairie, lassoing cattle, ostriches, and guanacos, +fighting single-handed with the jaguar, or lying stiff and stark behind +the heels of some plunging colt that he has too carelessly bestrid. + +At twenty-one he is in his glory. Then we must look for him in the +_pulperías_, the bar-rooms of the Pampas, whither he repairs on Sundays +and _fiestas_, to get drunk on _aguardiente_ or on Paraguay rum. There you +may see him seated, listening open-mouthed to the _cantor_, or Gaucho +troubadour, as he sings the marvellous deeds of some desert hero, +persecuted, unfortunately, by the myrmidons of justice for the numerous +_misfortunes_ (_Anglicé_, murders) upon his head,--or narrates in +impassioned strain, to the accompaniment of his guitar, the circumstances +of one in which he has borne a part himself,--or chants the frightful end +of the Gaucho Attila, Quiroga, and the punishment that overtook his +murderer, the daring Santos Perez. When the song is over, the cards are +dealt. Seated upon a dried bull's-hide, each man with his unsheathed knife +placed ostentatiously at his side, the jolly Gauchos commence their game. +Suddenly Manuel exclaims, that Pedro or Estanislao or Antonio is playing +false. Down fly the cards; up flash the blades; a ring is formed. Manuel, +to tell the truth, has accused his friend Pedro only for the sake of a +little sport; he has never _marked_ a man yet, and thinks it high time +that that honor were attained. So the sparks fly from the flashing blades, +and Pedro's nose has got another gash in it, and Manuel is bleeding in a +dozen places, but he will not give in just yet. Unfortunate Gaucho! Pedro +the next moment slips in a sticky pool of his own blood, and Manuel's +knife is buried in his heart! "He is killed! Manuel has had a misfortune!" +exclaim the ring; "fly, Manuel, fly!" In another minute, and just as the +_vigilantes_ are throwing themselves upon their horses to pursue him, he +has galloped out of sight. + +Twenty miles from the _pulpería_ he draws rein, dismounts, wipes his +bloody knife on the grass, and slices off a collop of _charque_, which he +munches composedly for his supper. Very likely this _misfortune_ will make +him a _Gaucho malo_. The _Gaucho malo_ is an outlaw, at home only in the +desert, intangible as the wind, sanguinary, remorseless, swift. His +brethren of the _estancia_ pronounce his name occasionally, but in lowered +tones, and with a mixture of terror and respect; he is looked up to by +them as a sort of higher being. His home is a movable point upon an area +of twenty thousand square miles; his horse, the finest steed that he can +find upon the Pampas between Buenos Ayres and the Andes, between the Gran +Chaco and Cape Horn; his food, the first beef that he captures with his +lasso; his dainties, the tongues of cows which he kills, and abandons, +when he has stripped them of his favorite titbit, to the birds of prey. +Sometimes he dashes into a village, drinks a gourdful of _aguardiente_ +with the admiring guests at the _pulpería_, and spurs away again into +obscurity, until at length the increasing number of his _desgracias_ +tempts the mounted emissaries of justice to pursue him, in the hope of +extra reward. If suddenly beset by seven or eight of these desert police, +the _Gaucho malo_ slashes right and left with his redoubted knife,--kills +one, maims another, wounds them all. Perhaps he reaches his horse and is +off and away amid a shower of harmless balls;--or he is taken; in which +case, all that remains, the day after, of the _Gaucho malo_, is a lump of +soulless clay. + +Then there is the guide, or _vaqueano_. This man, as one who knows him +well informs us, is a grave and reserved Gaucho, who knows by heart the +peculiarities of twenty thousand leagues of mountain, wood, and plain! He +is the only _map_ that an Argentinian general takes with him in a +campaign; and the _vaqueano_ is never absent from his side. No plan is +formed without his concurrence. The army's fate, the success of a battle, +the conquest of a province, is entirely dependent upon his integrity and +skill; and, strange to say, there is scarcely an instance on record of +treachery on the part of a _vaqueano_. He meets a pathway which crosses +the road upon which he is travelling, and he can tell you the exact +distance of the remote watering-place to which it leads; if he meet with a +thousand similar pathways in a journey of five hundred miles, it will +still be the same. He can point out the fords of a hundred rivers; he can +guide you in safety through a hundred trackless woods. Stand with him at +midnight on the Pampa,--let the track be lost,--no moon or stars; the +_vaqueano_ quietly dismounts, examines the foliage of the trees, if any +are near, and if there are none, plucks from the ground a handful of +roots, chews them, smells and tastes the soil, and tells +you that so many hours' travel due north or south will bring you to your +destination. Do not doubt him; he is infallible. + +A mere _vaqueano_ was General Rivera of Uruguay,--but he knew every tree, +every hillock, every dell, in a region extending over more than 70,000 +square miles! Without his aid, Brazil would have been powerless in the +Banda Oriental; without his aid, the Argentinians would never have +triumphed over Brazil. As a smuggler in 1804, as a custom-house officer a +few years later, as a patriot, a freebooter, a Brazilian general, an +Argentinian commander, as President of Uruguay against Lavalleja, as an +outlaw against General Oribe, and finally against Rosas, allied with +Oribe, as champion of the Banda Oriental del Uruguay, Rivera had certainly +ample opportunities for perfecting himself in that study of which he was +the ardent devotee. + +Cooper has told us how and by what signs, in years that have forever +faded, the Huron tracked his flying foe through the forests of the North; +we read of Cuban bloodhounds, and of their frightful baying on the scent +of the wretched maroon; we know how the Bedouin follows his tribe over +pathless sands;--and yet all these are bunglers, in comparison with the +_Gaucho rastreador_! + +In the interior of the Argentine every Gaucho is a trailer or +_rastreador_. On those vast feeding-grounds of a million cattle, whose +tracks intersect each other in every direction, the herdsman can +distinguish with unerring accuracy the footprints of his own peculiar +charge. When an animal is missing from the herd, he throws himself upon +his horse, gallops to the spot where he remembers having seen it last, +gazes for a moment upon the trampled soil, and then shoots off for miles +across the waste. Every now and then he halts, surveys the trail, and +again speeds onward in pursuit. At last he reaches the limits of another +_estancia_, and the pasturage of a stranger herd. His eagle eye singles +out at a glance the estray; rising in his stirrup, he whirls the lasso for +a moment above his head, launches it through the air, and coolly drags the +recalcitrant beast away on the homeward trail. He is nothing but a common, +comparatively unskilled, _rastreador_. + +The official trailer is of another stamp. Like his kinsman, the +_vaqueano_, he is a personage well convinced of his own importance; grave, +reserved, taciturn, whose word is law. Such a one was the famous Calébar, +the dreaded thief-taker of the Pampas, the Vidocq of Buenos Ayres. This +man during more than forty years exercised his profession in the Republic, +and a few years since was living, at an advanced age, not far from Buenos +Ayres. There appeared to be concentrated in him the acuteness and keen +perceptions of all the brethren of his craft; it was impossible to deceive +him; no one whose trail he had once beheld could hope to escape discovery. +An adventurous vagabond once entered his house, during his temporary +absence on a journey to Buenos Ayres, and purloined his best saddle. When +the robbery was discovered, his wife covered the robber's trail with a +kneading-trough. Two months later Calébar returned, and was shown the +almost obliterated footprint. Months rolled by; the saddle was apparently +forgotten; but a year and a half later, as the _rastreador_ was again at +Buenos Ayres, a footprint in the street attracted his notice. He followed +the trail; passed from street to street and from _plaza_ to _plaza_, and +finally entering a house in the suburbs, laid his hand upon the begrimed +and worn-out saddle which had once been his own _montura de fiesta_! + +In 1830, a prisoner, awaiting the death-penalty, effected his escape from +jail. Calébar, with a detachment of soldiers, was put upon the scent. +Expecting this, and knowing that the gallows lay behind him, the fugitive +had adopted every expedient for baffling his pursuers: he had walked long +distances upon tiptoe; had scrambled along walls; had walked backwards, +crawled, doubled, leaped; but all in vain! Calébar's blood was up; his +reputation was at stake; to fail now would be an indelible disgrace. If +now and then he found himself at fault, he as often recovered the trail, +until the bank of a water-course was reached, to which the flying criminal +had taken. The trail was lost; the soldiers would have turned back; but +Calébar had no such thought. He patiently followed the course of the +_acequia_ for a few rods, and suddenly halting, said to his companions, +"Here is the spot at which he left the canal; there is no trail,--not a +footprint,--but do you see those drops of water upon the grass?" With this +slight clue they were led towards a vineyard. Calébar examined it at every +side, and bade the soldiers enter, saying, "He is there!" The men obeyed +him, but shortly reported that no living being was within the walls. "He +is there!" quietly reiterated Calébar; and, in fact, a second more +thorough examination resulted in the capture of the trembling fugitive, +who was executed on the following day.--There can be no doubt regarding +the literal exactness of this anecdote. + +At another time, we are told, a party of political prisoners, incarcerated +by General Rosas, had contrived a plan of escape, in which they were to be +aided by friends outside. When all was ready, one of the party suddenly +exclaimed,-- + +"But Calébar! you forget him!" + +"Calébar!" echoed his friends; "true, it is useless to escape while he can +pursue us!" + +Nor was any flight attempted until the dreaded trailer had been bribed to +fall ill for a few days, when the prisoners succeeded in making good their +escape. + +He who would learn more of Calébar and his brother-trailers, let him +procure a copy of the little work that now lies before us,[1] in the shape +of a tattered duo-decimo, which has come to us across the Andes and around +Cape Horn, from the most secluded corner of the Argentine Confederation. +Badly printed and barbarously bound, this "Life of Juan Facundo Quiroga" +is nevertheless replete with the evidence of genius, and bears the stamp +of a generously-cultivated mind. Its author, indeed, the poet-patriot- +philosopher, Don Domingo F. Sarmiento, may be called the Lamartine of +South America, whose eventful career may some day invite us to an +examination. Suffice it now to say, that he was expelled by Rosas in 1840 +from Buenos Ayres, and that he took his way to Chile, with the intention +in that hospitable republic of devoting his pen to the service of his +oppressed country. At the baths of Zonda he wrote with charcoal, under a +delineation of the national arms: _On ne tue point les idées_! which +inscription, having been reported to the Gaucho chieftain, a committee was +appointed to decipher and translate it. When the wording of the +significant hint was conveyed to Rosas, he exclaimed,--"Well, what does it +mean?" The answer was conveyed to him in 1852; and the sentence serves as +epigraph to the present life of his associate and victim, Facundo Quiroga. + +[Footnote 1: _Vida de Juan Facundo Quiroga_, etc., por Domingo F. +Sarmiento. Santiago, 1845.] + +In this extraordinary character we see the quintessence of that desert- +life some types of which we have endeavored to delineate. As one who, +rising from the lowest station to heights of uncontrolled power, as a +representative of a class of rulers unfortunately too common in the +republics that descend from Spain, and as a remarkable instance of brutal +force and barbaric stubbornness triumphing over reason, science, +education, and, in a word, civilization, he is admirably portrayed by Sr. +Sarmiento. Ours be the task to condense into a few pages the story of his +life and death. + +The Argentine province of La Rioja embraces vast tracts of sandy desert. +Destitute of rivers, bare of trees, it is only by means of artificial and +scanty irrigation that the peasant can cultivate a narrow strip of land. +Inclosed by these arid wastes lies, nevertheless, a fertile region +entitled the Plains, which, in despite of its name, is broken by ridges of +hills, and supports a luxuriant vegetation with pastures trodden by +unnumbered herds. The character of the people is Oriental; their +appearance actually recalls, as we are told, that of the ancient dwellers +about Jerusalem; their very customs have rather an Arabic than a Spanish +tinge. + +Somewhere upon these _Llanos_, and toward the close of the eighteenth +century, Don Prudencio Quiroga, as a well-to-do _estanciero_ or grazier, +was gladdened (doubtless) by the birth of a lusty son. He called him Juan +Facundo. For the first few years of his existence, we may safely believe, +the future general was scarcely distinguishable from a common baby. +Obstinate he doubtless was, and fierce and cruel in his tiny way; were his +mother still alive, the good woman could doubtless tell us of many a +bitter moment spent in lamenting her infant's waywardness; but we hear +nothing of him until the year 1799, when he was sent to San Juan, a town +then celebrated for its schools and learning, to acquire the rudiments of +knowledge. At the age of eleven the boy already manifested the character +of the future man. Solitary, disdainful, rebellious, his intercourse with +his schoolfellows was limited to the interchange of blows, his only +amusement lay in the annoyance of those with whom he was brought in +contact. He is already a perfect Gaucho; can wield the lasso, and the +_bolas_, and the knife; is a fearless _ginete_, a consummate horseman. One +day at school, the master, irritated beyond endurance, exhibits a new rod, +bought expressly, so he says, "for flogging Facundo." When the boy is +called up to recite, he blunders, stammers, hesitates, on purpose. Down +comes the rod; with a vigorous kick Facundo upsets the pedagogue's rickety +throne, and takes to his heels. After a three-days' search, he is +discovered secreted in a vineyard outside the town. + +This little incident, of so trifling import at the time, was remembered +in after years as an early indication of the ferocious and uncontrollable +_caudillo's_ character. But it was soon eclipsed by the reckless deeds +that followed each other in quick succession between his fifteenth and +twentieth years. He speedily became notorious in the little town for his +wild moroseness, for his savage ferocity when excited, for his inordinate +love of cards. Gaming, a passion with many, was a necessary of life to +him; it was the only pursuit to which he was ever constant; it gave rise +to the quarrel in which, while yet a schoolboy, he for the first time +spilt blood. + +By and by we lose sight of the student of San Juan. He has absolutely +_sunk_ out of sight. Yet, if we peer into filthy _pulperías_ here and +there between San Luis and San Juan, we may catch a glimpse of a shaggy, +swarthy savage, gambling, gambling as if for life; and we may also hear of +more than one affray in which his dagger has "come home richer than it +went." A little later, the son of wealthy Don Prudencio has become--not a +common laborer--but a comrade of common laborers. He chooses the most +toilsome, the most unintellectual, but, at the same time, the most +remunerative handicraft,--that of the _tapiador_, or builder of mud +walls. At San Juan, in the orchard of the Godoys,--at Fiambalá, in La +Rioja, in the city of Mendoza,--they will show you walls which the hands +of General Facundo Quiroga, _Comandante de Campaña_, etc., etc., put +together. Wherever he works, he is noted for the ascendency which he +maintains over the other peons. They are entirely subject to his will; +they do nothing without his advice; he is worth, say his employers, a +dozen overseers. Ah, he is yet to rule on a larger scale! + +Did these people ever think,--as they watched the sombre, stubborn Gaucho +sweating over a _tapia_, subjecting a drove of peons to his authority, or, +stretched upon a hide, growing ferocious as the luck went against him at +cards,--that here was one of those forces which mould or overturn the +world? Could it ever have occurred to the Godoys of San Juan, to the +worthy municipality of Mendoza, that this scowling savage was yet to place +his heel upon their prostrate forms, and most thoroughly to exhibit, +through weary, sanguinary years, the reality of that tremendous saying,-- +"The State? _I_ am the State!"? + +Doubtless no. Little as the comrades of Maximin imagined that the +truculent Goth was yet to wear the blood-stained purple, little as the +clients of Robespierre dreamed of the vortex toward which he was being +insensibly hurried by the stream of years, did the men, whose names are +thrown out from their obscurity by the glare of his misdeeds, conceive +that their fortunes, their lives, all things but their souls, were shortly +to depend upon the capricious breath of this servant who so quietly pounds +away upon their mud inclosures. + +He does not long, however, remain the companion of peons. Eighteen hundred +and ten has come, bringing with it liberty, and bloodshed, and universal +discord. The sun of May beams down upon a desolated land. For the mild, +although repressive viceregal sway is substituted that of a swarm of +military chieftains, who, fighting as patriots against Liniers and his +ill-fated troops, as rivals with each other, or as _montanero_-freebooters +against all combined, swept the plains with their harrying lancers from +the seacoast to the base of the Cordillera. + +In this period of anarchy we catch another glimpse of Juan Facundo. He has +worked his way down to Buenos Ayres, nine hundred miles from home, and +enlists in the regiment of _Arribeños_, raised by his countryman, General +Ocampo, to take part in the liberation of Chile. But even the +infinitesimal degree of discipline to which his fellow-soldiers had been +reduced was too much for his wild spirit; already he feels that command, +and not obedience, is his birthright; there is soon a vacancy in the +ranks. + +With three companions Quiroga took to the desert. He was followed and +overtaken by an armed detachment, or _partida_; summoned to surrender; the +odds are overpowering. But this man bids defiance to the world; he is yet, +in this very region, to rout well-appointed and disciplined armies with a +handful of men; and he engages the _partida_. A sanguinary conflict is the +result, in which Quiroga, slaying four or five of his assailants, comes +off victorious, and pursues his journey in the teeth of other bands which +are ordered to arrest him. He reaches his native plains, and, after a +flying visit to his parents, we again lose sight of the _Gaucho malo_. +Blurred rumors of his actions have, indeed, been preserved; accounts of +brutality toward his gray-haired father, of burnings of the dwelling in +which he first saw the light, of endless gaming, and plentiful shedding of +blood; but we hear nothing positive concerning him until the year 1818. +Somewhere in that year he determines to join the band of freebooters under +Ramirez, which was then devastating the eastern provinces. And here--O +deep designs of Fate!--the very means intended to check his mad career +serve only to accelerate its development. Dupuis, governor of San Luis, +through which province he is passing on his way to join Ramirez, arrests +the _Gaucho malo_, and throws him into the common jail, there to rot or +starve as Fortune may direct. + +But she had other things in store for him. A number of Spanish officers, +captured by San Martin in Chile, were confined within the same walls. +Goaded to the energy of despair by their sufferings, and convinced that +after all they could die no more than once, the Spaniards rose one day, +broke open the doors of their prison, and proceeded to that part of the +building where the common malefactors, and among them Juan Facundo, were +confined. No sooner was Facundo set at liberty, than he snatched the bolt +of the prison-gate, from the very hand which had just withdrawn it to set +him free, crushed the Spaniard's skull with the heavy iron, and swung it +right and left, until, according to his own statement, made at a later +date, no less than fourteen corpses were stiffening on the ground. His +example incited his companions to aid him in subduing the revolt of their +fellow-prisoners; and, as a reward for "loyal and heroic conduct," he was +restored to his privileges as a citizen. + +Thus, in the energetic language of his biographer, was his name ennobled, +and cleansed, but with _blood_, from the stains that defiled it. +Persecuted no longer, nay, even caressed by the government, he returned to +his native plains, to stalk with added haughtiness and new titles to +esteem among his brother Gauchos of La Rioja. + +Having in this manner taken a rapid survey of the most salient points in +his private career up to the year 1820, we may pause for a moment, before +studying his public life, to glance at the condition of his native country +in the first decade of its independence. The partial separation from +Spain, which was effected on the 25th May, 1810, was followed by a long +and bloody struggle, in all the southern provinces, between the royal +forces and the adherents of the Provisional Junta. Such framework of +government as had been in existence was practically annihilated, and the +various provinces of the late Viceroyalty of Buenos Ayres fell a prey to +the military chieftains who could attract around them the largest number +of Gaucho cavalry,--while civilization, commerce, and every peaceful art, +declined at a rapid rate. No alteration in this state of affairs was +effected by the final Declaration of Independence, made at Tucuman, July +9, 1816; and in 1820, Buenos Ayres, the seat of the government which +claimed to be supreme, was seized by a confederacy of the provincial +chiefs, who secured, by the destruction of the Directorial Government, +complete and unchallenged independence for themselves. During this +anarchical period, the famous Artigas was harrying the Banda Oriental; +Rosas and Lopez were preparing for their blood-stained careers; Bustos, +Ibarra, and a host of other _caudillos_, ruled the interior provinces; and +Juan Facundo Quiroga was raised to irresponsible power. + +In his native province of La Rioja the mastery had for many years been +disputed by two powerful houses, the Ocampos and the Dávilas, both +descended from noble families in Spain. In the year 1820 the former were +triumphant, and possessed all the authority then wielded in the province. +From them Facundo received the appointment of Sergeant-Major of Militia, +with the powers of _Comandante de Campaña_, or District Commandant. + +In any other country the nomination to such a post of a man rendered +notorious by his contempt for authority, who already boasted of no less +than thirty murders, and who had voluntarily placed himself in the lowest +ranks of society, would be a thing absolutely incredible; but the Ocampos +probably felt the insecurity of their authority, and were sufficiently +sagacious to attempt, at least, to render that man a useful adherent or +ally, who might, if allured by their foes, prove a terrible weapon against +them. But they found in Quiroga no submissive servant. So openly did he +disregard the injunctions of his superiors, that a corps of the principal +officers in the army entreated their general, Ocampo, to seize upon and +execute the rebellious Gaucho, but failed in inducing him to adopt their +advice. It was not long before he had occasion to repent his leniency, or +his weakness. + +A mutiny having occurred among some troops at San Juan, a detachment was +sent against them, and with it Quiroga and his horsemen. The mutineers +proved victorious, and, headed by their ringleaders, Aldao and Corro, +continued their line of march towards the North. While Ocampo with his +beaten troops fell back to wait for reinforcements, Quiroga pursued the +retreating victors, harassed their rear, clogged their every movement, and +proved so formidable to the enemy, that Aldao, abandoning his companion, +made an arrangement with the government of La Rioja, by which he was to be +allowed free passage into San Luis, whither Quiroga was ordered to conduct +him. He joined Aldao. + +And here, close upon the summit of the steep he has so easily ascended, we +cannot help pausing for an instant to reflect upon the singular +manifestation of _destiny_ in his life. History acquaints us with no +similar character who displayed so little forethought with such +astonishing results. He premeditated nothing, unless now and then a +murder. He took no trouble to form a plan of government, yet his authority +was unquestioned during many years in Mendoza, Córdova, and San Juan. Even +his most monstrous acts of perfidy appear to have been committed on the +spur of the moment, with less calculation than he gave to a game at cards. +Thrown upon the world with brutal passions scarcely controlled by a +particle of reason, whirled hither and thither in a general and fearful +cataclysm, he shows us preëminently the wonderful designs of Providence +carried into effect, as it were, by a succession of blind and sudden +impulses. In a community of established order the gallows would have put a +speedy check upon his misdeeds; in the Argentine Confederation of 1820 he +was gradually lifted, by an ever-rising tide of blood, to the eminence of +lawless power. + +Only for a while, however; for the stream did not cease to rise. The flood +that had elevated him alone disregarded his commands. For a few moments he +might maintain his footing upon the fearful peak; and then-- + +But as yet he is only _Comandante de Campaña_, escorting the rebel Aldao +into San Luis. He took no pains to conceal his discontent with the +government of Ocampo, nor was Aldao slow in noticing or availing himself +of his disaffection. He offered Quiroga a hundred men, if he chose to +overturn the government and seize upon La Rioja. Quiroga eagerly accepted, +marched upon the city, took it by surprise, threw the Ocampos and their +subordinates into prison, and sent them confessors, with the order to +prepare for death. The remainder of Aldao's force was subsequently induced +to join his cause, and, on the intercession of some of its leaders, the +incarcerated Ocampos were suffered to escape with their lives. + +Their banished enemy, Don Nicolas Dávila, was called from Tucuman to the +nominal governorship of La Rioja, while Quiroga retained, with his old +title, the actual rule of the province. But Dávila was not long content +with this mere semblance of authority. During the temporary absence of +Quiroga, he concerted with Araya, one of the men of Aldao, a plan for the +capture of their master. Quiroga heard of it,--he heard of everything,-- +and his answer was the assassination of Captain Araya! Summoned by the +government which he himself had created to answer the accusation of +instigated murder, he advanced upon the Dávilas with his Llanista +horsemen. Miguel and Nicolas Dávila hastily assembled a body of troops, +and prepared for a final struggle. While the two armies were in presence +of each other, a commissioner from Mendoza endeavored to effect a +peaceable arrangement between their chiefs. Passing from one camp to the +other with propositions and conditions, he inspired the soldiers of the +Dávilas with a fatal security. Quiroga, falling suddenly upon them in the +midst of the negotiations, routed them with ease, and slew their general, +who, with a small body of devoted followers, made a fierce onslaught upon +him personally, and succeeded in inflicting upon him a severe wound before +he was shot down. Thenceforth,--from the year 1823,--Quiroga was despot +of La Rioja. + +His government was simple enough. His two engrossing objects--if objects, +indeed, he may be said to have possessed--were extortion and the +uprooting of the last vestiges of civilization and law; his instruments, +the dagger and the lash; his amusement, the torture of unwitting +offenders; his serious occupation, the shuffling of cards. For gambling +the man had an insatiable thirst; he played once for forty hours without +intermission; it was death to refuse a game with him; no one might cease +playing without his express commands; no one durst win the stakes; and as +a consequence, he accumulated at cards in a few years almost all the +coined money then existing in the province.[2] Not content with this +source of revenue, he became a farmer of the _diezmo_ or tithes, +appropriated to himself the _mostrenco_ or unbranded cattle, by which +means he speedily became proprietor of many thousand head, even +established a monopoly of beef in his own favor,--and woe to the luckless +fool who should dare to infringe upon the terrible barbarian's +prerogative! + +[Footnote 2: Thus the Monagas, the late rulers of Venezuela, are accused +of denuding their country of specie in order to accumulate a vast treasure +abroad in expectation of a rainy day.] + +What was the state of society, it will undoubtedly be inquired, in which +the defeat of a handful of men could result in such a despotism? We have +already glanced at the people of La Rioja,--at their dreamy, Oriental +character, at their pastoral pursuits. A community of herdsmen, scattered +over an extensive territory, and deprived at one blow of the two great +families to whom they had been accustomed to look up, with infantine +submission, as their God-appointed chiefs,--these were not the men to +stand up, unprompted by a single master-mind, to rid themselves of one +whose oppression was, after all, only a new form of the treatment to +which, for an entire generation, they had been subjected. La Rioja and San +Juan were the only two provinces in which Quiroga's heavy hand was felt +continuously; in the others he ruled rather by influence than in person; +and the Gauchos, as a matter of course, were enthusiastic for a man who +exalted the peasant at the expense of the citizen, whose exactions were +actually burdensome only to the wealthy, and who permitted every license +to his followers, with the single exception of disobedience to himself. + +He was not without--it is impossible that he should have lacked--some of +those instinctive and personal attributes with which almost every savage +chieftain who has maintained so extraordinary an ascendency over his +fellows has been endowed. Sarmiento tells us that he was tall, immensely +powerful, a famous _ginete_ or horseman, a more adroit wielder of the +lasso and the _bolas_ than even his rival, Rosas, capable of great +endurance, and abstinent from intoxicating drinks. + +His eye and voice were dreaded more by his soldiers than the lances of +their antagonists. He could wring a Gaucho's secret from his breast; it +was useless to attempt a subterfuge before him. Some article, we are told, +was once stolen from a company of his troops, and every effort for its +recovery proved fruitless. It was reported to Quiroga. He paraded the men, +and, having procured a number of sticks, exactly equal in length, gave to +each man one, proclaiming that the soldier whose stick should be found +longer than the others next morning had been the thief. Next morning he +again drew up his troops. The sticks were mustered by Quiroga himself. Not +one had grown since the previous day; but there was one which was shorter +than the rest. With a terrible roar, Quiroga seized the trembling Gaucho +to whom the stick belonged. "Thou art the thief!" he exclaimed. It was so; +the fellow had cut off a portion of the wood, hoping thus to escape +detection by its growth![3]-- + +[Footnote 3: Since the above was written, we have heard of the adoption of +an expedient identical with that of Quiroga, under similar circumstances, +and with the same result. The detector was, however, an English seaman, +now captain of a well-known steam-vessel, who forming part of a crew one +of whom had lost a sum of money, broke off ten twigs of equal length from +a broom, and distributed them among his shipmates, with the same +observation as was used by the Argentine chief. Two hours later he +examined them, and found that the negro steward had _shortened_ his +allotted twig. The money was restored.--The coincidence is instructive.] + +Another time, one of his soldiers had been robbed of some trappings, and +no trace of the thief could be discovered. Quiroga ordered the detachment +to file past him, one by one. He stood, himself, with folded arms and +terrible eyes, perusing each man as he passed. At length he darted +forward, pounced upon one of the soldiers, and shouted, "Where is the +_montura_?" "In yonder thicket!" stammered out the self-convicted thief. +"Four musketeers this way!" and the commander was not out of sight before +the wretched Gaucho was a corpse. In these instinctive qualities, so awful +to untutored minds, lay the secret of the power of Quiroga,--and of how +many others of the world's most famous names! + +Already in 1825 he was recognized as a lawful authority by the government +of Buenos Ayres, and invited to take part in a Congress of Generals at +that city. At the same time, however, he received a military errand. The +Province of Tucuman having been seized by a young Buenos Ayrean officer, +Colonel Madrid, Quiroga was requested to march against the successful +upstart, and to restore the cause of law and order,--an undertaking +scarcely congruous with his own antecedents. The chief of La Rioja, +however, eagerly accepted the mission, marched with a small force into +Tucuman, routed Madrid, (and this literally, for his army ran away, +leaving the Colonel to charge Quiroga's force alone, which he did, +escaping by a miracle with his life,) and returned to La Rioja and San +Juan. Into the latter town he made a triumphal entry, through streets +lined on both sides with the principal inhabitants, whom he passed by in +disdainful silence, and who humbly followed the Gaucho tyrant to his +quarters in a clover-field, where he allowed them to stand in anxious +humiliation while he conversed at length with an old negress whom he +seated by his side. Not ten years had elapsed since these very men might +have beheld him pounding _tapias_ on this spot! + +We do not propose following the blood-stained career of Juan Facundo +through all its windings and episodes of cruelty and blood. Suffice it to +say, that, with the title of _Comandante de Campaña_, he retained in La +Rioja every fraction of actual power,--nominating, nevertheless, a shadowy +governor, who, if he attempted any independent action, was instantly +deposed. His influence gradually extended over the neighboring provinces; +thrice he encountered and defeated Madrid; while at home he gambled, +levied contributions, bastinadoed, and added largely to his army. He +excelled his contemporary, Francia, in the art of inspiring terror; he +only fell short of Rosas in the results. A wry look might at any time call +down upon a luckless child a hundred lashes. He once split the skull of +his own illegitimate son for some trifling act of disobedience. A lady, +who once said to him, while he was in a bad humor, _Adios, mi General_, +was publicly flogged. A young girl, who would not yield to his wishes, he +threw down upon the floor, and kicked her with his heavy boots until she +lay in a pool of blood. Truly, a ruler after the Russian sort! + +Dorrego, meanwhile, was at the head of affairs at Buenos Ayres. Opposed to +the "Unitarianism" of Lavalle and Paz, who would have made of their +country, not a republic "one and indivisible," but a confederation after +the model in the North, Dorrego was chiefly anxious to consolidate his +power in the maritime state of Buenos Ayres, leaving the interior +provinces to their own devices, and to the tender mercies of Lopez, +Quiroga, Bustos, with a dozen other Gaucho chiefs. Rosas, the incarnation +of the spirit which was then distracting the entire Confederation, was +made Commandant General by Dorrego, who, however, frequently threatened to +shoot "the insolent boor," but who, unfortunately for his country, never +fulfilled the threat. As for himself, he, indeed, met with that fate at +the hands of Lavalle, who landed with an army from the opposite coast of +Uruguay, defeated Dorrego and Rosas in a pitched battle at the gates of +Buenos Ayres, and entered the city in triumph a few hours later. + +With the ascendency of Lavalle came the inauguration--and, alas! only the +inauguration--of a new system. Paz, one of the few Argentinians who really +deserved the name of General that they bore, was sent to Córdova, with +eight hundred veterans of his old command. He defeated Bustos, the tyrant +of Córdova, took possession of the city, (one of the most important +strategic points upon the Pampas,) and restored that confidence and +security to which its inhabitants had so long been strangers. This action +was at the same time a challenge to Quiroga in his neighboring domain. It +was a warning that right was beginning to assert its supremacy over might; +nor was the hero of La Rioja slow to understand it. Collecting a band of +four thousand Gaucho lancers, he marched upon Córdova with the assurance +of an easy victory. The _boleado_ General! The idea of _his_ opposing the +Tiger of the Plains! + +What followed this movement is a matter of general history. The battle of +the Tablada has had European, and therefore American, celebrity. It is +known to those who think of Chacabuco and Maipú, of Navarro and Monte +Caseros, only as of spots upon the map; let it, therefore, suffice to say +that Quiroga was beaten decisively, unmistakably, terribly. The serried +veterans of Paz, schooled in the Brazilian wars, stood grimly to the death +before the fiery onslaught of Quiroga; in vain did his horsemen shatter +themselves against the Unitarian General's scanty squares; the tactics of +civilized warfare proved for the first time successful on these plains +against wild ferocity and a larger force; Quiroga was driven back at +length with fearful slaughter, with the loss of arms, ammunition, +reputation, and of seventeen hundred men. He returned to La Rioja, with +the disorganized remnant of his band, marking his path with blood and the +infliction of atrocious chastisements. Even in adversity he is terrible +and is obeyed. + +For nearly two years he divided his time between the provinces of San +Juan, Tucuman, and La Rioja, engaged in the prosecution of his designs, +chief among which was the destruction of Paz, who remained at Córdova, +intending to act only on the defensive. At length, in 1830, he considered +himself sufficiently strong for an attack on his recent conqueror. Paz was +unwilling to shed blood a second time; he offered advantageous terms to +Quiroga; but the boastful Gaucho, full of confidence in his savage +lancers, refused to negotiate, and marched against his skilful but +unpresuming antagonist. Paz secretly evacuated Córdova, and, moving +westward, hazarded a feat which is alone sufficient to establish his +character as the best tactician of the New World,--San Martin alone, +perhaps, excepted. Splitting his little army into a dozen brigades, he +occupied the entire mountain-range behind the town, operated, with scarce +five thousand men, upon a front of two hundred miles in extent, held in +his own unwavering grasp the reins which controlled the movements of every +division, and gradually inclosed, as in a net, the forces of Quiroga and +Villafañe. In vain they struggled and blindly sought an exit; every door +was closed; until, finally, after a campaign of fifteen days, the +narrowing battalions of Paz surrounded, engaged, and utterly defeated at +Oncativo the bewildered army on whose success Quiroga had staked his all. + +The Gaucho himself again escaped. After seven years of dictatorial power, +he is once more reduced to the level upon which we saw him standing in +1818, a vagabond at Buenos Ayres, although from that level he may raise +his head a trifle higher. + +And here we might conclude, having seen his rocket-like ascent, and the +swiftly-falling night of his career,--having seen him a laborer, a +deserter, a General, a Dictator, a fugitive; but much remains to be +narrated. Passing over, with the barest mention, his temporary return to +power, which he accomplished by one of those lightning-like expeditions +that even among Gaucho horsemen rendered him conspicuous, let us hasten on +to the great dramatic crisis of his history; and taking no notice of the +five years of marching and countermarching, scheming, fighting, and +negotiating, that intervened between his defeat at the Laguna Larga and +1835, draw to a close our hasty sketch. + +In that year, after taking part in a disorderly and fruitless expedition +planned by Rosas to secure the southern frontier against Indian attacks, +he suddenly made his appearance at Buenos Ayres, with a body of armed +satellites, who inspired the newly-seated Dictator--the famous Juan Manuel +de Rosas, who has been already so often mentioned in these pages--with +vivid apprehensions. Rosas, Quiroga, Lopez--the Triumvirate of La Plata-- +were bound together, it is true, by a potent tie,--by the strongest, +indeed,--that of self-interest; but as each of the three, and especially +Rosas, was in continual dread lest that consideration in his colleagues +should clash with his own intentions, the presence of Quiroga at Buenos + Ayres was far from satisfactory to the remaining two. His influence over +half a dozen of the despotic governors in the interior was still immense; +the Pampa was his own, after all his defeats; and it was shrewdly +suspected that his indifference to power in La Rioja, and his mysterious +visit to the maritime capital, were indications of a design to seize upon +the government of Buenos Ayres itself. Nor were the actions of Quiroga +suited to remove these apprehensions. The sanguinary despot of the +interior bloomed in the Buenos Ayrean _cafés_ into a profound admirer of +Rivadavia, Lavalle, and Paz, his ancient Unitarian enemies; Buenos Ayres, +the Confederation, he loudly proclaimed, must have a Constitution; +conciliation must supplant the iron-heeled tyranny under which the people +had groaned so long; the very jaguar of the Pampa, said the Porteño wits, +--not yet wholly muzzled by the dread _Mazorca_, or Club, of Rosas,--was +to be stripped of his claws, and made to live on _matagusano_ twigs and +thistles! _Redeunt Saturnia regna!_ The reign of blood, according to +Quiroga, its chief evangelist, was approaching its termination. + +In order to form a conception of the effect produced by these +transactions, we must imagine Pelissier or Walewski entertaining, twenty- +three years later, the _cercles_ at Paris with discourses from the beauty +of the last _régime_, with eulogies of Lamartine, and apotheoses of Louis +Blanc; sneering at Espinasse, and eulogizing Cavaignac; vowing that France +can be governed only under a liberal constitution, and paying a visit to +his Majesty, the Elect of December, with a rough-and-tumble suite of +Republican bravos. Assuredly, were such a thing possible in Paris, the +gentlemen in question would very shortly be reviling English hospitality +under its protecting aegis, if not dying of fever at Cayenne. Nor could +Rosas, who was at that time far less firmly seated on his throne than is +at present the man who wields the destinies of France, endure so powerful +a rival in his vicinity. But how to get rid of him? Assassination, by +which a minor offender was so speedily put out of the way, could not +safely be attempted with a man who yet retained a singular mastery over +the minds of thousands of brutal and strong-armed horsemen; a false step +would result in inevitable destruction; and many anxious days were spent +by the gloomy tyrant ere he could decide upon a plan for disposing of his +inconvenient friend. + +In the midst of this perplexity intelligence was received of a +disagreement between the governments of Salta, Tucuman, and Santiago, +provinces of the interior, which threatened to expand into warlike +proceedings. Rosas sent for Quiroga. No one but the hero of La Rioja, he +insinuated, had sufficient influence to bring about a settlement of these +disputes; no one but he had power to prevent a war; would he not, +therefore, hasten to Tucuman, and obviate so dire a calamity? Quiroga +hesitated, refused, consented, wavered, and again declined the task. With +a vacillation to which he had hitherto been a stranger, he remained for +many days undecided; a suspicion of deceit appears to have presented +itself to his mind; but at length he resolved to accept the commission. +His hesitation, meanwhile, had completed his ruin; it had given time for +the maturing of deadly plans. + +In midsummer, 1835, (December 18th,) the Gaucho chieftain commenced his +fateful journey. As he entered the carriage which was to be his home for +many days, and bade farewell to the adherents who were assembled to +witness his departure, he turned toward the city with a wild expression +and words that were remembered afterwards. _Si salgo bien_, he said, _te +volevré á ver; si no, adios para siempre!_ "If I succeed, I shall see thee +again; if not, farewell forever!" Was it a presentiment of the truth which +came upon him, like that which clouded the great mind of the first +Napoleon as he left the Tuileries when the Hundred Days were running out? + +One hour before his departure, a mounted messenger had been dispatched +from Buenos Ayres in the same direction as that he was about to follow; +and the city was scarcely out of sight when Quiroga manifested the most +feverish anxiety to overtake this man. His travelling companions were his +secretary, Dr. Ortiz, and a young man of his acquaintance, bound for +Córdova, to whom he had given a seat in his vehicle. The postilions were +incessantly admonished to make haste. At a shallow stream which they +forded, in the mud of which the wheels became imbedded, resisting every +effort for their release, Quiroga actually hooked the postmaster of the +district, who had hastened to the spot, to the carriage, and made him join +his exertions to those of the horses until the vehicle was extricated, +when he sped onward with fearful velocity, asking at every post-station, +"When did the _chasquí_ from Buenos Ayres pass? An hour ago! Forward, +then!" and the carriage swept onward, on unceasingly, across the lonely +Pampa,--racing, as it afterwards proved, with Death. + +At last, Córdova, nearly six hundred miles from his starting-point, was +reached, just one hour after the arrival of the hunted courier. Quiroga +was besought by the cringing magistracy to spend the night in their city. +His only answer was, "Give me horses!" and two hours before midnight he +rolled out of Córdova, having _beaten_ in the grisly race. + +Beaten, inasmuch as he was yet alive. For Córdova was ringing with the +details of his intended assassination. Such and such men were to have done +the deed; at such a shop the pistol had been bought; at such a spot it was +to have been fired;--but the marvellous swiftness of the intended victim +had ruined all. + +Meanwhile, Quiroga sped onward more at ease toward Tucuman. Arrived there, +he speedily arranged the matters in dispute, and was entreated by the +governors of that province and of Santiago to accept of an escort on his +return; he was besought to avoid Córdova, to avoid Buenos Ayres; he was +counselled to throw off the mask of subservience, and to rally his +numerous adherents in La Rioja and San Juan;--but remonstrance and advice +were alike thrown away upon him. In vain was the most circumstantial +account of the preparations for his murder sent by friends from Córdova; +he appeared as foolhardy now in February as in December he had been panic- +stricken. "To Córdova!" he shouted, as he entered his _galera_; and for +Córdova the postilions steered. + +At the little post-hut of Ojos del Agua, in the State of Córdova, Quiroga, +with his secretary, Ortiz, halted one night on the homeward journey. +Shortly before reaching the place, a young man had mysteriously stopped +the carriage, and had warned its hurrying inmates that at a spot called +Barranca Yaco a _partida_, headed by one Santos Perez, was awaiting the +arrival of Quiroga. There the massacre was to take place. The youth, who +had formerly experienced kindness at the hands of Ortiz, begged him to +avoid the danger. The unhappy secretary was rendered almost insane with +terror, but his master sternly rebuked his fears.--"The man is not yet +born," he said, "who shall slay Facundo Quiroga! At a word from me these +fellows will put themselves at my command, and form my escort into +Córdova!" + +The night at Ojos del Agua was passed sleeplessly enough by the unhappy +Ortiz, but Quiroga was not to be persuaded into ordinary precautions. +Confident in his mastery over the minds of men, he set out unguarded, on +the 18th of February, at break of day. The party consisted of the +chieftain and his trembling secretary, a negro servant on horseback, two +postilions,--one of them a mere lad,--and a couple of couriers who were +travelling in the same direction. + +Who that has been on the Pampas but can picture to himself this party as +it left the little mud-hut on the plain? The cumbrous, oscillating +_galera_, with its shaggy, straggling four-in-hand,--the caracoling Gaucho +couriers,--the negro pricking on behind,--the tall grass rolling out on +every side,--the muddy pool that forms the watering-place for beasts and +men scattered over a hundred miles of brookless plain,--the great sun +streaming up from the herbage just in front, awakening the voices of a +million insects and the carols of unnumbered birds in the thickets here +and there! Look long, Quiroga, on that rising sun! listen to the well- +known melody that welcomes his approach! gaze once more upon the rolling +Pampa! look again upon those flying hills! Thou who hast said, "There is +no life but this life," who didst "believe in nothing," shalt know these +things no more! five minutes hence thy statecraft will be over, thy long +apprenticeship will have expired! thou shalt be standing--where thou mayst +learn the secret that the wisest man of all the bookworms thou despisest +will never know alive! + +Barranca Yaco is reached. The warning was well founded. A crack is heard, +--there is a puff of smoke,--and two musket-balls pass each other in the +carriage, yet without inflicting injury on its occupants. From either side +the road, however, the _partida_ dashes forth. In a moment the horses are +disabled, the postilions, the negro, and the couriers cut down. Ortiz +trembles more violently than ever; Quiroga rises above himself. Looking +from the carriage while the butchery is going on, he addresses the +murderers with a few unfaltering words. There is glamour in his speech; +the ensanguined assassins hesitate,--another instant, only one moment +more, and they will be on their knees before him; but Santos Perez, who +was at one side, comes up, raises his piece,--and the body of Juan Fecundo +Quiroga falls in a soulless heap with a bullet in the brain! Ortiz was +immediately hacked to pieces; and the tragedy of Córdova is at an end. + +Such were the life, misdeeds, and death of the Terror of the Pampas. +Having in the most rapid and imperfect manner sketched the career of this +extraordinary Fortune's-child, his rise from the most abject condition to +unbridled power, his ferocious rule, and his almost heroic end, we may +surely exclaim, that "nothing in his life became him like the leaving of +it," and, presenting this bare _résumé_ of facts as a mere outline, a mere +pen-and-ink sketch of the terrible chieftain, refer the curious student to +the impassioned narrative whence our facts are mainly derived. + +It may be well to add, that Santos Perez, who was actively pursued by the +government of Buenos Ayres, which itself had instigated him to the +commission of the crime, was finally, after many hairbreadth escapes, +betrayed by his mistress to the agents of Rosas, and suffered death at +Buenos Ayres with savage fortitude. The Lord have mercy on his soul! + + + + +MADEMOISELLE'S CAMPAIGNS. + + +THE SCENE AND THE ACTORS. + +The heroine of our tale is one so famous in history that her proper name +never appears in it. The seeming paradox is the soberest fact. To us +Americans, glory lies in the abundant display of one's personal +appellation in the newspapers. Our heroine lived in the most gossiping of +all ages, herself its greatest gossip; yet her own name, patronymic or +baptismal, never was talked about. It was not that she sank that name +beneath high-sounding titles; she only elevated the most commonplace of +all titles till she monopolized it, and it monopolized her. Anne Marie +Louise d'Orléans, Souveraine de Dombes, Princesse Dauphine d'Auvergne, +Duchesse de Montpensier, is forgotten, or rather was never remembered; but +the great name of MADEMOISELLE, _La Grande Mademoiselle_, gleams like a +golden thread shot through and through that gorgeous tapestry of crimson +and purple which records for us the age of Louis Quatorze. + +In May of the year 1627, while the Queen and Princess of England lived in +weary exile at Paris,--while the slow tide of events was drawing their +husband and father to his scaffold,--while Sir John Eliot was awaiting in +the Tower of London the summoning of the Third Parliament,--while the +troops of Buckingham lay dying, without an enemy, upon the Isle of Rhé,-- +while the Council of Plymouth were selling their title to the lands of +Massachusetts Bay,--at the very crisis of the terrible siege of Rochelle, +and perhaps during the very hour when the Three Guardsmen of Dumas held +that famous bastion against an army, the heroine of our story was born. +And she, like the Three Guardsmen, waited till twenty years after for a +career. + +The twenty years are over. Richelieu is dead. The strongest will that ever +ruled France has passed away; and the poor, broken King has hunted his +last badger at St. Germain, and meekly followed his master to the grave, +as he had always followed him. Louis XIII., called Louis Le Juste, not +from the predominance of that particular virtue (or any other) in his +character, but simply because he happened to be born under the +constellation of the Scales, has died like a Frenchman, in peace with all +the world except his wife. That beautiful and queenly wife, Anne of +Austria, (Spaniard though she was,)--no longer the wild and passionate +girl who fascinated Buckingham and embroiled two kingdoms,--has hastened +within four days to defy all the dying imprecations of her husband, by +reversing every plan and every appointment he has made. The little prince +has already shown all the Grand Monarque in his childish "Je suis Louis +Quatorze," and has been carried in his bib to hold his first parliament. +That parliament, heroic as its English contemporary, though less +successful, has reached the point of revolution at last. Civil war is +impending. Condé, at twenty-one the greatest general in Europe, after +changing sides a hundred times in a week, is fixed at last. Turenne is +arrayed against him. The young, the brave, the beautiful cluster around +them. The performers are drawn up in line,--the curtain rises,--the play +is "The Wars of the Fronde,"--and into that brilliant arena, like some +fair circus equestrian, gay, spangled, and daring, rides Mademoiselle. + +Almost all French historians, from Voltaire to Cousin, (St. Aulaire being +the chief exception,) speak lightly of the Wars of the Fronde. "La Fronde +n'est pas sérieuse." Of course it was not. If it had been serious, it +would not have been French. Of course, French insurrections, like French +despotisms, have always been tempered by epigrams; of course, the people +went out to the conflicts in ribbons and feathers; of course, over every +battle there pelted down a shower of satire, like the rain at the Eglinton +tournament. More than two hundred pamphlets rattled on the head of Condé +alone, and the collection of _Mazarinades_, preserved by the Cardinal +himself, fills sixty-nine volumes in quarto. From every field the first +crop was glory, the second a _bon-mot_. When the dagger of De Retz fell +from his breast-pocket, it was "our good archbishop's breviary"; and when +his famous Corinthian troop was defeated in battle, it was "the First +Epistle to the Corinthians." While, across the Channel, Charles Stuart was +listening to his doom, Paris was gay in the midst of dangers, Madame de +Longueville was receiving her gallants in mimic court at the Hôtel de +Ville, De Retz was wearing his sword-belt over his archbishop's gown, the +little hunchback Conti was generalissimo, and the starving people were +pillaging Mazarin's library, in joke, "to find something to gnaw upon." +Outside the walls, the maids-of-honor were quarrelling over the straw beds +which annihilated all the romance of martyrdom, and Condé, with five +thousand men, was besieging five hundred thousand. No matter, they all +laughed through it, and through every succeeding turn of the kaleidoscope; +and the "Anything may happen in France," with which La Rochefoucauld +jumped amicably into the carriage of his mortal enemy, was not only the +first and best of his maxims, but the key-note of French history for all +coming time. + +But behind all this sport, as in all the annals of the nation, were +mysteries and terrors and crimes. It was the age of cabalistic ciphers, +like that of De Retz, of which Guy Joli dreamed the solution; of +inexplicable secrets, like the Man in the Iron Mask, whereof no solution +was ever dreamed; of poisons, like that diamond-dust which in six hours +transformed the fresh beauty of the Princess Royal into foul decay; of +dungeons, like that cell at Vincennes which Madame de Rambouillet +pronounced to be "worth its weight in arsenic." War or peace hung on the +color of a ball-dress, and Madame de Chevreuse knew which party was coming +uppermost, by observing whether the binding of Madame de Hautefort's +prayer-book was red or green. Perhaps it was all a little theatrical, but +the performers were all Rachels. + +And behind the crimes and the frivolities stood the Parliaments, calm and +undaunted, with leaders, like Molé and Talon, who needed nothing but +success to make their names as grand in history as those of Pym and +Hampden. Among the Brienne Papers in the British Museum there is a +collection of the manifestoes and proclamations of that time, and they are +earnest, eloquent, and powerful, from beginning to end. Lord Mahon alone +among historians, so far as our knowledge goes, has done fit and full +justice to the French parliaments, those assemblies which refused +admission to the foreign armies which the nobles would gladly have +summoned in,--but fed and protected the banished princesses of England, +when the court party had left those descendants of the Bourbons to die of +cold and hunger in the palace of their ancestors. And we have the +testimony of Henrietta Maria herself, the only person who had seen both +revolutions near at hand, that "the troubles in England never appeared so +formidable in their early days, nor were the leaders of the revolutionary +party so ardent or so united." The character of the agitation was no more +to be judged by its jokes and epigrams, than the gloomy glory of the +English Puritans by the grotesque names of their saints, or the stern +resolution of the Dutch burghers by their guilds of rhetoric and +symbolical melodrama. + +But popular power was not yet developed in France, as it was in England; +all social order was unsettled and changing, and well Mazarin knew it. He +knew the pieces with which he played his game of chess: the king +powerless, the queen mighty, the bishops unable to take a single +straightforward move, and the knights going naturally zigzag; but a host +of plebeian pawns, every one fit for a possible royalty, and therefore to +be used shrewdly, or else annihilated as soon as practicable. True, the +game would not last forever; but after him the deluge. + +Our age has forgotten even the meaning of the word Fronde; but here also +the French and Flemish histories run parallel, and the Frondeurs, like the +Gueux, were children of a sarcasm. The Counsellor Bachaumont one day +ridiculed insurrectionists, as resembling the boys who played with slings +(_frondes_) about the streets of Paris, but scattered at the first glimpse +of a policeman. The phrase organized the party. Next morning all fashions +were _à la fronde_,--hats, gloves, fans, bread, and ballads; and it cost +six years of civil war to pay for the Counsellor's facetiousness. + +That which was, after all, the most remarkable characteristic of these +wars might be guessed from this fact about the fashions. The Fronde was +preëminently "the War of the Ladies." Educated far beyond the Englishwomen +of their time, they took a controlling share, sometimes ignoble, as often +noble, always powerful, in the affairs of the time. It was not merely a +courtly gallantry which flattered them with a hollow importance. De Retz, +in his Memoirs, compares the women of his age with Elizabeth of England. A +Spanish ambassador once congratulated Mazarin on obtaining temporary +repose. "You are mistaken," he replied, "there is no repose in France, for +I have always women to contend with. In Spain, women have only love- +affairs to employ them; but here we have three who are capable of +governing or overthrowing great kingdoms: the Duchess de Longueville, the +Princess Palatine, and the Duchess de Chevreuse." And there were others as +great as these; and the women who for years outwitted Mazarin and +outgeneralled Condé are deserving of a stronger praise than they have yet +obtained, even from the classic and courtly Cousin. + +What men of that age eclipsed or equalled the address and daring of those +delicate and highborn women? What a romance was their ordinary existence! +The Princess Palatine gave refuge to Mme. de Longueville when that alone +saved her from sharing the imprisonment of her brothers Condé and Conti,-- +then fled for her own life, by night, with Rochefoucauld. Mme. de +Longueville herself, pursued afterwards by the royal troops, wished to +embark in a little boat, on a dangerous shore, during a midnight storm so +wild that not a fisherman could at first be found to venture forth; the +beautiful fugitive threatened and implored till they consented; the sailor +who bore her in his arms to the boat let her fall amid the furious surges; +she was dragged senseless to the shore again, and, on the instant of +reviving, demanded to repeat the experiment; but as they utterly refused, +she rode inland beneath the tempest, and travelled for fourteen nights +before she could find another place of embarkation. + +Madame de Chevreuse rode with one attendant from Paris to Madrid, fleeing +from Richelieu, remaining day and night on her horse, attracting perilous +admiration by the womanly loveliness which no male attire could obscure. +From Spain she went to England, organizing there the French exiles into a +strength which frightened Richelieu; thence to Holland, to conspire nearer +home; back to Paris, on the minister's death, to form the faction of the +Importants; and when the Duke of Beaufort was imprisoned, Mazarin said, +"Of what use to cut off the arms while the head remains?" Ten years from +her first perilous escape, she made a second, dashed through La Vendée, +embarked at St. Malo for Dunkirk, was captured by the fleet of the +Parliament, was released by the Governor of the Isle of Wight, unable to +imprison so beautiful a butterfly, reached her port at last, and in a few +weeks was intriguing at Liège again. + +The Duchess de Bouillon, Turenne's sister, purer than those we have named, +but not less daring or determined, after charming the whole population of +Paris by her rebel beauty at the Hôtel de Ville, escaped from her sudden +incarceration by walking through the midst of her guards at dusk, +crouching in the shadow of her little daughter, and afterwards allowed +herself to be recaptured, rather than desert that child's sick-bed. + +Then there was Clémence de Maille, purest and noblest of all, niece of +Richelieu and hapless wife of the cruel ingrate Condé, his equal in daring +and his superior in every other high quality. Married a child still +playing with her dolls, and sent at once to a convent to learn to read and +write, she became a woman the instant her husband became a captive; while +he watered his pinks in the garden at Vincennes, she went through France +and raised an army for his relief. Her means were as noble as her ends. +She would not surrender the humblest of her friends to an enemy, or suffer +the massacre of her worst enemy by a friend. She threw herself between the +fire of two hostile parties at Bordeaux, and, while men were falling each +side of her, compelled them to peace. Her deeds rang through Europe. When +she sailed from Bordeaux for Paris at last, thirty thousand people +assembled to bid her farewell. She was loved and admired by all the world, +except that husband for whom she dared so much,--and the Archbishop of +Taen. The respectable Archbishop complained, that "this lady did not prove +that she had been authorized by her husband, an essential provision, +without which no woman can act in law." And Condé himself, whose heart, +physically twice as large as other men's, was spiritually imperceptible, +repaid this stainless nobleness by years of persecution, and bequeathed +her, as a life-long prisoner, to his dastard son. + +Then, on the royal side, there was Anne of Austria, sufficient unto +herself, Queen Regent, and every inch a queen, (before all but Mazarin,)-- +from the moment when the mob of Paris filed through the chamber of the +boy-king, in his pretended sleep, and the motionless and stately mother +held back the crimson draperies, with the same lovely arm which had waved +perilous farewells to Buckingham,--to the day when the news of the fatal +battle of Gien came to her in her dressing-room, and "she remained +undisturbed before the mirror, not neglecting the arrangement of a single +curl." + +In short, every woman who took part in the Ladies' War became heroic,-- +from Marguerite of Lorraine, who snatched the pen from her weak husband's +hand and gave De Retz the order for the first insurrection, down to the +wife of the commandant of the Porte St. Roche, who, springing from her bed +to obey that order, made the drums beat to arms and secured the barrier; +and fitly, amid adventurous days like these, opened the career of +Mademoiselle. + + +II. + +THE FIRST CAMPAIGN. + +Grandchild of Henri Quatre, niece of Louis XIII., cousin of Louis XIV., +first princess of the blood, and with the largest income in the nation, +(500,000 livres,) to support these dignities, Mademoiselle was certainly +born in the purple. Her autobiography admits us to very gorgeous company; +the stream of her personal recollections is a perfect Pactolus. There is +almost a surfeit of royalty in it; every card is a court-card, and all her +counters are counts. "I wore at this festival all the crown-jewels of +France, and also those of the Queen of England." "A far greater +establishment was assigned to me than any _fille de France_ had ever had, +not excepting any of my aunts, the Queens of England and of Spain, and the +Duchess of Savoy." "The Queen, my grandmother, gave me as a governess the +same lady who had been governess to the late King." Pageant or funeral, it +is the same thing. "In the midst of these festivities we heard of the +death of the King of Spain; whereat the Queens were greatly afflicted, and +we all went into mourning." Thus, throughout, her Memoirs glitter like the +coat with which the splendid Buckingham astonished the cheaper chivalry of +France: they drop diamonds. + +But for any personal career Mademoiselle found at first no opportunity, in +the earlier years of the Fronde. A gay, fearless, flattered girl, she +simply shared the fortunes of the court; laughed at the +festivals in the palace, laughed at the ominous insurrections in the +streets; laughed when the people cheered her, their pet princess; and when +the royal party fled from Paris, she adroitly secured for herself the best +straw-bed at St. Germain, and laughed louder than ever. She despised the +courtiers who flattered her; secretly admired her young cousin Condé, whom +she affected to despise; danced when the court danced, and ran away when +it mourned. She made all manner of fun of her English lover, the future +Charles II., whom she alone of all the world found bashful; and in general +she wasted the golden hours with much excellent fooling. Nor would she, +perhaps, ever have found herself a heroine, but that her respectable +father was a poltroon. + +Lord Mahon ventures to assert, that Gaston, Duke of Orléans, was "the most +cowardly prince of whom history makes mention." A strong expression, but +perhaps safe. Holding the most powerful position in the nation, he never +came upon the scene but to commit some new act of ingenious pusillanimity; +while, by some extraordinary chance, every woman of his immediate kindred +was a natural heroine, and became more heroic through disgust at him. His +wife was Marguerite of Lorraine, who originated the first Fronde +insurrection; his daughter turned the scale of the second. But, +personally, he not only had not the courage to act, but he had not the +courage to abstain from acting; he could no more keep out of parties than +in them; but was always busy, waging war in spite of Mars, and negotiating +in spite of Minerva. + +And when the second war of the Fronde broke out, it was in spite of +himself that he gave his name and his daughter to the popular cause. When +the fate of the two nations hung trembling in the balance, the royal army +under Turenne advancing on Paris, and almost arrived at the city of +Orléans, and that city likely to take the side of the strongest,--then +Mademoiselle's hour had come. All her sympathies were more and more +inclining to the side of Condé and the people. Orléans was her own +hereditary city. Her father, as was his custom in great emergencies, +declared that he was very ill and must go to bed immediately; but it was +as easy for her to be strong as it was for him to be weak; so she wrung +from him a reluctant plenipotentiary power; she might go herself and try +what her influence could do. And so she rode forth from Paris, one fine +morning, March 27, 1652,--rode with a few attendants, half in enthusiasm, +half in levity, aiming to become a second Joan of Arc, secure the city, +and save the nation. "I felt perfectly delighted," says the young girl, +"at having to play so extraordinary a part." + +The people of Paris had heard of her mission, and cheered her as she went. +The officers of the army, with an escort of five hundred men, met her half +way from Paris. Most of them evidently knew her calibre, were delighted to +see her, and installed her at once over a regular council of war. She +entered into the position with her natural promptness. A certain grave M. +de Rohan undertook to tutor her privately, and met his match. In the +public deliberation, there were some differences of opinion. All agreed +that the army should not pass beyond the Loire: this was Gaston's +suggestion, and nevertheless a good one. Beyond this all was left to +Mademoiselle. Mademoiselle intended to go straight to Orléans. "But the +royal army had reached there already." Mademoiselle did not believe it. +"The citizens would not admit her." Mademoiselle would see about that. +Presently the city government of Orléans sent her a letter, in great +dismay, particularly requesting her to keep her distance. Mademoiselle +immediately ordered her coach, and set out for the city. "I was naturally +resolute," she naïvely remarks. + +Her siege of Orléans is perhaps the most remarkable on record. She was +right in one thing; the royal army had not arrived: but it might appear at +any moment; so the magistrates quietly shut all their gates, and waited to +see what would happen. + +Mademoiselle happened. It was eleven in the morning when she reached the +Porte Bannière, and she sat three hours in her state carriage without +seeing a person. With amusing politeness, the governor of the city at last +sent her some confectionery,--agreeing with John Keats, who held that +young women were beings fitter to be presented with sugar-plums than with +one's time. But he took care to explain that the bonbons were not +official, and did not recognize her authority. So she quietly ate them, +and then decided to take a walk outside the walls. Her council of war +opposed this step, as they did every other; but she coolly said (as the +event proved) that the enthusiasm of the populace would carry the city for +her, if she could only get at them. + +So she set out on her walk. Her two beautiful ladies-of-honor, the +Countesses de Fiesque and de Frontenac, went with her; a few attendants +behind. She came to a gate. The people were all gathered inside the +ramparts. "Let me in," demanded the imperious young lady. The astonished +citizens looked at each other and said nothing. She walked on,--the crowd +inside keeping pace with her. She reached another gate. The enthusiasm was +increased. The captain of the guard formed his troops in line and saluted +her. "Open the gate," she again insisted. The poor captain made signs that +he had not the keys. "Break it down, then," coolly suggested the daughter +of the House of Orléans; to which his only reply was a profusion of +profound bows, and the lady walked on. + +Those were the days of astrology, and at this moment it occurred to our +Mademoiselle, that the chief astrologer of Paris had predicted success to +all her undertakings, from the noon of this very day until the noon +following. She had never had the slightest faith in the mystic science, +but she turned to her attendant ladies, and remarked that the matter was +settled; she should get in. On went the three, until they reached the bank +of the river, and saw, opposite, the gates which opened on the quay. The +Orléans boatmen came flocking round her, a hardy race, who feared neither +queen nor Mazarin. They would break down any gate she chose. She selected +one, got into a boat, and sending back her terrified male attendants, that +they might have no responsibility in the case, she was rowed to the other +side. Her new allies were already at work, and she climbed from the boat +upon the quay by a high ladder, of which several rounds were broken away. +They worked more and more enthusiastically, though the gate was built to +stand a siege, and stoutly resisted this one. Courage is magnetic; every +moment increased the popular enthusiasm, as these highborn ladies stood +alone among the boatmen; the crowd inside joined in the attack upon the +gate; the guard looked on; the city government remained irresolute at the +Hôtel de Ville, fairly beleaguered and stormed by one princess and two +maids-of-honor. + +A crash, and the mighty timbers of the Porte Brûlée yield in the centre. +Aided by the strong and exceedingly soiled hands of her new friends, our +elegant Mademoiselle is lifted, pulled, pushed, and tugged between the +vast iron bars which fortify the gate; and in this fashion, torn, +splashed, and dishevelled generally, she makes entrance into her city. The +guard, promptly adhering to the winning side, present arms to the heroine. +The people fill the air with their applauses; they place her in a large, +wooden chair, and bear her in triumph through the streets. "Everybody came +to kiss my hands, while I was dying with laughter to find myself in so odd +a situation." + +Presently our volatile lady told them that she had learned how to walk, +and begged to be put down; then she waited for her countesses, who arrived +bespattered with mud. The drums beat before her, as she set forth again, +and the city government, yielding to the feminine conqueror, came to do +her homage. She carelessly assured them of her clemency. She "had no doubt +that they would soon have opened the gates, but she was naturally of a +very impatient disposition, and could not wait." Moreover, she kindly +suggested, neither party could now find fault with them; and as for the +future, she would save them all trouble, and govern the city herself,-- +which she accordingly did. + +By confession of all historians, she alone saved the city for the Fronde, +and, for the moment, secured that party the ascendency in the nation. Next +day the advance-guard of the royal forces appeared,--a day too late. +Mademoiselle made a speech (the first in her life) to the city government; +then went forth to her own small army, by this time drawn near, and held +another council. The next day she received a letter from her father, +(whose health was now decidedly restored,) declaring that she had "saved +Orléans and secured Paris, and shown yet more judgment than courage." The +next day Condé came up with his forces, compared his fair cousin to +Gustavus Adolphus, and wrote to her that "her exploit was such as she only +could have performed, and was of the greatest importance." + +Mademoiselle staid a little longer at Orléans, while the armies lay +watching each other, or fighting the battle of Bléneau, of which Condé +wrote her an official bulletin, as being generalissimo. She amused herself +easily, went to mass, played at bowls, received the magistrates, stopped +couriers to laugh over their letters, reviewed the troops, signed +passports, held councils, and did many things "for which she should have +thought herself quite unfitted, if she had not found she did them very +well." The enthusiasm she had inspired kept itself unabated, for she +really deserved it. She was everywhere recognized as head of affairs; the +officers of the army drank her health on their knees, when she dined with +them, while the trumpets sounded and the cannons roared; Condé, when +absent, left instructions to his officers, "Obey the commands of +Mademoiselle, as my own"; and her father addressed a despatch from Paris +to her ladies of honor, as Field-Marshals in her army: "À Mesdames les +Comtesses Maréchales de Camp dans l'Armée de ma Fille contre le Mazarin." + + +III. + +CAMPAIGN THE SECOND. + +Mademoiselle went back to Paris. Half the population met her outside the +walls; she kept up the heroine, by compulsion, and for a few weeks held +her court as Queen of France. If the Fronde had held its position, she +might very probably have held hers. Condé, being unable to marry her +himself, on account of the continued existence of his invalid wife, (which +he sincerely regretted,) had a fixed design of marrying her to the young +King. Queen Henrietta Maria cordially greeted her, lamented more than ever +her rejection of the "bashful" Charles II., and compared her to the +original Maid of Orléans,--an ominous compliment from an English source. + +The royal army drew near; on July 1, 1652, Mademoiselle heard their drums +beating outside. "I shall not stay at home to-day," she said to her +attendants, at two in the morning; "I feel convinced that I shall be +called to do some unforeseen act, as I was at Orléans." And she was not +far wrong. The battle of the Porte St. Antoine was at hand. + +Condé and Turenne! The two greatest names in the history of European wars, +until a greater eclipsed them both. Condé, a prophecy of Napoleon, a +general by instinct, incapable of defeat, insatiable of glory, throwing +his marshal's baton within the lines of the enemy, and following it; +passionate, false, unscrupulous, mean. Turenne, the precursor of +Wellington rather, simple, honest, truthful, humble, eating off his iron +camp-equipage to the end of life. If it be true, as the ancients said, +that an army of stags led by a lion is more formidable than an army of +lions led by a stag, then the presence of two such heroes would have given +lustre to the most trivial conflict. But that fight was not trivial upon +which hung the possession of Paris and the fate of France; and between +these two great soldiers it was our Mademoiselle who was again to hold the +balance, and to decide the day. + +The battle raged furiously outside the city. Frenchman fought against +Frenchman, and nothing distinguished the two armies except a wisp of straw +in the hat, on the one side, and a piece of paper on the other. The people +of the metropolis, fearing equally the Prince and the King, had shut the +gates against all but the wounded and the dying. The Parliament was +awaiting the result of the battle, before taking sides. The Queen was on +her knees in the Carmelite Chapel. De Retz was shut up in his palace, and +Gaston of Orléans in his,--the latter, as usual, slightly indisposed; and +Mademoiselle, passing anxiously through the streets, met nobleman after +nobleman of her acquaintance, borne with ghastly wounds to his residence. +She knew that the numbers were unequal; she knew that her friends must be +losing ground. She rushed back to her father, and implored him to go forth +in person, rally the citizens, and relieve Condé. It was quite impossible; +he was so exceedingly feeble; he could not walk a hundred yards. "Then, +Sir," said the indignant Princess, "I advise you to go immediately to bed. +The world had better believe that you cannot do your duty, than that you +will not." + +Time passed on, each moment registered in blood. Mademoiselle went and +came; still the same sad procession of dead and dying; still the same mad +conflict, Frenchman against Frenchman, in the three great avenues of the +Faubourg St. Antoine. She watched it from the city walls till she could +bear it no longer. One final, desperate appeal, and her dastard father +consented, not to act himself, but again to appoint her his substitute. +Armed with the highest authority, she hastened to the Hôtel de Ville, +where the Parliament was in irresolute session. The citizens thronged +round her, as she went, imploring her to become their leader. She reached +the scene, exhibited her credentials, and breathlessly issued demands +which would have made Gaston's hair stand on end. + +"I desire three things," announced Mademoiselle: "first, that the citizens +shall be called to arms." + +"It is done," answered the obsequious officials. + +"Next," she resolutely went on, "that two thousand men shall be sent to +relieve the troops of the Prince." + +They pledged themselves to this also. + +"Finally," said the daring lady, conscious of the mine she was springing, +and reserving the one essential point till the last, "that the army of +Condé shall be allowed free passage into the city." + +The officials, headed by the Maréchal de l'Hôpital, at once exhibited the +most extreme courtesy of demeanor, and begged leave to assure her Highness +that under no conceivable circumstances could this request be granted. + +She let loose upon them all the royal anger of the House of Bourbon. She +remembered the sights she had just seen; she thought of Rochefoucauld, +with his eye shot out and his white garments stained with blood,--of +Guitant shot through the body,--of Roche-Giffard, whom she pitied, "though +a Protestant." Condé might, at that moment, be sharing their fate; all +depended on her; and so Conrart declares, in his Memoirs, that +"Mademoiselle said some strange things to these gentlemen": as, for +instance, that her attendants should throw them out of the window; that +she would pluck off the Marshal's beard; that he should die by no hand but +her's, and the like. When it came to this, the Maréchal de l'Hôpital +stroked his chin with a sense of insecurity, and called the council away +to deliberate; "during which time," says the softened Princess, "leaning +on a window which looked on the St. Esprit, where they were saying mass, I +offered up my prayers to God." At last they came back, and assented to +every one of her propositions. + +In a moment she was in the streets again. The first person she met was +Vallon, terribly wounded. "We are lost!" he said. "You are saved!" she +cried, proudly. "I command to-day in Paris, as I commanded in Orléans." +"Vous me rendez la vie," said the reanimated soldier, who had been with +her in her first campaign. On she went, meeting at every step men wounded +in the head, in the body, in the limbs,--on horseback, on foot, on planks, +on barrows,--besides the bodies of the slain. She reached the windows +beside the Porte St. Antoine, and Condé met her there; he rode up, covered +with blood and dust, his scabbard lost, his sword in hand. Before she +could speak, that soul of fire uttered, for the only recorded time in his +career, the word _Despair_: "Ma cousine, vous voyez un homme au +désespoir,"--and burst into tears. But her news instantly revived him, and +his army with him. "Mademoiselle is at the gate," the soldiers cried; and, +with this certainty of a place of refuge, they could do all things. In +this famous fight, five thousand men defended themselves against twelve +thousand, for eight hours. "Did you see Condé himself?" they asked +Turenne, after it was over. "I saw not one, but a dozen Condés," was the +answer; "he was in every place at once." + +But there was one danger more for Condé, one opportunity more for +Mademoiselle, that day. Climbing the neighboring towers of the Bastille, +she watched the royal party on the heights of Charonne, and saw fresh +cavalry and artillery detached to aid the army of Turenne. The odds were +already enormous, and there was but one course left for her. She was +mistress of Paris, and therefore mistress of the Bastille. She sent for +the governor of the fortress, and showed him the advancing troops. "Turn +the cannon under your charge, Sir, upon the royal army." Without waiting +to heed the consternation she left behind her, Mademoiselle returned to +the gate. The troops had heard of the advancing reinforcements, and were +drooping again; when, suddenly, the cannon of the Bastille, those Spanish +cannon; flamed out their powerful succor, the royal army halted and +retreated, and the day was won. + +The Queen and the Cardinal, watching from Charonne, saw their victims +escape them. But the cannon-shots bewildered them all. "It was probably a +salute to Mademoiselle," suggested some comforting adviser. "No," said the +experienced Maréchal de Villeroi, "if Mademoiselle had a hand in it, the +salute was for us." At this, Mazarin comprehended the whole proceeding, +and coldly consoled himself with a _bon-mot_ that became historic. "Elle a +tué son mari," he said,--meaning that her dreams of matrimony with the +young king must now be ended. No matter; the battle of the Porte St. +Antoine was ended also. + +There have been many narratives of that battle, including Napoleon's; they +are hard to reconcile, and our heroine's own is by no means the clearest; +but all essentially agree in the part they ascribe to her. One brief +appendix to the campaign, and her short career of heroism fades into the +light of common day. + +Yet a third time did Fortune, showering upon one maiden so many +opportunities at once, summon her to arm herself with her father's +authority, that she might go in his stead into that terrible riot which, +two days after, tarnished the glories of Condé, and by its reaction +overthrew the party of the Fronde ere long. None but Mademoiselle dared to +take the part of that doomed minority in the city government, which, for +resisting her own demands, were to be terribly punished on that fourth-of- +July night. "A conspiracy so base," said the generous Talon, "never +stained the soil of France." By deliberate premeditation, an assault was +made by five hundred disguised soldiers on the Parliament assembled in the +Hôtel de Ville; the tumult spread; the night rang with a civil conflict +more terrible than that of the day. Condé and Gaston were vainly summoned; +the one cared not, the other dared not. Mademoiselle again took her place +in her carriage and drove forth amid the terrors of the night. The sudden +conflict had passed its cruel climax, but she rode through streets +slippery with blood; she was stopped at every corner. Once a man laid his +arm on the window, and asked if Condé was within the carriage. She +answered "No," and he retreated, the flambeaux gleaming on a weapon +beneath his cloak. Through these interruptions, she did not reach the +half-burned and smoking Hôtel de Ville till most of its inmates had left +it; the few remaining she aided to conceal, and emerged again amid the +lingering, yawning crowd, who cheered her with, "God bless Mademoiselle! +all she does is well done." + +At four o'clock that morning she went to rest, weary with these days and +nights of responsibility. Sleep soundly, Mademoiselle, you will be +troubled with such no longer. An ignominious peace is at hand; and though +peace, too, has her victories, yours is not a nature grand enough to grasp +them. Last to yield, last to be forgiven, there will yet be little in your +future career to justify the distrust of despots, or to recall the young +heroine of Orléans and St Antoine. + + +IV. + +THE CONCLUSION. + +Like a river which loses itself, by infinite subdivision, in the sands, so +the wars of the Fronde disappeared in petty intrigues at last. As the +fighting ended and manoeuvring became the game, of course Mazarin came +uppermost,--Mazarin, that super-Italian, finessing and fascinating, so +deadly sweet, _l'homme plus agréable du monde_, as Madame de Motteville +and Bussy-Rabutin call him,--flattering that he might win, avaricious that +he might be magnificent, winning kings by jewelry and princesses by +lapdogs,--too cowardly for any avoidable collision,--too cool and +economical in his hatred to waste an antagonist by killing him, but always +luring and cajoling him into an unwilling tool,--too serenely careless of +popular emotion even to hate the mob of Paris, any more than a surgeon +hates his own lancet when it cuts him; he only changes his grasp and holds +it more cautiously. Mazarin ruled. And the King was soon joking over the +fight at the Porte St. Antoine, with Condé and Mademoiselle; the Queen at +the same time affectionately assuring our heroine, that, if she could have +got at her on that day, she would certainly have strangled her, but that, +since it was past, she would love her as ever,--as ever; while +Mademoiselle, not to be outdone, lies like a Frenchwoman, and assures the +Queen that really she did not mean to be so naughty, but "she was with +those who induced her to act against her sense of duty!" + +The day of civil war was over. The daring heroines and voluptuous blonde +beauties of the Frondeur party must seek excitement elsewhere. Some looked +for it in literature; for the female education of France in that age was +far higher than England could show. The intellectual glory of the reign of +the Grand Monarque began in its women. Marie de Médicis had imported the +Italian grace and wit,--Anne of Austria the Spanish courtesy and romance; +the Hôtel de Rambouillet had united the two, and introduced the _genre +précieux_, or stately style, which was superb in its origin, and dwindled +to absurdity in the hands of Mlle. de Scudéry and her valets, before +Molière smiled it away forever. And now that the wars were done, literary +society came up again. Madame de Sablé exhausted the wit and the cookery +of the age in her fascinating entertainments,--_pâtés_ and Pascal, +Rochefoucauld and _ragoûts_,--Mme. de Brégy's Epictetus, Mme. de Choisy's +salads,--confectionery, marmalade, elixirs, Des Cartes, Arnould, +Calvinism, and the barometer. Mme. de Sablé had a sentimental theory that +no woman should eat at the same table with a lover, but she liked to see +her lovers eat, and Mademoiselle, in her obsolete novel of the "Princesse +de Paphlagonie," gently satirizes this passion of her friend. And +Mademoiselle herself finally eclipsed the Sablé by her own entertainments +at her palace of the Luxembourg, where she offered no dish but one of +gossip, serving up herself and friends in a course of "Portraits" so +appetizing that it became the fashion for ten years, and reached +perfection at last in the famous "Characters" of La Bruyère. + +Other heroines went into convents, joined the Carmelites, or those nuns of +Port-Royal of whom the Archbishop of Paris said that they lived in the +purity of angels and the pride of devils. Thither went Madame de Sablé +herself, finally,--"the late Madame," as the dashing young abbés called +her when she renounced the world. Thither she drew the beautiful +Longueville also, and Heaven smiled on one repentance that seemed sincere. +There they found peace in the home of Angélique Arnould and Jacqueline +Pascal. And thence those heroic women came forth again, when religious war +threatened to take the place of civil: again they put to shame their more +timid male companions, and by their labors Jesuit and Jansenist found +peace. + +But not such was to be the career of our Mademoiselle, who, at twenty, had +tried the part of devotee for one week and renounced it forever. No doubt, +at thirty-five, she "began to understand that it is part of the duty of a +Christian to attend High Mass on Sundays and holy days"; and her +description of the deathbed of Anne of Austria is a most extraordinary +jumble of the next world and this. But thus much of devotion was to her +only a part of the proprieties of life, and before the altar of those +proprieties she served, for the rest of her existence, with exemplary +zeal. At forty, she was still the wealthiest unmarried princess in Europe; +fastidious in toilette, stainless in reputation, not lovely in temper, +rigid in etiquette, learned in precedence, an oracle in court traditions, +a terror to the young maids-of-honor, and always quarrelling with her own +sisters, younger, fairer, poorer than herself. Her mind and will were as +active as in her girlhood, but they ground chaff instead of wheat. Whether +her sisters should dine at the Queen's table, when she never had; who +should be her trainbearer at the royal marriage; whether the royal Spanish +father-in-law, on the same occasion, should or should not salute the +Queen-mother; who, on any given occasion, should have a _tabouret_, who a +_pliant_, who a chair, who an arm-chair; who should enter the King's +_ruelle_, or her own, or pass out by the private stairway; how she should +arrange the duchesses at state-funerals: these were the things which tried +Mademoiselle's soul, and these fill the later volumes of that +autobiography whose earlier record was all a battle and a march. From +Condé's "Obey Mademoiselle's orders as my own," we come down to this: "For +my part, I had been worrying myself all day; having been told that the new +Queen would not salute me on the lips, and that the King had decided to +sustain her in this position. I therefore spoke to Monsieur the Cardinal +on the subject, bringing forward as an important precedent in my favor, +that the Queen-mother had always kissed the princesses of the blood"; and +so on through many pages. Thus lapsed her youth of frolics into an old age +of cards. + +It is a slight compensation, that this very pettiness makes her chronicles +of the age very vivid in details. How she revels in the silver brocades, +the violet-colored velvet robes, the crimson velvet carpets, the purple +damask curtains fringed with gold and silver, the embroidered _fleurs de +lis_, the wedding-caskets, the cordons of diamonds, the clusters of +emeralds _en poires_ with diamonds, and the Isabelle-colored linen, +whereby hangs a tale! She still kept up her youthful habit of avoiding the +sick-rooms of her kindred, but how magnificently she mourned them when +they died! Her brief, genuine, but quite unexpected sorrow for her father +was speedily assuaged by the opportunity it gave her to introduce the +fashion of gray mourning, instead of black; it had previously, it seems, +been worn by widows only. Servants and horses were all put in deep black, +however, and "the court observed that I was very _magnifique_ in all my +arrangements." On the other hand, be it recorded, that our Mademoiselle, +chivalrous royalist to the last, was the only person at the French court +who refused to wear mourning for the usurper Cromwell! + +But, if thus addicted to funeral pageants, it is needless to say that +weddings occupied their full proportion of her thoughts. Her schemes for +matrimony fill the larger portion of her history, and are, like all the +rest, a diamond necklace of great names. In the boudoir, as in the field, +her campaigns were superb, but she was cheated of the results. Her picture +should have been painted, like that of Justice, with sword and scales,-- +the one for foes, the other for lovers. She spent her life in weighing +them,--monarch against monarch, a king in hand against an emperor in the +bush. We have it on her own authority, which, in such matters, was +unsurpassable, that she was "the best match in Europe, except the Infanta +of Spain." Not a marriageable prince in Christendom, therefore, can hover +near the French court, but this middle-aged sensitive-plant prepares to +close her leaves and be coy. The procession of her wooers files before our +wondering eyes, and each the likeness of a kingly crown has on: Louis +himself, her bright possibility of twenty years, till he takes her at her +own estimate and prefers the Infanta,--Monsieur, his younger brother, +Philip IV. of Spain, Charles II. of England, the Emperor of Germany, the +Archduke Leopold of Austria,--prospective king of Holland,--the King of +Portugal, the Prince of Denmark, the Elector of Bavaria, the Duke of +Savoy, Condé's son, and Condé himself. For the last of these alone she +seems to have felt any real affection. Their tie was more than cousinly; +the same heroic blood of the early Bourbons was in them, they were trained +by the same precocious successes, only six years apart in age, and +beginning with that hearty mutual aversion which is so often the parent of +love, in impulsive natures like theirs. Their flirtation was platonic, but +chronic; and whenever poor, heroic, desolate Clémence de Maille was sicker +than usual, these cousins were walking side by side in the Tuileries +gardens, and dreaming, almost in silence, of what might be, while Mazarin +shuddered at the thought of mating two such eagles together.--So passed +her life, and at last, like many a matchmaking lady, she baffled all the +gossips, and left them all in laughter when her choice was made. + +The tale stands embalmed forever in the famous letter of Madame de Sévigné +to her cousin, M. de Coulanges, written on Monday, December 15, 1670. It +can never be translated too often, so we will risk it again. + +"I have now to announce to you the most astonishing circumstance, the most +surprising, most marvellous, most triumphant, most bewildering, most +unheard-of, most singular, most extraordinary, most incredible, most +unexpected, most grand, most trivial, most rare, most common, most +notorious, most secret, (till to-day,) most brilliant, most desirable; +indeed, a thing to which past ages afford but one parallel, and that a +poor one; a thing which we can scarcely believe at Paris; how can it be +believed at Lyons? a thing which excites the compassion of all the world, +and the delight of Madame de Rohan and Madame de Hauterive; a thing which +is to be done on Sunday, when those who see it will hardly believe their +eyes; a thing which will be done on Sunday, and which might perhaps be +impossible on Monday: I cannot possibly announce it; guess it; I give you +three guesses; try now. If you will not, I must tell you. M. de Lauzun +marries on Sunday, at the Louvre,--whom now? I give you three guesses,-- +six,--a hundred. Madame de Coulanges says, 'It is not hard to guess; it is +Madame de la Vallière.' Not at all, Madame! 'Mlle. de Retz?' Not a bit; +you are a mere provincial. 'How absurd!' you say; 'it is Mlle. Colbert.' +Not that, either. 'Then, of course, it is Mlle. de Créqui.' Not right yet. +Must I tell you, then? Listen! he marries on Sunday, at the Louvre, by his +Majesty's permission, Mademoiselle,--Mademoiselle de,--Mademoiselle (will +you guess again?)--he marries MADEMOISELLE,--La Grande Mademoiselle,-- +Mademoiselle, daughter of the late Monsieur,--Mademoiselle, grand- +daughter of Henri Quatre,--Mademoiselle d'Eu,--Mademoiselle de Dombes,-- +Mademoiselle de Montpensier,--Mademoiselle d'Orléans,--Mademoiselle, the +King's own cousin,--Mademoiselle, destined for the throne,--Mademoiselle, +the only fit match in France for Monsieur [the King's brother];--there's +a piece of information for you! If you shriek,--if you are beside +yourself,--if you say it is a hoax, false, mere gossip, stuff, and +nonsense,--if, finally, you say hard things about us, we do not complain; +we took the news in the same way. Adieu; the letters by this post will +show you whether we have told the truth." + +Poor Mademoiselle! Madame de Sévigné was right in one thing,--if it were +not done promptly, it might prove impracticable. Like Ralph Roister +Doister, she should ha' been married o' Sunday. Duly the contract was +signed, by which Lauzun took the name of M. de Montpensier and the largest +fortune in the kingdom, surrendered without reservation, all, all to him; +but Mazarin had bribed the notary to four hours' delay, and during that +time the King was brought to change his mind, to revoke his consent, and +to contradict the letters he had written to foreign courts, formally +announcing the nuptials of the first princess of the blood. In reading the +Memoirs of Mademoiselle, one forgets all the absurdity of all her long +amatory angling for the handsome young guardsman, in pity for her deep +despair. When she went to remonstrate with the King, the two royal cousins +fell on their knees, embraced, "and thus we remained for near three +quarters of an hour, not a word being spoken during the whole time, but +both drowned in tears." Reviving, she told the King, with her usual +frankness, that he was "like apes who caress children and suffocate them"; +and this high-minded monarch soon proceeded to justify her remark by +ordering her lover to the Castle of Pignerol, to prevent a private +marriage,--which had probably taken place already. Ten years passed, +before the labors and wealth of this constant and untiring wife could +obtain her husband's release; and when he was discharged at last, he came +out a changed, soured, selfish, ungrateful man. "Just Heaven," she had +exclaimed in her youth, "would not bestow such a woman as myself upon a +man who was unworthy of her." But perhaps Heaven was juster than she +thought. They soon parted again forever, and he went to England, there to +atone for these inglorious earlier days by one deed of heroic loyalty +which it is not ours to tell. + +And then unrolled the gorgeous tapestry of the maturer reign of the Grand +Monarque,--that sovereign whom his priests in their liturgy styled "the +chief work of the Divine hands," and of whom Mazarin said, more honestly, +that there was material enough in him for four kings and one honest man. +The "Moi-même" of his boyish resolution became the "L'état, c'est moi" of +his maturer egotism; Spain yielded to France the mastery of the land, as +she had already yielded to Holland and England the sea; Turenne fell at +Sassbach, Condé sheathed his sword at Chantilly; Bossuet and Bourdaloue, +preaching the funeral sermons of these heroes, praised their glories, and +forgot, as preachers will, their sins; Vatel committed suicide because his +Majesty had not fish enough for breakfast; the Princess Palatine died in a +convent, and the Princess Condé in a prison; the fair Sévigné chose the +better part, and the fairer Montespan the worse; the lovely La Vallière +walked through sin to saintliness, and poor Marie de Mancini through +saintliness to sin; Voiture and Benserade and Corneille passed away, and +Racine and Molière reigned in their stead; and Mademoiselle, who had won +the first campaigns of her life and lost all the rest, died a weary old +woman at sixty-seven. + +Thus wrecked and wasted, her opportunity past, her career a +disappointment, she leaves us only the passing glimpse of what she was, +and the hazy possibility of what she might have been. Perhaps the defect +was, after all, in herself; perhaps the soil was not deep enough to +produce anything but a few stray heroisms, bright and transitory;--perhaps +otherwise. What fascinates us in her is simply her daring, that inborn +fire of the blood to which danger is its own exceeding great reward; a +quality which always kindles enthusiasm, and justly,--but which is a thing +of temperament, not necessarily joined with any other great qualities, and +worthless when it stands alone--But she had other resources,--weapons, at +least, if not qualities; she had birth, wealth, ambition, decision, pride, +perseverance, ingenuity; beauty not slight, though not equalling the +superb Longuevilles and Chevreuses of the age; great personal magnetism, +more than average cultivation for that period, and unsullied chastity. Who +can say what these things might have ended in, under other circumstances? +We have seen how Mazarin, who read all hearts but the saintly, dreaded the +conjunction of herself and Condé; it is scarcely possible to doubt that it +would have placed a new line of Bourbons on the throne. Had she married +Louis XIV., she might not have controlled that steadier will, but there +would have been two Grand Monarques instead of one; had she accepted +Charles II. of England, she might have only increased his despotic +tendencies, but she would easily have disposed of the Duchess of +Portsmouth; had she won Ferdinand III., Germany might have suffered less +by the Peace of Westphalia; had she chosen Alphonso Henry, the House of +Braganza would again have been upheld by a woman's hand. But she did none +of these things, and her only epitaph is that dreary might-have-been. + +Nay, not the only one,--for one visible record of her, at least, the soil +of France cherishes among its chiefest treasures. When the Paris +butterflies flutter for a summer day to the decaying watering-place of +Dieppe, some American wanderer, who flutters with them, may cast perchance +a longing eye to where the hamlet of Eu stands amid its verdant meadows, +two miles away, still lovely as when the Archbishop Laurent chose it out +of all the world for his "place of eternal rest," six centuries ago. But +it is not for its memories of priestly tombs and miracles that the summer +visitor seeks it now, nor because the _savant_ loves its ancient sea- +margin or its Roman remains; nor is it because the little Bresle winds +gracefully through its soft bed, beneath forests green in the sunshine, +glorious in the gloom; it is not for the memories of Rollo and William the +Conqueror, which fill with visionary shapes, grander than the living, the +corridors of its half-desolate château. It is because these storied walls, +often ruined, often rebuilt, still shelter a gallery of historic portraits +such as the world cannot equal; there is not a Bourbon king, nor a Bourbon +battle, nor one great name among the courtier contemporaries of Bourbons, +that is not represented there; the "Hall of the Guises" contains kindred +faces, from all the realms of Christendom; the "Salon des Rois" holds Joan +of Arc, sculptured in marble by the hand of a princess; in the drawing- +room, Père la Chaise and Marion de l'Orme are side by side, and the +angelic beauty of Agnes Sorel floods the great hall with light, like a +sunbeam; and in this priceless treasure-house, worth more to France than +almost fair Normandy itself, this gallery of glory, first arranged at +Choisy, then transferred hither to console the solitude of a weeping +woman, the wanderer finds the only remaining memorial of La Grande +Mademoiselle. + + + + +THE SWAN-SONG OF PARSON AVERY. +1635. + + +When the reaper's task was ended, and the summer wearing late, +Parson Avery sailed from Newbury with his wife and children eight, +Dropping down the river harbor in the shallop Watch and Wait. + +Pleasantly lay the clearings in the mellow summer-morn, +And the newly-planted orchards dropping their fruits first-born, +And the homesteads like brown islands amidst a sea of corn. + +Broad meadows reaching seaward the tided creeks between, +And hills rolled, wave-like, inland, with oaks and walnuts green: +A fairer home, a goodlier land, his eye had never seen. + +Yet away sailed Parson Avery, away where duty led, +And the voice of God seemed calling, to break the living bread +To the souls of fishers starving on the rocks of Marblehead! + +All day they sailed: at nightfall the pleasant land-breeze died, +The blackening sky at midnight its starry lights denied, +And, far and low, the thunder of tempest prophesied. + +Blotted out was all the coast-line, gone were rock and wood and sand; +Grimly anxious stood the helmsman with the tiller in his hand, +And questioned of the darkness what was sea and what was land. + +And the preacher heard his dear ones, nestled round him, weeping sore: +"Never heed, my little children! Christ is walking on before +To the pleasant land of Heaven, where the sea shall be no more!" + +All at once the great cloud parted, like a curtain drawn aside, +To let down the torch of lightning on the terror far and wide; +And the thunder and the whirlwind together smote the tide. + +There was wailing in the shallop, woman's wail and man's despair, +A crash of breaking timbers on the rocks so sharp and bare, +And through it all the murmur of Father Avery's prayer. + +From the struggle in the darkness with the wild waves and the blast, +On a rock, where every billow broke above him as it passed, +Alone of all his household the man of God was cast. + +There a comrade heard him praying in the pause of wave and wind: +"All my own have gone before me, and I linger just behind; +Not for life I ask, but only for the rest thy ransomed find! + +"In this night of death I challenge the promise of thy Word! +Let me see the great salvation of which mine ears have heard! +Let me pass from hence forgiven, through the grace of Christ, our Lord! + +"In the baptism of these waters wash white my every sin, +And let me follow up to Thee my household and my kin! +Open the sea-gate of thy Heaven and let me enter in!" + +The ear of God was open to his servant's last request; +As the strong wave swept him downward the sweet prayer upward pressed, +And the soul of Father Avery went with it to his rest. + +There was wailing on the mainland from the rocks of Marblehead, +In the stricken church of Newbury the notes for prayer were read, +And long by board and hearthstone the living mourned the dead. + +And still the fishers out-bound, or scudding from the squall, +With grave and reverent faces the ancient tale recall, +When they see the white waves breaking on the "Rock of Avery's Fall!" + + + + +THE DENSLOW PALACE. + + +It is the privilege of authors and artists to see and to describe; to "see +clearly and describe vividly" gives the pass on all state occasions. It is +the "cap of darkness" and the _talaria_, and wafts them whither they will. +The doors of boudoirs and senate-chambers open quickly, and close after +them,--excluding the talentless and staring rabble. I, who am one of the +humblest of the seers,--a universal admirer of all things beautiful and +great,--from the commonwealths of Plato and Solon, severally, expulsed, as +poet without music or politic, and a follower of the great,--I, from my +dormitory, or nest, of twelve feet square, can, at an hour's notice, or +less, enter palaces, and bear away, unchecked and unquestioned, those +_imagines_ of Des Cartes which emanate or are thrown off from all forms,-- +and this, not in imagination, but in the flesh. + +Whether it was the "tone of society" which pervaded my "Florentine +letters," or my noted description of the boudoir of Egeria Mentale, I +could not just now determine; but these, and other humble efforts of mine, +made me known in palaces as a painter of beauty and magnificence; and I +have been in demand, to do for wealth what wealth cannot do for itself,-- +namely, make it live a little, or, at least, spread as far, in fame, as +the rings of a stone-plash on a great pond. + +I enjoy friendships and regards which would satisfy the most fastidious. +Are not the Denslows enormously rich? Is not Dalton a sovereign of +elegance? It was I who gave the fame of these qualities to the world, in +true colors, not flattered. And _they_ know it, and love me. Honoria +Denslow is the most beautiful and truly charming woman of society. It was +I who first said it; and she is my friend, and loves me. I defy poverty; +the wealth of all the senses is mine, without effort. I desire not to be +one of those who mingle as principals and sufferers; for they are less +causes than effects. As the Florentine in the Inferno saw the souls of +unfortunate lovers borne upon a whirlwind, so have I seen all things fair +and precious,--outpourings of wealth,--all the talents,--all the offerings +of duty and devotion,--angelic graces of person and of soul,--borne and +swept violently around on the circular gale. Wealth is only an enlargement +of the material boundary, and leaves the spirit free to dash to and fro, +and exhaust itself in vain efforts.--But I am philosophizing,--oddly +enough,--when I should describe. + +An exquisite little note from Honoria, sent at the last moment, asking me +to be present that evening at a "select" party, which was to open the "new +house,"--the little palace of the Denslows,--lay beside me on the table. +It was within thirty minutes of nine o'clock, the hour I had fixed for +going. A howling winter out of doors, a clear fire glowing in my little +grate. My arm-chair, a magnificent present from Honoria, shaming the +wooden fixtures of the poor room, invited to meditation, and perhaps the +composition of some delicate periods. They formed slowly. Time, it is +said, devours all things; but imagination, in turn, devours time,--and, +indeed, swallowed my half-hour at a gulp. The neighboring church-clock +tolled nine. I was belated, and hurried away. + +It was a _reunion_ of only three hundred invitations, selected by my +friend Dalton, the intimate and adviser of Honoria. So happy were their +combinations, scarce a dozen were absent or declined. + +At eleven, the guests began to assemble. Introductions were almost +needless. Each person was a recognized member of "society." One-half of +the number were women,--many of them young, beautiful, accomplished,-- +heiresses, "charming widows," poetesses of real celebrity, and, rarer +still, of good repute,--wives of millionnaires, flashing in satin and +diamonds. The men, on their side, were of all professions and arts, and of +every grade of celebrity, from senator to merchant,--each distinguished by +some personal attribute or talent; and in all was the gift, so rare, of +manners and conversation. It was a company of undoubted gentlemen, as +truly entitled to respect and admiration as if they stood about a throne. +They were the untitled nobility of Nature, wealth, and genius. + +As I stood looking, with placid admiration, from a recess, upon a +brilliant _tableau_ of beautiful women and celebrated men that had +accidentally arranged itself before me, Dalton touched my arm. + +"I have seen," said he, "aristocratic and republican _réunions_ of the +purest mode in Paris, the court and the banker's circle of London, +_conversazioni_ at Rome and Florence. Every face in this room is +intelligent, and nearly all either beautiful, remarkable, or commanding. + Observe those five women standing with Denslow and Adonaïs,--grandeur, +sweetness, grace, form, purity; each has an attribute. It is a rare +assemblage of superior human beings. The world cannot surpass it. And, by +the by, the rooms are superb." + +They were, indeed, magnificent: two grand suites, on either side a central +hall of Gothic structure, in white marble, with light, aërial staircases +and gilded balconies. Each suite was a separate miracle: the height, the +breadth, the columnal divisions; the wonderful delicacy of the arches, +upon which rested ceilings frescoed with incomparable art. In one +compartment the arches and caryatides were of black marble; in another, of +snowy Parian; in a third, of wood, exquisitely carved, and joined like one +piece, as if it were a natural growth; vines rising at the bases of the +walls, and spreading under the roof. There was no forced consistency. +Forms suitable only for the support of heavy masses of masonry, or for the +solemn effects of church interiors, were not here introduced. From +straight window-cornices of dark wood, slenderly gilt, but richly carved, +fell cataracts of gleaming satin, softened in effect with laces of rare +appreciation. + +The frescoes and panel-work were a study by themselves, uniting the +classic and modern styles in allegorical subjects. The paintings, selected +by the taste of Dalton, to overpower the darkness of the rooms by +intensity of color, were incorporated with the walls. There were but few +mirrors. At the end of each suite, one, of fabulous size, without frame, +made to appear, by a cunning arrangement of dark draperies, like a +transparent portion of the wall itself, extended the magnificence of the +apartments. + +Not a flame nor a jet was anywhere visible. Tinted vases, pendent, or +resting upon pedestals, distributed harmonies and thoughts of light rather +than light itself; and yet all was visible, effulgent. The columns which +separated the apartments seemed to be composed of masses of richly-colored +flames, compelled, by some ingenious alchemy, to assume the form and +office of columns. + +In New York, _par excellence_ the city of private gorgeousness and +_petite_ magnificence, nothing had yet been seen equal to the rooms of the +glorious Denslow Palace. Even Dalton, the most capricious and critical of +men, whose nice vision had absorbed the elegancies of European taste, +pronounced them superb. The upholstery and ornamentation were composed +under the direction of celebrated artists. Palmer was consulted on the +marbles. Page (at Rome) advised the cartoons for the frescoes, and gave +laws for the colors and disposition of the draperies. The paintings, +panelled in the walls, were modern, triumphs of the art and genius of the +New World. + +Until the hour for dancing, prolonged melodies of themes modulated in the +happiest moments of the great composers floated in the perfumed air from a +company of unseen musicians, while the guests moved through the vast +apartments, charmed or exalted by their splendor, or conversed in groups, +every voice subdued and intelligent. + +At midnight began the modish music of the dance, and groups of beautiful +girls moved like the atoms of Chladni on the vibrating crystal, with their +partners, to the sound of harps and violins, in pleasing figures or +inebriating spirals. + +When supper was served, the ivory fronts of a cabinet of gems divided +itself in the centre,--the two halves revolving upon silver hinges,--and +discovered a hall of great height and dimensions, walled with crimson +damask, supporting pictures of all the masters of modern art. The dome- +like roof of this hall was of marble variously colored, and the floor +tessellated and mosaicked in grotesque and graceful figures of Vesuvian +lavas and painted porcelain. + +The tables, couches, chairs, and _vis-a-vis_ in this hall were of plain +pattern and neutral dead colors, not to overpower or fade the pictures on +the walls, or the gold and Parian service of the cedar tables. + +But the chief beauty of this unequalled supper-room was an immense bronze +candelabrum, which rose in the centre from a column of black marble. It +was the figure of an Italian elm, slender and of thin foliage, embraced, +almost enveloped, in a vine, which reached out and supported itself in +hanging from all the branches; the twigs bearing fruit, not of grapes, but +of a hundred little spheres of crimson, violet, and golden light, whose +combination produced a soft atmosphere of no certain color. + +Neither Honoria, Dalton, nor myself remained long in the gallery. We +retired with a select few, and were served in an antechamber, separated +from the grand reception-room by an arch, through which, by putting aside +a silk curtain, Honoria could see, at a distance, any that entered, as +they passed in from the hall. + +My own position was such that I could look over her shoulder and see as +she saw. _Vis-a-vis_ with her, and consequently with myself, was Adonaïs, +a celebrated author, and person of the _beau monde_. On his left, Dalton, +always mysteriously elegant and dangerously witty. Denslow and Jeffrey +Lethal, the critic, completed our circle. The conversation was easy, +animated, personal. + +"You are fortunate in having a woman of taste to manage your +entertainments," said Lethal, in answer to a remark of Denslow's,--"but in +bringing these people together she has made a sad blunder." + +"And what may that be?" inquired Dalton, mildly. + +"Your guests are too well behaved, too fine, and on their guard; there are +no butts, no palpable fools or vulgarians; and, worse, there are many +distinguished, but no one great man,--no social or intellectual sovereign +of the occasion." + +Honoria looked inquiringly at Lethal. "Pray, Mr. Lethal, tell me who he +is? I thought there was no such person in America," she added, with a look +of reproachful inquiry at Dalton and myself, as if we should have found +this sovereign and suggested him. + +"You are right, my dear queen; Lethal is joking," responded Dalton; "we +are a democracy, and have only a queen of"---- + +"Water ices," interrupted Lethal; "but, as for the king you seek, as +democracies finally come to that,"---- + +"Good Heavens!" exclaimed Honoria, raising the curtain, "it must be he +that is coming in." + +Honoria frowned slightly, rose, and advanced to meet a new-comer, who had +entered unannounced, and was advancing alone. Dalton followed to support +her. I observed their movements,--Lethal and Adonaïs using my face as a +mirror of what was passing beyond the curtain. + +The masses of level light from the columns on the left seemed to envelope +the stranger, who came toward us from the entrance, as if he had divined +the presence of Honoria in the alcove. + +He was about the middle height, Napoleonic in form and bearing, with +features of marble paleness, firm, and sharply defined. His hair and +magnificent Asiatic beard were jetty black, curling, and naturally +disposed. Under his dark and solid brows gleamed large eyes of abysmal +blackness and intensity. + +"Is it Lord N----?" whispered Lethal, moved from his habitual coldness by +the astonishment which he read in my face. + +"Senator D----, perhaps," suggested Denslow, whose ideas, like his person, +aspired to the senatorial. + +"Dumas," hinted Adonaïs, an admirer of French literature. "I heard he was +expected." + +"No," I answered, "but certainly in appearance the most noticeable man +living. Let us go out and be introduced." + +"Perhaps," said Lethal, "it is the d----." + +All rose instantly at the idea, and we went forward, urged by irresistible +curiosity. + +As we drew near the stranger, who was conversing with Honoria and Dalton, +a shudder went through me. It was a thrill of the universal Boswell; I +seemed to feel the presence of "the most aristocratic man of the age." + +Honoria introduced me. "My Lord Duke, allow me to present my friend, Mr. +De Vere; Mr. De Vere, the Duke of Rosecouleur." + +Was I, then, face to face with, nay, touching the hand of a highness,--and +that highness the monarch of the _ton_? And is this a ducal hand, white as +the albescent down of the eider-duck, which presses mine with a tender +touch, so haughty and so delicately graduated to my standing as "friend" +of the exquisite Honoria? It was too much; I could have wept; my senses +rather failed. + +Dalton fell short of himself; for, though his head stooped to none, unless +conventionally, the sudden and unaccountable presence of the Duke of +Rosecouleur annoyed and perplexed him. His own sovereignty was threatened. + +Lethal stiffened himself to the ordeal of an introduction; the affair +seemed to exasperate him. Denslow alone, of the men, was in his element. +Pompous and soft, he "cottoned" to the grandeur with the instinct of a +born satellite, and his eyes grew brighter, his body more shining and +rotund, his back more concave. His _bon-vivant_ tones, jolly and +conventional, sounded a pure barytone to the clear soprano of Honoria, in +the harmony of an obsequious welcome. + +The Duke of Rosecouleur glanced around him approvingly upon the +apartments. I believed that he had never seen anything more beautiful than +the _petite_ palace of Honoria, or more ravishing than herself. He said +little, in a low voice, and always to one person at a time. His answers +and remarks were simple and well-turned. + +Dalton allowed the others to move on, and by a slight sign drew me to him. + +"It is unexpected," he said, in a thoughtful manner, looking me full in +the eyes. + +"You knew the Duke of Rosecouleur in Europe?" + +"At Paris, yes,--and in Italy he was a travel friend; but we heard lately +that he had retired upon his estates in England; and certainly, he is the +last person we looked for here." + +"Unannounced." + +"That is a part of the singularity." + +"His name was not in the published list of arrivals; but he may have left +England incognito. Is a mistake possible?" + +"No! there is but one such man in Europe;--a handsomer or a richer does +not live." + +"An eye of wonderful depth." + +"Hands exquisite." + +"Feet, ditto." + +"And his dress and manner." + +"Unapproachable!" + +"Not a shadow of pretence;--the essence of good-breeding founded upon +extensive knowledge, and a thorough sense of position and its advantages; +--in fact, the Napoleon of the parlor." + +"But, Dalton," said I, nervously, "no one attends him." + +"No,--I thought so at first; but do you see that Mephistophelean figure, +in black, who follows the Duke a few paces behind, and is introduced to no +one?" + +"Yes. A singular creature, truly!--how thin he is!" + +"That shadow that follows his Highness is, in fact, the famous valet, Rêve +de Noir,--the prince of servants. The Duke goes nowhere without this man +as a shadow. He asserts that Rêve de Noir has no soul; and I believe him. +The face is that of a demon. It is a separate creation, equally wonderful +with the master, but not human. He was condensed out of the atmosphere of +the great world." + +As we were speaking, we observed a crowd of distinguished persons +gathered about and following his Highness, as he moved. He spoke now to +one; now to another. Honoria, fascinated, her beauty every instant +becoming more radiant, just leaned, with the lightest pressure, upon the +Duke's arm. They were promenading through the rooms. The music, soft and +low, continued, but the groups of dancers broke up, the loiterers in the +gallery came in, and as the sun draws his fifty, perhaps his hundreds of +planets, circling around and near him, this noble luminary centred in +himself the attention of all. If they could not speak with him, they could +at least speak of him. If they could not touch his hand, they could pass +before him and give one glance at his eyes. The less aristocratic were +even satisfied for the moment with watching the singular being, Rêve de +Noir,--who caught no one's eye, seemed to see no one but his master,--and +yet was not here nor there, nor in any place,--never in the way, a thing +of air, and not tangible, but only black. + +At a signal, he would advance and present to his master a perfume, a laced +handkerchief, a rose of rubies, a diamond clasp; of many with whom he +spoke the liberal Duke begged the acceptance of some little token, as an +earnest of his esteem. After interchanging a few words with Jeffrey +Lethal,--who dared not utter a sarcasm, though he chafed visibly under the +restraint,--the Duke's tasteful generosity suggested a seal ring, with an +intaglio head of Swift cut in opal, the mineral emblem of wit, which dulls +in the sunlight of fortune, and recovers its fiery points in the shade of +adversity;--Rêve de Noir, with a movement so slight, 'twas like the +flitting of a bat, placed the seal in the hand of the Duke, who, with a +charming and irresistible grace, compelled Lethal to receive it. + +To Denslow, Honoria, Dalton, and myself he offered nothing.--Strange?--Not +at all. Was he not the guest, and had not I been presented to him by +Honoria as her "friend?"--a word of pregnant meaning to a Duke of +Rosecouleur! + +To Adonaïs he gave _a lock of hair_ of the great novelist, Dumas, in a +locket of yellow tourmaline,--a stone usually black. Lethal smiled at +this. He felt relieved. + +"The Duke," thought he, "must be a humorist." + +From my coarse way of describing this, you would suppose that it was a +farcical exhibition of vulgar extravagance, and the Duke a madman or an +impostor; but the effect was different. It was done with grace, and, in +the midst of so much else, it attracted only that side regard, at +intervals, which is sure to surprise and excite awe. + +Honoria had almost ceased to converse with us. It was painful to her to +talk with any person. She followed the Duke with her eyes. When, by some +delicate allusion or attention, he let her perceive that she was in his +thoughts, a mantling color overspread her features, and then gave way to +paleness, and a manner which attracted universal remark. It was then +Honoria abdicated that throne of conventional purity which hitherto she +had held undisputed. Women who were plain in her presence outshone +Honoria, by meeting this ducal apparition, that called itself +Rosecouleur,--and which might have been, for aught they knew, a fume of +the Infernal, shaped to deceive us all,--with calm and haughty propriety. + +The sensation did not subside. The music of the waltz invited a renewal of +that intoxicating whirl which isolates friends and lovers, in whispering +and sighing pairs, in the midst of a great assemblage. All the world +looked on, when Honoria Denslow placed her hand upon the shoulder of the +Duke of Rosecouleur, and the noble and beautiful forms began silently and +smoothly turning, with a dream-like motion. Soon she lifted her lovely +eyes and steadied their rays upon his. She leaned wholly upon his arm, and +the gloved hands completed the magnetic circle. At the close of the first +waltz, she rested a moment, leaning upon his shoulder, and his hand still +held hers,--a liberty often assumed and permitted, but not to the nobles +and the monarchs of society. She fell farther, and her ideal beauty faded +into a sensuous. + +Honoria was lost. Dalton saw it. We retired together to a room apart. He +was dispirited; called for and drank rapidly a bottle of Champagne;--it +was insufficient. + +"De Vere," said he, "affairs go badly." + +"Explain." + +"This cursed thing that people call a duke--it kills me." + +"I saw." + +"Of course you did;--the world saw; the servants saw. Honoria has fallen +to-night. I shall transfer my allegiance." + +"And Denslow?" + +"A born sycophant;--he thinks it natural that his wife should love a duke, +and a duke love his wife." + +"So would you, if you were any other than you are." + +"Faugh! it is human nature." + +"Not so; would you not as soon strangle this Rosecouleur for making love +to your wife in public, as you would another man?" + +"Rather." + +"Pooh! I give you up. If you had + simply said, 'Yes,' it would have satisfied me." + +Dalton seemed perplexed. He called a servant and sent him with an order +for Nalson, the usher, to come instantly to him. + +Nalson appeared, with his white gloves and mahogany face. + +"Nalson, you were a servant of the Duke in England?" + +"Yes, Sir." + +"Is the person now in the rooms the Duke of Rosecouleur?" + +"I have not seen him, Sir." + +"Go immediately, study the man well,--do you hear?--and come to me. Let no +one know your purpose." + +Nalson disappeared. + +I was alarmed. If "the Duke" should prove to be an impostor, we were +indeed ruined. + +In five minutes,--an hour, it seemed,--Nalson stood before us. + +"Is it he?" said Dalton, looking fixedly upon the face of the usher. + +No reply. + +"Speak the truth; you need not be afraid." + +"I cannot tell, Sir." + +"Nonsense! go and look again." + +"It is of no use, Mr. Dalton; you, who are as well acquainted with the +personal appearance of his Highness as I am, you have been deceived,--if I +have." + +"Nalson, do you believe that this person is an impostor?" said Dalton, +pointing at myself. + +"Who? Mr. De Vere, Sir?" + +"If, then, you know at sight that this gentleman is my friend Mr. De Vere, +why do you hesitate about the other?" + +"But the imitation is perfect. And there is Rêve de Noir." + +"Yes, did Rêve de Noir recognize you?" + +"I have not caught his eye. You know, Sir, that this Rêve is not, and +never was, like other men; he is a devil. One knows, and one does not know +him." + +"Were you at the door when the Duke entered?" + +"I think not; at least--I cannot tell. When I first saw him, he was in the +room, speaking with Madam Denslow." + +"Nalson, you have done wrong; no one should have entered unannounced. Send +the doorkeeper to me." + +The doorkeeper came; a gigantic negro, magnificently attired. + +"Jupiter, you were at the door when the Duke of Rosecouleur entered?" + +"Yes, Sir." + +"Did the Duke and his man come in a carriage?" + +"Yes, Sir,--a hack." + +"You may go. They are not devils," said Dalton, musingly, "or they would +not have come in a carriage." + +"You seem to have studied the spiritual mode of locomotion," said I. + +Dalton frowned. "This is serious, De Vere." + +"What mean you?" + +"I mean that Denslow is a bankrupt." + +"Explain yourself." + +"You know what an influence he carries in political circles. The G----rs, +the S----es, and their kind, have more talent, but Denslow enjoys the +secret of popularity." + +"Well, I know it." + +"In the middle counties, where he owns vast estates, and has been liberal +to debtors and tenants, he carries great favor; both parties respect him +for his ignorance and pomposity, which they mistake for simplicity and +power, as usual. The estates are mortgaged three deep, and will not hold +out a year. The shares of the Millionnaire's Hotel and the Poor Man's Bank +in the B----y are worthless. Denslow's railroad schemes have absorbed the +capital of those concerns." + +"But he had three millions." + +"Nominally. This palace has actually sunk his income." + +"Madness!" + +"Wisdom, if you will listen." + +"I am all attention." + +"The use of money is to create and hold power. Denslow was certain of the +popular and county votes; he needed only the aristocratic support, and the +A---- people would have made him Senator." + +"Fool, why was he not satisfied with his money?" + +"Do you call the farmer fool, because he is not satisfied with the soil, +but wishes to grow wheat thereon? Money is the soil of power. For much +less than a million one may gratify the senses; great fortunes are not for +sensual luxuries, but for those of the soul. To the facts, then. The +advent of this mysterious duke,--whom I doubt,--hailed by Denslow and +Honoria as a piece of wonderful good-fortune, has already shaken him and +ruined the _prestige_ of his wife. They are mad and blind." + +"Tell me, in plain prose, the _how_ and the _why_." + +"De Vere, you are dull. There are three hundred people in the rooms of the +Denslow Palace; these people are the 'aristocracy.' They control the +sentiments of the 'better class.' Opinion, like dress, descends from them. +They no longer respect Denslow, and their women have seen the weakness of +Honoria." + +"Yes, but Denslow still has 'the people.'" + +"That is not enough. I have calculated the chances, and mustered all our +available force. We shall have no support among the 'better class,' since +we are disgraced with the 'millionnaires.'" + +At this moment Denslow came in. + +"Ah! Dalton,--like you! I have been looking for you to show the pictures. +Devil a thing I know about them. The Duke wondered at your absence." + +"Where is Honoria?" + +"Ill, ill,--fainted. The house is new; smell of new wood and mortar; +deused disagreeable in Honoria. If it had not been for the Duke, she would +have fallen. That's a monstrous clever fellow, that Rosecouleur. Admires +Honoria vastly. Come,--the pictures." + +"Mr. John Vanbrugen Denslow, you are an ass!" + +The large, smooth, florid millionnaire, dreaming only of senatorial +honors, the shouts of the multitude, and the adoration of a party press, +cowered like a dog under the lash of the "man of society." + +"Rather rough,--ha, De Vere? What have _I_ done? Am I an ass because I +know nothing of pictures? Come, Dalton, you are harsh with your old +friend." + +"Denslow, I have told you a thousand times never to concede position." + +"Yes, but this is a duke, man,--a prince!" + +"This from you? By Jove, De Vere, I wish you and I could live a hundred +years, to see a republican aristocrat. We are still mere provincials," +added Dalton, with a sigh. + +Denslow perspired with mortification. + +"You use me badly,--I tell you, Dalton, this Rosecouleur is a devil. +Condescend to him! be haughty and--what do you call it?--urbane to him! I +defy _you_ to do it, with all your impudence. Why, his valet, that shadow +that glides after him, is too much for me. Try him yourself, man." + +"Who, the valet?" + +"No, the master,--though I might have said the valet." + +"Did I yield in Paris?" + +"No, but you were of the embassy, and--and--_no one really knew us_, you +know." + +Dalton pressed his lips hard together. + +"Come," said he, "De Vere, let us try a fall with this Titan of the +carpet." + +Denslow hastened back to the Duke. I followed Dalton; but as for me, bah! +I am a cipher. + +The room in which we were adjoined Honoria's boudoir, from which a secret +passage led down by a spiral to a panel behind hangings; raising these, +one could enter the drawing-room unobserved. Dalton paused midway in the +secret passage, and through a loop or narrow window concealed by +architectural ornaments, and which overlooked the great drawing-rooms, +made a reconnaissance of the field. + +Nights of Venice! what a scene was there! The vine-branch chandeliers, +crystal-fruited, which depended from the slender ribs of the ceiling, cast +a rosy dawn of light, deepening the green and crimson of draperies and +carpets, making an air like sunrise in the bowers of a forest. Form and +order were everywhere visible, though unobtrusive. Arch beyond arch, to +fourth apartments, lessening in dimension, with increase of wealth;-- +groups of beautiful women, on either hand, seated or half reclined; the +pure or rich hues of their robes blending imperceptibly, or in gorgeous +contrasts, with the soft outlines and colors of their supports; a banquet +for the eyes and the mind; the perfect work of art and culture;--gliding +about and among these, or, with others, springing and revolving in that +monarch of all measures, which blends luxury and purity, until it is +either the one or the other, moved the men. + +"That is my work," exclaimed Dalton, unconsciously. + +"Not _all_, I think." + +"I mean the combinations,--the effect. But see! Honoria will again accept +the Duke's invitation. He is coming to her. Let us prevent it." + +He slipped away; and I, remaining at my post of observation, saw him, an +instant later, passing quickly across the floor among the dancers, toward +Honoria. The Duke of Rosecouleur arrived at the same instant before her. +She smiled sorrowfully upon Dalton, and held out her hand in a languid +manner toward the Duke, and again they floated away upon the eddies of the +music. I followed them with eyes fixed in admiration. It was a vision of +the orgies of Olympus,--Zeus and Aphrodite circling to a theme of Chronos. + +Had Honoria tasted of the Indian drug, the weed of paradise? Her eyes, +fixed upon the Duke's, shone like molten sapphires. A tress of chestnut +hair, escaping from the diamond coronet, sprang lovingly forward and +twined itself over her white shoulder and still fairer bosom. Tints like +flitting clouds, Titianic, the mystery and despair of art, disclosed to +the intelligent eye the feeling that mastered her spirit and her sense. +Admirable beauty! Unrivalled, unhappy! The Phidian idol of gold and ivory, +into which a demon had entered, overthrown, and the worshippers gazing on +it with a scorn unmixed with pity! + +The sullen animal rage of battle is nothing to the livor, the burning +hatred of the drawing-room. Dalton, defeated, cast a glance of deadly +hostility on the Duke. Nor was it lost. While the waltz continued, for ten +minutes, he stood motionless. Fearing some untoward event, I came down and +took my place near him. + +The Duke led Honoria to a sofa. But for his arm she would again have +fallen. Dalton had recovered his courage and natural haughtiness. The tone +of his voice, rich, tender, and delicately expressive, did not change. + +"Honoria, you sent for _me_; and the Duke wishes to see the pictures. The +air of the gallery will relieve your faintness." + +He offered his arm, which she, rising mechanically, accepted. A deep blush +crimsoned her features, at the allusion to her weakness. Several of the +guests moved after us, as we passed into the gallery. The Duke's shadow, +Rêve de Noir, following last, closed the ivory doors. We passed through +the gallery,--where pyramids of sunny fruits, in baskets of fine +porcelain, stood relieved by gold and silver services for wine and coffee, +disposed on the tables,--and thence entered another and smaller room, +devoid of ornament, but the crimson tapestried walls were covered with +works or copies of the great masters of Italy. + +Opposite the entrance there was a picture of a woman seated on a throne, +behind which stood a demon whispering in her ear and pointing to a +handsome youth in the circle of the courtiers. The design and color were +in the style of Correggio. Denslow stood close behind me. In advance were +Honoria, Dalton, and the Duke, whose conversation was addressed +alternately to her and Dalton. The lights of the gallery burst forth in +their full refulgence as we approached the picture. + +The glorious harmony of its colors,--the force of the shadows, which +seemed to be converging in the rays of a single unseen source of light,-- +the unity of sentiment, which drew all the groups together, in the idea;-- +I had seen all this before, but with the eyes of supercilious criticism. +Now the picture smote us with awe. + +"I have the original of this excellent work," said the Duke, "in my house +at A----, but your copy is nearly as good." + +The remark, intended for Honoria, reached the pride of her companion, who +blandly replied,-- + +"Your Highness's exquisite judgment is for once at fault. The piece is +original. It was purchased from a well-known collection in Italy, where +there are none others of the school." + +Honoria was gazing upon the picture, as I was, in silent astonishment. + +"If this," said she, "is a copy, what must have been the genuine work? Did +you never before notice the likeness between the queen, in that picture, +and myself?" she asked, addressing Dalton. + +The remark excited general attention. Every one murmured, "The likeness is +perfect." + +"And the demon behind the queen," said Denslow, insipidly, "resembles your +Highness's valet." + +There was another exclamation. No sooner was it observed, than the +likeness to Rêve de Noir seemed to be even more perfect. + +The Duke made a sign. + +Rêve de Noir placed himself near the canvas. His profile was the +counterpart of that in the painting. He seemed to have stepped out of it. + +"It was I," said the Duke, in a gentle voice, and with a smile which just +disclosed the ivory line under the black moustache, "who caused this +picture to be copied and altered. The beauty of the Hon. Mrs. Denslow, +whom it was my highest pleasure to know, seemed to me to surpass that of +the queen of my original. I first, with great secrecy, unknown to your +wife," continued the Duke, turning to Denslow, "procured a portrait from +the life by memory, which was afterwards transferred to this canvas. The +resemblance to my attendant is, I confess, remarkable and inexplicable." + +"But will you tell us by what accident this copy happened to be in Italy?" +asked Dalton. + +"You will remember," replied the Duke, coldly, "that at Paris, noticing +your expressions of admiration for the picture, which you had seen in my +English gallery, I gave you a history of its purchase at Bologna by +myself. I sent my artist to Bologna, with orders to place the copy in the +gallery and to introduce the portrait of the lady; it was a freak of +fancy; I meant it for a surprise; as I felt sure, that, if you saw the +picture, you would secure it. + +"It seems to me," replied Dalton, "that the _onus_ of proof rests with +your Highness." + +The Duke made a signal to Rêve de Noir, who again stepped up to the +canvas, and, with a short knife or stiletto, removed a small portion of +the outer layer of paint, disclosing a very ancient ground of some other +and inferior work, over which the copy seemed to have been painted. The +proof was unanswerable. + +"Good copies," remarked the Duke, "are often better than originals." + +He offered his arm to Honoria, and they walked through the gallery,--he +entertaining her, and those near him, with comments upon other works. The +crowd followed them, as they moved on or returned, as a cloud of gnats +follow up and down, and to and fro, a branch tossing in the wind. + +"Beaten at every point," I said, mentally, looking on the pale features of +the defeated Dalton. + +"Yes," he replied, seeing the remark in my face; "but there is yet time. I +am satisfied this is the man with whom we travelled; none other could have +devised such a plan, or carried it out. He must have fallen in love with +Honoria at that time; and simply to see her is the object of his visit to +America. He is a connoisseur in pictures as in women; but he must not be +allowed to ruin us by his arrogant assumptions." + +"Excepting his manner and extraordinary personal advantages, I find +nothing in him to awe or astonish." + +"His wealth is incalculable; he is used to victories; and that manner +which you affect to slight,--that is everything. 'Tis power, success, +victory. This man of millions, this prince, does not talk; he has but +little use for words. It is manner, and not words, that achieves social +and amatory conquests." + +"Bah! You are like the politicians, who mistake accidents for principles. +But even you are talking, while this pernicious foreigner is acting. See! +they have left the gallery, and the crowd of fools is following them. You +cannot stem such a tide of folly." + +"I deny that they are fools. Why does that sallow wretch, Lethal, follow +them? Or that enamelled person, Adonaïs? They are at a serpent-charming, +and Honoria is the bird-of-paradise. They watch with delight, and sketch +as they observe, the struggles of the poor bird. The others are +indifferent or curious, envious or amused. It is only Denslow who is +capped and antlered, and the shafts aimed at his foolish brow glance and +wound us." + +We were left alone in the gallery. Dalton paced back and forth, in his +slow, erect, and graceful manner; there was no hurry or agitation. + +"How quickly," said he, as his moist eyes met mine, "how like a dream, +this glorious vision, this beautiful work, will fade and be forgotten! +Nevertheless, I made it," he added, musingly. "It was I who moulded and +expanded the sluggish millions." + +"You will still be what you are, Dalton,--an artist, more than a man of +society. You work with a soft and perishable material." + +"A distinction without a difference. Every _man_ is a politician, but only +every artist is a gentleman." + +"Denslow, then, is ruined." + +"Yes and no;--there is nothing in him to ruin. It is I who am the +sufferer." + +"And Honoria?" + +"It was I who formed her manners, and guided her perceptions of the +beautiful. It was I who married her to a mass of money, De Vere." + +"Did you never love Honoria?" + +He laughed. + +"Loved? Yes; as Praxiteles may have loved the clay he moulded,--for its +smoothness and ductility under the hand." + +"The day has not come for such men as you, Dalton." + +"Come, and gone, and coming. It has come in dream-land. Let us follow your +fools." + +The larger gallery was crowded. The pyramids of glowing fruit had +disappeared; there was a confused murmur of pairs and parties, chatting +and taking wine. The master of the house, his wife, and guest were nowhere +to be seen. Lethal and Adonaïs stood apart, conversing. As we approached +them unobserved, Dalton checked me. "Hear what these people are saying," +said he. + +"My opinion is," said Lethal, holding out his crooked forefinger like a +claw, "that this _soi-disant_ duke--what the deuse is his name?" + +"Rosecouleur," interposed Adonaïs, in a tone of society. + +"Right,--Couleur de Rose is an impostor,--an impostor, a sharper. +Everything tends that way. What an utter sell it would be!" + +"You were with us at the picture scene?" murmured Adonaïs. + +"Yes. Dalton looked wretchedly cut up, when that devil of a valet, who +must be an accomplice, scraped the new paint off. The picture must have +been got up in New York by Dalton and the Denslows." + +"Perhaps the Duke, too, was got up in New York, on the same principle," +suggested Adonaïs. "Such things are possible. Society is intrinsically +rotten, you know, and Dalton"---- + +"Is a fellow of considerable talent," sneered Lethal,--"but has enemies, +who may have planned a duke." + +Adonaïs coughed in his cravat, and hinted,--"How would it do to call him +'Barnum Dalton'?" + +Adonaïs appeared shocked at himself, and swallowed a minim of wine to +cleanse his vocal apparatus from the stain of so coarse an illustration. + +"Do you hear those creatures?" whispered Dalton. "They are arranging +scandalous paragraphs for the 'Illustration.'" + +A moment after, he was gone. I spoke to Lethal and Adonaïs. + +"Gentlemen, you are in error about the picture and the Duke; they are as +they now appear;--the one, an excellent copy, purchased as an original,-- +no uncommon mistake; the other, a genuine highness. How does he strike +you?" + +Lethal cast his eyes around to see who listened. + +"The person," said he, "who is announced here to-night as an English duke +seemed to me, of all men I could select, least like one." + +"Pray, what is your ideal of an English duke, Mr. Lethal?" asked Adonaïs, +with the air of a connoisseur, sure of himself, but hating to offend. + +"A plain, solid person, well dressed, but simple; mutton-chop whiskers; +and the manners of a--a----" + +"Bear!" said a soft female voice. + +"Precisely,--the manners of a bear; a kind of gentlemanly bear, perhaps,-- +but still, ursine and heavy; while this person, who seems to have walked +out of ----- or a novel, affects me, by his ways and appearance, like a-- +a--h'm"---- + +"Gambler!" said the same female voice, in a conclusive tone. + +There was a general soft laugh. Everybody was pleased. All admired, hated, +and envied the Duke. It was settled beyond a doubt that he was an +impostor,--and that the Denslows were either grossly taken in, or were +"selling" their friends. In either case, it was shocking and delightful. + +"The fun of the thing," continued Lethal, raising his voice a little, "is, +that the painter who got up the old picture must have been as much an +admirer of the Hon. Mrs. Denslow as--his--Highness; for, in touching in +the queen, he has unconsciously made it a portrait." + +The blow was final. I moved away, grieved and mortified to the soul, +cursing the intrusion of the mysterious personage whose insolent +superiority had overthrown the hopes of my friends. + +At the door of the gallery I met G----, the painter, just returned from +London. I drew him with me into the inner gallery, to make a thorough +examination of the picture. I called his attention to the wonderful +resemblance of the queen to Honoria. He did not see it; we looked +together, and I began to think that it might have been a delusion. I told +the Duke's story of the picture to G----. He examined the canvas, tested +the layers of color, and pronounced the work genuine and of immense value. +We looked again and again at the queen's head, viewing it in every light. +The resemblance to Honoria had disappeared; nor was the demon any longer a +figure of the Duke's valet. + +"One would think," said G----, laughing, "that you had been mesmerized. If +you have been so deceived in a picture, may you not be equally cheated in +a man? I am loath to offend; but, indeed, the person whom you call +Rosecouleur cannot be the Duke of that title, whom I saw in England. I had +leave to copy a picture in his gallery. He was often present. His manners +were mild and unassuming,--not at all like those of this man, to whom, I +acknowledge, the personal resemblance is surprising. I am afraid our good +friends, the Denslows, and Mr. Dalton,--whom I esteem for their patronage +of art,--have been taken in by an adventurer." + +"But the valet, Rêve de Noir?" + +"The Duke had a valet of that name who attended him, and who may, for +aught I know, have resembled this one; but probability is against +concurrent resemblances. There is also an original of the picture in the +Duke's gallery; in fact, the artist, as was not unusual in those days, +painted two pictures of the same subject. Both, then, are genuine." + +Returning my cordial thanks to the good painter for his timely +explanation, I hastened to find Dalton. Drawing him from the midst of a +group whom he was entertaining, I communicated G----'s account of the two +pictures, and his suspicions in regard to the Duke. + +His perplexity was great. "Worse and worse, De Vere! To be ruined by a +common adventurer is more disgraceful even than the other misfortune. +Besides, our guests are leaving us. At least a hundred of them have gone +away with the first impression, and the whole city will have it. The +journal reporters have been here. Denslow's principal creditors were among +the guests to-night; they went away soon, just after the affair with the +picture; to-morrow will be our dark day. If it had not been for this demon +of a duke and his familiar, whoever they are, all would have gone well. +Now we are distrusted, and they will crush us. Let us fall facing the +enemy. Within an hour I will have the truth about the Duke. Did I ever +tell you what a price Denslow paid for that picture?" + +"No, I do not wish to hear." + +"You are right. Come with me." + +The novel disrespect excited by the scandal of Honoria and the picture +seemed to have inspired the two hundred people who remained with a +cheerful ease. Eating, drinking excessively of Denslow's costly wines, +dancing to music which grew livelier and more boisterous as the musicians +imbibed more of the inspiriting juice, and, catching scraps of the +scandal, threw out significant airs, the company of young persons, +deserted by their scandalized seniors, had converted the magnificent suite +of drawing-rooms into a carnival theatre. Parties of three and four were +junketing in corners; laughing servants rushed to and fro as in a _café_; +the lounges were occupied by reclining beauties or languid fops +overpowered with wine, about whom lovely young women, flushed with +Champagne and mischief, were coquetting and frolicking. + +"I warrant you, these people know it is our last night," said Dalton; "and +see what a use they make of us! Denslow's rich wines poured away like +water; everything soiled, smeared, and overturned; our entertainment, at +first stately and gracious as a queen's drawing-room, ending, with the +loss of _prestige_, in the riot of a _bal masqué_. So fades ambition! But +to this duke." + +Denslow, who had passed into the polite stage of inebriation, evident to +close observers, had arranged a little exclusive circle, which included +three women of fashionable reputation, his wife, the Duke, Jeffrey Lethal, +and Adonaïs. Rêve de Noir officiated as attendant. The _fauteuils_ and +couches were disposed around a pearl table, on which were liquors, coffee, +wines, and a few delicacies for Honoria, who had not supped. They were in +the purple recess adjoining the third drawing-room. Adonaïs talked with +the Duke about Italy; Lethal criticized; while Honoria, in the full +splendor of her beauty, outshining and overpowering, dropped here and +there a few musical words, like service-notes, to harmonize. + +There is no beauty like the newly-enamored. Dalton seemed to forget +himself, as he contemplated her, for a moment. Spaces had been left for +us; the valet placed chairs. + +"Dalton," cried Lethal, "you are in time to decide a question of deep +interest;--your friend, De Vere, will assist you. His Highness has given +preference to the women of America over those of Italy. Adonaïs, the +exquisite and mild, settles his neck-tie against the Duke, and objects in +that bland but firm manner which is his. I am the Duke's bottle-holder; +Denslow and wife accept that function for the chivalrous Adonaïs." + +"I am of the Duke's party," replied Dalton, in his most agreeable manner. +"To be in the daily converse and view of the most beautiful women in +America, as I have been for years, is a privilege in the cultivation of a +pure taste. I saw nothing in Italy, except on canvas, comparable with what +I see at this moment. The Duke is right; but in commending his judgment, I +attribute to him also sagacity. Beauty is like language; its use is to +conceal. One may, under rose-colored commendations, a fine manner, and a +flowing style, conceal, as Nature does with personal advantages in men, +the gross tastes and vulgar cunning of a charlatan." + +Dalton, in saying this, with a manner free from suspicion or excitement, +fixed his eyes upon the Duke's. + +"You seem to have no faith in either men or women," responded the rich +barytone voice of his Highness, the dark upper lip disclosing, as before, +the row of square, sharp, ivory teeth. + +"Little, very little," responded Dalton, with a sigh. "Your Highness will +understand me,--or if not now, presently." + +Lethal trod upon Adonaïs's foot; I saw him do it. Adonaïs exchanged +glances with a brilliant hawk-faced lady who sat opposite. The lady smiled +and touched her companion. Honoria, who saw everything, opened her +magnificent eyes to their full extent. Denslow was oblivious. + +"In fact," continued Dalton, perceiving the electric flash he had excited, +"skepticism is a disease of my intellect. Perhaps the most noticeable and +palpable fact of the moment is the presence and identity of the Duke who +is opposite to me; and yet, doubting as I sometimes do my own existence, +is it not natural, that, philosophically speaking, the presence and +identity of your Highness are at moments a subject of philosophical +doubt?" + +"In cases of this kind," replied the Duke, "we rest upon circumstantial +evidence." + +So saying, he drew from his finger a ring and handed it to Dalton, who +went to the light and examined it closely, and passed it to me. It was a +minute cameo, no larger than a grain of wheat, in a ring of plain gold; a +rare and beautiful work of microscopic art. + +"I seem to remember presenting the Duke of Rosecouleur with a similar +ring, in Italy," said Dalton, resuming his seat; "but the coincidence does +not resolve my philosophic doubt, excited by the affair of the picture. We +all supposed that we saw a portrait of the Hon. Mrs. Denslow in yon +picture; and we seemed to discover, under the management of your valet, +that Denslow's picture, a genuine duplicate of the original by the author, +was a modern copy. Since your Highness quitted the gallery, those +delusions have ceased. The picture appears now to be genuine. The +likeness to Mrs. Denslow has vanished." + +An exclamation of surprise from all present, except the Duke, followed +this announcement. + +"And so," continued Dalton, "it may be with this ring, which now seems to +be the one I gave the Duke at Rome, but to-morrow may be different." + +As he spoke, Dalton gave back the ring to the Duke, who received it with +his usual grace. + +"Who knows," said Lethal, with a deceptive innocence of manner, "whether +aristocracy itself be not founded in mesmerical deceptions?" + +"I think, Lethal," observed Adonaïs, "you push the matter. It would be +impossible, for instance, even for his Highness, to make Honoria Denslow +appear ugly." + +We all looked at Honoria, to whom the Duke leaned over and said,-- + +"Would you be willing for a moment to lose that exquisite beauty?" + +"For my sake, Honoria," said Dalton, "refuse him." + +The request, so simply made, was rewarded by a ravishing smile. + +"Edward, do you know that you have not spoken a kind word to me to-night, +until now?" + +Their eyes met, and I saw that Dalton trembled with a deep emotion. "I +will save you yet," he murmured. + +A tall, black hound, of the slender breed, rose up near Honoria, and, +placing his fore-paws upon the edge of the pearl table, turned and licked +her face and eyes. + +It was the vision of a moment. The dog sprang upon the sofa by the Duke's +side, growling and snapping. + +"Rêve de Noir," cried Lethal and Adonaïs, "drive the dog away!" + +The valet had disappeared. + +"I have no fear of him, gentlemen," said the Duke, patting the head of the +hound; "he is a faithful servant, and has a faculty of reading thoughts. +Go bring my servant, Demon," said the Duke. + +The hound sprang away with a great bound, and in an instant Rêve de Noir +was standing behind us. The dog did not appear again. + +Honoria looked bewildered. "Of what dog were you speaking, Edward?" + +"The hound that licked your face." + +"You are joking. I saw no hound." + +"See, gentlemen," exclaimed Lethal, "his Highness shows us tricks. He is a +wizard." + +The three women gave little shrieks,--half pleasure, half terror. + +Denslow, who had fallen back in his chair asleep, awoke and rubbed his +eyes. + +"What is all this, Honoria?" + +"That his Highness is a wizard," she said, with a forced laugh, glancing +at Dalton. + +"Will his Highness do us the honor to lay aside the mask, and appear in +his true colors?" said Dalton, returning Honoria's glance with an +encouraging look. + +"Gentlemen," said the Duke, haughtily, "I am your guest, and by +hospitality protected from insult." + +"Insult, most noble Duke!" exclaimed Lethal, with a sneer,--"impossible, +under the roof of our friend, the Honorable Walter Denslow, in the small +hours of the night, and in the presence of the finest women in the world. +Dalton, pray, reassure his Highness!" + +"Edward! Edward!" murmured Honoria, "have a care,--even if it be as you +think." + +Dalton remained bland and collected. + +"Pardon, my Lord, the effect of a little wine, and of those wonderful +fantasies you have shown us. Your dog, your servant, and yourself interest +us equally; the picture, the ring,--all are wonderful. In supposing that +you had assumed a mask, and one so noble, I was led into an error by these +miracles, expecting no less than a translation of yourself into the person +of some famous wonder-worker. It is, you know, a day of miracles, and even +kings have their salaried seers, and take counsel of the spiritual world. +More!--let us have more!" + +The circle were amazed; the spirit of superstitious curiosity seized upon +them. + +"Rêve de Noir," said the Duke, "a carafe, and less light." + +The candelabra became dim. The Duke took the carafe of water from the +valet, and, standing up, poured it upon the air; it broke into flames, +which mounted and floated away, singly or in little crowds. Still the Duke +poured, and dashing up the water with his hand, by and by the ceiling was +illuminated with a thousand miniature tongues of violet-colored fire. We +clapped our hands, and applauded,--"Beautiful I marvellous! wonderful, +Duke!--your Highness is the only magician,"--when, on a sudden, the flames +disappeared and the lights rose again. + +"The world is weary of skepticism," remarked Lethal; "there is no +chemistry for that. It is the true magic, doubtless,--recovered from +antiquity by his Highness. Are the wonders exhausted?" + +The Duke smiled again. He stretched out his hand toward Honoria, and she +slept. It was the work of an instant. + +"I have seen that before," said Dalton. + +"Not as we see it," responded his Highness. "Rêve de Noir, less light!" +The room was dark in a moment. Over the head of Honoria appeared a cloud, +at first black, and soon in this a nucleus of light, which expanded and +shaped itself into an image and took the form of the sleeper, nude and +spiritual, a belt of rosy mist enveloping and concealing all but a head +and bust of ravishing beauty. The vision gazed with languid and beseeching +eyes upon Dalton, and a sigh seemed to heave the bosom. In scarce a +breathing-time, it was gone. Honoria waked, unconscious of what had +passed. + +Deep terror and amazement fell upon us all. + +"I have seen enough," said Dalton, rising slowly, and drawing a small +riding-whip, "to know now that this person is no duke, but either a +charlatan or a devil. In either case, since he has intruded here, to +desecrate and degrade, I find it proper to apply a magic more material." + +At the word, all rose exclaiming,--"For God's sake, Dalton!" He pressed +forward and laid his hand upon the Duke. A cry burst from Rêve de Noir +which rent our very souls; and a flash followed, unspeakably bright, which +revealed the demoniacal features of the Duke, who sat motionless, +regarding Dalton's uplifted arm. A darkness followed, profound and +palpable. I listened in terror. There was no sound. Were we transformed? +Silence, darkness, still. I closed my eyes, and opened them again. A pale, +cold light became slowly perceptible, stealing through a crevice, and +revealing the walls and ceiling of my narrow room. The dream still +oppressed me. I went to the window, and let in reality with the morning +light. Yet, for days after, the images of the real Honoria and Dalton, my +friends, remained separated from the creatures of the vision; and the +Denslow Palace of dreamland, the pictures, the revelry, and the magic of +the Demon Duke haunted my memory, and kept with them all their visionary +splendors and regrets. + + + + +MYRTLE FLOWERS + + +Since Love within my heart made nest, + With the fond trust of brooding bird, + I find no all-embracing word +To say how deeply I am blest. + +Though wintry clouds are in the air + And the dead leaves unburied lie, + Nor open is the violet's eye, +I see new beauty everywhere. + +I walk beneath the naked trees, + Where wild streams shiver as they pass, + Yet in the sere and sighing grass +I hear a murmur as of bees,-- + +The bees that in love's morning rise + From tender eyes and lips to drain, + In ecstasies of blissful pain, +The sweets that bloomed in Paradise. + +There twines a joy with every care + That springs within this sacred ground; + But, oh! to give what I have found +Doth thrill me with divine despair. + +If distant, thou dost rise a star + Whose beams are with my being wrought, + And curvest all my teeming thought +With sweet attractions from afar. + +As a winged ship, in calmest hour, + Still moves upon the mighty sea + To some deep ocean melody, +I feel thy spirit and thy power. + + + + +CHESUNCOOK + +[Continued] + + +How far men go for the material of their houses! The inhabitants of the +most civilized cities, in all ages, send into far, primitive forests, +beyond the bounds of their civilization, where the moose and bear and +savage dwell, for their pine-boards for ordinary use. And, on the other +hand, the savage soon receives from cities iron arrow-points, hatchets, +and guns to point his savageness with. + +The solid and well-defined fir-tops, like sharp and regular spear-heads, +black against the sky, gave a peculiar, dark, and sombre look to the +forest. The spruce-tops have a similar, but more ragged outline,--their +shafts also merely feathered below. The firs were somewhat oftener regular +and dense pyramids. I was struck by this universal spiring upward of the +forest evergreens. The tendency is to slender, spiring tops, while they +are narrower below. Not only the spruce and fir, but even the arbor-vitae +and white pine, unlike the soft, spreading second-growth, of which I saw +none, all spire upwards, lifting a dense spear-head of cones to the light +and air, at any rate, while their branches straggle after as they may; as +Indians lift the ball over the heads of the crowd in their desperate game. +In this they resemble grasses, as also palms somewhat. The hemlock is +commonly a tent-like pyramid from the ground to its summit. + +After passing through some long rips and by a large island, we reached an +interesting part of the river called the Pine-Stream Dead-Water, about six +miles below Ragmuff, where the river expanded to thirty rods in width and +had many islands in it, with elms and canoe-birches, now yellowing, along +the shore, and we got our first sight of Katadn. + +Here, about two o'clock, we turned up a small branch three or four rods +wide, which comes in on the right from the south, called Pine Stream, to +look for moose signs. We had gone but a few rods before we saw very recent +signs along the water's edge, the mud lifted up by their feet being quite +fresh, and Joe declared that they had gone along there but a short time +before. We soon reached a small meadow on the east side, at an angle in +the stream, which was for the most part densely covered with alders. As we +were advancing along the edge of this, rather more quietly than usual, +perhaps, on account of the freshness of the signs,--the design being to +camp up this stream, if it promised well,--I heard a slight crackling of +twigs deep in the alders, and turned Joe's attention to it; whereupon he +began to push the canoe back rapidly; and we had receded thus half a dozen +rods, when we suddenly spied two moose standing just on the edge of the +open part of the meadow which we had passed, not more than six or seven +rods distant, looking round the alders at us. They made me think of great +frightened rabbits, with their long ears and half-inquisitive, half- +frightened looks; the true denizens of the forest, (I saw at once,) +filling a vacuum which now first I discovered had not been filled for me, +--_moose-_men, _wood-eaters_, the word is said to mean,--clad in a sort of +Vermont gray, or homespun. Our Nimrod, owing to the retrograde movement, +was now the farthest from the game; but being warned of its neighborhood, +he hastily stood up, and, while we ducked, fired over our heads one barrel +at the foremost, which alone he saw, though he did not know what kind of +creature it was; whereupon this one dashed across the meadow and up a high +bank on the north-east, so rapidly as to leave but an indistinct +impression of its outlines on my mind. At the same instant, the other, a +young one, but as tall as a horse, leaped out into the stream, in full +sight, and there stood cowering for a moment, or rather its +disproportionate lowness behind gave it that appearance, and uttering two +or three trumpeting squeaks. I have an indistinct recollection of seeing +the old one pause an instant on the top of the bank in the woods, look +toward its shivering young, and then dash away again. The second barrel +was levelled at the calf, and when we expected to see it drop in the +water, after a little hesitation, it, too, got out of the water, and +dashed up the hill, though in a somewhat different direction. All this was +the work of a few seconds, and our hunter, having never seen a moose +before, did not know but they were deer, for they stood partly in the +water, nor whether he had fired at the same one twice or not. From the +style in which they went off, and the fact that he was not used to +standing up and firing from a canoe, I judged that we should not see +anything more of them. The Indian said that they were a cow and her calf, +--a yearling, or perhaps two years old, for they accompany their dams so +long; but, for my part, I had not noticed much difference in their size. +It was but two or three rods across the meadow to the foot of the bank, +which, like all the world thereabouts, was densely wooded; but I was +surprised to notice, that, as soon as the moose had passed behind the veil +of the woods, there was no sound of foot-steps to be heard from the soft, +damp moss which carpets that forest, and long before we landed, perfect +silence reigned. Joe said, "If you wound 'em moose, me sure get 'em." + +We all landed at once. My companion reloaded; the Indian fastened his +birch, threw off his hat, adjusted his waistband, seized the hatchet, and +set out. He told me afterward, casually, that before we landed he had seen +a drop of blood on the bank, when it was two or three rods off. He +proceeded rapidly up the bank and through the woods, with a peculiar, +elastic, noiseless, and stealthy tread, looking to right and left on the +ground, and stepping in the faint tracks of the wounded moose, now and +then pointing in silence to a single drop of blood on the handsome, +shining leaves of the Clintonia Borealis, which, on every side, covered +the ground, or to a dry fern-stem freshly broken, all the while chewing +some leaf or else the spruce gum. I followed, watching his motions more +than the trail of the moose. After following the trail about forty rods in +a pretty direct course, stepping over fallen trees and winding between +standing ones, he at length lost it, for there were many other moose- +tracks there, and, returning once more to the last bloodstain, traced it a +little way and lost it again, and, too soon, I thought, for a good hunter, +gave it up entirely. He traced a few steps, also, the tracks of the calf; +but, seeing no blood, soon relinquished the search. + +I observed, while he was tracking the moose, a certain reticence or +moderation in him. He did not communicate several observations of interest +which he made, as a white man would have done, though they may have leaked +out afterward. At another time, when we heard a slight crackling of twigs +and he landed to reconnoitre, he stepped lightly and gracefully, stealing +through the bushes with the least possible noise, in a way in which no +white man does,--as it were, finding a place for his foot each time. + +About half an hour after seeing the moose, we pursued our voyage up Pine +Stream, and soon, coming to a part which was very shoal and also rapid, we +took out the baggage, and proceeded to carry it round, while Joe got up +with the canoe alone. We were just completing our portage and I was +absorbed in the plants, admiring the leaves of the aster macrophyllus, ten +inches wide, and plucking the seeds of the great round-leaved orchis, when +Joe exclaimed from the stream that he had killed a moose. He had found the +cow-moose lying dead, but quite warm, in the middle of the stream, which +was so shallow that it rested on the bottom, with hardly a third of its +body above water. It was about an hour after it was shot, and it was +swollen with water. It had run about a hundred rods and sought the stream +again, cutting off a slight bend. No doubt, a better hunter would have +tracked it to this spot at once. I was surprised at its great size, horse- +like, but Joe said it was not a large cow-moose. My companion went in +search of the calf again. I took hold of the ears of the moose, while Joe +pushed his canoe down stream toward a favorable shore, and so we made out, +though with some difficulty, its long nose frequently sticking in the +bottom, to drag it into still shallower water. It was a brownish black, or +perhaps a dark iron-gray, on the back and sides, but lighter beneath and +in front. I took the cord which served for the canoe's painter, and with +Joe's assistance measured it carefully, the greatest distances first, +making a knot each time. The painter being wanted, I reduced these +measures that night with equal care to lengths and fractions of my +umbrella, beginning with the smallest measures, and untying the knots as I +proceeded; and when we arrived at Chesuncook the next day, finding a two- +foot rule there, I reduced the last to feet and inches; and, moreover, I +made myself a two-foot rule of a thin and narrow strip of black ash which +would fold up conveniently to six inches. All this pains I took because I +did not wish to be obliged to say merely that the moose was very large. Of +the various dimensions which I obtained I will mention only two. The +distance from the tips of the hoofs of the fore-feet, stretched out, to +the top of the back between the shoulders, was seven feet and five inches. +I can hardly believe my own measure, for this is about two feet greater +than the height of a tall horse. The extreme length was eight feet and two +inches. Another cow-moose, which I have since measured in those woods with +a tape, was just six feet from the tip of the hoof to the shoulders, and +eight feet long as she lay. + +When afterward I asked an Indian at the carry how much taller the male +was, he answered, "Eighteen inches," and made me observe the height of a +cross-stake over the fire, more than four feet from the ground, to give +me some idea of the depth of his chest. Another Indian, at Oldtown, told +me that they were nine feet high to the top of the back, and that one +which he tried weighed eight hundred pounds. The length of the spinal +projections between the shoulders is very great. A white hunter, who was +the best authority among hunters that I could have, told me that the male +was _not_ eighteen inches taller than the female; yet he agreed that he +was sometimes nine feet high to the top of the back, and weighed a +thousand pounds. Only the male has horns, and they rise two feet or more +above the shoulders,--spreading three or four, and sometimes six feet,-- +which would make him in all, sometimes, eleven feet high! According to +this calculation, the moose is as tall, though it may not be as large, as +the great Irish elk, Megaceros Hibernicus, of a former period, of which +Mantell says that it "very far exceeded in magnitude any living species, +the skeleton" being "upward of ten feet high from the ground to the +highest point of the antlers." Joe said, that, though the moose shed the +whole horn annually, each new horn has an additional prong; but I have +noticed that they sometimes have more prongs on one side than on the +other. I was struck with the delicacy and tenderness of the hoofs, which +divide very far up, and the one half could be pressed very much behind the +other, thus probably making the animal surer-footed on the uneven ground +and slippery moss-covered logs of the primitive forest. They were very +unlike the stiff and battered feet of our horses and oxen. The bare, horny +part of the fore-foot was just six inches long, and the two portions could +be separated four inches at the extremities. + +The moose is singularly grotesque and awkward to look at. Why should it +stand so high at the shoulders? Why have so long a head? Why have no tail +to speak of? for in my examination I overlooked it entirely. Naturalists +say it is an inch and a half long. It reminded me at once of the +camelopard, high before and low behind,--and no wonder, for, like it, it +is fitted to browse on trees. The upper lip projected two inches beyond +the lower for this purpose. This was the kind of man that was at home +there; for, as near as I can learn, that has never been the residence, but +rather the hunting-ground of the Indian. The moose will perhaps one day +become extinct; but how naturally then, when it exists only as a fossil +relic, and unseen as that, may the poet or sculptor invent a fabulous +animal with similar branching and leafy horns,--a sort of fucus or lichen +in bone,--to be the inhabitant of such a forest as this! + +Here, just at the head of the murmuring rapids, Joe now proceeded to skin +the moose with a pocket-knife, while I looked on; and a tragical business +it was,--to see that still warm and palpitating body pierced with a +knife, to see the warm milk stream from the rent udder, and the ghastly +naked red carcass appearing from within its seemly robe, which was made to +hide it. The ball had passed through the shoulder-blade diagonally and +lodged under the skin on the opposite side, and was partially flattened. +My companion keeps it to show to his grandchildren. He has the shanks of +another moose which he has since shot, skinned and stuffed, ready to be +made into boots by putting in a thick leather sole. Joe said, if a moose +stood fronting you, you must not fire, but advance toward him, for he will +turn slowly and give you a fair shot. In the bed of this narrow, wild, and +rocky stream, between two lofty walls of spruce and firs, a mere cleft in +the forest which the stream had made, this work went on. At length Joe had +stripped off the hide and dragged it trailing to the shore, declaring that +it weighed a hundred pounds, though probably fifty would have been nearer +the truth. He cut off a large mass of the meat to carry along, and +another, together with the tongue and nose, he put with the hide on the +shore to lie there all night, or till we returned. I was surprised that he +thought of leaving this meat thus exposed by the side of the carcass, as +the simplest course, not fearing that any creature would touch it; but +nothing did. This could hardly have happened on the bank of one of our +rivers in the eastern part of Massachusetts; but I suspect that fewer +small wild animals are prowling there than with us. Twice, however, in +this excursion I had a glimpse of a species of large mouse. + +This stream was so withdrawn, and the moose-tracks were so fresh, that my +companions, still bent on hunting, concluded to go farther up it and camp, +and then hunt up or down at night. Half a mile above this, at a place +where I saw the aster puniceus and the beaked hazel, as we paddled along, +Joe, hearing a slight rustling amid the alders, and seeing something black +about two rods off, jumped up and whispered, "Bear!" but before the hunter +had discharged his piece, he corrected himself to "Beaver!"--"Hedgehog!" +The bullet killed a large hedgehog, more than two feet and eight inches +long. The quills were rayed out and flattened on the hinder part of its +back, even as if it had lain on that part, but were erect and long between +this and the tail. Their points, closely examined, were seen to be finely +bearded or barbed, and shaped like an awl, that is, a little concave, to +give the barbs effect. After about a mile of still water, we prepared our +camp on the right side, just at the foot of a considerable fall. Little +chopping was done that night, for fear of scaring the moose. We had moose- +meat fried for supper. It tasted like tender beef, with perhaps more +flavor,--sometimes like veal. + +After supper, the moon having risen, we proceeded to hunt a mile up this +stream, first "carrying" about the falls. We made a picturesque sight, +wending single-file along the shore, climbing over rocks and logs,--Joe, +who brought up the rear, twirling his canoe in his hands as if it were a +feather, in places where it was difficult to get along without a burden. + +We launched the canoe again from the ledge over which the stream fell, but +after half a mile of still water, suitable for hunting, it became rapid +again, and we were compelled to make our way along the shore, while Joe +endeavored to get up in the birch alone, though it was still very +difficult for him to pick his way amid the rocks in the night. We on the +shore found the worst of walking, a perfect chaos of fallen and drifted +trees, and of bushes projecting far over the water, and now and then we +made our way across the mouth of a small tributary on a kind of net-work +of alders. So we went tumbling on in the dark, being on the shady side, +effectually scaring all the moose and bears that might be thereabouts. At +length we came to a standstill, and Joe went forward to reconnoitre; but +he reported that it was still a continuous rapid as far as he went, or +half a mile, with no prospect of improvement, as if it were coming down +from a mountain. So we turned about, hunting back to the camp through the +still water. It was a splendid moonlight night, and I, getting sleepy as +it grew late,--for I had nothing to do,--found it difficult to realize +where I was. This stream was much more unfrequented than the main one, +lumbering operations being no longer carried on in this quarter. It was +only three or four rods wide, but the firs and spruce through which it +trickled seemed yet taller by contrast. Being in this dreamy state, which +the moonlight enhanced, I did not clearly discern the shore, but seemed, +most of the time, to be floating through ornamental grounds,--for I +associated the fir-tops with such scenes;--very high up some Broadway, and +beneath or between their tops, I thought I saw an endless succession of +porticos and columns, cornices and façades, verandas and churches. I did +not merely fancy this, but in my drowsy state such was the illusion. I +fairly lost myself in sleep several times, still dreaming of that +architecture and the nobility that dwelt behind and might issue from it; +but all at once I would be aroused and brought back to a sense of my +actual position by the sound of Joe's birch horn in the midst of all this +silence calling the moose, _ugh, ugh, oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo_, and I prepared +to hear a furious moose come rushing and crashing through the forest, and +see him burst out on to the little strip of meadow by our side. + +But, on more accounts than one, I had had enough of moose-hunting. I had +not come to the woods for this purpose, nor had I foreseen it, though I +had been willing to learn how the Indian manoeuvred; but one moose killed +was as good, if not as bad, as a dozen. The afternoon's tragedy, and my +share in it, as it affected the innocence, destroyed the pleasure of my +adventure. It is true, I came as near as is possible to come to being a +hunter and miss it, myself; and as it is, I think that I could spend a +year in the woods, fishing and hunting, just enough to sustain myself, +with satisfaction. This would be next to living like a philosopher on the +fruits of the earth which you had raised, which also attracts me. But this +hunting of the moose merely for the satisfaction of killing him,--not even +for the sake of his hide,--without making any extraordinary exertion or +running any risk yourself, is too much like going out by night to some +wood-side pasture and shooting your neighbor's horses. These are God's own +horses, poor, timid creatures, that will run fast enough as soon as they +smell you, though they _are_ nine feet high. Joe told us of some hunters +who a year or two before had shot down several oxen by night, somewhere in +the Maine woods, mistaking them for moose. And so might any of the +hunters; and what is the difference in the sport, but the name? In the +former case, having killed one of God's and _your own_ oxen, you strip off +its hide,--because that is the common trophy, and, moreover, you have +heard that it may be sold for moccasins,--cut a steak from its haunches, +and leave the huge carcass to smell to heaven for you. It is no better, at +least, than to assist at a slaughter-house. + +This afternoon's experience suggested to me how base or coarse are the +motives which commonly carry men into the wilderness. The explorers and +lumberers generally are all hirelings, paid so much a day for their labor, +and as such they have no more love for wild nature than wood-sawyers have +for forests. Other white men and Indians who come here are for the most +part hunters, whose object is to slay as many moose and other wild animals +as possible. But, pray, could not one spend some weeks or years in the +solitude of this vast wilderness with other employments than these,-- +employments perfectly sweet and innocent and ennobling? For one that comes +with a pencil to sketch or sing, a thousand come with an axe or rifle. +What a coarse and imperfect use Indians and hunters make of Nature! No +wonder that their race is so soon exterminated. I already, and for weeks +afterward, felt my nature the coarser for this part of my woodland +experience, and was reminded that our life should be lived as tenderly and +daintily as one would pluck a flower. + +With these thoughts, when we reached our camping-ground, I decided to +leave my companions to continue moose-hunting down the stream, while I +prepared the camp, though they requested me not to chop much nor make a +large fire, for fear I should scare their game. In the midst of the damp +fir-wood, high on the mossy bank, about nine o'clock of this bright +moonlight night, I kindled a fire, when they were gone, and, sitting on +the fir-twigs, within sound of the falls, examined by its light the +botanical specimens which I had collected that afternoon, and wrote down +some of the reflections which I have here expanded; or I walked along the +shore and gazed up the stream, where the whole space above the falls was +filled with mellow light. As I sat before the fire on my fir-twig seat, +without walls above or around me, I remembered how far on every hand that +wilderness stretched, before you came to cleared or cultivated fields, and +wondered if any bear or moose was watching the light of my fire; for +Nature looked sternly upon me on account of the murder of the moose. + +Strange that so few ever come to the woods to see how the pine lives and +grows and spires, lifting its evergreen arms to the light,--to see its +perfect success; but most are content to behold it in the shape of many +broad boards brought to market, and deem that its true success! But the +pine is no more lumber than man is, and to be made into boards and houses +is no more its true and highest use than the truest use of a man is to be +cut down and made into manure. There is a higher law affecting our +relation to pines as well as to men. A pine cut down, a dead pine, is no +more a pine than a dead human carcass is a man. Can he who has discovered +only some of the values of whalebone and whale oil be said to have +discovered the true use of the whale? Can he who slays the elephant for +his ivory be said to have "seen the elephant"? These are petty and +accidental uses; just as if a stronger race were to kill us in order to +make buttons and flageolets of our bones; for everything may serve a lower +as well as a higher use. Every creature is better alive than dead, men and +moose and pine-trees, and he who understands it aright will rather +preserve its life than destroy it. + +Is it the lumberman, then, who is the friend and lover of the pine, stands +nearest to it, and understands its nature best? Is it the tanner who has +barked it, or he who has boxed it for turpentine, whom posterity will +fable to have been changed into a pine at last? No! no! it is the poet; he +it is who makes the truest use of the pine,--who does not fondle it with +an axe, nor tickle it with a saw, nor stroke it with a plane,--who knows +whether its heart is false without cutting into it,--who has not bought +the stumpage of the township on which it stands. All the pines shudder and +heave a sigh when _that_ man steps on the forest floor. No, it is the +poet, who loves them as his own shadow in the air, and lets them stand. I +have been into the lumber-yard, and the carpenter's shop, and the tannery, +and the lampblack-factory, and the turpentine clearing; but when at length +I saw the tops of the pines waving and reflecting the light at a distance +high over all the rest of the forest, I realized that the former were not +the highest use of the pine. It is not their bones or hide or tallow that +I love most. It is the living spirit of the tree, not its spirit of +turpentine, with which I sympathize, and which heals my cuts. + +Ere long, the hunters returned, not having seen a moose, but, in +consequence of my suggestions, bringing a quarter of the dead one, which, +with ourselves, made quite a load for the canoe. + +After breakfasting on moose-meat, we returned down Pine Stream on our way +to Chesuncook Lake, which was about five miles distant. We could see the +red carcass of the moose lying in Pine Stream when nearly half a mile off. +Just below the mouth of this stream were the most considerable rapids +between the two lakes, called Pine-Stream Falls, where were large flat +rocks washed smooth, and at this time you could easily wade across above +them. Joe ran down alone while we walked over the portage, my companion +collecting spruce gum for his friends at home, and I looking for flowers. +Near the lake, which we were approaching with as much expectation as if it +had been a university,--for it is not often that the stream of our life +opens into such expansions,--were islands, and a low and meadowy shore +with scattered trees, birches, white and yellow, slanted over the water, +and maples,--many of the white birches killed, apparently by inundations. +There was considerable native grass; and even a few cattle--whose +movements we heard, though we did not see them, mistaking them at first +for moose--were pastured there. + +On entering the lake, where the stream runs southeasterly, and for some +time before, we had a view of the mountains about Katadn, +(_Katahdinauquoh_ one says they are called,) like a cluster of blue fungi +of rank growth, apparently twenty-five or thirty miles distant, in a +southeast direction, their summits concealed by clouds. Joe called some of +them the _Souadneunk_ mountains. This is the name of a stream there, which +another Indian told us meant "Running between mountains." Though some +lower summits were afterward uncovered, we got no more complete view of +Katadn while we were in the woods. The clearing to which we were bound was +on the right of the mouth of the river, and was reached by going round a +low point, where the water was shallow to a great distance from the shore. +Chesuncook Lake extends northwest and southeast, and is called eighteen +miles long and three wide, without an island. We had entered the northwest +corner of it, and when near the shore could see only part way down it. The +principal mountains visible from the land here were those already +mentioned, between southeast and east, and a few summits a little west of +north, but generally the north and northwest horizon about the St. John +and the British boundary was comparatively level. + +Ansell Smith's, the oldest and principal clearing about this lake, +appeared to be quite a harbor for _bateaux_ and canoes; seven or eight of +the former were lying about, and there was a small scow for hay, and a +capstan on a platform, now high and dry, ready to be floated and anchored +to tow rafts with. It was a very primitive kind of harbor, where boats +were drawn up amid the stumps,--such a one, methought, as the Argo might +have been launched in. There were five other huts with small clearings on +the opposite side of the lake, all at this end and visible from this +point. One of the Smiths told me that it was so far cleared that they came +here to live and built the present house four years before, though the +family had been here but a few months. + +I was interested to see how a pioneer lived on this side of the country. +His life is in some respects more adventurous than that of his brother in +the West; for he contends with winter as well as the wilderness, and there +is a greater interval of time at least between him and the army which is +to follow. Here immigration is a tide which may ebb when it has swept away +the pines; there it is not a tide, but an inundation, and roads and other +improvements come steadily rushing after. + +As we approached the log-house, a dozen rods from the lake, and +considerably elevated above it, the projecting ends of the logs lapping +over each other irregularly several feet at the corners gave it a very +rich and picturesque look, far removed from the meanness of weather- +boards. It was a very spacious, low building, about eighty feet long, with +many large apartments. The walls were well clayed between the logs, which +were large and round, except on the upper and under sides, and as visible +inside as out, successive bulging cheeks gradually lessening upwards and +tuned to each other with the axe, like Pandean pipes. Probably the musical +forest-gods had not yet cast them aside; they never do till they are split +or the bark is gone. It was a style of architecture not described by +Vitruvius, I suspect, though possibly hinted at in the biography of +Orpheus; none of your frilled or fluted columns, which have cut such a +false swell, and support nothing but a gable end and their builder's +pretensions,--that is, with the multitude; and as for "ornamentation," one +of those words with a dead tail which architects very properly use to +describe their flourishes, there were the lichens and mosses and fringes +of bark, which nobody troubled himself about. We certainly leave the +handsomest paint and clapboards behind in the woods, when we strip off the +bark and poison ourselves with white-lead in the towns. We get but half +the spoils of the forest. For beauty, give me trees with the fur on. This +house was designed and constructed with the freedom of stroke of a +forester's axe, without other compass and square than Nature uses. +Wherever the logs were cut off by a window or door, that is, were not kept +in place by alternate overlapping, they were held one upon another by very +large pins driven in diagonally on each side, where branches might have +been, and then cut off so close up and down as not to project beyond the +bulge of the log, as if the logs clasped each other in their arms. These +logs were posts, studs, boards, clapboards, laths, plaster, and nails, all +in one. Where the citizen uses a mere sliver or board, the pioneer uses +the whole trunk of a tree. The house had large stone chimneys, and was +roofed with spruce-bark. The windows were imported, all but the casings. +One end was a regular logger's camp, for the boarders, with the usual fir +floor and log benches. Thus this house was but a slight departure from the +hollow tree, which the bear still inhabits,--being a hollow made with +trees piled up, with a coating of bark like its original. + +The cellar was a separate building, like an ice-house, and it answered for +a refrigerator at this season, our moose-meat being kept there. It was a +potato-hole with a permanent roof. Each structure and institution here was +so primitive that you could at once refer it to its source; but our +buildings commonly suggest neither their origin nor their purpose. There +was a large, and what farmers would call handsome, barn, part of whose +boards had been sawed by a whip-saw; and the saw-pit, with its great pile +of dust, remained before the house. The long split shingles on a portion +of the barn were laid a foot to the weather, suggesting what kind of +weather they have there. Grant's barn at Caribou Lake was said to be still +larger, the biggest ox-nest in the woods, fifty feet by a hundred. Think +of a monster barn in that primitive forest lifting its gray back above the +tree-tops! Man makes very much such a nest for his domestic animals, of +withered grass and fodder, as the squirrels and many other wild creatures +do for themselves. + +There was also a blacksmith's shop, where plainly a good deal of work was +done. The oxen and horses used in lumbering operations were shod, and all +the iron-work of sleds, etc., was repaired or made here. I saw them load a +_bateau_ at the Moosehead carry, the next Tuesday, with about thirteen +hundred weight of bar iron for this shop. This reminded me how primitive +and honorable a trade was Vulcan's. I do not hear that there was any +carpenter or tailor among the gods. The smith seems to have preceded these +and every other mechanic at Chesuncook as well as on Olympus, and his +family is the most widely dispersed, whether he be christened John or +Ansell. + +Smith owned two miles down the lake by half a mile in width. There were +about one hundred acres cleared here. He cut seventy tons of English hay +this year on this ground, and twenty more on another clearing, and he uses +it all himself in lumbering operations. The barn was crowded with pressed +hay and a machine to press it. There was a large garden full of roots, +turnips, beets, carrots, potatoes, etc., all of great size. They said that +they were worth as much here as in New York. I suggested some currants for +sauce, especially as they had no apple-trees set out, and showed how +easily they could be obtained. + +There was the usual long-handled axe of the primitive woods by the door, +three and a half feet long,--for my new black-ash rule was in constant +use,--and a large, shaggy dog, whose nose, report said, was full of +porcupine quills. I can testify that he looked very sober. This is the +usual fortune of pioneer dogs, for they have to face the brunt of the +battle for their race, and act the part of Arnold Winkelried without +intending it. If he should invite one of his town friends up this way, +suggesting moose-meat and unlimited freedom, the latter might pertinently +inquire, "What is that sticking in your nose?" When a generation or two +have used up all the enemies' darts, their successors lead a comparatively +easy life. We owe to our fathers analogous blessings. Many old people +receive pensions for no other reason, it seems to me, but as a +compensation for having lived a long time ago. No doubt, our town dogs +still talk, in a snuffling way, about the days that tried dogs' noses. How +they got a cat up there I do not know, for they are as shy as my aunt +about entering a canoe. I wondered that she did not run up a tree on the +way; but perhaps she was bewildered by the very crowd of opportunities. + +Twenty or thirty lumberers, Yankee and Canadian, were coming and going,-- +Aleck among the rest,--and from time to time an Indian touched here. In +the winter there are sometimes a hundred men lodged here at once. The most +interesting piece of news that circulated among them appeared to be, that +four horses belonging to Smith, worth seven hundred dollars, had passed by +further into the woods a week before. + +The white-pine-tree was at the bottom or further end of all this. It is a +war against the pines, the only real Aroostook or Penobscot war. I have no +doubt that they lived pretty much the same sort of life in the Homeric +age, for men have always thought more of eating than of fighting; then, as +now, their minds ran chiefly on the "hot bread and sweet cakes"; and the +fur and lumber trade is an old story to Asia and Europe. I doubt if men +ever made a trade of heroism. In the days of Achilles, even, they +delighted in big barns, and perchance in pressed hay, and he who possessed +the most valuable team was the best fellow. + +We had designed to go on at evening up the Caucomgomoc, whose mouth was a +mile or two distant, to the lake of the same name, about ten miles off; +but some Indians of Joe's acquaintance, who were making canoes on the +Caucomgomoc, came over from that side, and gave so poor an account of the +moose-hunting, so many had been killed there lately, that my companions +concluded not to go there. Joe spent this Sunday and the night with his +acquaintances. The lumberers told me that there were many moose +hereabouts, but no caribou or deer. A man from Oldtown had killed ten or +twelve moose, within a year, so near the house that they heard all his +guns. His name may have been Hercules, for aught I know, though I should +rather have expected to hear the rattling of his club; but, no doubt, he +keeps pace with the improvements of the age, and uses a Sharpe's rifle +now; probably he gets all his armor made and repaired at Smith's shop. One +moose had been killed and another shot at within sight of the house within +two years. I do not know whether Smith has yet got a poet to look after +the cattle, which, on account of the early breaking up of the ice, are +compelled to summer in the woods, but I would suggest this office to such +of my acquaintances as love to write verses and go a-gunning. + +After a dinner, at which apple-sauce was the greatest luxury to me, but +our moose-meat was oftenest called for by the lumberers, I walked across +the clearing into the forest, southward, returning along the shore. For my +dessert, I helped myself to a large slice of the Chesuncook woods, and +took a hearty draught of its waters with all my senses. The woods were as +fresh and full of vegetable life as a lichen in wet weather, and contained +many interesting plants; but unless they are of white pine, they are +treated with as little respect here as a mildew, and in the other case +they are only the more quickly cut down. The shore was of coarse, flat, +slate rocks, often in slabs, with the surf beating on it. The rocks and +bleached drift-logs, extending some way into the shaggy woods, showed a +rise and fall of six or eight feet, caused partly by the dam at the +outlet. They said that in winter the snow was three feet deep on a level +here, and sometimes four or five,--that the ice on the lake was two feet +thick, clear, and four feet, including the snow-ice. Ice had already +formed in vessels. + +We lodged here this Sunday night in a comfortable bed-room, apparently the +best one; and all that I noticed unusual in the night--for I still kept +taking notes, like a spy in the camp--was the creaking of the thin split +boards, when any of our neighbors stirred. + +Such were the first rude beginnings of a town. They spoke of the +practicability of a winter-road to the Moosehead carry, which would not +cost much, and would connect them with steam and staging and all the busy +world. I almost doubted if the lake would be there,--the self-same lake,-- +preserve its form and identity, when the shores should be cleared and +settled; as if these lakes and streams which explorers report never +awaited the advent of the citizen. + +The sight of one of these frontier-houses, built of these great logs, +whose inhabitants have unflinchingly maintained their ground many summers +and winters in the wilderness, reminds me of famous forts, like +Ticonderoga, or Crown Point, which have sustained memorable sieges. They +are especially winter-quarters, and at this season this one had a +partially deserted look, as if the siege were raised a little, the snow- +banks being melted from before it, and its garrison accordingly reduced. I +think of their daily food as rations,--it is called "supplies"; a Bible +and a great coat are munitions of war, and a single man seen about the +premises is a sentinel on duty. You expect that he will require the +countersign, and will perchance take you for Ethan Allen, come to demand +the surrender of his fort in the name of the Continental Congress. It is a +sort of ranger service. Arnold's expedition is a daily experience with +these settlers. They can prove that they were out at almost any time; and +I think that all the first generation of them deserve a pension more than +any that went to the Mexican war. + +[To be continued.] + + + + +THE AUTOCRAT OF THE BREAKFAST-TABLE. + +EVERY MAN HIS OWN BOSWELL. + +_Aquí está encerrada el alma del licenciado +Pedro Garcias_. + + +If I should ever make a little book out of these papers, which I hope you +are not getting tired of, I suppose I ought to save the above sentence for +a motto on the title-page. But I want it now, and must use it. I need not +say to you that the words are Spanish, nor that they are to be found in +the short Introduction to "Gil Blas," nor that they mean, "Here lies +buried the soul of the licentiate Pedro Garcias." + +I warned all young people off the premises when I began my notes referring +to old age. I must be equally fair with old people now. They are earnestly +requested to leave this paper to young persons from the age of twelve to +that of four-score years and ten, at which latter period of life I am sure +that I shall have at least one youthful reader. You know well enough what +I mean by youth and age;--something in the soul, which has no more to do +with the color of the hair than the vein of gold in a rock has to do with +the grass a thousand feet above it. + +I am growing bolder as I write. I think it requires not only youth, but +genius, to read this paper. I don't mean to imply that it required any +whatsoever to talk what I have here written down. It did demand a certain +amount of memory, and such command of the English tongue as is given by a +common school education. So much I do claim. But here I have related, at +length, a string of trivialities. You must have the imagination of a poet +to transfigure them. These little colored patches are stains upon the +windows of a human soul; stand on the outside, they are but dull and +meaningless spots of color; seen from within, they are glorified shapes +with empurpled wings and sunbright aureoles. + +My hand trembles when I offer you this. Many times I have come bearing +flowers such as my garden grew; but now I offer you this poor, brown, +homely growth, you may cast it away as worthless. And yet--and yet--it is +something better than flowers; it is a _seed-capsule_. Many a gardener +will cut you a bouquet of his choicest blossoms for small fee, but he does +not love to let the seeds of his rarest varieties go out of his own hands. + +It is by little things that we know ourselves; a soul would very probably +mistake itself for another, when once disembodied, were it not for +individual experiences that differed from those of others only in details +seemingly trifling. All of us have been thirsty thousands of times, and +felt, with Pindar, that water was the best of things. I alone, as I think, +of all mankind, remember one particular pailful of water, flavored with +the white-pine of which the pail was made, and the brown mug out of which +one Edmund, a red-faced and curly-haired boy, was averred to have bitten a +fragment in his haste to drink; it being then high summer, and little +full-blooded boys feeling very warm and porous in the low-"studded" +school-room where Dame Prentiss, dead and gone, ruled over young children, +many of whom are old ghosts now, and have known Abraham for twenty or +thirty years of our mortal time. + +Thirst belongs to humanity, everywhere, in all ages; but that white-pine +pail and that brown mug belong to me in particular; and just so of my +special relationships with other things and with my race. One could never +remember himself in eternity by the mere fact of having loved or hated any +more than by that of having thirsted; love and hate have no more +individuality in them than single waves in the ocean;--but the accidents +or trivial marks which distinguished those whom we loved or hated make +their memory our own forever, and with it that of our own personality +also. + +Therefore, my aged friend of five-and-twenty, or thereabouts, pause at the +threshold of this particular record, and ask yourself seriously whether +you are fit to read such revelations as are to follow. For observe, you +have here no splendid array of petals such as poets offer you,--nothing +but a dry shell, containing, if you will get out what is in it, a few +small seeds of poems. You may laugh at them, if you like. I shall never +tell you what I think of you for so doing. But if you can read into the +heart of these things, in the light of other memories as slight, yet as +dear to your soul, then you are neither more nor less than a POET, and can +afford to write no more verses during the rest of your natural life,-- +which abstinence I take to be one of the surest marks of your meriting the +divine name I have just bestowed upon you. + +[May I beg of you who have begun this paper, nobly trusting to your own +imagination and sensibilities to give it the significance which it does +not lay claim to without your kind assistance,--may I beg of you, I say, +to pay particular attention to the _brackets_ which enclose certain +paragraphs? I want my "asides," you see, to whisper loud to you who read +my notes, and sometimes I talk a page or two to you without pretending +that I said a word of it to our boarders. You will find a very long +"aside" to you almost as soon as you begin to read. And so, dear young +friend, fall to at once, taking such things as I have provided for you; +and if you turn them, by the aid of your powerful imagination, into a fair +banquet, why, then, peace be with you, and a summer by the still waters of +some quiet river, or by some yellow beach, where, as my friend, the +Professor, says, you can sit with Nature's wrist in your hand and count +her ocean-pulses.] + +I should like to make a few intimate revelations relating especially to my +early life, if I thought you would like to hear them. + +[The schoolmistress turned a little in +her chair, and sat with her face directed partly towards me.--Half- +mourning now;--purple ribbon. That breastpin she wears has _gray_ hair in +it; her mother's, no doubt;--I remember our landlady's daughter telling +me, soon after the school-mistress came to board with us, that she had +lately "buried a payrent." That's what made her look so pale,--kept the +poor sick thing alive with her own blood. Ah! long illness is the real +vampyrism; think of living a year or two after one is dead, by sucking the +life-blood out of a frail young creature at one's bedside!--Well, souls +grow white, as well as cheeks, in these holy duties; one that goes in a +nurse may come out an angel.--God bless all good women!--to their soft +hands and pitying hearts we must all come at last!----The schoolmistress +has a better color than when she came.---- ---- Too late!----"It might +have been."----Amen! + +----How many thoughts go to a dozen heart-beats, sometimes! There was no +long pause after my remark addressed to the company, but in that time I +had the train of ideas and feelings I have just given flash through my +consciousness sudden and sharp as the crooked red streak that springs out +of its black sheath like the creese of a Malay in his death-rage, and +stabs the earth right and left in its blind rage. + +I don't deny that there was a pang in it,--yes, a stab; but there was a +prayer, too,--the "Amen" belonged to that.--Also, a vision of a four-story +brick house, nicely furnished,--I actually saw many specific articles,-- +curtains, sofas, tables, and others, and could draw the patterns of them +at this moment,--a brick house, I say, looking out on the water, with a +fair parlor, and books and busts and pots of flowers and bird-cages, all +complete; and at the window, looking on the water, two of us.--"Male and +female created He them."--These two were standing at the window, when a +little boy that was playing near them looked up at me with such a look +that I---- ----poured out a glass of water, drank it all down, and then +continued.] + +I said I should like to tell you some things, such as people commonly +never tell, about my early recollections. Should you like to hear them? + +Should we _like_ to hear them?--said the schoolmistress;--no, but we +should _love_ to. + +[The voice was a sweet one, naturally, and had something very pleasant in +its tone, just then.--The four-story brick house, which had gone out like +a transparency when the light behind it is quenched, glimmered again for a +moment; parlor, books, busts, flower-pots, bird-cages, all complete,--and +the figures as before.] + +We are waiting with eagerness, Sir,--said the divinity-student. + +[The transparency went out as if a flash of black lightning had struck +it.] + +If you want to hear my confessions, the next thing--I said--is to know +whether I can trust you with them. It is only fair to say that there are a +great many people in the world that laugh at such things. _I_ think they +are fools, but perhaps you don't all agree with me. + +Here are children of tender age talked to as if they were capable of +understanding Calvin's "Institutes," and nobody has honesty or sense +enough to tell the plain truth about the little wretches: that they are as +superstitious as naked savages, and such miserable spiritual cowards--that +is, if they have any imagination--that they will believe anything which is +taught them, and a great deal more which they teach themselves. + +I was born and bred, as I have told you twenty times, among books and +those who knew what was in books. I was carefully instructed in things +temporal and spiritual. But up to a considerable maturity of childhood I +believed Raphael and Michel Angelo to have been super-human beings. The +central doctrine of the prevalent religious faith of Christendom was +utterly confused and neutralized in my mind for years by one of those too +common stories of actual life, which I overheard repeated in a whisper.-- +Why did I not ask? you will say.--You don't remember the rosy pudency of +sensitive children. The first instinctive movement of the little creatures +is to make a _cache_, and bury in it beliefs, doubts, dreams, hopes, and +terrors. I am uncovering one of these _caches_. Do you think I was +necessarily a greater fool and coward than another? + +I was afraid of ships. Why, I could never tell. The masts looked +frightfully tall,--but they were not so tall as the steeple of our old +yellow meeting-house. At any rate, I used to hide my eyes from the sloops +and schooners that were wont to lie at the end of the bridge, and I +confess that traces of this undefined terror lasted very long.--One other +source of alarm had a still more fearful significance. There was a great +wooden HAND,--a glove-maker's sign, which used to swing and creak in the +blast, as it hung from a pillar before a certain shop a mile or two +outside of the city. Oh, the dreadful hand! Always hanging there ready to +catch up a little boy, who would come home to supper no more, nor yet to +bed,--whose porringer would be laid away empty thenceforth, and his half- +worn shoes wait until his small brother grew to fit them. + +As for all manner of superstitious observances, I used once to think I +must have been peculiar in having such a list of them, but I now believe +that half the children of the same age go through the same experiences. No +Roman soothsayer ever had such a catalogue of _omens_ as I found in the +Sibylline leaves of my childhood. That trick of throwing a stone at a tree +and attaching some mighty issue to hitting or missing, which you will find +mentioned in one or more biographies, I well remember. Stepping on or over +certain particular things or spots--Dr. Johnson's especial weakness--I got +the habit of at a very early age.--I won't swear that I have not some +tendency to these not wise practices even at this present date. [How many +of you that read these notes can say the same thing!] + +With these follies mingled sweet delusions, which I loved so well I would +not outgrow them, even when it required a voluntary effort to put a +momentary trust in them. Here is one which I cannot help telling you. + +The firing of the great guns at the Navy-yard is easily heard at the place +where I was born and lived. "There is a ship of war come in," they used to +say, when they heard them. Of course, I supposed that such vessels came in +unexpectedly, after indefinite years of absence,--suddenly as falling +stones; and that the great guns roared in their astonishment and delight +at the sight of the old warship splitting the bay with her cutwater. Now, +the sloop-of-war the Wasp, Captain Blakely, after gloriously capturing the +Reindeer and the Avon, had disappeared from the face of the ocean, and was +supposed to be lost. But there was no proof of it, and, of course, for a +time, hopes were entertained that she might be heard from. Long after the +last real chance had utterly vanished, I pleased myself with the fond +illusion that somewhere on the waste of waters she was still floating, and +there were _years_ during which I never heard the sound of the great guns +booming inland from the Navy-yard without saying to myself, "The Wasp has +come!" and almost thinking I could see her, as she rolled in, crumpling +the water before her, weather-beaten, barnacled, with shattered spars and +threadbare canvas, welcomed by the shouts and tears of thousands. This was +one of those dreams that I nursed and never told. Let me make a clean +breast of it now, and say, that, so late as to have outgrown childhood, +perhaps to have got far on towards manhood, when the roar of the cannon +has struck suddenly on my ear, I have started with a thrill of vague +expectation and tremulous delight, and the long-unspoken words have +articulated themselves in the mind's dumb whisper, _The Wasp has come!_ + +----Yes, children believe plenty of queer things. I suppose all of you +have had the pocket-book fever when you were little?--What do I mean? Why, +ripping up old pocket-books in the firm belief that bank-bills to an +immense amount were hidden in them.--So, too, you must all remember some +splendid unfulfilled promise of somebody or other, which fed you with +hopes perhaps for years, and which left a blank in your life which nothing +has ever filled up.--O.T. quitted our household carrying with him the +passionate regrets of the more youthful members. He was an ingenious +youngster; wrote wonderful copies, and carved the two initials given above +with great skill on all available surfaces. I thought, by the way, they +were all gone; but the other day I found them on a certain door which I +will show you some time. How it surprised me to find them so near the +ground! I had thought the boy of no trivial dimensions. Well, O.T. when he +went, made a solemn promise to two of us. I was to have a ship, and the +other a mar_tin_-house (last syllable pronounced as in the word _tin_). +Neither ever came; but, oh, how many and many a time I have stolen to the +corner,--the cars pass close by it at this time,--and looked up that long +avenue, thinking that he must be coming now, almost sure, as I turned to +look northward, that there he would be, trudging toward me, the ship in +one hand and the mar_tin_-house in the other! + +[You must not suppose that all I am going to say, as well as all I have +said, was told to the whole company. The young fellow whom they call John +was in the yard, sitting on a barrel and smoking a cheroot, the fumes of +which came in, not ungrateful, through the open window. The divinity- +student disappeared in the midst of our talk. The poor relation in black +bombazine, who looked and moved as if all her articulations were elbow- +joints, had gone off to her chamber, after waiting with a look of soul- +subduing decorum at the foot of the stairs until one of the male sort had +passed her and ascended into the upper regions. This is a famous point of +etiquette in our boarding-house; in fact, between ourselves, they make +such an awful fuss about it, that I, for one, had a great deal rather have +them simple enough not to think of such matters at all. Our land-lady's +daughter said, the other evening, that she was going to "retire"; where- +upon the young fellow called John took up a lamp and insisted on lighting +her to the foot of the staircase. Nothing would induce her to pass by him, +until the schoolmistress, saying in good plain English that it was her +bed-time, walked straight by them both, not seeming to trouble herself +about either of them. + +I have been led away from what I meant the portion included in these +brackets to inform my readers about. I say, then, most of the boarders had +left the table about the time when I began telling some of these secrets +of mine, all of them, in fact, but the old gentleman opposite and the +schoolmistress. I understand why a young woman should like to hear these +homely but genuine experiences of early life, which are, as I have said, +the little brown seeds of what may yet grow to be poems with leaves of +azure and gold; but when the old gentleman pushed up his chair nearer to +me, and slanted round his best ear, and once, when I was speaking of some +trifling, tender reminiscence, drew a long breath, with such a tremor in +it that a little more and it would have been a sob, why, then I felt there +must be something of nature in them which redeemed their seeming +insignificance. Tell me, man or woman with whom I am whispering, have you +not a small store of recollections, such as these I am uncovering, buried +beneath the dead leaves of many summers, perhaps under the unmelting snows +of fast-returning winters,--a few such recollections, which, if you +should write them all out, would be swept into some careless editor's +drawer, and might cost a scanty half-hour's lazy reading to his +subscribers,--and yet, if Death should cheat you of them, you would not +know yourself in eternity?] + +----I made three acquaintances at a +very early period of life, my introduction to whom was never forgotten. +The first unequivocal act of wrong that has left its trace in my memory +was this: it was refusing a small favor asked of me,--nothing more than +telling what had happened at school one morning. No matter who asked it; +but there were circumstances which saddened and awed me. I had no heart to +speak;--I faltered some miserable, perhaps petulant excuse, stole away, +and the first battle of life was lost. What remorse followed I need not +tell. Then and there; to the best of my knowledge, I first consciously +took Sin by the hand and turned my back on Duty. Time has led me to look +upon my offence more leniently; I do not believe it or any other childish +wrong is infinite, as some have pretended, but infinitely finite. Yet, oh +if I had but won that battle! + +The great Destroyer, whose awful shadow it was that had silenced me, came +near me,--but never, so as to be distinctly seen and remembered, during my +tender years. There flits dimly before me the image of a little girl, +whose name even I have forgotten, a schoolmate, whom we missed one day, +and were told that she had died. But what death was I never had any very +distinct idea, until one day I climbed the low stone wall of the old +burial-ground and mingled with a group that were looking into a very deep, +long, narrow hole, dug down through the green sod, down through the brown +loam, down through the yellow gravel, and there at the bottom was an +oblong red box, and a still, sharp, white face of a young man seen through +an opening at one end of it. When the lid was closed, and the gravel and +stones rattled down pell-mell, and the woman in black, who was crying and +wringing her hands, went off with the other mourners, and left him, then I +felt that I had seen Death, and should never forget him. + +One other acquaintance I made at an earlier period of life than the habit +of romancers authorizes.--Love, of course.--She was a famous beauty +afterwards.--I am satisfied that many children rehearse their parts in the +drama of life before they have shed all their milk-teeth.--I think I won't +tell the story of the golden blonde.--I suppose everybody has had his +childish fancies; but sometimes they are passionate impulses, which +anticipate all the tremulous emotions belonging to a later period. Most +children remember seeing and adoring an angel before they were a dozen +years old. + +[The old gentleman had left his chair opposite and taken a seat by the +schoolmistress and myself, a little way from the table.--It's true, it's +true,--said the old gentleman.--He took hold of a steel watch-chain, which +carried a large, square gold key at one end and was supposed to have some +kind of timekeeper at the other. With some trouble he dragged up an +ancient-looking, thick, silver, bull's-eye watch. He looked at it for a +moment,--hesitated,--touched the inner corner of his right eye with the +pulp of his middle finger,--looked at the face of the watch,--said it was +getting into the forenoon,--then opened the watch and handed me the loose +outside case without a word.--The watch-paper had been pink once, and had +a faint tinge still, as if all its tender life had not yet quite faded +out. Two little birds, a flower, and, in small school-girl letters, a +date,--17...--no matter.--Before I was thirteen years old,--said the old +gentleman.--I don't know what was in that young schoolmistress's head, nor +why she should have done it; but she took out the watch-paper and put it +softly to her lips, as if she were kissing the poor thing that made it so +long ago. The old gentleman took the watch-paper carefully from her, +replaced it, turned away and walked out, holding the watch in his hand. I +saw him pass the window a moment after with that foolish white hat on his +head; he couldn't have been thinking what he was about when he put it on. +So the schoolmistress and I were left alone. I drew my chair a shade +nearer to her, and continued.] + +And since I am talking of early recollections, I don't know why I +shouldn't mention some others that still cling to me,--not that you will +attach any very particular meaning to these same images so full of +significance to me, but that you will find something parallel to them in +your own memory. You remember, perhaps, what I said one day about smells. +There were certain _sounds_ also which had a mysterious suggestiveness to +me,--not so intense, perhaps, as that connected with the other sense, but +yet peculiar, and never to be forgotten. + +The first was the creaking of the wood-sleds, bringing their loads of oak +and walnut from the country, as the slow-swinging oxen trailed them along +over the complaining snow, in the cold, brown light of early morning. +Lying in bed and listening to their dreary music had a pleasure in it akin +to that which Lucretius describes in witnessing a ship toiling through the +waves while we sit at ease on shore, or that which Byron speaks of as to +be enjoyed in looking on at a battle by one "who hath no friend, no +brother there." + +There was another sound, in itself so sweet, and so connected with one of +those simple and curious superstitions of childhood of which I have +spoken, that I can never cease to cherish a sad sort of love for it.--Let +me tell the superstitious fancy first. The Puritan "Sabbath," as everybody +knows, began at "sundown" on Saturday evening. To such observance of it I +was born and bred. As the large, round disk of day declined, a stillness, +a solemnity, a somewhat melancholy hush came over us all. It was time for +work to cease, and for playthings to be put away. The world of active life +passed into the shadow of an eclipse, not to emerge until the sun should +sink again beneath the horizon. + +It was in this stillness of the world without and of the soul within that +the pulsating lullaby of the evening crickets used to make itself most +distinctly heard,--so that I well remember I used to think that the +purring of these little creatures, which mingled with the batrachian hymns +from the neighboring swamp, was peculiar to Saturday evenings. I don't +know that anything could give a clearer idea of the quieting and subduing +effect of the old habit of observance of what was considered holy time, +than this strange, childish fancy. + +Yes, and there was still another sound which mingled its solemn cadences +with the waking and sleeping dreams of my boyhood. It was heard only at +times,--a deep, muffled roar, which rose and fell, not loud, but vast,--a +whistling boy would have drowned it for his next neighbor, but it must +have been heard over the space of a hundred square miles. I used to wonder +what this might be. Could it be the roar of the thousand wheels and the +ten thousand footsteps jarring and tramping along the stones of the +neighboring city? That would be continuous; but this, as I have said, rose +and fell in regular rhythm. I remember being told, and I suppose this to +have been the true solution, that it was the sound of the waves, after a +high wind, breaking on the long beaches many miles distant. I should +really like to know whether any observing people living ten miles, more or +less, inland from long beaches,--in such a town, for instance, as +Cantabridge, in the eastern part of the Territory of the Massachusetts,-- +have ever observed any such sound, and whether it was rightly accounted +for as above. + +Mingling with these inarticulate sounds in the low murmur of memory, are +the echoes of certain voices I have heard at rare intervals. I grieve to +say it, but our people, I think, have not generally agreeable voices. The +marrowy organisms, with skins that shed water like the backs of ducks, +with smooth surfaces neatly padded beneath, and velvet linings to their +singing-pipes, are not so common among us as that other pattern of +humanity with angular outlines and plane surfaces, arid integuments, hair +like the fibrous covering of a cocoa-nut in gloss and suppleness as well +as color, and voices at once thin and strenuous,--acidulous enough to +produce effervescence with alkalis, and stridulous enough to sing duets +with the katydids. I think our conversational soprano, as sometimes +overheard in the cars, arising from a group of young persons, who may have +taken the train at one of our great industrial centres, for instance,-- +young persons of the female sex, we will say, who have bustled in full- +dressed, engaged in loud strident speech, and who, after free discussion, +have fixed on two or more double seats, which having secured, they proceed +to eat apples and hand round daguerreotypes,--I say, I think the +conversational soprano, heard under these circumstances, would not be +among the allurements the old Enemy would put in requisition, were he +getting up a new temptation of St. Anthony. + +There are sweet voices among us, we all know, and voices not musical, it +may be, to those who hear them for the first time, yet sweeter to us than +any we shall hear until we listen to some warbling angel in the overture +to that eternity of blissful harmonies we hope to enjoy.--But why should I +tell lies? If my friends love me, it is because I try to tell the truth. I +never heard but two voices in my life that frightened me by their +sweetness. + +----Frightened you?--said the school-mistress.--Yes, frightened me. They +made me feel as if there might be constituted a creature with such a chord +in her voice to some string in another's soul, that, if she but spoke, he +would leave all and follow her, though it were into the jaws of Erebus. +Our only chance to keep our wits is, that there are so few natural chords +between others' voices and this string in our souls, and that those which +at first may have jarred a little by and by come into harmony with it.-- +But I tell you this is no fiction. You may call the story of Ulysses and +the Sirens a fable, but what will you say to Mario and the poor lady who +followed him? + +----Whose were those two voices that bewitched me so?--They both belonged +to German women. One was a chambermaid, not otherwise fascinating. The key +of my room at a certain great hotel was missing, and this Teutonic maiden +was summoned to give information respecting it. The simple soul was +evidently not long from her mother-land, and spoke with sweet uncertainty +of dialect. But to hear her wonder and lament and suggest, with soft, +liquid inflexions, and low, sad murmurs, in tones as full of serious +tenderness for the fate of the lost key as if it had been a child +that had strayed from its mother, was so winning, that, had her features +and figure been as delicious as her accents,--if she had looked like the +marble Clytie, for instance,--why, all I can say is---- + +[The schoolmistress opened her eyes so wide, that I stopped short.] + +I was only going to say that I should have drowned myself. For Lake Erie +was close by, and it is so much better to accept asphyxia, which takes +only three minutes by the watch, than a _mésalliance_, that lasts fifty +years to begin with, and then passes along down the line of descent, +(breaking out in all manner of boorish manifestations of feature and +manner, which, if men were only as short-lived as horses, could be readily +traced back through the square-roots and the cube-roots of the family +stem, on which you have hung the armorial bearings of the De Champignons +or the De la Morues, until one came to beings that ate with knives and +said "Haow?") that no person of right feeling could have hesitated for a +single moment. + +The second of the ravishing voices I have heard was, as I have said, that +of another German woman.--I suppose I shall ruin myself by saying that +such a voice could not have come from any Americanized human being. + +----What was there in it?--said the schoolmistress,--and, upon my word, +her tones were so very musical, that I almost wished I had said three +voices instead of two, and not made the unpatriotic remark above +reported.--Oh, I said, it had so much _woman_ in it,--_muliebrity_, as +well as _femineity_;--no self-assertion, such as free suffrage introduces +into every word and movement; large, vigorous nature, running back to +those huge-limbed Germans of Tacitus, but subdued by the reverential +training and tuned by the kindly culture of fifty generations. Sharp +business habits, a lean soil, independence, enterprise, and east winds, +are not the best things for the larynx. Still, you hear noble voices among +us,--I have known families famous for them,--but ask the first person you +meet a question, and ten to one there is a hard, sharp, metallic, matter- +of-business clink in the accents of the answer, that produces the effect +of one of those bells which small trades-people connect with their shop- +doors, and which spring upon your ear with such vivacity, as you enter, +that your first impulse is to retire at once from the precincts. + +----Ah, but I must not forget that dear little child I saw and heard in a +French hospital. Between two and three years old. Fell out of her chair +and snapped both thigh-bones. Lying in bed, patient, gentle. Rough +students round her, some in white aprons, looking fearfully business-like; +but the child placid, perfectly still. I spoke to her, and the blessed +little creature answered me in a voice of such heavenly sweetness, with +that reedy thrill in it which you have heard in the thrush's even-song, +that I hear it at this moment, while I am writing, so many, many years +afterwards.--_C'est tout comme un serin_, said the French student at my +side. + +These are the voices which struck the key-note of my conceptions as to +what the sounds we are to hear in heaven will be, if we shall enter +through one of the twelve gates of pearl. There must be other things +besides aërolites that wander from their own spheres to ours; and when we +speak of celestial sweetness or beauty, we may be nearer the literal truth +than we dream. If mankind generally are the shipwrecked survivors of some +pre-Adamitic cataclysm, set adrift in these little open boats of humanity +to make one more trial to reach the shore,--as some grave theologians have +maintained,--if, in plain English, men are the ghosts of dead devils who +have "died into life," (to borrow an expression from Keats,) and walk the +earth in a suit of living rags that lasts three or four score summers,-- +why, there must have been a few good spirits sent to keep them company, +and these sweet voices I speak of must belong to them. + +----I wish you could once hear my sister's voice,--said the +schoolmistress. + +If it is like yours, it must be a pleasant one,--said I. + +I never thought mine was anything,--said the schoolmistress. + +How should you know?--said I.--People never hear their own voices,--any +more than they see their own faces. There is not even a looking-glass for +the voice. Of course, there is something audible to us when we speak; but +that something is not our own voice as it is known to all our +acquaintances. I think, if an image spoke to us in our own tones, we +should not know them in the least.--How pleasant it would be, if in +another state of being we could have shapes like our former selves for +playthings,--we standing outside or inside of them, as we liked, and they +being to us just what we used to be to others! + +----I wonder if there will be nothing like what we call "play," after our +earthly toys are broken,--said the schoolmistress. + +Hush,--said I,--what will the divinity-student say? + +[I thought she was hit, that time;--but the shot must have gone over her, +or on one side of her; she did not flinch.] + +Oh,--said the schoolmistress,--he must look out for my sister's heresies; +I am afraid he will be too busy with them to take care of mine. + +Do you mean to say,--said I,--that it is _your sister_ whom that +student---- + +[The young fellow commonly known as John, who had been sitting on the +barrel, smoking, jumped off just then, kicked over the barrel, gave it a +push with his foot that set it rolling, and stuck his saucy-looking face +in at the window so as to cut my question off in the middle; and the +schoolmistress leaving the room a few minutes afterwards, I did not have a +chance to finish it. + +The young fellow came in and sat down in a chair, putting his heels on the +top of another. + +Pooty girl,--said he. + +A fine young lady,--I replied. + +Keeps a fust-rate school, according to accounts,--said he,--teaches all +sorts of things,--Latin and Italian and music. Folks rich once,--smashed +up. She went right ahead as smart as if she'd been born to work. That's +the kind o' girl I go for. I'd marry her, only two or three other girls +would drown themselves, if I did. + +I think the above is the longest speech of this young fellow's which I +have put on record. I do not like to change his peculiar expressions, for +this is one of those cases in which the style is the man, as M. de Buffon +says. The fact is, the young fellow is a good-hearted creature enough, +only too fond of his jokes,--and if it were not for those heat-lightning +winks on one side of his face, I should not mind his fun much.] + +[Some days after this, when the company were together again, I talked a +little.] + +----I don't think I have a genuine hatred for anybody. I am well aware +that I differ herein from the sturdy English moralist and the stout +American tragedian. I don't deny that I hate _the sight_ of certain +people; but the qualities which make me tend to hate the man himself are +such as I am so much disposed to pity, that, except under immediate +aggravation, I feel kindly enough to the worst of them. It is such a sad +thing to be born a sneaking fellow, so much worse than to inherit a hump- +back or a couple of club-feet, that I sometimes feel as if we ought to +love the crippled souls, if I may use this expression, with a certain +tenderness which we need not waste on noble natures. One who is born with +such congenital incapacity that nothing can make a gentleman of him is +entitled, not to our wrath, but to our profoundest sympathy. But as we +cannot help hating the sight of these people, just as we do that of +physical deformities, we gradually eliminate them from our society,--we +love them, but open the window and let them go. By the time decent people +reach middle age they have weeded their circle pretty well of these +unfortunates, unless they have a taste for such animals; in which case, no +matter what their position may be, there is something, you may be sure, in +their natures akin to that of their wretched parasites. + +----The divinity-student wished to know what I thought of affinities, as +well as of antipathies; did I believe in love at first sight? + +Sir,--said I,--all men love all women. That is the _primâ-facie_ aspect of +the case. The Court of Nature assumes the law to be, that all men do so; +and the individual man is bound to show cause why he does not love any +particular woman. A man, says one of my old black-letter law-books, may +show divers good reasons, as thus; He hath not seen the person named in +the indictment; she is of tender age, or the reverse of that; she hath +certain personal disqualifications,--as, for instance, she is a +blackamoor, or hath an ill-favored countenance; or, his capacity of loving +being limited, his affections are engrossed by a previous comer; and so of +other conditions. Not the less is it true that he is bound by duty and +inclined by nature to love each and every woman. Therefore it is that each +woman virtually summons every man to show cause why he doth not love her. +This is not by written document, or direct speech, for the most part, but +by certain signs of silk, gold, and other materials, which say to all +men,--Look on me and love, as in duty bound. Then the man pleadeth his +special incapacity, whatsoever that may be,--as, for instance, +impecuniosity, or that he hath one or many wives in his household, or that +he is of mean figure, or small capacity; of which reasons it may be noted, +that the first is, according to late decisions, of chiefest authority.--So +far the old law-book. But there is a note from an older authority, saying +that every woman doth also love each and every man, except there be some +good reason to the contrary; and a very observing friend of mine, a young +unmarried clergyman, tells me, that, so far as his experience goes, he has +reason to think the ancient author had fact to justify his statement. + +I'll tell you how it is with the pictures of women we fall in love with at +first sight. + +----We a'n't talking about pictures,--said the landlady's daughter,-- +we're talking about women. + +I understood that we were speaking of love at sight,--I remarked, mildly. +--Now, as all a man knows about a woman whom he looks at is just what a +picture as big as a copper, or a "nickel," rather, at the bottom of his +eye can teach him, I think I am right in saying we are talking about the +pictures of women.--Well, now, the reason why a man is not desperately in +love with ten thousand women at once is just that which prevents all our +portraits being distinctly seen upon that wall. They all _are_ painted +there by reflection from our faces, but because _all_ of them are painted +on each spot, and each on the same surface, and many other objects at the +same time, no one is seen as a picture. But darken a chamber and let a +single pencil of rays in through a key-hole, then you have a picture on +the wall. We never fall in love with a woman in distinction from women, +until we can get an image of her through a pin-hole; and then we can see +nothing else, and nobody but ourselves can see the image in our mental +camera-obscura. + +----My friend, the Poet, tells me he has to leave town whenever the +anniversaries come round. + +What's the difficulty?--Why, they all want him to get up and make +speeches, or songs, or toasts; which is just the very thing he doesn't +want to do. He is an old story, he says, and hates to show on these +occasions. But they tease him, and coax him, and can't do without him, and +feel all over his poor weak head until they get their fingers on the +_fontanelle_, (the Professor will tell you what this means,--he says the +one at the top of the head always remains open in poets,) until, by gentle +pressure on that soft pulsating spot, they stupefy him to the point of +acquiescence. + +There are times, though, he says, when it is a pleasure, before going to +some agreeable meeting, to rush out into one's garden and clutch up a +handful of what grows there,--weeds and violets together,--not cutting +them off, but pulling them up by the roots with the brown earth they grow +in sticking to them. That's his idea of a post-prandial performance. Look +here, now. These verses I am going to read you, he tells me, were pulled +up by the roots just in that way, the other day.--Beautiful entertainment, +--names there on the plates that flow from all English-speaking tongues as +familiarly as _and_ or _the_; entertainers known wherever good poetry and +fair title-pages are held in esteem; guest a kind-hearted, modest, genial, +hopeful poet, who sings to the hearts of his countrymen, the British +people, the songs of good cheer which the better days to come, as all +honest souls trust and believe, will turn into the prose of common life. +My friend, the Poet, says you must not read such a string of verses too +literally. If he trimmed it nicely below, you wouldn't see the roots, he +says, and he likes to keep them, and a little of the soil clinging to +them. + +This is the farewell my friend, the Poet, read to his and our friend, the +Poet:-- + + +A GOOD TIME GOING! + +Brave singer of the coming time, + Sweet minstrel of the joyous present, +Crowned with the noblest wreath of rhyme, + The holly-leaf of Ayrshire's peasant, +Good-bye! Good-bye!--Our hearts and hands, + Our lips in honest Saxon phrases, +Cry, God be with him, till he stands + His feet among the English daisies! + +'Tis here we part;--for other eyes + The busy deck, the fluttering streamer, +The dripping arms that plunge and rise, + The waves in foam, the ship in tremor, +The kerchiefs waving from the pier, + The cloudy pillar gliding o'er him, +The deep blue desert, lone and drear, + With heaven above and home before him! + +His home!--the Western giant smiles, + And twirls the spotty globe to find it;-- +This little speck the British Isles? + 'Tis but a freckle,--never mind it!-- +He laughs, and all his prairies roll, + Each gurgling cataract roars and chuckles, +And ridges stretched from pole to pole + Heave till they crack their iron knuckles! + +But Memory blushes at the sneer, + And Honor turns with frown defiant, +And Freedom, leaning on her spear, + Laughs louder than the laughing giant:-- +"An islet is a world," she said, + "When glory with its dust has blended, +And Britain keeps her noble dead + Till earth and seas and skies are rended!" + +Beneath each swinging forest-bough + Some arm as stout in death reposes,-- +From wave-washed foot to heaven-kissed brow + Her valor's life-blood runs in roses; +Nay, let our brothers of the West + Write smiling in their florid pages, +One-half her soil has walked the rest + In poets, heroes, martyrs, sages! + +Hugged in the clinging billow's clasp, + From sea-weed fringe to mountain heather, +The British oak with rooted grasp + Her slender handful holds together;-- +With cliffs of white and bowers of green, + And Ocean narrowing to caress her, +And hills and threaded streams between,-- + Our little mother isle, God bless her! + +In earth's broad temple where we stand, + Fanned by the eastern gales that brought us, +We hold the missal in our hand, + Bright with the lines our Mother taught us; +Where'er its blazoned page betrays + The glistening links of gilded fetters, +Behold, the half-turned leaf displays + Her rubric stained in crimson letters! + +Enough! To speed a parting friend + 'Tis vain alike to speak and listen;-- +Yet stay,--these feeble accents blend + With rays of light from eyes that glisten. +Good-bye! once more,--and kindly tell + In words of peace the young world's story,-- +And say, besides,--we love too well + Our mother's soil, our fathers' glory! + + +When my friend, the Professor, found that my friend, the Poet, had been +coming out in this full-blown style, he got a little excited, as you may +have seen a canary, sometimes, when another strikes up. The Professor says +he knows he can lecture, and thinks he can write verses. At any rate, he +has often tried, and now he was determined to try again. So when some +professional friends of his called him up, one day, after a feast of +reason and a regular "freshet" of soul which had lasted two or three +hours, he read them these verses. He introduced them with a few remarks, +he told me, of which the only one he remembered was this: that he had +rather write a single line which one among them should think worth +remembering than set them all laughing with a string of epigrams. It was +all right, I don't doubt; at any rate, that was his fancy then, and +perhaps another time he may be obstinately hilarious; however, it may be +that he is growing graver, for time is a fact so long as clocks and +watches continue to go, and a cat can't be a kitten always, as the old +gentleman opposite said the other day. + +You must listen to this seriously, for I think the Professor was very much +in earnest when he wrote it. + + +THE TWO ARMIES. + +As Life's unending column pours, + Two marshalled hosts are seen,-- +Two armies on the trampled shores + That Death flows black between. + +One marches to the drum-beat's roll, + The wide-mouthed clarion's bray, +And bears upon a crimson scroll, + "Our glory is to slay." + +One moves in silence by the stream, + With sad, yet watchful eyes, +Calm as the patient planet's gleam + That walks the clouded skies. + +Along its front no sabres shine, + No blood-red pennons wave; +Its banner bears the single line, + "Our duty is to save." + +For those no death-bed's lingering shade; + At Honor's trumpet-call, +With knitted brow and lifted blade + In Glory's arms they fall. + +For these no clashing falchions bright, + No stirring battle-cry; +The bloodless stabber calls by night,-- + Each answers, "Here am I!" + +For those the sculptor's laurelled bust, + The builder's marble piles, +The anthems pealing o'er their dust + Through long cathedral aisles. + +For these the blossom-sprinkled turf + That floods the lonely graves, +When Spring rolls in her sea-green surf + In flowery-foaming waves. + +Two paths lead upward from below, + And angels wait above, +Who count each burning life-drop's flow, + Each falling tear of Love. + +Though from the Hero's bleeding breast + Her pulses Freedom drew, +Though the white lilies in her crest + Sprang from that scarlet dew,-- + +While Valor's haughty champions wait + Till all their scars are shown, +Love walks unchallenged through the gate + To sit beside the Throne! + + + + +THE AMERICAN TRACT SOCIETY. + + +There was no apologue more popular in the Middle Ages than that of the +hermit, who, musing on the wickedness and tyranny of those whom the +inscrutable wisdom of Providence had intrusted with the government of the +world, fell asleep and awoke to find himself the very monarch whose abject +life and capricious violence had furnished the subject of his moralizing. +Endowed with irresponsible power, tempted by passions whose existence in +himself he had never suspected, and betrayed by the political necessities +of his position, he became gradually guilty of all the crimes and the +luxury which had seemed so hideous to him in his hermitage over a dish of +water-cresses. + +The American Tract Society from small beginnings has risen to be the +dispenser of a yearly revenue of nearly half a million. It has become a +great establishment, with a traditional policy, with the distrust of +change and the dislike of disturbing questions (especially of such +as would lessen its revenues) natural to great establishments. It had been +poor and weak; it has become rich and powerful. The hermit has become +king. + +If the pious men who founded the American Tract Society had been told that +within forty years they would be watchful of their publications, lest, by +inadvertence, anything disrespectful might be spoken of the African Slave- +trade,--that they would consider it an ample equivalent for compulsory +dumbness on the vices of Slavery, that their colporteurs could awaken the +minds of Southern brethren to the horrors of St. Bartholomew,--that they +would hold their peace about the body of Cuffee dancing to the music of +the cart-whip, provided only they could save the soul of Sambo alive by +presenting him a pamphlet, which he could not read, on the depravity of +the double-shuffle,--that they would consent to be fellow-members in the +Tract Society with him who sold their fellow-members in Christ on the +auction-block, if he agreed with them in condemning Transubstantiation, +(and it would not be difficult for a gentleman who ignored the real +presence of God in his brother man to deny it in the sacramental wafer,)-- +if those excellent men had been told this, they would have shrunk in +horror, and exclaimed, "Are thy servants dogs, that they should do these +things?" + +Yet this is precisely the present position of the Society. + +There are two ways of evading the responsibility of such inconsistency. +The first is by an appeal to the Society's Constitution, and by claiming +to interpret it strictly in accordance with the rules of law as applied to +contracts, whether between individuals or States. The second is by denying +that Slavery is opposed to the genius of Christianity, and that any moral +wrongs are the necessary results of it. We will not be so unjust to the +Society as to suppose that any of its members would rely on this latter +plea, and shall therefore confine ourselves to a brief consideration of +the other. + +In order that the same rules of interpretation should be considered +applicable to the Constitution of the Society and to that of the United +States, we must attribute to the former a solemnity and importance which +involve a palpable absurdity. To claim for it the verbal accuracy and the +legal wariness of a mere contract is equally at war with common sense and +the facts of the case; and even were it not so, the party to a bond who +should attempt to escape its ethical obligation by a legal quibble of +construction would be put in Coventry by all honest men. In point of fact, +the Constitution was simply the minutes of an agreement among certain +gentlemen, to define the limits within which they would accept trust- +funds, and the objects for which they should expend them. + +But if we accept the alternative offered by the advocates of strict +construction, we shall not find that their case is strengthened. Claiming +that where the meaning of an instrument is doubtful, it should be +interpreted according to the contemporary understanding of its framers, +they argue that it would be absurd to suppose that gentlemen from the +Southern States would have united to form a society that included in its +objects any discussion of the moral duties arising from the institution of +Slavery. Admitting the first part of their proposition, we deny the +conclusion they seek to draw from it. They are guilty of a glaring +anachronism in assuming the same opinions and prejudices to have existed +in 1825 which are undoubtedly influential in 1858. The Antislavery +agitation did not begin until 1831, and the debates in the Virginia +Convention prove conclusively that six years after the foundation of the +Tract Society, the leading men in that State, men whose minds had been +trained and whose characters had been tempered in that school of action +and experience which was open to all during the heroic period of our +history, had not yet suffered such distortion of the intellect through +passion, and such deadening of the conscience through interest, as would +have prevented their discussing either the moral or the political aspects +of Slavery, and precluded them from uniting in any effort to make the +relation between master and slave less demoralizing to the one and less +imbruting to the other. + +Again, it is claimed that the words of the Constitution are conclusive, +and that the declaration that the publications of the Society shall be +such as are "satisfactory to all Evangelical Christians" forbids by +implication the issuing of any tract which could possibly offend the +brethren in Slave States. The Society, it is argued, can publish only on +topics about which all Evangelical Christians are agreed, and must, +therefore, avoid everything in which the question of politics is involved. +But what are the facts about matters other than Slavery? Tracts have been +issued and circulated in which Dancing is condemned as sinful; are all +Evangelical Christians agreed about this? On the Temperance question; +against Catholicism;--have these topics never entered into our politics? +The simple truth is, that Slavery is the only subject about which the +Publishing Committee have felt Constitutional scruples. Till this question +arose, they were like me in perfect health, never suspecting that they had +any constitution at all; but now, like hypochondriacs, they feel it in +every pore, at the least breath from the eastward. + +If a strict construction of the words "all Evangelical Christians" be +insisted on, we are at a loss to see where the Committee could draw the +dividing line between what might be offensive and what allowable. The +Society publish tracts in which the study of the Scriptures is enforced +and their denial to the laity by Romanists assailed. But throughout the +South it is criminal to teach a slave to read; throughout the South, no +book could be distributed among the servile population more incendiary +than the Bible, if they could only read it. Will not our Southern brethren +take alarm? The Society is reduced to the dilemma of either denying that +the African has a soul to be saved, or of consenting to the terrible +mockery of assuring him that the way of life is to be found only by +searching a book which he is forbidden to open. + +If we carry out this doctrine of strict construction to its legitimate +results, we shall find that it involves a logical absurdity. What is the +number of men whose outraged sensibilities may claim the suppression of a +tract? Is the _taboo_ of a thousand valid? Of a hundred? Of ten? Or are +tracts to be distributed only to those who will find their doctrine +agreeable, and are the Society's colporteurs to be instructed that a +Temperance essay is the proper thing for a total-abstinent infidel, and a +sermon on the Atonement for a distilling deacon? If the aim of the Society +be only to convert men from sins they have no mind to, and to convince +them of errors to which they have no temptation, they might as well be +spending their money to persuade schoolmasters that two and two make four, +or mathematicians that there cannot be two obtuse angles in a triangle. If +this be their notion of the way in which the gospel is to be preached, we +do not wonder that they have found it necessary to print a tract upon the +impropriety of sleeping in church. + +But the Society are concluded by their own action; for in 1857 they +unanimously adopted the following resolution: "That those moral duties +which grow out of the existence of Slavery, as well as those moral evils +and vices which it is known to promote, and which are condemned in +Scripture, and so much deplored by Evangelical Christians, undoubtedly do +fall within the province of this Society, and can and ought to be +discussed in a fraternal and Christian spirit." The Society saw clearly +that it was impossible to draw a Mason and Dixon's line in the world of +ethics, to divide Duty by a parallel of latitude. The only line which +Christ drew is that which parts the sheep from the goats, that great +horizon-line of the moral nature of man which is the boundary between +light and darkness. The Society, by yielding (as they have done in 1858) +to what are pleasantly called the "objections" of the South, (objections +of so forcible a nature that we are told the colporteurs were "forced to +flee,") virtually exclude the black man, if born to the southward of a +certain arbitrary line, from the operation of God's providence, and +thereby do as great a wrong to the Creator as the Episcopal Church did to +the artist when they published Ary Scheffer's _Christus Consolator_ with +the figure of the slave left out. + +The Society is not asked to disseminate antislavery doctrines, but simply +to be even-handed between master and slave, and, since they have +recommended Sambo and Toney to be obedient to Mr. Legree, to remind him in +turn that he also has duties toward the bodies and souls of his bondmen. +But we are told that the time has not yet arrived, that at present the +ears of our Southern brethren are closed against all appeals, that God in +his good time will turn their hearts, and that then, and not till then, +will be the fitting occasion to do something in the premises. But if the +Society is to await this golden opportunity with such exemplary patience +in one case, why not in all? If it is to decline any attempt at converting +the sinner till after God has converted him, will there be any special +necessity for a tract society at all? Will it not be a little +presumptuous, as well as superfluous, to undertake the doing over again of +what He has already done? We fear that the studies of Blackstone, upon +which the gentlemen who argue thus have entered in order to fit themselves +for the legal and constitutional argument of the question, have confused +their minds, and that they are misled by some fancied analogy between a +tract and an action of trover, and conceive that the one, like the other, +cannot be employed till after an actual conversion has taken place. + +The resolutions reported by the Special Committee at the annual meeting of +1857, drawn up with great caution and with a sincere desire to make whole +the breach in the Society, have had the usual fate of all attempts to +reconcile incompatibilities by compromise. They express confidence in the +Publishing Committee, and at the same time impliedly condemn them by +recommending them to do precisely what they had all along scrupulously +avoided doing. The result was just what might have been expected. Both +parties among the Northern members of the Society, those who approved the +former action of the Publishing Committee, and those who approved the new +policy recommended in the resolutions, those who favored silence and those +who favored speech on the subject of Slavery, claimed the victory, while +the Southern brethren, as usual, refused to be satisfied with anything +short of unconditional submission. The word Compromise, as far as Slavery +is concerned, has always been of fatal augury. The concessions of the +South have been like the "With all my worldly goods I thee endow" of a +bankrupt bridegroom, who thereby generously bestows all his debts upon his +wife, and as a small return for his magnanimity consents to accept all her +personal and a life estate in all her real property. The South is willing +that the Tract Society should expend its money to convince the slave that +he has a soul to be saved so far as he is obedient to his master, but not +to persuade the master that he has a soul to undergo a very different +process so far as he is unmerciful to his slave. + +We Americans are very fond of this glue of compromise. Like so many quack +cements, it is advertised to make the mended parts of the vessel stronger +than those which have never been broken, but, like them, it will not stand +hot water,--and as the question of Slavery is sure to plunge all who +approach it, even with the best intentions, into that fatal element, the +patched-up brotherhood, which but yesterday was warranted to be better +than new, falls once more into a heap of incoherent fragments. The last +trial of the virtues of the Patent Redintegrator by the Special Committee +of the Tract Society has ended like all the rest, and as all attempts to +buy peace at too dear a rate must end. Peace is an excellent thing, but +principle and pluck are better; and the man who sacrifices them to gain it +finds at last that he has crouched under the Caudine yoke to purchase only +a contemptuous toleration that leaves him at war with his own self-respect +and the invincible forces of his higher nature. + +But the peace which Christ promised to his followers was not of this +world; the good gift he brought them was not peace, but a sword. It was no +sword of territorial conquest, but that flaming blade of conscience and +self-conviction which lightened between our first parents and their lost +Eden,--that sword of the Spirit that searcheth all things,--which severs +one by one the ties of passion, of interest, of self-pride, that bind the +soul to earth,--whose implacable edge may divide a man from family, from +friends, from whatever is nearest and dearest,--and which hovers before +him like the air-drawn dagger of Macbeth, beckoning him, not to crime, but +to the legitimate royalties of self-denial and self-sacrifice, to the +freedom which is won only by surrender of the will. Christianity has never +been concession, never peace; it is continual aggression; one province of +wrong conquered, its pioneers are already in the heart of another. The +mile-stones of its onward march down the ages have not been monuments of +material power, but the blackened stakes of martyrs, trophies of +individual fidelity to conviction. For it is the only religion which is +superior to all endowment, to all authority,--which has a bishopric and a +cathedral wherever a single human soul has surrendered itself to God. That +very spirit of doubt, inquiry, and fanaticism for private judgment, with +which Romanists reproach Protestantism, is its stamp and token of +authenticity,--the seal of Christ, and not of the Fisherman. + +We do not wonder at the division which has taken place in the Tract +Society, nor do we regret it. The ideal life of a Christian is possible to +very few, but we naturally look for a nearer approach to it in those who +associate together to disseminate the doctrines which they believe to be +its formative essentials, and there is nothing which the enemies of +religion seize on so gladly as any inconsistency between the conduct and +the professions of such persons. Though utterly indifferent to the wrongs +of the slave, the scoffer would not fail to remark upon the hollowness of +a Christianity which was horror-stricken at a dance or a Sunday-drive, +while it was blandly silent about the separation of families, the putting +asunder whom God had joined, the selling Christian girls for Christian +harems, and the thousand horrors of a system which can lessen the agonies +it inflicts only by debasing the minds and souls of the race on whom it +inflicts them. Is your Christianity, then, he would say, a respecter of +persons, and does it condone the sin because the sinner can contribute to +your coffers? Was there ever a Simony like this,--that does not sell, but +withholds, the gift of God for a price? + +The world naturally holds the Society to a stricter accountability than it +would insist upon in ordinary cases. Were they only a club of gentlemen +associated for their own amusement, it would be very natural and proper +that they should exclude all questions which would introduce controversy, +and that, however individually interested in certain reforms, they should +not force them upon others who would consider them a bore. But a society +of professing Christians, united for the express purpose of carrying both +the theory and the practice of the New Testament into every household in +the land, has voluntarily subjected itself to a graver responsibility, and +renounced all title to fall back upon any reserved right of personal +comfort or convenience. + +We say, then, that we are glad to see this division in the Tract Society, +--not glad because of the division, but because it has sprung from an +earnest effort to relieve the Society of a reproach which was not only +impairing its usefulness, but doing an injury to the cause of truth and +sincerity everywhere. We have no desire to impugn the motives of those who +consider themselves conservative members of the Society; we believe them +to be honest in their convictions, or their want of them; but we think +they have mistaken notions as to what conservatism is, and that they are +wrong in supposing it to consist in refusing to wipe away the film on +their spectacle-glasses which prevents their seeing the handwriting on the +wall, or in conserving reverently the barnacles on their ship's bottom and +the dry-rot in its knees. We yield to none of them in reverence for the +Past; it is there only that the imagination can find repose and seclusion; +there dwells that silent majority whose experience guides our action and +whose wisdom shapes our thought in spite of ourselves;--but it is not +length of days that can make evil reverend, nor persistence in +inconsistency that can give it the power or the claim of orderly +precedent. Wrong, though its title-deeds go back to the days of Sodom, is +by nature a thing of yesterday,--while the right, of which we became +conscious but an hour ago, is more ancient than the stars, and of the +essence of Heaven. If it were proposed to establish Slavery to-morrow, +should we have more patience with its patriarchal argument than with the +parallel claim of Mormonism? That Slavery is old is but its greater +condemnation; that we have tolerated it so long, the strongest plea for +our doing so no longer. There is one institution to which we owe our first +allegiance, one that is more sacred and venerable than any other,--the +soul and conscience of Man. + +What claim has Slavery to immunity from discussion? We are told that +discussion is dangerous. Dangerous to what? Truth invites it, courts the +point of the Ithuriel-spear, whose touch can but reveal more clearly the +grace and grandeur of her angelic proportions. The advocates of Slavery +have taken refuge in the last covert of desperate sophism, and affirm that +their institution is of Divine ordination, that its bases are laid in the +nature of man. Is anything, then, of God's contriving endangered by +inquiry? Was it the system of the universe, or the monks, that trembled at +the telescope of Galileo? Did the circulation of the firmament stop in +terror because Newton laid his daring finger on its pulse? But it is idle +to discuss a proposition so monstrous. There is no right of sanctuary for +a crime against humanity, and they who drag an unclean thing to the horns +of the altar bring it to vengeance and not to safety. + +Even granting that Slavery were all that its apologists assume it to be, +and that the relation of master and slave were of God's appointing, would +not its abuses be just the thing which it was the duty of Christian men to +protest against, and, as far as might be, to root out? Would our courts +feel themselves debarred from interfering to rescue a daughter from a +parent who wished to make merchandise of her purity, or a wife from a +husband who was brutal to her, by the plea that parental authority and +marriage were of Divine ordinance? Would a police-justice discharge a +drunkard who pleaded the patriarchal precedent of Noah? or would he not +rather give him another month in the House of Correction for his +impudence? + +The Antislavery question is not one which the Tract Society can exclude by +triumphant majorities, nor put to shame by a comparison of +respectabilities. Mixed though it has been with politics, it is in no +sense political, and springing naturally from the principles of that +religion which traces its human pedigree to a manger, and whose first +apostles were twelve poor men against the whole world, it can dispense +with numbers and earthly respect. The clergyman may ignore it in the +pulpit, but it confronts him in his study; the church-member, who has +suppressed it in parish-meeting, opens it with the pages of his Testament; +the merchant, who has shut it out of his house and his heart, finds it +lying in wait for him, a gaunt fugitive, in the hold of his ship; the +lawyer, who has declared that it is no concern of his, finds it thrust +upon him in the brief of the slave-hunter; the historian, who had +cautiously evaded it, stumbles over it at Bunker Hill. And why? Because it +is not political, but moral,--because it is not local, but national, +--because it is not a test of party, but of individual honesty and honor. +The wrong which we allow our nation to perpetrate we cannot localize, +if we would; we cannot hem it within the limits of Washington or Kansas; +sooner or later, it will force itself into the conscience and sit by the +hearthstone of every citizen. + +It is not partisanship, it is not fanaticism, that has forced this matter +of Anti-slavery upon the American people; it is the spirit of +Christianity, which appeals from prejudices and predilections to the moral +consciousness of the individual man; that spirit elastic as air, +penetrative as heat, invulnerable as sunshine, against which creed after +creed and institution after institution have measured their strength and +been confounded; that restless spirit which refuses to crystallize in any +sect or form, but persists, a Divinely-commissioned radical and +reconstructor, in trying every generation with a new dilemma between case +and interest on the one hand, and duty on the other. Shall it be said that +its kingdom is not of this world? In one sense, and that the highest, it +certainly is not; but just as certainly Christ never intended those words +to be used as a subterfuge by which to escape our responsibilities in the +life of business and politics. Let the cross, the sword, and the arena +answer, whether the world, that then was, so understood its first +preachers and apostles. Caesar and Flamen both instinctively dreaded it, +not because it aimed at riches or power, but because it strove to conquer +that other world in the moral nature of mankind, where it could establish +a throne against which wealth and force would be weak and contemptible. No +human device has ever prevailed against it, no array of majorities or +respectabilities; but neither Caesar nor Flamen ever conceived a scheme so +cunningly adapted to neutralize its power as that graceful compromise +which accepts it with the lip and denies it in the life, which marries it +at the altar and divorces it at the church-door. + + + + +NOTE TO THE CATACOMBS OF ROME. + + +In our first article on the Roman Catacombs we expressed the belief that +"a year was now hardly likely to pass without the discovery" of new +burial-places of the early Christians,--the fresh interest in Christian +archaeology leading to fresh explorations in the hollow soil of the +Campagna. A letter to us from Rome, of the 2lst of April, confirms the +justness of this expectation. We quote from it the following interesting +passage:-- + +"The excavations on the Via Appia Nuova, which I mentioned in a former +letter, prove very interesting, and have already resulted in most +important discoveries. The spot is at the second milestone outside of the +gate of St. John Lateran. The field is on the left of the road going +towards Albano, and in it are several brick tombs of beautiful fine work, +now or formerly used as dwellings or barns. You and I crossed the very +field on a certain New Year's Day, and lingered to admire the almost +unrivalled view of the Campagna, the mountains, and Rome, which it +affords. + +"The first discovery was an ancient basilica, satisfactorily ascertained +to be the one dedicated to St. Stephen, built by Santa Demetria,--the +first nun,--at the instigation of the pope, St. Leo the Great. [A.D. 440- +461.] Sig. Fortunati, who made the discovery and directs the excavations, +told me at great length how he was led to the investigation; but as he has +published this and much more in a pamphlet, which I shall send to you, I +will not repeat it here. + +"Twenty-two columns have been found, many of rare and beautiful marble, +one of _verde antico_, most superb, others of _breccia_ and of _cipollino +marino_, said to be rare, and certainly very beautiful. Forty bases and +over thirty capitals of various styles have also been found, as well as +architectural ornaments without number, many of them carved with Greek or +Roman crosses. The rare and superb fragments of marble show that there +must have been costly and beautiful linings and finish. There are also +numerous inscriptions of great interest, which connect this church with +illustrious families and famous martyrs. + +"Subsequently, portions of villas were found, with ruined baths, and +mosaics and frescoes, with various pieces of sculpture, some perfect and +of most excellent style. There is also a sarcophagus with bas-relief of a +Bacchic procession, remarkably fine. The government has bought all for the +Museum, and intends spending a large sum in building a basilica over the +remains of the old one, in honor of St. Stephen. + +"But the most remarkable discovery is an old Roman tomb, by far the finest +I have seen in its preservation and perfection. It is about eighteen feet +square, has been lined and paved with white marble, some of which still +remains. The lofty ceiling is covered with bas-reliefs in stucco, of +charming grace and spirit, representing various mythological subjects, in +square compartments united by light and elegant arabesques. They are +really of wonderful merit, and so perfectly preserved, so fresh, that they +seem as if done last year. A massive marble doorway, beautifully corniced, +gives entrance to this superb chamber, in which were found three huge +sarcophagi, containing the bones of nine bodies;--which bones are left to +lie exposed, because the bones of pagans! These sarcophagi are of splendid +workmanship, but, unhappily, broken by former barbarians. Present +barbarians (said to be Inglesi and Americani) have stolen two skulls, and +pick up everything not closely watched. Opposite to this chamber is +another, smaller and more modest in adornment, and by the side of this +descend two flights of steps in perfect repair. Many vases of colored +glass and two very handsome rings were found at the foot of these steps. +This tomb is supposed to be of about 160 of our era. + +"These stairways descend from the ancient Via Latina, which has been +excavated for some distance, and is found with wide sidewalks of stone +(lava) similar to the sidewalks in Pompeii. The narrow carriage-way is +deeply rutted, which makes one think that the old Romans had hard bumps to +contend with. + +"Another tomb with perfect stairway has been discovered, but it is much +more plain. Foundations of villas, and baths with leaden pipes in great +quantity, have been exposed. I hear to-day that the government has ordered +the excavation of a mile and a half of the old Via Latina in this +neighborhood, and much interesting discovery is anticipated." + +We will only add to our correspondent's account the fact that the Basilica +of St. Stephen had been sought for in vain previously to this discovery by +Signor Fortunati. The great explorer, Bosio, failed to find it, and +Aringhi, writing just two hundred years ago, says, "Formerly upon the Via +Latina stood the church erected with great pains in honor of the most +blessed Stephen, the first martyr, by Demetria, a woman of pristine piety; +of which the Bibliothecarius, in his account of Pope Leo the First, thus +makes mention: 'In these days, Demetria, the handmaid of God, made the +Basilica of St. Stephen on the Latin Way, at the third mile-stone, on her +estate:... which afterward, being decayed and near to ruin through the +long course of years, was restored by Pope Leo the Third.' Of this most +noble church, which was one of the chief monuments of the Christian +religion, as well as an ornament of the city of Rome, no vestige at this +day remains." + +It is remarkable that a church restored so late as the time of Leo III. +[A.D. 795-816] should have been so lost without being utterly destroyed, +and so buried under the slowly-accumulating soil of the Campagna, that the +very tradition of the existence of its remains should have disappeared, +and its discovery have been the result of scientific archæeological +investigation. + +The disappearance and the forgetting of the Church of St. Alexander were +less remarkable, because of its far greater distance from the city, and +its comparative inconspicuousness and poverty. Scarcely a more striking +proof exists of the misery and lowness of Rome during many generations in +the Dark Ages than that she should thus have forgotten the very sites of +the churches which had stood around her walls, the outpost citadels of her +faith. + + + + +LITERARY NOTICES. + + +_The Aquarium: An Unveiling of the Wonders of the Deep Sea_. By P.H. +GOSSE. Second Edition, revised and enlarged. With Illustrations. London: +1866. + +_The Common Objects of the Seashore; including Hints for an Aquarium_. By +the REV. J.G. WOOD. With Illustrations. London: Routledge & Co. 1857. + +We trust that many of our readers, stimulated by the account of an +Aquarium which was given in our number for February, are proposing to set +one up for themselves. + +Let no one who has been to Barnum's Museum, to look at what the naming +advertisement elegantly and grammatically terms "an aquaria," fancy that +he has seen the beauty of the real aquarium. The sea will not show its +treasures in a quarter of an hour, or be made a sight of for a quarter of +a dollar. An aquarium is not to be exhausted in a day, but, if favorably +placed where it may have sufficient direct sunshine, and well stocked with +various creatures, day after day developes within it new beauties and +unexpected sights. It becomes like a secret cave in the ocean, where the +processes of Nature go on in wonderful and silent progression, and the coy +sea displays its rarer beauties of life, of color, and of form before the +watching eyes. Look at it on some clear day, when the sun is bright, and +see the broad leaves of ulva, their vivid green sparkling with the +brilliant bubbles of oxygen which float up to the surface like the bubbles +of Champagne; see the glades of the pink coralline, or the purple Iceland- +moss covered with its plum-like down, in the midst of which the +transparent bodies of the shrimps or the yellow or banded shells of the +sea-snails are lying half hid. See on the brown rock, whose surface is +covered with the softest growth, the white anemone stretching its crown of +delicate tentacles to the light; or the long winding case of the serpula, +from the end of which appear the purple, brown, or yellow feathers that +decorate the head of its timid occupant. Or watch the scallop with his +turquoise eyes; or the comic crabs, or the minnows playing through the +water, in and out of the recesses of the rocks or the thickets of the +seaweed. There is no end of the pleasant sights. And day after day the +creatures will grow more tame, the serpula will not dart back into his +case when you approach, nor the pecten close his beautiful shell as your +shadow passes over it. Moreover, the habits of the creatures grow more +entertaining as you become familiar with them, and even the dull oyster +begins at last to show some signs of individual character. + +And it is easy to have all this away from the seashore. The best tanks, so +far as we know, that are made in this country, are those of Mr. C.E. +Hammett, of Newport, Rhode Island. But the tank is of little importance, +if one cannot get the water, the seaweed, and the stock; and therefore Mr. +Hammett undertakes to supply these also. He will send, not the water +itself, but the salts obtained by evaporation from the quantity of water +necessary for each aquarium. These are to be dissolved in clear spring- +water, (previously boiled, to insure its containing no injurious living +matter,) and then the aquarium, having first had a bed of cleanly-washed +sand put upon its bottom for about an inch or an inch and a half in depth, +and this in turn covered with a thin layer of small pebbles,--though these +last are not essential,--is to be filled with it. Then the seaweed, which +is sent so packed as to preserve its freshness, is to be put in. It will +be attached to small bits of rock, and these should be supported by or +laid upon other pieces of stone, so raised as to secure a free passage for +the water about them, and so afford places of retreat for the animals. The +stock will be sent, if it is to go to any distance, in jars, and anemones, +crabs, shell-fish of various kinds, and many other creatures, will be +found among it. The seaweed should be a day or two in the tank before the +creatures are put into it. + +And now, having got the aquarium in order, comes the point how to keep it +in order,--how to keep the creatures alive, and how to prevent the water +from growing cloudy and thick. The main rule is to secure sunlight,--hot +enough to raise the water to a temperature above that of the outer air,-- +to remove all dirt and floating scum, and to furnish the tank on every +cloudy day with a supply of air and with motion by means of a syringe. The +creatures should never be fed in warm weather with any animal substance, +its decay being certain to corrupt the water. A little meal or a few +crumbs of bread may now and then be given; but even this is not necessary; +for Nature furnishes all the food that is needed, in the spores thrown off +by the seaweed, in the seaweed itself, whose growth is generally +sufficiently rapid to make up for the ravages committed upon it, and in +the host of infusoria constantly produced in the water. If any of the +creatures die, their bodies should be immediately removed,--though +sometimes the omnivorous crabs will do this work rapidly enough. As the +water evaporates, it should be filled up to its original level with fresh +spring-water,--the salts in it undergoing no diminution by evaporation. +If, suddenly, the water should grow thick, it should be taken from the +tank, a portion at a time, and filtered back into it slowly through +pounded charcoal, the process being repeated till the purity seems to be +returning, and at the same time the rocks and seaweed should be removed +and carefully washed in fresh water. If, however, the water should by any +ill chance grow tainted and emit a bad odor, nothing can be done to +restore it, and, unless it is at once changed, the creatures will die. To +meet such an emergency, which is of rare occurrence, it is well to have a +double quantity of the salts sent with the tank to secure a new supply of +water. But we have known aquariums that have kept in order for more than +a year with no change of the water, a supply of spring-water being put in +from time to time as we have directed; and at this moment, as we write, +there is an aquarium at our side which has been in active operation for +six months, and the water is as clear as it was the day it was put in. If, +spite of everything, the seawater fail, then try a fresh-water aquarium. +Use your tank for the pond instead of the ocean; and in the spotted newt, +the tortoise, the tadpole, the caddis-worm, and the thousand other +inhabitants of our inland ponds and brooks, with the weeds among which +they live, you will find as much entertainment as in watching the wonders +of the great sea. + +A camel's-hair brush, a bent spoon on a long handle, a sponge tied to a +stick, and one or two other instruments which use will suggest, are all +that are needed for keeping the sides of the tank free from growth or +removing obnoxious substances from its bottom. + +If, on receiving the animals, any of them should appear exhausted by the +journey, they may sometimes be revived by aerating the water in which they +are by means of a syringe. It should always be remembered, that, though +living in the water, they need a constant supply of air. And it would be +well, in getting an aquarium, to have the tank and the seaweeds sent a few +days in advance of the stock, so that on the arrival of the creatures they +may be at once transferred to their new abode. + +There are no American books upon the subject, and, in the present want of +them, the two whose names are given above are the best that can be +obtained. Mr. Gosse's is expensive, costing between four and five dollars. +"The Common Objects of the Seashore," to be got for a quarter of a dollar, +contains much accurate, unpretending, and pleasant information. + + +_The American Drawing-Book: a Manual for the Amateur, and a Basis of Study +for the Professional Artist_. Especially adapted to the Use of Public and +Private Schools, as well as Home Instruction. By J.G. CHAPMAN, N.A. New +York: J.S. Redfield. 4to. pp. 304. + +Drawing-books, in general, deserve to be put into the same category with +the numerous languages "without a master" which have deluded so many +impatient aspirants to knowledge by royal (and cheap) roads. A drawing- +book, at its very best, is only a partial and lame substitute for a +teacher, giving instruction empirically; so that, be it ever so correct in +principle, it must lack adaptation to the momentary and most pressing +wants of the pupil and to his particular frame of mind; it is too +Procrustean to be of any ultimate use to anybody, except in comparatively +unimportant matters. It is well enough for those who need only amusement +in their drawing, and whose highest idea of Art is copying prints and +pictures; but for those who want assistance from Art in order to the +better understanding of Nature, no man, be he ever so wise, can, by the +drawing-book plan, do much to smooth the way of study. + +All that another mind could do for us by way of teaching Art would be to +save us time,--first, by its experience, in anticipating our failures; +second, by its trained accuracy, to correct our errors of expression more +promptly than our afterthought would do it,--and to systematize our +perceptions for us by showing us the relative and comparative importance +of truths in Nature. In the first two respects, which are merely +practical, the drawing-book, if judiciously prepared, might do somewhat to +assist us; but in the last and most important, only the experienced and +thoughtful artist, standing with us before Nature, can give us further +insight into her system of expression. A good picture may do a little, but +it is Nature's own face we need to study, and that neither book nor +picture can very deeply interpret for our proper and peculiar perception. + +In the practical part, again, the drawing-book can give us no real +assistance in regard to color. And thus the efficacy of it is reduced to +the communication of methods of drawing in white and black. This Chapman's +book does to the best purpose possible under the circumstances, in what is +technically termed the right-line system of drawing,--that is, the +reduction of all forms to their approximate geometrical figures in order +to facilitate the measurements of the eye. Thus, it is easier by far to +determine the proportion which exists between the sides of a triangle +formed by the lines connecting the three principal points in any figure +than any curvilinear connections whatever. The application of the +rectilinear system consists in the use, as a basis of the drawing, of such +a series of triangles as shall at once show the exact relation of the +points of definition or expression to each other; but the successful +application of this depends much on the assistance of the trained eye and +hand of a master watching every step we make. + +When we leave this section of the "American Drawing-Book," we leave all +that is of practical value to the young artist. The prescription of any +particular mode of execution is always injurious, (if in any degree +effective,) for the reason that the student must not think of execution at +all, but simply what the form is which he wants to draw, and how he can +draw it most plainly and promptly. Decision of execution should always be +the result of complete knowledge of the thing to be drawn; if from any +other source, it will assuredly be only heedless scrawling, bad in +proportion as it is energetic and decided. + +The chapter on Perspective is full and well illustrated, and useful to +architectural or mechanical draughtsmen, may-be, but little so to artists. +There are, indeed, no laws of perspective which the careful draughtsman +from Nature need ever apply, for his eye will show him the tendency of +lines and the relative magnitude of bodies quicker than he can find them +by the application of the rules of perspective,--and with much better +result, since all application of science _directly_ to artistic work +endangers its poetic character, and almost invariably gives rise to a +hardness and formalism the reverse of artistic, leading the artist to +depend on what he knows ought to be rather than on what he really sees, a +tendency more to be deprecated than any want of correctness in drawing. + +The book contains chapters on artistic processes and technical matters +generally, making it a useful hand-book to amateurs; but all that is +really valuable to a young student of Art might be compressed into a very +few pages of this ponderous book. To follow its prescriptions _seriatim_ +would be to him a serious loss of time and heart. + + +_The New American Cyclopaedia_. A Popular Dictionary of General Knowledge, +Edited by GEORGE RIPLEY and CHAS. A. DANA. Vol. II. New York: D. Appleton +& Co. 8vo. + +We have spoken so fully of the purpose and general character of this work, +in noticing the first volume, that it is hardly necessary for us to speak +at length of the second. In a rapid glance at its contents, it appears +fully to bear out the promise of the first. We have noticed a few +omissions, and some mistakes of judgment. It is, perhaps, impossible to +preserve the gradation of reputations in such a work; but a zoologist must +be puzzled when he sees Von Baer, the great embryologist, who made a +classification of animals, founded on their development, which +substantially agrees with that of Cuvier, founded on their structure, +occupy about one tenth of the space devoted to Peter T. Barnum; however, +we suppose, that, as Barnum created new animals, he is a more wonderful +personage than Von Baer, who simply classified old ones. These occasional +omissions and disturbances of the scale of reputations are, however, more +than offset by the new information the editors have been able to +incorporate into most of their biographies of the living, and not a few of +those of the dead. Many persons who were mere names to the majority of the +public are here, for the first time, recognized as men engaged in living +lives as well as in writing books. Some of these biographies must have +been obtained at the expense of much time and correspondence. Samuel +Bayley, the author of "Essays on the Formation of Opinions," is one of +these well-known names but unknown men; but in the present volume he has +been compelled to come out of his mysterious seclusion, and present to the +public those credentials of dates and incidents which prove him to be a +positive existence on the planet. + +The papers on Arboriculture, Architecture, Arctic Discovery, Armor, Army, +Asia, Atlantic Ocean, Australia, Balance of Power, Bank, and Barometer, +are excellent examples of compact and connected statement of facts and +principles. The biographies of Aristotle, Aristophanes, Augustine, +Ariosto, and Arnold, and the long article on Athens, are among the most +striking and admirable papers in the volume. As the purpose of the work is +to supply a Cyclopaedia for popular use, it is inevitable that students of +special sciences or subjects should be occasionally disappointed at the +comparatively meagre treatment of their respective departments of +knowledge. In regard to the articles in the present volume, it may be said +that such subjects as Astronomy and the Association of Ideas should have +occupied more space, even if the wants of the ordinary reader were alone +consulted. But still, when we consider the vast range and variety of +topics included in this volume, and the fact that it comprehends a dozen +subjects which a dozen octavos devoted to each would not exhaust, we are +compelled to award praise to the editors for contriving to compress into +so small a space an amount of information so great. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY, VOLUME 2, +NUMBER 9, JULY, 1858*** + + +******* This file should be named 10079-8.txt or 10079-8.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/0/7/10079 + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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For +example an eBook of filename 10234 would be found at: + +https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/2/3/10234 + +or filename 24689 would be found at: +https://www.gutenberg.org/2/4/6/8/24689 + +An alternative method of locating eBooks: +https://www.gutenberg.org/GUTINDEX.ALL + +*** END: FULL LICENSE *** diff --git a/old/10079-8.zip b/old/10079-8.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..9c9e497 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/10079-8.zip diff --git a/old/10079.txt b/old/10079.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..746f5e4 --- /dev/null +++ b/old/10079.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9182 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Number 9, +July, 1858, by Various + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, Number 9, July, 1858 + +Author: Various + +Release Date: November 14, 2003 [eBook #10079] +[Date last updated: June 8, 2005] + +Language: English + +Chatacter set encoding: US-ASCII + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY, VOLUME 2, +NUMBER 9, JULY, 1858*** + + +E-text prepared by Anne Soulard, Cornell University, Joshua Hutchinson, +and the Project Gutenberg Online Distributed Proofreading Team + + + +THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY. + +A MAGAZINE OF LITERATURE, ART, AND POLITICS. + +VOL. II.--JULY, 1858.--NO. IX. + + + + + + +THE CATACOMBS OF ROME. +[Concluded.] + +--fessoque Sacrandum +Supponato capiti lapidem, Curistoque quiescam. +PAULINUS OF NOLL + +Et factus est in pace locus ejus et halitatio in Sion. +Ps. LXXV. 2 + +V. + +Rome is preeminently the city of monuments and inscriptions, and the +lapidary style is the one most familiar to her. The Republic, the Empire, +the Papacy, the Heathens, and the Christians have written their record +upon marble. But gravestones are proverbially dull reading, and +inscriptions are often as cold as the stone upon which they are engraved. + +The long gallery of the Vatican, through which one passes to enter the +famous library, and which leads to the collection of statues, is lined on +one side with heathen inscriptions, of miscellaneous character, on the +other with Christian inscriptions, derived chiefly from the catacombs, but +arranged with little order. The comparison thus exhibited to the eye is an +impressive one. The contrast of one class with the other is visible even +in external characteristics. The old Roman lines are cut with precision +and evenness; the letters are well formed, the words are rightly spelt, +the construction of the sentences is grammatical. But the Christian +inscriptions bear for the most part the marks of ignorance, poverty, and +want of skill. Their lines are uneven, the letters of various sizes, the +words ill-spelt, the syntax often incorrect. Not seldom a mixture of Greek +and Latin in the same sentence betrays the corrupt speech of the lower +classes, and the Latin itself is that of the common people. But defects of +style and faults of engraving are insufficient to hide the feeling that +underlies them. + +Besides this great collection of the Vatican, there is another collection +now being formed in the _loggia_ of the Lateran Palace, in immediate +connection with the Christian Museum. Arranged as the inscriptions will +here be in historic sequence and with careful classification, it will be +chiefly to this collection that the student of Christian antiquity will +hereafter resort. It in in the charge of the Cavaliere de Rossi, who is +engaged in editing the Christian inscriptions of the first six centuries, +and whose extraordinary learning and marvellous sagacity in deciphering +and determining the slightest remains of ancient stone-cutting give him +unexampled fitness for the work. Of these inscriptions, about eleven +thousand are now known, and of late some forty or fifty have been added +each year to the number previously recorded. But a very small proportion +of the eleven thousand remain _in situ_ in the catacombs, and besides the +great collections of the Vatican and the Lateran, there are many smaller +ones in Rome and in other Italian cities, and many inscriptions originally +found in the subterranean cemeteries are now scattered in the porticos or +on the pavements of churches in Rome, Ravenna, Milan, and elsewhere. From +the first period of the desecration of the catacombs, the engraved tablets +that had closed the graves were almost as much an object of the greed of +pious or superstitious marauders as the more immediate relics of the +saints. Hence came their dispersion through Italy, and hence, too, it has +happened that many very important and interesting inscriptions belonging +to Rome are now found scattered through the Continent. + +It has been, indeed, sometimes the custom of the Roman Church to enhance +the value of a gift of relics by adding to it the gift of the inscription +on the grave from which they were taken. A curious instance of this kind, +connected with the making of a very popular saint, occurred not many years +since. In the year 1802 a grave was found in the Cemetery of St. +Priscilla, by which were the remains of a glass vase that had held blood, +the indication of the burial-place of a martyr. The grave was closed by +three tiles, on which were the following words painted in red letters: +LVMENA PAXTE CVMFL. There were also rudely painted on the tiles two +anchors, three darts, a torch, and a palm-branch. The bones found within +the grave, together with the tiles bearing the inscription, were placed in +the Treasury of Relics at the Lateran. + +On the return of Pius VII., one of the deputation of Neapolitan clergy +sent to congratulate him sought and received from the Pope these relics +and the tiles as a gift for his church. The inscription had been read by +placing the first tile after the two others, thus,--PAX TECUM FILUMENA, +_Peace be with thee, Filumena_; and Filumena was adopted as a new saint in +the long list of those to whom the Roman Church has given this title. It +was supposed, that, in the haste of closing the grave, the tiles had been +thus misplaced. + +Very soon after the gift, a priest, who desired not to be named _on +account of his great humility_, had a vision at noonday, in which the +beautiful virgin with the beautiful name appeared to him and revealed to +him that she had suffered death rather than yield her chastity to the will +of the Emperor, who desired to make her his wife. Thereupon a young +artist, whose name is also suppressed, likewise had a vision of St. +Filomena, who told him that the emperor was Diocletian; but as history +stands somewhat opposed to this statement, it has been suggested that the +artist mistook the name, and that the Saint said Maximian. However this +may be, the day of her martyrdom was fixed on the 10th of August, 303. Her +relics were carried to Naples with great reverence; they were inclosed, +after the Neapolitan fashion, in a wooden doll of the size of life, +dressed in a white satin skirt and a red tunic, with a garland of flowers +on its head, and a lily and a dart in its hand. This doll, with the red- +lettered tiles, was soon transferred to its place in the church of +Mugnano, a small town not far from Naples. Many miracles were wrought on +the way, and many have since been wrought in the church itself. The fame +of the virgin spread through Italy, and chapels were dedicated to her +honor in many distant churches; from Italy it reached Germany and France, +and it has even crossed the Atlantic to America. Thus a new saint, a new +story, and a new exhibition of credulity had their rise not long ago from +a grave and three words in the catacombs. + +One of the first differences which are obvious, in comparing the Christian +with the heathen mortuary inscriptions, is the introduction in the former +of some new words, expressive of the new ideas that prevailed among them. +Thus, in place of the old formula which had been in most common use upon +gravestones, D.M., or, in Greek, [Greek: TH.K.], standing for _Dis +Manibus_, or [Greek: _Theois karachthoniois_], a dedication of the stone +to the gods of death, we find constantly the words _In pace_. The exact +meaning of these words varies on different inscriptions, but their general +significance is simple and clear. When standing alone, they seem to mean +that the dead rests in the peace of God; sometimes they are preceded by +_Requiescat_, "May he rest in peace"; sometimes there is the affirmation, +_Dormit in pace_, "He sleeps in peace"; sometimes a person is said +_recessisse in pace_, "to have departed in peace." Still other forms are +found, as, for instance, _Vivas in pace_, "Live in peace," or _Suscipiatur +in pace_, "May he be received into peace,"--all being only variations of +the expression of the Psalmist's trust, "I will lay me down in peace and +sleep, for thou, Lord, only makest me dwell in safety." It is a curious +fact, however, that on some of the Christian tablets the same letters +which were used by the heathens have been found. One inscription exists +beginning with the words _Dis Manibus_, and ending with the words _in +pace_. But there is no need of finding a difficulty in this fact, or of +seeking far for an explanation of it. As we have before remarked, in +speaking of works of Art, the presence of some heathen imagery and ideas +in the multitude of the paintings and inscriptions in the catacombs is not +so strange as the comparatively entire absence of them. Many professing +Christians must have had during the early ages but an imperfect conception +of the truth, and can have separated themselves only partially from their +previous opinions, and from the conceptions that prevailed around them in +the world. To some the letters of the heathen gravestones, and the words +which they stood for, probably appeared little more than a form expressive +of the fact of death, and, with the imperfect understanding natural to +uneducated minds, they used them with little thought of their absolute +significance.[1] + +[Footnote 1: It is probable that most of the gravestones upon which this +heathen formula is found are not of an earlier date than the middle of the +fourth century. At this time Christianity became the formal religion of +many who were still heathen in character and thought, and cared little +about the expression of a faith which they had adopted more from the +influence of external motives than from principle or conviction.] + +Another difference in words which is very noticeable, running through the +inscriptions, is that of _depositus_, used by the Christians to signify +the _laying away_ in the grave, in place of the heathen words _situs, +positus, sepultus, conditus_. The very name of _coemeterium_, adopted by +the Christians for their burial-places, a name unknown to the ancient +Romans, bore a reference to the great doctrine of the Resurrection. Their +burial-ground was a _cemetery_, that is, a _sleeping-place_; they regarded +the dead as put there to await the awakening; the body was _depositus_, +that is, _intrusted to_ the grave, while the heathen was _situs_ or +_sepultus, interred_ or _buried_,--the words implying a final and +definitive position. And as the Christian _dormit_ or _quiescit, sleeps_ +or _rests_ in death, so the heathen is described as _abreptus_, or +_defunctus, snatched away_ or _departed_ from life. + +Again, the contrast between the inscriptions is marked, and in a sadder +way, by the difference of the expressions of mourning and grief. No one +who has read many of the ancient gravestones but remembers the bitter +words that are often found on them,--words of indignation against the +gods, of weariness of life, of despair and unconsoled melancholy. Here is +one out of many:-- + + PROCOPE MANVS LEBO CONTRA + DEVM QVI ME INNOCENTEM SVS + TVLIT QVAE VIXI ANNOS XX. + POS. PROCLVS. + + I, Procope, who lived twenty years, lift up + my hands against God, who took me away innocent. + Proclus set up this. + +But among the Christian inscriptions of the first centuries there is not +one of this sort. Most of them contain no reference to grief; they are the +very short and simple words of love, remembrance, and faith,--as in the +following from the Lateran:-- + + ADEODATE DIGNAE ET MERITAE VIRGINI + ETQVIESCE HIC IN PACE IVBENTE XPO EJUS + + To Adeodata, a worthy and deserving Virgin, + and rests here in peace, her Christ commanding. + +On a few the word _dolens_ is found, simply telling of grief. On one to +the memory of a sweetest daughter the word _irreparable_ is used, _Filiae +dulcissimae inreparabili_. Another is, "To Dalmatius, sweetest son, whom +his _unhappy_ father was not permitted to enjoy for even seven years." +Another inscription, in which something of the feeling that was unchecked +among the heathens finds expression in Christian words, is this: "Sweet +soul. To the incomparable child, who lived seventeen years, and +_undeserving_ [of death] gave up life in the peace of the Lord." Neither +the name of the child nor of the parents is on the stone, and the word +_immeritus_, which is used here, and which is common in heathen use, is +found, we believe, on only one other Christian grave. One inscription, +which has been interpreted as being an expression of unresigned sorrow, is +open to a very different signification. It is this:-- + + INNOCENTISSISSIMAE ETATIS + DVLCISSIMO FILIO + JOVIANO QVI VIXIT ANN. VII + ET MENSES VI NON MERENTES + THEOCTISTVS ET THALLVSA PARENTES + + To their sweetest boy Jovian, of the most + innocent age, who lived seven years and six + months, his undeserving [or unlamenting] parents + Theoctistus and Thallusa. + +Here, without forcing the meaning, _non merentes_ might be supposed to +refer to the parents' not esteeming themselves worthy to be left in +possession of such a treasure; but the probability is that _merentes_ is +only a misspelling of _maerentes_ for otherwise _immerentes_ would have +been the natural word. + +But it is thus that the Christian inscriptions must be sifted, to find +expressions at variance with their usual tenor, their general composure +and trust. The simplicity and brevity of the greater number of them are, +indeed, striking evidence of the condition of feeling among those who set +them upon the graves. Their recollections of the dead feared no fading, +and Christ, whose coming was so near at hand, would know and reunite his +own. Continually we read only a name with _in pace_, without date, age, or +title, but often with some symbol of love or faith hastily carved or +painted on the stone or tiles. Such inscriptions as the following are +common:-- + + FELICISSIMVS DVLCIS,--GAVDENTIA IN PACE, + --SEVERA IN DEO VIVAS,-- + +or, with a little more fulness of expression,-- + + DVLCISSIMO FILIO ENDELECIO + BENEMERENTI QVI VIXIT + ANNOS II MENSE VNV + DIES XX IN PACE + + To the sweetest son Endelechius, the well- + deserving, who lived two years, one month, + twenty days. In peace. + +The word _benemerenti_ is of constant recurrence. It is used both of the +young and the old; and it seems to have been employed, with comprehensive +meaning, as an expression of affectionate and grateful remembrance. + +Here is another short and beautiful epitaph. The two words with which it +begins are often found. + + ANIMA DVLCIS AVFENIA VIRGO + BENEDICTA QVE VIXIT ANN: XXX + DORMIT IN PACE + + Sweet Soul. The Blessed Virgin Aufenia, + who lived thirty years. She sleeps in peace. + +But the force and tenderness of such epitaphs as these is hardly to be +recognized in single examples. There is a cumulative pathos in them, as +one reads, one after another, such as these that follow:-- + + ANGELICE BENE IN PACE + + To Angelica well in peace. + + CVRRENTIO SERVO DEI DEP. D. XVI. KAL + NOVEM. + + To Currentius, the servant of God, laid in + the grave on the sixteenth of the Kalends of + November. + + MAXIMINVS QVI VIXIT ANNOS XXIII + AMICVS OMNIVM + + Maximin, who lived twenty-three years, the + friend of all. + + SEPTIMVS MARCIANE + IN PACE QUE BICSIT MECV + ANNOS XVII. DORMIT IN PACE + + Septimus to Marciana in peace. Who lived + with me seventeen years. She sleeps in peace. + + GAVDENTIA + PAVSAT DVLCIS + SPIRITVS ANNORVM II + MENSORVM TRES. + + Gaudentia rests. Sweet spirit of two years + and three months. + +Here is a gravestone with the single word VIATOR; here one that tells only +that Mary placed it for her daughter; here one that tells of the light of +the house,--[Greek: To phos thaes Oikias]. + +Nor is it only in these domestic and intimate inscriptions that the +habitual temper and feeling of the Christians is shown, but even still +more in those that were placed over the graves of such members of the +household of faith as had made public profession of their belief, and +shared in the sufferings of their Lord. There is no parade of words on the +gravestones of the martyrs. Their death needed no other record than the +little jar of blood placed in the mortar, and the fewest words were enough +where this was present. Here is an inscription in the rudest letters from +a martyr's grave:-- + + SABATIVS BENEMERENTI QVI VIXIT ANNOS XL + + To the well-deserving Sabatias, who lived + forty years. + +And here another:-- + + PROSPERO INNOCENTI ANIMAE IN PACE. + + To Prosperus, innocent soul, in peace. + +And here a third, to a child who had died as one of the Innocents:-- + + MIRAE INNOCENTIAE ANIMA DULCIS AEMILEANVS + QVI VIXIT ANNO VNO, MENS. VIII D. XXVIII + DORMIT IN PACE + + Aemilian, sweet soul of marvellous innocence, + who lived one year, eight months, twenty-eight + days. He sleeps in peace. + +At this grave was found the vase of blood, and on the gravestone was the +figure of a dove. + +Another inscription, which preserves the name of one of those who suffered +in the most severe persecution to which the ancient Church was exposed, +and which, if genuine, is, so far as known, the only monument of the kind, +is marked by the same simplicity of style:-- + + LANNVS XPI MA + RTIR HC*[Hic?] REQVIESC + IT SVR [E-P-S] DIOCLITI ANO PASSVS + + Lannus Martyr of Christ here rests. He + suffered under Diocletian. + +The three letters EPS have been interpreted as standing for the words _et +posteris suis_, and as meaning that the grave was also for his successors. +Not yet, then, had future saints begun to sanctify their graves, and to +claim the exclusive possession of them. + +But there is another point of contrast between the inscriptions of the un- +Christianized and the Christian Romans, which illustrates forcibly the +difference in the regard which they paid to the dead. To the one the dead +were still of this world, and the greatness of life, the distinctions of +class, the titles of honor still clung to them; to the other the past life +was as nothing to that which had now begun. The heathen epitaphs are +loaded with titles of honor, and with the names of the offices which the +dead had borne, and, like the modern Christian (?) epitaphs whose style +has been borrowed from them, the vanity of this world holds its place +above the grave. But among the early Christian inscriptions of Rome +nothing of this kind is known. Scarcely a title of rank or a name of +office is to be found among them. A military title, or the name of priest +or deacon, or of some other officer in the Church, now and then is met +with; but even these, for the most part, would seem to belong to the +fourth century, and never contain any expression of boastfulness or +flattery. + + FL. OLIVS PATERNVS + CENTVRIO CHOR. X VRB. + QVI VIXIT AH XXVII + IN PACE + + Flavius Olius Paternus, Centurion of the + Tenth Urban Cohort, who lived twenty-seven + years. In peace. + +It is true, no doubt, that among the first Christians there were very few +of the rich and great. The words of St. Paul to the Corinthians were as +true of the Romans as of those to whom they were specially addressed: "For +ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, +not many mighty, not many noble are called." Still there is evidence +enough that even in the first two centuries some of the mighty and some of +the noble at Rome were among those called, but that evidence is not to be +gathered from the gravestones of the catacombs. We have seen, in a former +article, that even the grave of one of the early bishops,--the highest +officer of the Church,--and one who had borne witness to the truth in his +death, was marked by the words, + + CORNELIVS MARTYR + EP. + + The Martyr Cornelius, Bishop. + +Compare this with the epitaphs of the later popes, as they are found on +their monuments in St. Peter's,--"flattering, false insculptions on a +tomb, and in men's hearts reproach,"--epitaphs overweighted with +superlatives, ridiculous, were it not for their impiety, and full of the +lies and vanities of man in the very house of God. + +With this absence of boastfulness and of titles of rank on the early +Christian graves two other characteristics of the inscriptions are closely +connected, which bear even yet more intimate and expressive relation to +the change wrought by Christianity in the very centre of the heathen +world. + +"One cannot study a dozen monuments of pagan Rome," says Mr. Northcote, in +his little volume on the catacombs, "without reading something of _servus_ +or _libertus, libertis libertabusque posterisque eorum_; and I believe the +proportion in which they are found is about three out of every four. Yet, +in a number of Christian inscriptions exceeding eleven thousand, and all +belonging to the first six centuries of our era, scarcely six have been +found containing any allusion whatever--and even two or three of these are +doubtful--to this fundamental division of ancient Roman society. + +"No one, we think, will be rash enough to maintain, either that this +omission is the result of mere accident, or that no individual slave or +freedman was ever buried in the catacombs. Rather, these two cognate +facts, the absence from ancient Christian epitaphs of all titles of rank +and honor on the one hand, or of disgrace and servitude on the other, can +only be adequately explained by an appeal to the religion of those who +made them. The children of the primitive Church did not record upon their +monuments titles of earthly dignity, because they knew that with the God +whom they served 'there was no respect of persons'; neither did they care +to mention the fact of their bondage, or of their deliverance from +bondage, to some earthly master, because they thought only of that higher +and more perfect liberty wherewith Christ had set them free; remembering +that 'he that was called, being a bondman, was yet the freeman of the +Lord, and likewise he that was called, being free, was still the bondman +of Christ.' + +"And this conclusion is still further confirmed by another remarkable fact +which should be mentioned, namely, that there are not wanting in the +catacombs numerous examples of another class of persons, sometimes ranked +among slaves, but the mention of whose servitude, such as it was, served +rather to record an act of Christian charity than any social degradation; +I allude to the alumni, or foundlings, as they may be called. The laws of +pagan Rome assigned these victims of their parents' crimes or poverty to +be the absolute property of any one who would take charge of them. As +nothing, however, but compassion could move a man to do this, children +thus acquired were not called _servi_, as though they were slaves who had +been bought with money, nor _vernae_, as though they had been the children +of slaves born in the house, but _alumni_, a name simply implying that +they had been brought up (_ab alendo_) by their owners. Now it is a very +singular fact, that there are actually more instances of _alumni_ among +the sepulchral inscriptions of Christians than among the infinitely more +numerous inscriptions of pagans, showing clearly that this was an act of +charity to which the early Christians were much addicted; and the +_alumni_, when their foster-parents died, very properly and naturally +recorded upon their tombs this act of charity, to which they were +themselves so deeply indebted." + +So far Mr. Northcote. It is still further to be noted, as an expression of +the Christian temper, as displayed in this kind of charity, that it never +appears in the inscriptions as furnishing a claim for praise, or as being +regarded as a peculiar merit. There is no departure from the usual +simplicity of the gravestones in those of this class. + + [Greek: + PETROS + THREPTOS + RAUKUTA + TOS EN THEO] + + Peter, sweetest foster-child, in God. + +And a dove is engraved at either side of +this short epitaph. + + VITALIANO ALVMNO KARO + EVTROPIVS FECIT. + + Eutropius made this for the dear foster-child + Vitalian. + + ANTONIVS DISCOLIVS FILIVS ET BIBIVS + FELLICISSIMVS ALVMNVS VALERIE CRESTENI + MATRI BIDVE ANORVM XVIII INTET SANCTOS + + Antonius Discolius her son, and Bibius Felicissimus + her foster-child, to Valeria Crestina + their mother, a widow for eighteen years. + [Her grave is] among the holy.[2] + +[Footnote 2: This inscription is not of earlier date than the fourth +century, as is shown by the words, _Inter sancios_,--referring, as we +heretofore stated, to the grave being made near that of some person +esteemed a saint.] + +These inscriptions lead us by a natural transition to such as contain some +reference to the habits of life or to the domestic occupations and +feelings of the early Christians. Unfortunately for the gratification of +the desire to learn of these things, this class of inscriptions is far +from numerous,--and the common conciseness is rarely, in the first +centuries, amplified by details. But here is one that tells a little story +in itself:-- + + DOMNINAE +INNOCENTISSINAE ET DVLCISSIMAE COIVGI + QVAE VIXIT ANN XVI M. IIII ET FVIT + IMARITATA ANN. DVOBVS M. IIII D. VIIII + CVM QVA SON LICVIT FVISSE PROPTER + CAVSAS PEREGRINATIONIS + NISI MENEIE VI +QVO TEMPORE VT EGO SENSI ET EXHBVI + AMOREM MEVM + NVLLI SV ALII SIC DILEXERVNT + DEPOSIT XV KAL. IVN. + + To Domnina, my most innocent and sweetest + wife; who lived sixteen years and four + months, and was married two years, four + months, and nine days; with whom, on account + of my journeys, I was permitted to be + only six months; in which time, as I felt, so + I showed my love. No others have so loved + one another. Placed in the grave the 15th + of the Kalends of June. + +Who was this husband whose far-off journeys had so separated him from his +lately married wife? Who were they who so loved as no others had loved? +The tombstone gives only the name of Domnina. But in naming her, and in +the expression of her husband's love, it gives evidence, which is +confirmed by many other tokens in the catacombs, of the change introduced +by Christianity in the position of women, and in the regard paid to them. +Marriage was invested with a sanctity which redeemed it from sensuality, +and Christianity became the means of uniting man and woman in the bonds of +an immortal love. + +Here is an inscription which, spite of the rudeness of its style, +preserves the pleasant memory of a Roman child:-- + + ISPIRITO SANTO BONO + FLORENTIO QVI VIXIT ANIS XIII + QVAM SI FILIVM SVVM ET COTDEVS + MATER FILIO BENEMERETI FECERVNT. + + To the good and holy spirit Florentius, who + lived thirteen years, Coritus, his master, who + loved him more than if he were his own son, + and Cotdeus, his mother, have made this for + her well-deserving son.[3] + +[Footnote 3: Compare an inscription from a heathen tomb:-- + + C. JVLIVS MAXIMVS + ANN. II. M. V. + + ATROX O FORTVNA TRVCI QVAE FVNERR GAVDES + QVID MIHI TAM SVBITO MAXIMVS ERIPITVR + QVI MODO JVCVNDVS GREMIO SVPERESSE SOLEBAT + HIC LAPIS TN TVMVLO NVNC JACET ECCE MATER + + C. Julius Maximus, + Two years, five months old. + + Harsh Fortune, that in cruel death finds't joy, + Why is my Maximus thus sudden reft, + So late the pleasant burden of my breast? + Now in the grave this stone lies: lo, his mother!] + +And Coritus, his master, and Cotdeus, his mother, might have rejoiced in +knowing that their poor, rough tablet would keep the memory of her boy +alive for so many centuries; and that long after they had gone to the +grave, the good spirit of Florentius should still, through these few +words, remain to work good upon the earth.--Note in this inscription (as +in many others) the Italianizing of the old Latin,--the _ispirito_, and +the _santo_; note also the mother's strange name, reminding one of Puritan +appellations,--Cotdeus being the abbreviation of _Quod vult Deus_, "What +God wills."[4] + +[Footnote 4: Other names of this kind were _Deogratias_, _Habetdeum_, and +_Adeodatus_.] + +Here is an inscription set up by a husband to his wife, Dignitas, who was +a woman of great goodness and entire purity of life:-- + + QUE SINE LESIONE ANIMI MEI VIXI MECVM + ANNOS XV FILIOS AVTEM PROCREAVIT VII + EX QVIBVS SECV ABET AD DOMINVM IIII + + Who, without ever wounding my soul, lived + with me for fifteen years, and bore seven + children, four of whom she has with her in + the Lord. + +We have already referred to the inscriptions which bear the name of some +officer of the early Church; but there is still another class, which +exhibits in clear letters others of the designations and customs familiar +to the first Christians. Thus, those who had not yet been baptized and +received into the fold, but were being instructed in Christian doctrine +for that end, were called _catechumens_; those who were recently baptized +were called _neophytes_; and baptism itself appears sometimes to have +been designated by the word _illuminatio_. Of the use of these names the +inscriptions give not infrequent examples. It was the custom also among +the Christians to afford support to the poor and to the widows of their +body. Thus we read such inscriptions as the following:-- + + RIGINE VENEMEREMTI FILIA SVA FECIT + VENERIGINE MATRI VIDVAE QVE SE + DIT VIDVA ANNOS LX ET ECLESA + VIXIT ANNOS LXXX MESIS V + DIES XXVI + + Her daughter Reneregina made this for her + well-deserving mother Regina, a widow, who + sat a widow sixty years, and never burdened + the church, the wife of one husband, who lived + eighty years, five months, twenty-six days. + +The words of this inscription recall to mind those of St. Paul, in his +First Epistle to Timothy, (v. 3-16,) and especially the verse, "If any man +or woman that believeth have widows, let them relieve them, and let not +the church be charged." + +Some of the inscriptions preserve a record of the occupation or trade of +the dead, sometimes in words, more often by the representation of the +implements of labor. Here, for instance, is one which seems like the +advertisement of a surviving partner:-- + + DE BIANOBA + POLLECLA QVE ORDEV BENDET DE + BIANOBA + + From New Street. Pollecla, who sold barley + on New Street. + +Others often bear a figure which refers to the name of the deceased, an +_armoirie parlante_ as it were, which might be read by those too ignorant +to read the letters on the stone. Thus, a lion is scratched on the grave +of a man named Leo; a little pig on the grave of the little child +Porcella, who had lived not quite four years; on the tomb of Dracontius is +a dragon; and by the side of the following charming inscription is found +the figure of a ship:-- + + NABIRA IN PACE ANIMA DULCIS + QVI BIXIT ANOS XVI M V + ANIMA MELEIEA + TITVLV FACTV + APARENTES SIGNVM NABE + + Navira in peace. Sweet soul, who lived sixteen + years, five months. Soul honey-sweet. + This inscription made by her parents. The + sign a ship. + +The figures that are most frequent upon the sepulchral slabs are, however, +not such as bear relation to a name or profession, but the commonly +adopted symbols of the faith, similar in design and character to those +exhibited in the paintings of the catacombs. The Good Shepherd is thus +often rudely represented; the figure of Jonah is naturally, from its +reference to the Resurrection, also frequently found; and the figure of a +man or woman with arms outstretched, in the attitude of prayer, occurs on +many of the sepulchral slabs. The anchor, the palm, the crown, and the +dove, as being simpler in character and more easily represented, are still +more frequently found. The varying use of symbols at different periods has +been one of the means which have assisted in determining approximate dates +for the inscriptions upon which they are met with. It is a matter of +importance, in many instances, to fix a date to an inscription. Historical +and theological controversies hang on such trifles. Most of the early +gravestones bear no date; and it was not till the fourth century, that, +with many other changes, the custom of carving a date upon them became +general. The century to which an inscription belongs may generally be +determined with some confidence, either by the style of expression and the +nature of the language, or by the engraved character, or some other +external indications. Among these latter are the symbols. It has, for +instance, been recently satisfactorily proved by the Cavaliere de Rossi +that the use of the emblem of the fish in the catacombs extended only to +the fourth century, so that the monuments upon which it is found may, with +scarcely an exception, be referred to the preceding period. As this emblem +went out of use, owing perhaps to the fact that the Christians were no +longer forced to seek concealment for their name and profession, the +famous monogram of Christ, [Symbol] the hieroglyphic, not only of his +name, but of his cross, succeeded to it, and came, indeed, into far more +general use than that which the fish had ever attained. The monogram is +hardly to be found before the time of Constantine, and, as it is very +frequently met with in the inscriptions from the catacombs, it affords an +easy means, in the absence of a more specific date, for determining a +period earlier than which any special inscription bearing it cannot have +originated. Its use spread rapidly during the fourth century. It "became," +says Gibbon, with one of his amusing sneers, "extremely fashionable in the +Christian world." The story of the vision of Constantine was connected +with it, and the Labarum displayed its form in the front of the imperial +army. It was thus not merely the emblem of Christ, but that also of the +conversion of the Emperor and of the fatal victory of the Church. + +It is a remarkable fact, and one which none of the recent Romanist +authorities attempt to controvert, that the undoubted earlier inscriptions +afford no evidence of any of the peculiar doctrines of the Roman Church. +There is no reference to the doctrine of the Trinity to be found among +them; nothing is to be derived from them in support of the worship of the +Virgin; her name even is not met with on any monument of the first three +centuries; and none of the inscriptions of this period give any sign of +the prevalence of the worship of saints. There is no support of the claim +of the Roman Church to supremacy, and no reference to the claim of the +Popes to be the Vicars of Christ. As the third century advances to its +close, we find the simple and crude beginning of that change in Christian +faith which developed afterward into the broad idea of the intercessory +power of the saints. Among the earlier inscriptions prayers to God or to +Christ are sometimes met with, generally in short exclamatory expressions +concerning the dead. Thus we find at first such words as these:-- + + AMERIMNVS + RVFINAE COIV + GI CARISSIME + BENEMEREN + TI SPIRITVM + TVVM DEVS + REFRIGERET + + Amerimnus to his dearest wife Rufina well- + deserving. May God refresh thy spirit! + +And, in still further development,-- + + [Greek: AUR. AIANOS PAPHLAGON THEOU + DOULOS PISTOS + EKOIMNON EN EIPNIN MINSON + AUTOU + O THEOS EIS TOUS AIONAS] + + Aurelius Aelianus, a Paphlagonian, faithful + servant of God. He sleeps in peace. Remember + him, O God, forever! + +Again, two sons ask for their mother,-- + + DOMINE NE QVANDO + ADVMBRETVR SPIRITVS + VENERES + + O Lord, let not the spirit of Venus be shadowed + at any time! + +From such petitions as these we come by a natural transition to such as +are addressed to the dead themselves, as being members of the same +communion with the living, and uniting in prayers with those they had left +on earth and for their sake. + + VIBAS IN PACE ET PETE PRO NOBIS + + Mayst thou live in peace and ask for us! + +Or, as in another instance,-- + + PETE PRO PARENTES TVOS + MATRONATA MATRONA + QVE VIXIT AN. I. DI. LII. + + Pray for thy parents, Matronata Matrona! + Who lived one year, fifty-two days. + +And as we have seen how in the fourth century the desire arose of being +buried near the graves of those reputed holy, so by a similar process we +find this simple and affectionate petition to the dead passing into a +prayer for the dead to those under whose protection it was hoped that they +might be. In the multitude of epitaphs, however, these form but a small +number. Here is one that begins with a heathen formula:-- + + SOMNO HETERNALI + AVRELIVS GEMELLVS QVI BIXIT AN-- + ET MESES VIII DIES XVIII MATER FILIO + CARISSIMO BENAEMERENTI FECIT IN PA-- + [C]ONMANDO BASSILA INNOCENTIA GEMELLI + + In Eternal Sleep. Aurelius Gemellus, who + lived --- years, and eight months, eighteen + days. His mother made this for her dearest + well-deserving son in peace. I commend to + Basilla the innocence of Gemellus. + +Basilla was one of the famous martyrs of the time of Valerian and +Gallienus. + +Here again is another inscription of a curious character, as interposing a +saint between the dead and his Saviour. The monogram marks its date. + + RVTA OMNIBVS SVBDITA ET ATFABI + LIS BIBET IN NOMINE PETRI + IN PACE + + Ruta, subject and affable to all, shall live in + the name of Peter, in the peace of Christ. + +But it would seem from other inscriptions as if the new practice of +calling upon the saints were not adopted without protest. Thus we read, in +contrast to the last epitaph, this simple one:-- + + ZOSIME VIVAS IN NOMINE XTI + + O Zosimus, mayst thou live in the name of Christ! + +And again, in the strongest and most direct words:-- + + SOLVS DEVS ANIMAM TVAM + DEFENDAD ALEXANDRE + + May God alone protect thy spirit, Alexander! + +One more inscription and we have done; it well closes the long list:-- + + QVI LEGERIT VIVAT IN CHRISTO + + Whoever shall read this, may he live in Christ! + +As the fourth century advanced, the character of the inscriptions +underwent great change. They become less simple; they exhibit less faith, +and more worldliness; superlatives abound in them; and the want of feeling +displays itself in the abundance of words. + +We end here our examinations of the testimony of the catacombs regarding +the doctrine, the faith, and the lives of the Christians of Rome in the +first three centuries. The evidence is harmonious and complete. It leaves +no room for skepticism or doubt. There are no contradictions in it. From +every point of view, theologic, historic, artistic, the results coincide +and afford mutual support. The construction of the catacombs, the works of +painting found within them, the inscriptions on the graves, all unite in +bearing witness to the simplicity of the faith, the purity of the +doctrine, the strength of the feeling, the change in the lives of the vast +mass of the members of the early church of Christ. A light had come into +the world, and the dark passages of the underground cemeteries were +illuminated by it, and manifest its brightness. Wherever it reached, the +world was humanized and purified. To the merely outward eye it might at +first have seemed faint and dim, but "the kingdom of God cometh not with +observation." + + + + +THREE OF US. + + +Such a spring day as it was!--the sky all one mild blue, hazy on the +hills, warm with sunshine overhead; a soft south-wind, expressive, and +full of new impulses, blowing up from the sea, and spreading the news of +life all over our brown pastures and leaf-strewn woods. The crocuses in +Friend Allis's garden-bed shot up cups of gold and sapphire from the dark +mould; slight long buds nestled under the yellow-green leafage of the +violet-patch; white and sturdy points bristled on the corner that in May +was thick with lilies-of-the-valley, crisp, cool, and fragrant; and in a +knotty old apricot-tree two bluebirds and a robin did heralds' duty, +singing of summer's procession to come; and we made ready to receive it +both in our hearts and garments. + +Josephine Boyle, Letty Allis, and I, Sarah Anderson, three cousins as we +were, sat at the long window of Friend Allis's parlor, pretending to sew, +really talking. Mr. Stepel, a German artist, had just left us; and a +little trait of Miss Josephine's, that had occurred during his call, +brought out this observation from Cousin Letty:-- + +"Jo, how could thee let down thy hair so before that man?" + +Jo laughed. "Thee is a little innocent, Letty, with your pretty dialect! +Why did I let my hair down? For Mr. Stepel to see it, of course." + +"That is very evident," interposed I; "but Letty is not so innocent or so +wise as to have done wondering at your caprices, Jo; expound, if you +please, for her edification." + +"I do not pretend to be wise or simple, Sarah; but I didn't think Cousin +Josephine had so much vanity." + +"You certainly shall have a preacher-bonnet, Letty. How do you know it was +vanity, my dear? I saw you show Mr. Stepel your embroidery with the +serenest satisfaction; now you made your crewel cherries, and I didn't +make my hair; which was vain?" + +Letty was astounded. "Thee has a gift of speech, certainly, Jo." + +"I have a gift of honesty, you mean. My hair is very handsome, and I knew +Mr. Stepel would admire it with real pleasure, for it is a rare color. I +took down those curls with quite as simple an intention as you brought him +that little picture of Cole's to see." + +Josephine was right,--partly, at least. Her hair was perfect; its tint the +exact hue of a new chestnut-skin, with golden lights, and shadows of deep +brown; not a tinge of red libelled it as auburn; and the light broke on +its glittering waves as it does on the sea, tipping the undulations with +sunshine, and scattering rays of gold through the long, loose curls, and +across the curve of the massive coil, that seemed almost too heavy for her +proud and delicate head to bear. Mr. Stepel was excusably enthusiastic +about its beauty, and Jo as cool as if it had been a wig. Sometimes I +thought this peculiar hair was an expression of her own peculiar +character. + +Letty said truly that Jo had a gift of speech; and she, having said her +say about the hair, dismissed the matter, with no uneasy recurring to it, +and took up a book from the table, declaring she was tired of her seam;-- +she always was tired of sewing! Presently she laughed. + +"What is it, Jo?" said I. + +"Why, it is 'Jane Eyre,' with Letty Allis's name on the blank leaf. That +is what I call an anachronism, spiritually. What do you think about the +book, Letty?" said she, turning her lithe figure round in the great chair +toward the little Quakeress, whose pretty red head and apple-blossom of a +face bloomed out of her gray attire and prim collar with a certain +fascinating contrast. + +"I think it has a very good moral tendency, Cousin Jo." + +The clear, hazel eyes flashed a most amused comment at me. + +"Well, what do you call the moral, Letty?" + +"Why,--I should think,--I do not quite know that the moral is stated, +Josephine,--but I think thee will allow it was a great triumph of +principle for Jane Eyre to leave Mr. Rochester when she discovered that he +was married." + +Jo flung herself back impatiently in the chair, and began an harangue. + +"That is a true world's judgment! And you, you innocent little Quaker +girl! think it is the height of virtue not to elope with a married man, +who has entirely and deliberately deceived you, and adds to the wrong of +deceit the insult of proposing an elopement! Triumph of principle! I +should call it the result of common decency, rather,--a thing that the +instinct of any woman would compel her to do. My only wonder is how Jane +Eyre could continue to love him." + +"My dear young friend," said I, rather grimly, "when a woman loves a man, +it is apt, I regret to say, to become a fact, not a theory; and facts are +stubborn things, you know. It is not easy to set aside a real affection." + +"I know that, ma'am," retorted Jo, in a slightly sarcastic tone; "it is a +painful truth; still, I do think a deliberate deceit practised on me by +any man would decapitate any love I had for him, quite inevitably." + +"So it might, in your case," replied I; "for you never will love a man, +only your idea of one. You will go on enjoying your mighty theories and +dreams till suddenly the juice of that 'little western flower' drips on +your eyelids, and then I shall have the pleasure of seeing you caress 'the +fair large ears' of some donkey, and hang rapturously upon its bray, till +you perhaps discover that he has pretended, on your account solely, to +like roses, when he has a natural proclivity to thistles; and then, +pitiable child! you will discover what you have been caressing, and--I +spare you conclusions; only, for my part, I pity the animal! Now Jane Eyre +was a highly practical person; she knew the man she loved was only a man, +and rather a bad specimen at that; she was properly indignant at this +further development of his nature, but reflecting in cool blood, +afterward, that it was only his nature, and finding it proper and legal to +marry him, she did so, to the great satisfaction of herself and the +public. _You_ would have made a new ideal of St. John Rivers, who was +infinitely the best material of the two, and possibly gone on to your +dying day in the belief that his cold and hard soul was only the adamant +of the seraph, encouraged in that belief by his real and high principle,-- +a thing that went for sounding brass with that worldly-wise little +philosopher, Jane, because it did not act more practically on his inborn +traits." + +"Bah!" said Josephine, "when did you turn gypsy, Sally? You ought to sell +_dukkeripen_, and make your fortune. Why don't you unfold Letty's fate?" + +"No," said I, laughing. "Don't you know that the afflatus always exhausts +the priestess? You may tell Letty's fortune, or mine, if you will; but my +power is gone." + +"I can tell yours easily, O Sibyl!" replied she. "You will never marry, +neither for real nor ideal. You should have fallen in love in the orthodox +way, when you were seventeen. You are adaptive enough to have moulded +yourself into any nature that you loved, and constant enough to have clung +to it through good and evil. You would have been a model wife, and a +blessed mother. But now--you are too old, my dear; you have seen too +much; you have not hardened yourself, but you have learned to see too +keenly into other people. You don't respect men, 'except exceptions'; and +you have seen so much matrimony that is harsh and unlovable, that you +dread it; and yet--Don't look at me that way, Sarah! I shall cry!--My +dear! my darling! I did not mean to hurt you.--I am a perfect fool!--Do +please look at me with your old sweet eyes again!--How could I!"---- + +"Look at Letty," said I, succeeding at last in a laugh. And really Letty +was comical to look at; she was regarding Josephine and me with her eyes +wide open like two blue larkspur flowers, her little red lips apart, and +her whole pretty surface face quite full of astonishment. + +"Wasn't that a nice little tableau, Letty?" said Josephine, with +preternatural coolness. "You looked so sleepy, I thought I'd wake you up +with a bit of a scene from 'Lara Aboukir, the Pirate Chief'; you know we +have a great deal of private theatricals at Baltimore; you should see me +in that play as Flashmoria, the Bandit's Bride." + +Letty rubbed her left eye a little, as if to see whether she was sleepy or +not, and looked grave; for me, the laugh came easily enough now. Jo saw +she had not quite succeeded, so she turned the current another way. + +"Shall I tell your fortune now, Letty? Are you quite waked up?" said she. + +"No, thee needn't, Cousin Jo; thee don't tell very good ones, I think." + +"No, Letty, she shall not vex your head with nonsense. I think your fate +is patent; you will grow on a little longer like a pink china-aster, safe +in the garden, and in due time marry some good Friend,--Thomas Dugdale, +very possibly,--and live a tranquil life here in Slepington till you +arrive at a preacher-bonnet, and speak in meeting, as dear Aunt Allis did +before you." + +Letty turned pale with rage. I did not think her blonde temperament held +such passion. + +"I won't! I won't! I never will!" she cried out. "I hate Thomas Dugdale, +Sarah! Thee ought to know better about me! thee knows I cannot endure him, +the old thing!" + +This climax was too much for Jo. With raised brows and a round mouth, she +had been on the point of whistling ever since Letty began; it was an old, +naughty trick of hers; but now she laughed outright. + +"No sort of inspiration left, Sally! I must patch up Letty's fate myself. +Flatter not yourself that she is going to be a good girl and marry in +meeting; not she! If there's a wild, scatter-brained, handsome, +dissipated, godless youth in all Slepington, it is on him that testy +little heart will fix,--and think him not only a hero, but a prodigy of +genius. Friend Allis will break her heart over Letty; but I'd bet you a +pack of gloves, that in three years you'll see that juvenile Quakeress in +a scarlet satin hat and feather, with a blue shawl, and green dress, on +the arm of a fast young man with black hair, and a cigar in his mouth." + +"Why! where _did_ thee ever see him, Josey?" exclaimed Letty, now rosy +with quick blushes. + +The question was irresistible. Jo and I burst into a peal of laughter that +woke Friend Allis from her nap, and, bringing her into the parlor, forced +us to recover our gravity; and presently Jo and I took leave. + +Letty was an orphan, and lived with her cousin, Friend Allis. I, too, was +alone; but I kept a tiny house in Slepington, part of which I rented, and +Jo was visiting me. + +As we walked home, along the quiet street overhung with willows and +sycamores, I said to her, "Jo, how came you to know Letty's secret?" + +"My dear, I did not know it any more than you; but I drew the inference of +her tastes from her character. She is excitable,--even passionate; but her +formal training has allowed no scope for either trait, and suppression has +but concentrated them. She really pines for some excitement;--what, then, +could be more natural than that her fancy should light upon some person +utterly diverse from what she is used to see? That is simple enough. I hit +upon the black hair on the same principle, 'like in difference.' The cigar +seemed wonderful to the half-frightened, all-amazed child; but who ever +sees a fast young man without a cigar?" + +"I am afraid it is Henry Malden," said I, meditatively; "he is all you +describe, but he is also radically bad; besides, having been in the +Mexican war, he will have the prestige of a hero to Letty. How can the +poor girl be undeceived before it is quite too late?" + +"What do you want to undeceive her for, Sally? Do you suppose that will +prevent her marrying Mr. Malden?" + +"I should think so, most certainly!" + +"Not in the least. If you want Letty to marry him, just judiciously oppose +it. Go to her, and say you come as a friend to tell her Mr. Malden's +faults, and the result will be, she will hate you, and be deeper in love +with him than ever." + +"You don't give her credit for common sense, Jo." + +"Just as much as any girl of her age has in love. Did you ever know a +woman who gave up a man she loved because she was warned against him?--or +even if she knew his character well, herself? I don't know but there are +women who could do it, from sheer religious principle. I believe you +might, Sarah. It would be a hard struggle, and wear you to a shadow in +mind and body; but you have a conscience, and, for a woman with a heart as +soft as pudding, the most thoroughly rigid streak of duty in you; none of +which Letty has to depend on. No; if you want to save her, take her away +from Slepington; take her to Saratoga, to Newport, to Washington; turn her +small head with gayety: she is pretty enough to have a dozen lovers at any +watering-place; it is only propinquity that favors Mr. Malden here." + +"I can't do that, Josephine. I have not the means, and Miss Allis would +not have the will, even if she believed in your prescription." + +"Then Letty must stay here and bide her time. You believe in a special +Providence, Sarah, don't you?" + +"Yes, of course I do." + +"Then cannot you leave her to that care? Circumstances do not work for +you. Perhaps it is best that she should marry him, suffer, live, love, and +be refined by fire." + +My heart sunk at the prospect of these possibilities. Josephine put her +arm round me. "Sally," said she, in her softest tone, "I grieved you, +dear, this afternoon. I did not mean to. I grieved myself most. Please +forgive me!" + +"I haven't anything to forgive, Jo," said I. "What you said to me was +true, painfully true,--and, being so, for a moment pained me. I should +have been much happier to be married, I know; but now I daren't think of +it. I have lost a great deal. I have + + "--'lost _my_ place, + _My_ sweet, safe corner by the household fire, + Behind the heads of children'; + +"and yet I do not know that I have not gained a little. It is something, +Jo, to know that I am not in the power of a bad, or even an ill-tempered +man. I can sit by my fire and know that no one will come home to fret at +me,--that I shall encounter no cold looks, no sneers, no bursts of anger, +no snarl of stinginess, no contempt of my opinion and advice. I know that +now men treat me with respect and attention, such as their wives rarely, +if ever, receive from them. Sensitive and fastidious as I am, I do not +know whether my gain is not, to me, greater than my loss. I know it ought +not to be so,--that it argues a vicious, an unchristian, almost an +uncivilized state of society; but that does not affect the facts." + +"You frighten me, Sarah. I cannot believe this is always true of men and +their wives." + +"Neither is it. Some men are good and kind and gentle, gentle-men, even in +their families; and every woman believes the man she is to marry is that +exception. Jo,--bend your ear down closer,--I thought once I knew such a +man,--and,--dear,--I loved him." + +"My darling!--but, Sarah, why"-- + +"Because, as you said, Josey, I was too old; I had seen too much; I would +not give way to an impulse. I bent my soul to know him; I rang the metal +on more than one stone, and every time it rang false. I knew, if I married +him, I should live and die a wretched woman. Was it not better to live +alone?" + +"But, Sarah,--if he loved you?" + +"He did not,--not enough to hurt himself; he could not love anything so +much better than his ease as to suffer, Josey: he was safe. He thought, or +said, he loved me; but he was mistaken." + +"Safe, indeed! He ought to have been shot!" + +"Hush, dear!" + +There was a long pause. It was as when you lift a wreck from the tranquil +sea and let it fall again to the depths, useless to wave or shore; the +black and ghastly hulk is covered; it is seen no more; but the water +palpitates with circling rings, trembles above the grave, dashes quick and +apprehensive billows upon the sand, and is long in regaining its quiet +surface. + +"I wonder if there ever was a perfect man," said Jo, at length, drawing a +deep sigh. + +"You an American girl, Jo, and don't think at once of Washington?" + +"My dear, I am bored to death with Washington _a l'Americain_. A man!-- +how dare you call him a man?--don't you know he is a myth, an abstraction, +a plaster-of-Paris cast? Did you ever hear any human trait of his noticed? +Weren't you brought up to regard him as a species of special seraph, a +sublime and stainless figure, inseparable from a grand manner and a +scroll? Did you ever dare suppose he ate, or drank, or kissed his wife? +You started then at the idea: I saw you!" + +"You are absurd, Jo. It is true that he is exactly, among us, what +demigods were to the Greeks,--only less human than they. But when I once +get my neck out of the school-yoke, I do not start at such suggestions as +yours; I believe he did comport himself as a man of like passions with +others, and was as far from being a hero to his _valet-de-chambre_ as +anybody." + +By this time we were at home, and Jo flung her parasol on the bench in the +porch, and sat down beside it with a gesture of weariness and disgust +mingled. + +"Why will you, of all people, Sarah, quote that tinkling, superficial +trash of a proverb, so palpably French, when the true reason why a man is +not a hero to his lackey is only because he is seen with a lackey's eyes, +--the sight of a low, convention-ridden, narrow, uneducated mind, unable +to take a broad enough view to see that a man is a hero because he is a +man, because he overleaps the level of his life, and is greater than his +race, being one of them? If he were of the heroic race, what virtue in +being heroic? it is the assertion of his trivial life that makes his +speciality evident,--the shadow that throws out the bas-relief. We chatter +endlessly about the immense good of Washington's example: I believe its +good would be more than doubled, could we be made, nationally, to see him +as a human being, living on 'human nature's daily food,' having mortal and +natural wants, tastes, and infirmities, but building with and over all, by +the help of God and a good will, the noble and lofty edifice of a patriot +manhood, a pure life of duty and devotion, sublime for its very strength +and simpleness, heroic because manly and human." + +The day had waned, and the sunset lit Josephine's excited eyes with fire: +she was not beautiful, but now, if ever, beauty visited her with a +transient caress. She looked up and met my eyes fixed on her. + +"What is it, Sally?--what do I look like?" + +"Very pretty, just now, Jo; your eyes are bright and your cheek flushed: +the sunshine suits you. I admire you tonight." + +"I am glad," said she, naively. "I often wish to be pretty." + +"A waste wish, Jo!--and yet I have entertained it myself." + +"It's not so much matter for you, Sarah; for people love you. And besides, +you have a certain kind of beauty: your eyes are beautiful,--rather too +sad, perhaps, but fine in shape and tint; and you have a good head, and a +delicately outlined face. Moreover, you are picturesque: people look at +you, and then look again,--and, any way, love you, don't they?" + +"People are very good to me, Jo." + +"Oh, yes! we all know that people as a mass are kindly, considerate, and +unselfish; that they are given to loving and admiring disagreeable and +ugly people; in short, that the millennium has come. Sally, my dear, you +are a small hypocrite,--or else--But I think we won't establish a mutual- +admiration society to-night, as there are only two of us; besides, I am +hungry: let us have tea." + +The next day, Josephine left me. As we walked together toward the landing +of the steamer, Letty Allis emerged from a green lane to say good-bye, and +down its vista I discerned the handsome, lazy person of Henry Malden, but +I did not inform Letty of my discovery. + +A year passed away,--to me with the old monotonous routine; full of work, +not wanting in solace; barren, indeed, of household enjoyments and +vicissitudes; solitary, sometimes desolate, yet peaceful even in monotony. +But this new spring had not come with such serene neglect to the other two +of us three. Against advice, remonstrance, and entreaty from her good +friends, Letty Allis had married Henry Malden, and, in attire more +tasteful, but quite as far from Quakerism as Josephine had predicted, +beamed upon the inhabitants of Slepington from the bow-window, or open +door, of a cottage very _ornee_ indeed; while the odor of a tolerable +cigar served as Mr. Malden's exponent, wherever he abode. And to Josephine +had come a loss no annual resurrection should repair: her mother was dead; +she, too, was orphaned,--for she had never known her father; her only +sister was married far away; and I kept an old promise in going to her for +a year's stay at least. + +Aunt Boyle's property had consisted chiefly in large cotton mills owned by +herself and her twin brother,--who, dying before her, left her all his own +share in them. These mills were on a noisy little river in the western +part of Massachusetts,--in a valley, narrow, but picturesque, and so far +above the level of the sea that the air was keen and pure as among +mountains. Mrs. Boyle had removed here from Baltimore, a few years before +her own death, that she might be with her brother through his long and +fatal illness; and, finding her health improved by change of air, had +occupied his house ever since, until one of those typhoid fevers that +infest such river-gorges at certain seasons of the year entered the +village about the mills, when, in visiting the sick, she took the epidemic +herself and died. Josephine still retained the house endeared to her by +sad and glad recollections; and it was there I found her, when, after +renting the whole of my little tenement at Slepington, I betook myself to +Valley Mills at her request. + +The cottage where she lived was capacious enough for her wants, and though +plain, even to an air of superciliousness, without, was most luxurious +within,--made to use and live in; for Mr. Brown, her uncle, was an +Englishman, and had never arrived at that height of Transatlantic _ton_ +which consists in shrouding and darkening all the pleasant rooms in the +house, and skulking through life in the basement and attic. Sunshine, +cushions, and flowers were Mr. Brown's personal tastes; and plenty of +these characterized the cottage. A green terrace between hill and river +spread out before the door for lawn and garden, and a tiny conservatory +abutted upon the brink of the terrace slope, from a bay-window in the +library, that opened sidewise into this winter-garden. + +I found Jo more changed than I had expected: this last year of country +life had given strength and elasticity to the tall and slender figure; a +steady rose of health burned on either cheek; and sorrow had subdued and +calmed her quick spirits. + +I was at home directly, and a sweeter summer never glowed and blushed over +earth than that which installed me in the Nook Cottage. Out of doors the +whole country was beautiful, and attainable; within, I had continual +resources in my usual work and in Jo's society: for she was one of those +persons who never are uninteresting, never fatiguing; a certain salient +charm pervaded her conversation, and a simplicity quite original startled +you continually in her manner and ways. I liked to watch her about the +house; dainty and fastidious in the extreme about some things, utterly +careless about others, you never knew where or when either trait would +show itself next. She was scrupulous as to the serving of meals, for +instance,--almost to a fault; no carelessness, no slight neglect, was +admitted here, and always on the spotless damask laid with quaint china +stood a tapered vase of white Venice glass, with one, or two, or three +blossoms, sometimes a cluster of leaves, the spray of a wild vine, or the +tasselled branch of a larch-tree jewelled with rose-red cones, arranged +therein with an artist's taste and skill: but perhaps, while she sharply +rebuked the maid for a dim spot on her chocolate-pitcher or a grain of +sugar spilt on the salver, her white India shawl lay trailed over the +divan half upon the floor, and her gloves fluttered on the doorstep till +the wind carried them off to find her parasol hanging in the honeysuckle +boughs. + +But, happily, it is not one's duty to make other people uncomfortable by +perpetually tinkering at that trait in them which most offends our own +nature; and I thought it more for my good and hers to learn patience +myself than undertake to beat her into order; the result of which was +peace and good-will that vindicated my wisdom to myself; and I found her, +faults and all, sufficiently fascinating and lovable. + +A year passed away serenely; and when spring came again, Josephine refused +to let me leave her. Our life was quiet enough, but, with such beautiful +Nature, and plenty to do, we were not lonely,--less so because Jo's hands +were as open as her heart, and to her all the sick and poor looked, not +only for help, but for the rarer consolations of living sympathy and +counsel. Her shrewd common sense, her practical capacity, her kindly, +cheerful face, her power of appreciating a position of want and perplexity +and seeing the best way out of it, and, above all, her deep and fervent +religious feeling, made her an invaluable friend to just that class who +most needed her. + +In the course of this spring we gained an addition to our society, in the +person of Mr. Waring, the son of the gentleman who had bought the mills at +Mrs. Boyle's death, but who had hitherto conducted them by an overseer. He +had recently bought a little island in the middle of the river, just below +the dam, and proposed erecting a new mill upon it; but as the Tunxis (the +Indian name of our river) was liable to rapid and destructive freshets, +the mill required a deep and secure foundation and a lower story of stone. + +This implied some skilful engineering, and Mr. Arthur Waring, having +studied this subject fully abroad, came on from Boston, and took up his +abode in Valley Mills village. Of course, we being his only hope of +society in the place, he made our acquaintance early. I rather liked him; +his manner was good, his perceptions acute, his tastes refined, and he had +a certain strength of will that gave force to a character otherwise +common-place. Josephine liked him at once; she laid his shyness and +_brusquerie_, which were only the expression of a dominant self- +consciousness, to genuine modesty. He was depressed and moody, because he +was bored for want of acquaintance, and missed the adulation and caresses +that he received at home as an only child; but Jo's swift imagination +painted this as the trait of a reflective and melancholy nature disgusted +with the world, and pitied him accordingly; a mild way of misanthropic +speech, that is apt to infest young men, added to this delusion; and, with +all the energy of her sweet, earnest disposition, Josephine undertook his +education,--undertook to teach him faith and hope and charity, to set +right his wayward soul, to renovate his bitter opinions, to make him a +better and a happier man. + +It is a well-known fact in the philosophy of the human mind, that it is +apt to gain more by imparting than by receiving; and since philosophy, +where it becomes fact, does not mercifully adjust its results to +circumstance, but rushes on in implacable grooves, and clears its own +track of whatever lies thereon by the summary process of crushing it to +dust, it did not pause now for the pure intentions and tender heart which, +in teaching another love to men, taught herself love to a man, and learnt +far better than her pupil. + +Mr. Waring was but a man; he did not love Josephine,--he admired her; he +loved nothing but himself, his quiet, his pleasure; and while she +ministered to either, he regarded her with a species of affection that put +on the mask of a diviner passion and used its language. A thousand little +things showed the man fully to me, a cool spectator; but she who needed +most the discerning eye regarded this gay bubble as if it had been a +jewel. + +Perhaps I blame him too severely, for it was against the very heart of my +heart that he sinned; possibly I do not allow for the temptation it was to +a young man, quite alone in a country village, without resources, and +accustomed to the flattery and caresses of a devoted mother, to find +himself agreeable in the eyes of a noble and lovable woman. Possibly, in +his place, a better man might have sought her society, drawn her out of +her reserve for his own delectation, confided in her, worked upon her +pity, claimed her care, played on her simplicity and ignorance of the +world, crept into her heart and won its strength of emotion and its +generous affection,--in short, made love to her, without saying so, +honestly and openly. Yet there are some men who would not have done it; +and even yet, while I try to regard Arthur Waring with Christian charity, +I feel that I cannot trust him, that I do not respect him,--that, if I +dared despise anything God has made, my first contempt would light on him. + +In the autumn, while all this was going on, I received a painful and +wretched letter from Letty Malden, begging me to come to her. I could not +resist such an appeal; and one of Josephine's little nieces having come to +spend the winter with her, I hurried to Slepington,--not, I am sure, in +the least regretted by Mr. Waring, who had begun to look at me with uneasy +and sometimes defiant eyes. + +I found a miserable household here. Mr. Malden had in no way reformed. +When did marriage ever reform a bad man? On the contrary, he was more +dissipated than ever; and whenever he came home, the welcome that waited +for him was one little calculated to make home pleasant; for Letty's quick +temper blazed up in reproach and reviling that drew out worse +recrimination; and even the little, wailing, feeble baby, that filled +Letty's arms and consoled her in his absence, was only further cause of +strife between her and her husband. Often, as I came down the street and +saw the pretty outside of the cottage, waving with creepers, and hedged +about with thorns, whose gay berries decked it as if for a festival, I +thought of what a good old preacher among the Friends once said to me: +"Sarah, thee will live to find shows are often seems; thee sees many a +quiet house, with gay windows, that is hell inside." + +I soon found that I must stay all winter at Slepington. I had a hard task +before me,--to try and teach Letty that she had no right to neglect her +own duties because her husband ignored his. But six months of continual +dropping seemed to wear a tiny channel of perception; and my presence, as +well as the efforts we made together to preserve order, if not serenity, +in the house, restored a certain dim hope to Letty's mind, and I began to +see that the "purification by fire" was doing its work, in slow pain, but +to a sure end. + +Selfish as it was, I cannot say that I felt sorry to return to Jo, who +wrote for me in April, urging me to come as soon as I could, for Mr. +Waring had fallen from the mill-wall and broken his leg, and the workmen, +in their confusion, had carried him to her house, and she wanted me to +help her. I learned, on reaching Valley Mills, that the new building on +the island had not been completed far enough to resist a heavy freshet, +that had swept away part of the first story, where the mortar was not yet +hardened; and it was in traversing these wet stones to ascertain the +extent of the damage that Mr. Waring had slipped, and, unable to recover +his footing, fallen on a heap of stones and received his injury. + +My first question to Josephine was, "Where is Mr. Waring's mother?" + +"He would not send for her, Sally," said she, "because she is not well, +and he feared to startle her." + +"H'm!" said I, very curtly. + +Josephine looked at me with innocent, grave eyes,--dear, simple child!-- +and yet, for anybody but herself she would have been sufficiently +discerning. This love seemed to have remodelled her nature, to have taken +from her all the serpent's wisdom, to have destroyed her common sense, and +distorted her view of everything in which Arthur Waring was concerned. She +had certainly got on very fast in my absence. I had returned too late. + +I had little to do with the care of the invalid; that devolved on Jo; my +offers of service were kindly received, but always declined. Nobody could +read to him so well as Miss Boyle. Nobody else understood his moods, his +humors, his whims; she knew his tastes with ominous exactness. It was she +who arranged his meals on the salver with such care and grace, nay, even +cooked them at times; for Jo believed, like a rational woman, that +intellect and cultivation increase one's capacity for every office,--that +a woman of intelligence should be able to excel an ignorant servant in +every household duty, by just so much as she excels her in mind. In fact, +this was a pleasant life to two persons, but harassing enough for me. Had +I been confident of Arthur Waring's integrity, I should have regarded him +with friendly and cordial interest; but I had every reason to distrust +him. I perceived he had so far insinuated himself into Jo's confidence, +that his whole artillery of expressive looks, broken sentences, even +caresses, were received by her with entire good faith; but when I asked +her seriously if I was to regard Mr. Waring as her lover, she burst into +indignant denial, colored scarlet, and was half inclined to be angry with +me,--though a certain tremulous key, into which her usually sweet and +steady voice broke while she declared he had never spoken to her of love, +it was only friendship, witnessed against her that she was apprehensive, +sad, perhaps visited with a tinge of that causeless shame which even in a +pure and good woman conventionality constrains, when she has loved a man +before he says in plain English, "I love you," though every act and look +and tone of his may have carried that significance unmistakably for years. +Thank God, there is a day of sure judgment coming, when conventions and +shields of usage will save no man from the due vengeance of truth upon +falsehood, justice upon smooth and plausible duplicity! + +In due time Mr. Waring recovered. If there was any change in his manner to +Jo, it was too slight to be seen, though it was felt, and was, after all, +the carelessness of a person certain of his foothold in her good graces, +rather than the evident withdrawal of attention,--which I could have +pardoned even then, had it been the result of honest regret for past +carelessness, and stern resolution to repair that past. Whatever it was, +Jo perceived that her ideal man was become a real man; but, with a +tenacity of nature, for which in my fate-telling I had not given her +credit, she was as constant to the substance as she had been to the dream; +and while she lost both health and spirits in the contemplation of Arthur +Waring's fitful and heedless manner toward her, and was evidently pained +by the discovery of his selfish and politic traits,--to call them by no +harsher name,--it was inexpressibly touching to hear the excuses she made +for him, to see the all-shielding love with which she veiled his faults, +and kept him as a mother would keep her graceless, yet dearest child from +animadversion and reproach. + +In the mean time I heard often from Letty,--no good news of her husband, +but that her child grew more and more a comfort, that her friends were +very kind, and always in a tiny postscript some such phrase as this: "I +try to be patient, Sarah," or "I don't scold Harry so much as I did, +dear." I hoped for Letty, for she persevered. + +That summer we saw less than ever of Mr. Waring; he was very busy at the +mill in order that it might be far enough advanced to resist the +inevitable spring freshets; and besides, we were absent from the Valley +some weeks, endeavoring to recruit Jo's failing health at the sea-side. +But this was a vain endeavor; that which sapped the springs of her life +was past outward cure. She inherited her father's delicate and unreliable +constitution, and a nervous organization, whose worst disease is ever the +preying of doubt, anxiety, or regret. As winter drew on, she grew no +better; a dim, dreamy abstraction brooded over her. She said to me often, +with a vague alarm, "Sally, how far off you seem! Do come nearer!" She +ceased to talk when we were alone, her step grew languid, her eye deeper, +--and its bright expression, when you roused her, was longer in shooting +back into the clouded sphere than ever before. She sat for hours by the +window, her lovely head resting on its casement, looking out, always out +and away, beyond the hills, into the deep spaces of blue air, past cloud +and vapor, to the stars. Sudden noises startled her to an extreme degree; +a quick step flushed her cheek with fire and fluttered her breath. How I +longed for spring! I hoped all from the delicate ministrations of Nature; +though the physician we called gave me no hope of her final recovery. Mr. +Waring himself seemed struck with her aspect, and many little signs of +friendly interest came from him. As often as he could, he returned to his +old haunts; and while the pleasure of his presence and the excitement of +his undisguised anxiety wrought on her, Jo became almost her old self for +the moment, gay, cheerful, blooming,--alas! with the bloom of feverishness +and vain hope. + +So spring drew near. The mill was nearly finished. One day in March a warm +south-wind "quieted the earth" after a long rain, the river began to stir, +its mail of ice to crack and heave under the sun's rays. I persuaded Jo to +take a little drive, and once in the carriage the air reanimated her; she +rested against me and talked more than I had known her for weeks. + +"What a lovely day!" said she; "how balmy the air is! there is such an +expression of rest without despair, such calm expectation! I always think +of heaven such days, Sally!--they are like the long sob with which a child +finishes weeping. Only to think of never more knowing tears!--that is life +indeed!" + +A keen pang pierced me at the vibration of her voice as she spoke. I +thought to soothe her a little, and said, "Heaven can be no more than +love, Jo, and we have a great deal of that on earth." + +"Do we?" answered she, in a tone of grief just tipped with irony,--and +then went on: "I believe you love me, Sally. I would trust you with--my +heart, if need were. I think you love me better than any one on earth +does." + +"I love you enough, dear," said I; more words would have choked me in the +utterance. + +Soon we turned homeward. + +"Tell John to drive down by the river," said Josephine,--"I want to see +the new mill." + +"But you cannot see it from the road, Jo; the hemlocks stand between." + +"Never mind, Sally; I shall just walk through them; don't deny me! I want +to see it all again; and perhaps the arbutus is in bloom." + +"Not yet, Jo." + +"I can get some buds, then; I want to have some just once." + +We left the carriage, and on my arm Jo strolled through the little thicket +of hemlock-trees, green and fragrant. She seemed unusually strong. I began +to hope. After much searching, we found the budded flowers; she loved most +of all wild blossoms; no scent breathed from the closed petals; they were +not yet kissed by the odor-giving south-wind into life and expression; but +Jo looked at them with sad, far-reaching eyes. I think she silently said +good-bye to them. + +Presently we came out on the steep bank of the river, directly opposite +the mill. A heavy timber was thrown across from the shore to the island, +on which the workmen from the west side had passed and repassed; it was +firm enough for its purpose, but now, wet with the morning's rain, and +high above the grinding ice, it seemed a hazardous bridge. As we stood +looking over at the new mill, listening to the slight stir within it, +apparently the setting to rights by some lingering workman of such odds +and ends as remain after finishing the great whole of such a building, +suddenly the cool wind, which had shifted to the north, brought on its +waft a most portentous roar. We stood still to listen. Nearer and nearer +it swelled, crashing and hissing as it approached. Josephine grasped my +arm with convulsive energy, and at that instant we perceived Mr. Waring's +plaid cap pass an open casement. She turned upon me like a wild creature +driven to bay. I looked up-stream;--the ice had gathered in one high +barrier mixed with flood-wood and timber, and, bearing above all the +uprooted trunk of a huge sycamore, was coming down upon the dam like a +battering-ram. Jo gasped. "The river is broken up and Arthur is on the +island," said she, in a fearfully suppressed tone, and, swifter than I +could think or guess her meaning, she had reached the timber, she was on +it,--and with light, untrembling steps half across, when both she and I +simultaneously caught sight of Mr. Waring running for dear life to the +other and stronger bridge. Jo turned to come back; but the excitement was +past that had sustained her; she trembled, she tottered. I ran to meet and +aid her. Just then the roots of the great sycamore thundered against the +dam; the already heavily pressed structure gave way; with the freed roar +of a hurricane, the barrier, the dam, the foot-bridge swept down toward +us. She had all but reached the end of the timber,--I stood there to grasp +her hand,--when the old tree, whirled down by the torrent, struck the +other end of the beam and threw Josephine forward to the bank, dashing her +throbbing, panting breast, with all the force of her fall, against the +hard ground. I lifted her in my arms. She was white with pain. Presently +she opened her eyes and looked up, a flush of rapture glowed all over her +face, and then the awful mist of death, gray and rigid, veiled it. Her +head dropped on my shoulder; a sharp cry and a rush of scarlet blood +passed her lips together; the head lay more heavily,--she was dead. But +Arthur Waring never knew how or for what she died! + +Five years have passed since that day. Still I live at Nook Cottage; but +not alone. Of us three, Josephine is in heaven. Letty is still troubled +upon earth; her husband tests her patience and her temper every hour, but +both temper and patience are in good training; and if ever Henry Malden is +reclaimed, as I begin to see reasons to hope he will be, he will owe it to +the continual example and gentle goodness of his wife, who has grown from +a petulant, thoughtless girl into a lovely, unselfish, religious woman, a +devoted mother and wife, "refined by fire." For me, the last,--whenever +now I say, as I used to say, "Three of us," I mean a new three,--Paul, +baby, and me; for Jo was not a prophet. Four years ago, while my heart- +ache for her was fresh and torturing, a new pastor came to the little +village church of Valley Mills. Mr. Lyman was very good; I have seen other +men with as fine natural traits, but I have never seen a man or woman so +entirely good. He came to me to console me; for he, too, had just lost a +sister, and in listening to his story I for a moment forgot my own, as he +meant I should. But I did not love him,--no, not till I discovered, months +afterward, that he suffered incessantly from ill-health, and was all alone +in the world. I was too much a woman to resist such a plea. I pitied him; +I tried to take care of him; and when he asked me if I liked the office of +sick-nurse, I told him I liked it well enough to wish it were for life; +and now, when he wants to light my eyes out of that dreamy expression that +tells him I am re-living the past, and thinking of the dead, he tells me, +for the sake of the flash that follows, that I offered myself to him! +Perhaps I did. But he is well now; the air of the Tunxis hills, and the +rest of a quiet life, partly, I hope, good care also, have restored to him +his lost health. And I am what Jo said I should have been,--a blessed +mother, as well as a happy wife. The baby that lies across my lap has +traits that endear her to me doubly,--traits of each of us three cousins: +Josephine's hair on her little nestling head, Letty's apple-blossom +complexion, and my eyes, except that they are serene when they are not +smiling. I ask only of the love that has given me all this unexpected joy, +that my little Jo may have one better trait,--her father's heart; a +stronger, tenderer, and purer heart than belonged to any one among "Three +of us!" + + + + +WHAT A WRETCHED WOMAN SAID TO ME. + + +All the broad East was laced with tender rings + Of widening light; the Daybreak shone afar; +Deep in the hollow, 'twixt her fiery wings, + Fluttered the morning star. + +A cloud, that through the time of darkness went + With wanton winds, now, heavy-hearted, came +And fell upon the sunshine, penitent, + And burning up with shame. + +The grass was wet with dew; the sheep-fields lay + Lapping together far as eye could see; +And the great harvest hung the golden way + Of Nature's charity. + +My house was full of comfort; I was propped + With life's delights, all sweet as they could be, +When at my door a wretched woman stopped, + And, weeping, said to me,-- + +"Its rose-root in youth's seasonable hours + Love in thy bosom set, so blest wert thou; +Hence all the pretty little red-mouthed flowers + That climb and kiss thee now! + +"_I_ loved, but _I_ must stifle Nature's cries + With old dry blood, else perish, I was told; +Hence the young light shrunk up within my eyes, + And left them blank and bold. + +"I take my deeds, all, bad as they have been,-- + The way was dark, the awful pitfall bare;-- +In my weak hands, up through the fires of sin, + I hold them for my prayer." + +"The thick, tough husk of evil grows about + Each soul that lives," I mused, "but doth it kill? +When the tree rots, the imprisoned wedge falls out, + Rusted, but iron still. + +"Shall He who to the daisy has access, + Reaching it down its little lamp of dew +To light it up through earth, do any less, + Last and best work, for you?" + + + + +SONGS OF THE SEA. + + +Not Dibdin's; not Barry Cornwall's; not Tom Campbell's; not any of the +"Pirate's Serenades" and "I'm afloats!" which appear in the music-shop- +windows, illustrated by lithographic vignettes of impossible ships in +impracticable positions. These are sung by landsmen yachting in still +waters and in sight of green fields, by romantic young ladies in +comfortable and unmoving drawing-rooms to the tinkling of Chickering's +pianos. What are the songs the sailor sings to the accompaniment of the +thrilling shrouds, the booming double-bass of the hollow topsails, and the +multitudinous chorus of Ocean? What does the coaster, in his brief walk +"three steps and overboard," hum to himself, as he tramps up and down his +little deck through the swathing mists of a Bank fog? What sings the cook +at the galley-fire in doleful unison with the bubble of his coppers? +Surely not songs that exult in the life of the sea. Certainly not, my +amateur friend, anything that breathes of mastery over the elements. The +sea is a real thing to him. He never is familiar with it, or thinks of it +or speaks of it as his slave. It is "a steed that knows his rider," and, +like many another steed which the men of the forecastle have mounted, +knows that it can throw its rider at pleasure, and the riders know it too. +Now and then a sailor will utter some fierce imprecation upon wind or sea, +but it is in the impotence of despair, and not in the conscious, boastful +mastery which the land-songs attribute to him. What, then, does the sailor +sing?--and does he sing at all? + +Certainly the sailor sings. Did you ever walk through Ann Street, Boston, +or haunt the purlieus of the Fulton Market? and when there did you never +espy a huckster's board covered with little slips of printed paper of the +size and shape of the bills-of-fare at the Commonwealth Hotel? They are +printed on much coarser paper, and are by no means as typographically +exact as the aforesaid _carte_, or as this page of the "Atlantic Monthly," +but they are what the sailor sings. I know they are there, for I once +spent a long summer's day in the former place, searching those files for a +copy of the delightful ballad sung (or attempted to be sung) by Dick +Fletcher in Scott's "Pirate,"--the ballad beginning + + "It was a ship, and a ship of fame, + Launched off the stocks, bound for the main." + +I did not find my ballad, and to this day remain in ignorance of what fate +befell the "hundred and fifty brisk young men" therein commemorated. But I +found what the sailor does sing. It was a miscellaneous collection of +sentimental songs, the worn-out rags of the stage and the parlor, or +ditties of highwaymen, or ballad narratives of young women who ran away +from a rich "parient" with "silvier and gold" to follow the sea. The truth +of the story was generally established by the expedient of putting the +damsel's name in the last verse,--delicately suppressing all but the +initial and final letters. The only sea-songs that I remember were other +ballads descriptive of piracies, of murders by cruel captains, and of +mutinies, with a sprinkling of sea-fights dating from the last war with +England. + +The point of remark is, that all of these depend for their interest upon a +human association. Not one of them professes any concern with the sea or +ships for their own sake. The sea is a sad, solemn reality, the theatre +upon which the seaman acts his life's tragedy. It has no more of +enchantment to him than the "magic fairy palace" of the ballet has to a +scene-shifter. + +But other songs the sailor sings. The Mediterranean sailor is popularly +supposed to chant snatches of opera over his fishing-nets; but, after all, +his is only a larger sort of lake, with water of a questionable saltness. +It can furnish dangerous enough storms upon occasion, and, far worse than +storms, the terrible white-squall which lies ambushed under sunny skies, +and leaps unawares upon the doomed vessel. But the Mediterranean is not +the deep sea, nor has it produced the best and boldest navigators. +Therefore, although we still seek the sources of our maritime law amid the +rock-poised huts (once palaces) of Amalfi, we must go elsewhere for our +true sea-songs. + +The sailor does not lack for singing. He sings at certain parts of his +work;--indeed, he must sing, if he would work. On vessels of war, the drum +and fife or boatswain's whistle furnish the necessary movement-regulator. +There, where the strength of one or two hundred men can be applied to one +and the same effort, the labor is not intermittent, but continuous. The +men form on either side of the rope to be hauled, and walk away with it +like firemen marching with their engine. When the headmost pair bring up +at the stern or bow, they part, and the two streams flow back to the +starting-point, outside the following files. Thus in this perpetual +"follow-my-leader" way the work is done, with more precision and +steadiness than in the merchant-service. Merchant-men are invariably +manned with the least possible number, and often go to sea shorthanded, +even according to the parsimonious calculations of their owners. The only +way the heavier work can be done at all is by each man doing his utmost at +the same moment. This is regulated by the song. And here is the true +singing of the deep sea. It is not recreation; it is an essential part of +the work. It mastheads the topsail-yards, on making sail; it starts the +anchor from the domestic or foreign mud; it "rides down the main tack with +a will"; it breaks out and takes on board cargo; it keeps the pumps (the +ship's,--not the sailor's) going. A good voice and a new and stirring +chorus are worth an extra man. And there is plenty of need of both. + +I remember well one black night in the mid-Atlantic, when we were beating +up against a stiff breeze, coming on deck near midnight, just as the ship +was put about. When a ship is tacking, the tacks and sheets (ropes which +confine the clews or lower corners of the sails) are let run, in order +that the yards may be swung round to meet the altered position of the +ship. They must then be hauled taut again, and belayed, or secured, in +order to keep the sails in their place and to prevent them from shaking. +When the ship's head comes up in the wind, the sail is for a moment or two +edgewise to it, and then is the nice moment, as soon as the head-sails +fairly fill, when the main-yard and the yards above it can be swung +readily, and the tacks and sheets hauled in. If the crew are too few in +number, or too slow at their work, and the sails get fairly filled on the +new tack, it is a fatiguing piece of work enough to "board" the tacks and +sheets, as it is called. You are pulling at one end of the rope, but the +gale is tugging at the other. The advantages of lungs are all against you, +and perhaps the only thing to be done is to put the helm down a little, +and set the sails shaking again before they can be trimmed properly.--It +was just at such a time that I came on deck, as above mentioned. Being +near eight bells, the watch on deck had been not over spry; and the +consequence was that our big main-course was slatting and flying out +overhead with a might that shook the ship from stem to stern. The flaps of +the mad canvas were like successive thumps of a giant's fist upon a mighty +drum. The sheets were jerking at the belaying-pins, the blocks rattling in +sharp snappings like castanets. You could hear the hiss and seething of +the sea alongside, and see it flash by in sudden white patches of +phosphorescent foam, while all overhead was black with the flying scud. +The English second-mate was stamping with vexation, and, with all his +ills misplaced, storming at the men:--"'An'somely the weather main- +brace,--'an'somely, I tell you!--'Alf a dozen of you clap on to the main +sheet here,--down with 'im!--D'y'see 'ere's hall like a midshipman's +bag,--heverythink huppermost and nothing 'andy.--'Aul 'im in, Hi say!" +--But the sail wouldn't come, though. All the most forcible expressions of +the Commination-Service were liberally bestowed on the watch. "Give us +the song, men!" sang out the mate, at last,--"pull with a will! +--together, men!--haltogether now!"--And then a cracked, melancholy voice +struck up this chant: + + "Oh, the bowline, bully bully bowline, + Oh, the bowline, bowline, HAUL!" + +At the last word every man threw his whole strength into the pull,--all +singing it in chorus, with a quick, explosive sound. And so, jump by jump, +the sheet was at last hauled taut.--I dare say this will seem very much +spun out to a seafarer, but landsmen like to hear of the sea and its ways; +and as more landsmen than seamen, probably, read the "Atlantic Monthly," I +have told them of one genuine sea-song, and its time and place. + +Then there are pumping-songs. "The dismal sound of the pumps is heard," +says Mr. Webster's Plymouth-Rock Oration; but being a part of the daily +morning duty of a well-disciplined merchant-vessel,--just a few minutes' +spell to keep the vessel free and cargo unharmed by bilge-water,--it is +not a dismal sound at all, but rather a lively one. It was a favorite +amusement with us passengers on board the ---- to go forward about +pumping-time to the break of the deck and listen. Any quick tune to which +you might work a fire-engine will serve for the music, and the words were +varied with every fancy. "Pay me the money down," was one favorite chorus, +and the verse ran thus:-- + + _Solo._ Your money, young man, is no object to me. + + _Chorus._ Pay me the money down! + + _Solo._ Half a crown's no great amount. + + _Chorus._ Pay me the money down! + + _Solo and Chorus. (Bis)_ Money down, money down, pay me the money down! + +Not much sense in all this, but it served to man and move the brakes +merrily. Then there were other choruses, which were heard from time to +time,--"And the young gals goes a-weepin',"--"O long storm, storm along +stormy"; but the favorite tune was "Money down," at least with our crew. +They were not an avaricious set, either; for their parting ceremony, on +embarking, was to pitch the last half-dollars of their advance on to the +wharf, to be scrambled for by the land-sharks. But "Money down" was the +standing chorus. I once heard, though not on board that ship, the lively +chorus of "Off she goes, and off she must go,"-- + + "Highland day and off she goes, + Off she goes with a flying fore-topsail, + Highland day and off she goes." + +It is one of the most spirited things imaginable, when well sung, and, +when applied to the topsail-halyards, brings the yards up in grand style. + +These are some of the working-songs of the sea. They are not chosen for +their sense, but for their sound. They must contain good mouth-filling +words, with the vowels in the right place, and the rhythmic ictus at +proper distances for chest and hand to keep true time. And this is why the +seaman beats the wind in a trial of strength. The wind may whistle, but it +cannot sing. The sailor does not whistle, on shipboard at least, but does +sing. + +Besides the working-day songs, there are others for the forecastle and +dog-watches, which have been already described. But they are seldom of the +parlor pattern. I remember one lovely moonlight evening, off the Irish +coast, when our ship was slipping along before a light westerly air,--just +enough of it for everything to draw, and the ship as steady as Ailsa Crag, +so that everybody got on deck, even the chronically sea-sick passengers of +the steerage. There was a boy on board, a steerage passenger, who had been +back and forth several times on this Liverpool line of packets. He was set +to singing, and his sweet, clear voice rang out with song after song,-- +almost all of them sad ones. At last one of the crew called on him for a +song which he made some demur at singing. I remember the refrain well (for +he _did_ sing it at last); it ran thus:-- + + "My crew are tried, my bark's my pride, +I'm the Pirate of the Isles." + +It was no rose-water piracy that the boy sang of; it was the genuine +pirate of the Isle of Pines,--the gentleman who before the days of +California and steamers was the terror of the Spanish Main. He was +depicted as falling in deadly combat with a naval cruiser, after many +desperate deeds. What was most striking to us of the cabin was, that the +sympathy of the song, and evidently of the hearers, was all on the side of +the defier of law and order. There was no nonsense in it about "islands on +the face of the deep where the winds never blow and the skies never weep," +which to the parlor pirate are the indications of a capital station for +wood and water, and for spending his honeymoon. It was downright cutting +of throats and scuttling of ships that our youngster sang of, and the grim +faces looked and listened approvingly, as you might fancy Ulysses's +veterans hearkening to a tale of Troy. + +There is another class of songs, half of the sea, half of the shore, which +the fishermen and coasters croon in their lonely watches. Such is the +rhyme of "Uncle Peleg," or "Pillick," as it is pronounced,--probably an +historical ballad concerning some departed worthy of the Folger family of +Nantucket. It begins-- + + "Old Uncle Pillick he built him a boat + On the ba-a-ck side of Nantucket P'int; + He rolled up his trowsers and set her afloat + From the ba-a-ck side of Nantucket P'int." + +Like "Christabel," this remains a fragment. Not so the legend of "Captain +Cottington," (or Coddington,) which perhaps is still traditionally known +to the young gentlemen at Harvard. It is marked by a bold and ingenious +metrical novelty. + + "Captain Cottington he went to sea, + Captain Cottington he went to sea, + Captain Cottington he went to sea-e-e, + Captain Cottington he went to sea." + +The third verse of the next stanza announces that he didn't go to sea in a +schoo-oo-ooner,--of the next that he went to sea in a bri-i-ig,--and so +on. We learn that he got wrecked on the "Ba-ha-ha-hamys," that he swam +ashore with the papers in his hat, and, I believe, entered his protest at +the nearest "Counsel's" (_Anglice_. Consul's) dwelling. + +For the amateur of genuine ballad verse, here is a field quite as fertile +as that which was reaped by Scott and Ritson amid the border peels and +farmhouses of Liddesdale. It is not unlikely that some treasures may thus +be brought to light. The genuine expression of popular feeling is always +forcible, not seldom poetic. And at any rate, these wild bits of verse are +redolent of the freshness of the sea-breeze, the damps of the clinging +fog, the strange odors of the caboose-cookery, of the curing of cod, and +of many another "ancient and fish-like smell." Who will tell us of these +songs, not indeed of the deep sea, but of soundings? What were the stanzas +which Luckie Mucklebackit sang along the Portanferry Sands? What is the +dredging-song which the oyster "come of a gentle kind" is said to love? + +These random thoughts may serve to indicate to the true seeker new and +unworked mines of rhythmic ore. We are crying continually, that we have no +national literature, that we are a nation of imitators and plagiarists. +Why will not some one take the trouble to learn what we have? This does +not mean that amateurs should endeavor to write such ballad fragments and +popular songs,--because that cannot be done; such things grow,--they are +not made. If the sea wants songs, it will have them. It is only suggested +here that we look about us and ascertain of what lyric blessings we may +now be the unconscious possessors. Can it be that oars have risen and +fallen, sails flapped, waves broken in thunder upon our shores in vain? +that no whistle of the winds, or moan of the storm-foreboding seas has +waked a responsive chord in the heart of pilot or fisherman? If we are so +poor, let us know our poverty. + +And now to bring these desultory remarks to a practical conclusion. I have +written these seemingly trifling fragments with a serious purpose. It is +to show that the seaman has little or no art or part in the poetry of the +seas. I have put down facts, have given what experience I have had of some +of the idiosyncrasies of the forecastle. The poetry of the sea has been +written on shore and by landsmen. Falconer's "Shipwreck" is a clever +nautical tract, written in verse,--or if it be anything more, it is but +the solitary exception which proves and enforces the rule. Midshipmen have +written ambitious verses about the sea; but by the time the young +gentlemen were promoted to the ward-room they have dropped the habit or +found other themes for their stanzas. In truth, the stern manliness of his +calling forbids the seaman to write poetry. He acts it. His is a +profession which leaves no room for any assumed feeling or for any +reflective tendencies. His instincts are developed, rather than his +reason. He has no time to speculate. He must be prepared to lay his hand +on the right rope, let the night be the darkest that ever came down upon +the waves. He obeys orders, heedless of consequences; he issues commands +amid the uproar and tumult of pressing emergencies. There is no chance for +quackery in his work. The wind and the wave are infallible tests of all +his knots and splices. He cannot cheat them. The gale and the lee-shore +are not pictures, but fierce realities, with which he has to grapple for +life or death. The soldier and the fireman may pass for heroes upon an +assumed stock of courage; but the seaman must be a brave man in his +calling, or Nature steps in and brands him coward. Therefore he cares +little about the romance of his duties. If you would win his interest and +regard, it must be on the side of his personal and human sensibilities. +Cut off during his whole active life from any but the most partial +sympathy with his kind, he yearns for the life of the shore, its social +pleasures and its friendly greetings. Captains, whose vessels have been +made hells-afloat by their tyranny, have found abundant testimony in the +courts of law to their gentle and humane deportment on land. Therefore, +when you would address seamen effectively, either in acts or words, let it +be by no shallow mimicry of what you fancy to be their life afloat. It +will be at best but "shop" to them, and we all know how distasteful that +is in the mouth of a stranger to our pursuits. They laugh at your clumsy +imitations, or are puzzled by your strange misconceptions. It is painful +to see the forlorn attempts which are made to raise the condition of this +noble race of men, to read the sad nonsense that is perpetrated for their +benefit. If you wish really to benefit them, it must be by raising their +characters as men; and to do this, you must address them as such, +irrespectively of the technicalities of their calling. + + + + +THE KINLOCH ESTATE, AND HOW IT WAS SETTLED. + + +CHAPTER I. + +"Mildred, my daughter, I am faint. Run and get me a glass of cordial from +the buffet." + +The girl looked at her father as he sat in his bamboo chair on the piazza, +his pipe just let fall on the floor, and his face covered with a deadly +pallor. She ran for the cordial, and poured it out with a trembling hand. + +"Shan't I go for the doctor, father?" she asked. + +"No, my dear, the spasm will pass off presently." But his face grew more +ashy pale, and his jaw drooped. + +"Dear father," said the frightened girl, "what shall I do for you? Oh, +dear, if mother were only at home, or Hugh, to run for the doctor!" + +"Mildred, my daughter," he gasped with difficulty, "the blacksmith,--send +for Ralph Hardwick,--quick! In the ebony cabinet, middle drawer, you will +find----Oh! oh!--God bless you, my daughter!--God bless"---- + +The angels, only, heard the conclusion of the sentence; for the speaker, +Walter Kinloch, was dead, summoned to the invisible world without a +warning and with hardly a struggle. + +But Mildred thought he had fainted, and, raising the window, called loudly +for Lucy Ransom, the only female domestic then in the house. + +Lucy, frightened out of her wits at the sudden call, came rushing to the +piazza, flat-iron in hand, and stood riveted to the spot where she first +saw the features on which the awful shadow of death had settled. + +"Rub his hands, Lucy!" said Mildred. "Run for some water! Get me the +smelling-salts!" + +Lucy attempted to obey all three orders at once, and therefore did +nothing. + +Mildred held the unresisting hand. "It is warm," she said. "But the +pulse,--I can't find it." + +"Deary, no," said Lucy, "you won't find it." + +"Why, you don't mean"---- + +"Yes, Mildred, he's dead!" And she let fall her flat-iron, and covered her +face with her apron. + +But Mildred kept chafing her father's temples and hands,--calling +piteously, in hopes to get an answer from the motionless lips. Then she +sank down at his feet, and clasped his knees in an agony of grief. + +A carriage stopped at the door, and a hasty step came up the walk. + +"Lucy Ransom," said Mrs. Kinloch, (for it was she, just returned from her +drive,) "Lucy Ransom, what are you blubbering about? Here on the piazza, +and with your flat-iron! What is the matter?" + +"Matter enough!" said Lucy. "See!--see Mr."----But the sobs were too +frequent. She became choked, and fell into an hysterical paroxysm. + +By this time Mrs. Kinloch had stepped upon the piazza, and saw the +drooping head, the dangling arms, and the changed face of her husband. +"Dead! dead!" she exclaimed. "My God! what has happened? Mildred, who was +with him? Was the doctor sent for? or Squire Clamp? or Mr. Rook? What did +he say to you, dear?" And she tried to lift up the sobbing child, who +still clung to the stiffening knees where she had so often climbed for a +kiss. + +"Oh, mother! _is_ he dead?--no life left?" + +"Calm yourself, my dear child," said Mrs. Kinloch. "Tell me, did he say +anything?" + +Mildred replied, "He was faint, and before I could give him the cordial he +asked for he was almost gone. 'The blacksmith,' he said, 'send for Ralph +Hardwick'; then he said something of the ebony cabinet, but could not +speak the words which were on his lips." She could say no more, but gave +way to uncontrollable tears and sobs. + +By this time, Mrs. Kinloch's son, Hugh Branning, who had been to the +stable with the horse and carriage, came whistling through the yard, and +cutting off weeds or twigs along the path with sharp cuts of his whip. + +"Which way is the wind now?" said he, as he approached; "the governor +asleep, Mildred crying, and you scolding, mother?" In a moment, however, +the sight of the ghastly face transfixed the thoughtless youth, as it had +done his mother; and, dropping his whip, he stood silent, awe-struck, in +the presence of the dead. + +"Hugh," said Mrs. Kinloch, speaking in a very quiet tone, "go and tell +Squire Clamp to come over here." + +In a few minutes the dead body was carried into the house by George, the +Asiatic servant, aided by a villager who happened to pass by. Squire +Clamp, the lawyer of the town, came and had a conference with Mrs. Kinloch +respecting the funeral. Neighbors came to offer sympathy, and aid, if need +should be. Then the house was put in order, and crape hung on the door- +handle. The family were alone with their dead. + +On the village green the boys were playing a grand game of "round ball," +for it was a half-holiday. The clear, silvery tones of the bell were +heard, and we stopped to listen. Was it a fire? No, the ringing was not +vehement enough. A meeting of the church? In a moment we should know. As +the bell ceased, we looked up to the white taper spire to catch the next +sound. One stroke. It was a death, then,--and of a man. We listened for +the age tolled from the belfry. Fifty-five. Who had departed? The sexton +crossed the green on his way to the shop to make the coffin, and informed +us. Our bats and balls had lost their interest for us; we did not even ask +our tally-man, who cut notches for us on a stick, how the game stood. For +Squire Walter Kinloch was the most considerable man in our village of +Innisfield. Without being highly educated, he was a man of reading and +intelligence. In early life he had amassed a fortune in the China trade, +and with it he had brought back a deeply bronzed complexion, a scar from +the creese of a Malay pirate, and the easy manners which travel always +gives to observant and sensible men. But his rather stately carriage +produced no envy or ill-will among his humbler neighbors, for his +superiority was never questioned. Men bowed to him with honest good-will, +and boys, who had been flogged at school for confounding Congo and +Coromandel, and putting Borneo in the Bight of Benin, made an awkward +obeisance and stared wonderingly, as they met the man who had actually +sailed round the world, and had, in his own person, illustrated the +experiment of walking with his head downwards among the antipodes. His +house had no rival in the country round, and his garden was considered a +miracle of art, having, in popular belief, all the fruits, flowers, and +shrubs that had been known from the days of Solomon to those of Linnaeus. +Prodigious stories were told of his hoard of gold, and some of the less +enlightened thought that even the outlandish ornaments of the balustrade +over the portico were carven silver. Curious vases adorned the hall and +side-board; and numberless quaint trinkets, whose use the villagers could +not even imagine, gave to the richly-furnished rooms an air of Oriental +magnificence. Tropical birds sang or chattered in cages, and a learned but +lawless parrot talked, swore, or made mischief, as he chose. The tawny +servant George, brought by Mr. Kinloch from one of the islands of the +Pacific, completed his claims upon the admiration of the untravelled. + +He was just ready to enjoy the evening of life, when the night of death +closed upon him with tropic suddenness. He left one child only, his +daughter Mildred, then just turned of eighteen; and as Mrs. Kinloch had +only one son to claim her affection, the motherless girl would seem to be +well provided for. Mildred was sweet-tempered, and her step-mother had +hitherto been discreet and kind. + +The funeral was over, and the townspeople recovered from the shock which +the sudden death had caused. Administration was granted to the widow +conjointly with Squire Clamp, the lawyer, and the latter was appointed +guardian for Mildred during her minority. + +Squire Clamp was an ill-favored man, heavy-browed and bald, and with a +look which, in a person of less consequence, would have been called "hang- +dog,"--owing partly, no doubt, to the tribulation he had suffered from his +vixen spouse, whose tongue was now happily silenced. He was the town's +only lawyer, (a fortunate circumstance,) so that he could frequently +manage to receive fees for advice from both parties in a controversy. He +made all the wills, deeds, and contracts, and settled all the estates he +could get hold of. But no such prize as the Kinloch property had ever +before come into his hands. + +If Squire Clamp's reputation for shrewdness had belonged to an irreligious +man, it would have been of questionable character; but as he was a zealous +member of the church, he was protected from assaults upon his integrity. +If there were suspicions, they were kept close, not bruited abroad. + +He was now an almost daily visitor at the widow Kinloch's. What was the +intricate business that required the constant attention of a legal +adviser? The settlement of the estate, so far as the world knew, was an +easy matter. The property consisted of the dwelling-house, a small tract +of land near the village, a manufactory at the dam, by the side of Ralph +Hardwick's blacksmith's shop, and money, plate, furniture, and stocks. +There were no debts. There was but one child, and, after the assignment of +the widow's dower, the estate was Mildred's. Nothing, therefore, could be +simpler for the administrators. The girl trusted to the good faith of her +stepmother and the justice of the lawyer, who now stood to her in the +place of a father. She was an orphan, and her innocence and childlike +dependence would doubtless be a sufficient spur to the consciences of her +protectors. So the girl thought, if she thought at all,--and so all +charitable people were bound to think. + +How wearily the days passed during the month after the funeral! The shadow +of death seemed to darken everything. Doors creaked dismally when they +were opened. The room where the body had been laid seemed to have grown a +century older than the other parts of the once bright and cheerful house, +--its atmosphere was so stagnant and full of mould. The family spoke only +in suppressed tones; their countenances were as sad as their garments. All +this was terrible to the impressible, imaginative, and naturally buoyant +temper of Mildred. It was like dwelling in a tomb, and her heart cried out +for very loneliness. She must do something to take her mind out of the +sunless vault,--she must resume her relations with the dwellers in the +upper air. All at once she thought of her father's last words,--of Ralph +Hardwick, and the ebony cabinet. It was in the next room. She opened the +door, half expecting to see some bodiless presence in the silent space. +She could hear her own heart beat between the tickings of the great Dutch +clock, as she stepped across the floor. How still was everything! The air +tingled in her ears as though now disturbed for the first time. + +She opened the cabinet, which was not locked, and pulled out the middle +drawer. She found nothing but a dried rose-bud and a lock of sunny hair +wrapped in a piece of yellowed paper. Was it her mother's hair? As +Mildred remembered her mother, the color of her hair was dark, not golden. +Still it might have been cut in youth, before its hue had deepened. And +what a world of mystery, of feeling, of associations there was in that +scentless and withered rose-bud! What fair hand had first plucked it? What +pledge did it carry? Was the subtile aroma of love ever blended with its +fragrance? Had her father borne it with him in his wanderings? The secret +was in his coffin. The struggling lips could not utter it before they were +stiffened into marble. Yet she could not believe that these relics were +the sole things to which he had referred. There must have been something +that more nearly concerned her,--something in which the blacksmith or his +nephew was interested. + + +CHAPTER II. + +In order to show the position of Mrs. Kinloch and her son in our story, it +will be necessary to make the reader acquainted with some previous +occurrences. + +Six years before this date, Mrs. Kinloch was the Widow Branning. Her +husband's small estate had melted like a snow-bank in the liquidation of +his debts. She had only one child, Hugh, to support; but in a country town +there is generally little that a woman can do to earn a livelihood; and +she might often have suffered from want, if the neighbors had not relieved +her. If she left her house for any errand, (locks were but seldom used in +Innisfield,) she would often on her return find a leg of mutton, a basket +of apples or potatoes, or a sack of flour, conveyed there by some unknown +hands. In winter nights she would hear the voices of Ralph Hardwick, the +village blacksmith, and his boys, as they drew sled-loads of wood, ready +cut and split, to keep up her kitchen fire. Other friends ploughed and +planted her garden, and performed numberless kind offices. But, though +aided in this way by charity, Mrs. Branning never lost her self-respect +nor her standing in the neighborhood. + +Everybody knew that she was poor, and she knew that everybody knew it; yet +so long as she was not in absolute want, and the poor-house, that bugbear +of honest poverty, was yet far distant, she managed to keep a cheerful +heart, and visited her neighbors on terms of entire equality. + +At this period Walter Kinloch's wife died, leaving an only child. During +her sickness, Mrs. Branning had been sent for to act as nurse and +temporary house-keeper, and, at the urgent request of the widower, +remained for a time after the funeral. Weeks passed, and her house was +still tenantless. Mildred had become so much attached to the motherly +widow and her son, that she would not allow the servants to do anything +for her. So, without any definite agreement, their relations continued. +By-and-by the village gossips began to query and surmise. At the sewing- +society the matter was fully discussed. + +Mrs. Greenfield, the doctor's wife, admitted that it would be an excellent +match, "jest a child apiece, both on 'em well brought up, used to good +company, and all that; but, land's sakes! he, with his mint o' money, +a'n't a-goin' to marry a poor widder that ha'n't got nothin' but her +husband's pictur' and her boy,--not he!" + +Others insinuated that Mrs. Branning knew what she was about when she went +to Squire Kinloch's, and his wife was 'most gone with consumption. +"'Twasn't a mite strange that little Mildred took to her so kindly; plenty +of women could find ways to please a child, if so be they could have such +a chance to please themselves." + +The general opinion seemed to be that Mrs. Branning would marry the +Squire, if she could get him; but that as to his intentions, the matter +was quite doubtful. Nevertheless, after being talked about for a year, the +parties were duly published, married, and settled down into the quiet +routine of country life. + +Doubtless the accident of daily contact was the secret of the match. Had +Mrs. Branning been living in her own poorly-furnished house, Mr. Kinloch +would hardly have thought of going to seek her. But as mistress of his +establishment she had an opportunity to display her house-wifely +qualities, as well as to practise those nameless arts by which almost any +clever woman knows how to render herself agreeable. + +The first favorable impression deepened, until the widower came to believe +that the whole parish did not contain so proper a person to be the +successor of Mrs. Kinloch, as his housekeeper. Their union, though +childless, was as happy as common; there was nothing of the romance of a +first attachment,--little of the tenderness that springs from fresh +sensibilities, for she at least was of a matter-of-fact turn. But there +was a constant and hearty good feeling, resulting from mutual kindness and +deference. + +If the step-mother made any difference in her treatment of the two +children, it was in favor of the gentle Mildred. And though the Squire +naturally felt more affection for his motherless daughter, yet he was +proud of his step-son, gave him the advantages of the best schools, and +afterwards sent him for a year to college. But the lad's spirits were too +buoyant for the sober notions of the Faculty. He was king in the +gymnasium, and was minutely learned in the natural history and botany of +the neighborhood; at least, he knew all the haunts of birds, rabbits, and +squirrels, as well as the choicest orchards of fruit. + +After repeated admonitions without effect, a letter was addressed to his +stepfather by vote at a Faculty-meeting. A damsel at service in the +President's house overheard the discussion, and found means to warn the +young delinquent of his danger; for she, as well as most people who came +within the sphere of his attraction, felt kindly toward him. + +The stage-coach that conveyed the next morning's mail to Innisfield +carried Hugh Branning as a passenger. Alighting at the post-office, he +took out the letter superscribed in the well-known hand of the President, +pocketed it, and returned by the next stage to college. This prank only +moved the Squire to mirth, when he heard of it. He knew that Hugh was a +lad of spirit,--that in scholarship he was by no means a dunce; and as +long as there was no positive tendency to vice, he thought but lightly of +his boyish peccadilloes. But it was impossible for such irregularities to +continue, and after a while Mr. Kinloch yielded to his step-son's request +and took him home. + +Next year it was thought best that the young man should go to sea, and a +midshipman's commission was procured for him. Now, for the second time, +after an absence of three years, Hugh was at home in all the dignity of +navy blue, anchor buttons, glazed cap, and sword. + + +CHAPTER III. + +"I have brought you the statement of the property, Mrs. Kinloch," said Mr. +Clamp. "It is merely a legal form, embracing the items which you gave to +me; it must be returned at the next Probate term." + +Mrs. Kinloch took the paper and glanced over it. + +"This statement must be sworn to, Mrs. Kinloch." + +"By you?" + +"We are joined in the administration, and both must swear to it." + +There was a pause. Mrs. Kinloch, resting her hands on her knee, tossed the +hem of her dress with her foot, as though meditating. + +"I shall of course readily make oath to the schedule," he continued,--"at +least, after you have done so; for I have no personal knowledge of the +effects of the deceased." + +His manner was decorous, but he regarded her keenly. She changed the +subject. + +"People seem to think I have a mint in the house; and _such_ bills as come +in! Sawin, the cabinet-maker, has sent his to-day, as soon as my husband +is fairly under ground: forty dollars for a cherry coffin, which he made +in one day. Cleaver, the butcher, too, has sent a bill running back for +five years or more. Now I _know_ that Mr. Kinloch never had an ounce of +meat from him that he didn't pay for. If they all go on in this way, I +sha'n't have a cent left. Everybody tries to cheat the widow"---- + +"And orphan," interposed Mr. Clamp. + +She looked at him quietly; but he was imperturbable. + +"We must begin to collect what is due," she continued. + +"Did you refer to the notes from Ploughman?" asked Mr. Clamp. "He is +perfectly good; and he will pay the interest till we want to use the +money." + +"I wasn't thinking of Ploughman," she replied, "but of Mark Davenport, +Uncle Ralph Hardwick's nephew. They say he is a teacher in one of the +fashionable schools in New York,--and he must be able to pay, if he's ever +going to." + +"Well, when he comes on here, I will present the notes." + +"But I don't intend to wait till he comes; can't you send the demands to a +lawyer where he is?" + +"Certainly, if you wish it; but that course will necessarily be attended +with some expense." + +"I choose to have it done," said Mrs. Kinloch, decisively. "Mildred, who +has always been foolishly partial to the young upstart, insists that her +father intended to give up the notes to Mark, and she thinks that was what +he wanted to send for Uncle Ralph about, just before he died. I don't +believe it, and I don't intend to fling away _my_ money upon such folks." + +"You are quite right, ma'am," said the lawyer. "The inconsiderate +generosity of school-children would be a poor basis for the transactions +of business." + +"And besides," continued Mrs. Kinloch, "I want the young man to remember +the blacksmith's shop that he came from, and get over his ridiculous +notion of looking up to our family." + +"Oh ho!" said Mr. Clamp, "that is it? Well, you are a sagacious woman,"-- +looking at her with unfeigned admiration. + +"I _can_ see through a millstone, when there is a hole in it," said Mrs. +Kinloch. "And I mean to stop this nonsense." + +"To be sure,--it would be a very unequal match in every way. Besides, I'm +told that he isn't well-grounded in doctrine. He even goes to Brooklyn to +hear Torchlight preach." And Mr. Clamp rolled up his eyes, interlocking +his fingers, as he was wont when at church-meeting he rose to exhort. + +"I don't pretend to be a judge of doctrine, further than the catechism +goes," said the widow; "but Mr. Rook says that Torchlight is a dangerous +man, and will lead the churches off into infidelity." + +"Yes, Mrs. Kinloch, the free-thinking of this age is the fruitful parent +of all evil,--of Mormonism, Unitarianism, Spiritualism, and of all those +forms of error which seek to overthrow"---- + +There was a crash in the china-closet. Mrs. Kinloch went to the door, and +leading out Lucy Ransom, the maid, by the ear, exclaimed, "You hussy, what +were you there for? I'll teach you to be listening about in closets," +(giving the ear a fresh tweak,) "you eavesdropper!" + +"Quit!" cried Lucy. "I didn't mean to listen. I was there rubbin' the +silver 'fore you come. Then I didn't wanter come out, for I was afeard." + +"What made the smash, then?" demanded Mrs. Kinloch. + +"I was settin' things on the top shelf, and the chair tipped over." + +"Don't make it worse by fibbing! If that was so, how came the chair to tip +the way it did? You were trying to peep over the door. Go to the kitchen!" + +Lucy went out with fallen plumes. Mr. Clamp took his hat to go also. + +"Don't go till I get you the notes," said Mrs. Kinloch. + +As she brought them, he said, "I will send these by the next mail, with +instructions to collect." + +While his hand was on the latch, she spoke again:-- + +"Mr. Clamp, did you ever look over the deed of the land we own about the +dam where the mill stands?" + +"No, ma'am, I have never seen it." + +"I wish you would have the land surveyed according to this title," she +said. "Quite privately, you know. Just have the line run, and let me know +about it. Perhaps it will be as well to send over to Riverbank and get +Gunter to do it; he will keep quiet about it." + +Mr. Clamp stood still a moment. Here was a woman whom he was expecting to +lead like a child, but who on the other hand had fairly bridled and +saddled _him_, so that he was driven he knew not whither. + +"Why do you propose this, may I ask, Mrs. Kinloch?" + +"Oh, I have heard," she replied, carelessly, "that there was some error in +the surveys. Mr. Kinloch often talked of having it corrected, but, like +most men, put it off. Now, as we may sell the property, we shall want to +know what we have got." + +"Certainly, Mrs. Kinloch, I will follow your prudent suggestions,"--adding +to himself, as he walked away, "I shall have to be tolerably shrewd to get +ahead of that woman. I wonder what she is driving at." + + +CHAPTER IV. + +Ralph Hardwick was the village blacksmith. His shop stood on the bank of +the river, not far from the dam. The great wheel below the flume rolled +all day, throwing over its burden of diamond drops, and tilting the +ponderous hammer with a monotonous clatter. What a palace of wonders to +the boys was that grim and sooty shop!--the roar of the fires, as they +were fed by the laboring bellows; the sound of water, rushing, gurgling, +or musically dropping, heard in the pauses; the fiery shower of sparkles +that flew when the trip-hammer fell; and the soft and glowing mass held by +the smith's tongs with firm grasp, and turning to some form of use under +his practised eye! How proud were the young amateur blacksmiths when the +kind-hearted owner of the shop gave them liberty to heat and pound a bit +of nail-rod, to mend a skate or a sled-runner, or sharpen a pronged fish- +spear! Still happier were they, when, at night, with his sons and nephew, +they were allowed to huddle on the forge, sitting on the bottoms of old +buckets or boxes, and watching the fire, from the paly blue border of +flame in the edge of the damp charcoal, to the reddening, glowing column +that shot with an arrowy stream of sparks up the wide-throated chimney. +How the dark rafters and nail-pierced roof grew ruddy as the white-hot +ploughshare or iron bar was drawn from the fire!--what alternations of +light and shadow! No painter ever drew figure in such relief as the +blacksmith presented in that wonderful light, with his glistening face, +his tense muscles, and his upraised arm. + +Alas! the hammer is still; the wheel dashes no more the glittering spray; +the fire has died out in the forge; the blacksmith's long day's work is +done! + +He settled in Innisfield when it was but a district attached to a +neighboring town. There were but three or four houses in the now somewhat +populous village. He came on foot, driving his cow; his wife following in +the wagon, with their little stock of household goods,--not forgetting his +hammer, more potent than Prospero's wand. The minister, the doctor, and +Squire Kinloch, who constituted the aristocracy, yielded precedence in +date to Ralph Hardwick, Knight of the Ancient Order of the Anvil. + +So he toiled, faithful to his calling. By day the din of his hammer rarely +ceased, and by night the flame and sparks from his chimney were a Pharos +to all travellers approaching the town. Children were born to him, for +which he blessed God, and worked the harder. He attained a moderate +prosperity, secure from want, but still dependent upon labor for bread. At +length his wife died; he wept like a true and faithful husband as he was, +and thenceforth was both mother and father to his babes. + +During all his life he kept Sunday with religious scrupulousness, and with +his family went to the house of worship in all weathers. From the very +first he had been leader of the choir, and had given the pitch with a fork +hammered and tuned by his own hands. With a clear and sympathetic voice, +he had such an instinctive taste and power of expression, that his song of +penitence or praise was far more devotional than the labored efforts of +many more highly cultivated singers. Music and poetry flowed smoothly and +naturally from his lips, but in uttering the common prose of daily life +his organs were rebellious. The truth must be spoken,--he stammered badly, +incurably. Whether it was owing to the attempt to overcome his impediment +by making his speech musical, or to the cadences of his hammer beating +time while his brain was shaping its airy fancies, his thoughts ran +naturally in verse. + +Do not smile at the thought of Vulcan's callused fingers touching the +chords of the lyre to delicate music. The sun shone as lovingly upon the +swart face of the blacksmith in his shop-door, as upon the scholar at his +library-window. "Poetry was an angel in his breast," making his heart glad +with her heavenly presence; he did not "make her his drudge, his maid-of- +all-work," as professional verse-makers do. + +Mr. Hardwick's younger sister was married to a hard-working, stern, +puritanical man named Davenport, (not her first love,) who removed to a +Western State when it was almost a wilderness, cleared for himself a farm, +and built a log-house. The toil and privations of frontier life soon +wrought their natural effects upon Mrs. Davenport's delicate constitution. +She fell into a rapid decline and died. Her husband was seized with a +fever the summer after, and died also, leaving two children, Mark and +Anna. The blacksmith had six motherless children of his own; but he set +out for the West, and brought the orphans home with him. He thenceforth +treated them like his own offspring, manifesting a woman's tenderness as +well as a father's care for them. + +Mark was a comely lad, with the yellow curling hair, the clear blue eyes, +and the marked symmetry of features that belonged to his uncle. He had an +inborn love of reading and study; he was first in his class at every +winter's school, and had devoured all the books within his reach. Then he +borrowed an old copy of Adam's Latin Grammar from Dr. Greenfield, and +committed the rules to memory without a teacher. That was his introduction +to the classics. + +But Mr. Hardwick believed in the duty and excellence of work, and Mark, as +well as his cousins, was trained to make himself useful. So the Grammar +was studied and Virgil read at chance intervals, when a storm interrupted +out-door work, or while waiting at the upper mill for a grist, or of +nights at the shop by the light of the forge fire. The paradigms were +committed to memory with an anvil accompaniment; and long after, he never +could scan a line of Homer, especially the oft-repeated + +[Greek: Tou d'au | Taelema | chos pep | numenos | antion | aeuda], + +without hearing the ringing blows of his uncle's hammer keeping tune to +the verse. + +At sixteen years of age he was ready to enter college, though he had +received little aid in his studies, except when some schoolmaster who was +versed in the humanities chanced to be hired for the winter. But his uncle +was not able to support him at any respectable university, and the lad's +prospects for such an education as he desired seemed to be none of the +best. + +At this point an incident occurred which changed the course of our hero's +life, and as it will serve to explain how he came to give his notes to Mr. +Kinloch, on which the administrators are about to bring suit, it should +properly be related here. + +Mark Davenport was at work on a farm a short distance from the village. He +hoped to enter college the following autumn, and he knew no means to +obtain money for a portion of his outfit except by the labor of his hands. +He could get twenty dollars a month for the summer season. Sixty, or +possibly seventy dollars!--what ideas of opulence were suggested by the +sound of those words! + +It was a damp, drizzly day; there was not a settled rain, yet it was too +wet to work in the corn. Mark was therefore busy in picking loose stones +from the surface of a field cultivated the year before, and now "seeded +down" for grass. A portion of the field bordered on a pond, and the alders +upon its margin formed a dense green palisade, over which might be seen +the gray surface of the water freckled by the tiny drops of rain. Low +clouds trailed their gauzy robes over the top of Mount Quobbin, and flecks +of mist swept across the blue sides of the loftier Mount Elizabeth. + +"What a perfect day for fishing!" thought Mark. "If I had my tackle here, +and a frog's leg or a shiner, I would soon have a pickerel out from +under those lilypads." + +But he kept at work, and, having his basket full of stones, carried them +to the pond and plumped them in. A growl of anger came up from behind the +bushes. + +"What the Devil do you mean, you lubber, throwing stones over here to +scare away the fish?" + +The bushes parted at the same time, showing Hugh Branning sitting in the +end of his boat, and apparently just ready to fling out his line. + +"If I had known you were there fishing," said Mark, "I shouldn't have +thrown the stones into the water. But," he continued, while every fibre +tingled with indignation, "I will have you to know that I am not to be +talked to in that way by you or anybody else." + +"I would like to know how you are going to help yourself," said Hugh, +stepping ashore and advancing. + +"You will find out, Mr. Insolence, if you don't leave this field. You +a'n't on the quarter-deck yet, bullying a tar with his hat off." + +"Bless me! how the young Vulcan talks!" + +"I have talked all I am going to. Now get into your boat and be off!" + +"I don't propose to be in a hurry," said Hugh, with provoking coolness, +standing with his arms a-kimbo. + +The remembrance of Hugh's usual patronizing airs, together with his +insulting language, was too much for Mark's impetuous temper. He was in a +delirium of rage, and he rushed upon his antagonist. Hugh stood warily +upon the defensive, and parried Mark's blows with admirable skill; he had +not the muscle nor the endurance of the young blacksmith, but he had +considerable skill in boxing, and was perfectly cool; and though Mark +finally succeeded in grappling and hurling to the ground his lithe and +resolute foe, it was not until he had been pretty severely pommelled +himself, especially in his face. Mark set his knee on the breast of his +adversary and waited to hear "Enough." Hugh ground his teeth, but there +was no escape; no feint nor sudden movement could reverse their positions; +and, out of breath, he gave up in sullen despair. + +"Let me up," he said, at length. Mark arose, and being by this time +thoroughly sobered, he walked off without a word and picked up his basket. + +Hugh, on the other hand, was more and more angry every minute. The +indignity he had suffered was not to be tamely submitted to. He got into +the boat and took his oar; he looked back and saw Mark commencing work +again; the temptation was too strong. He picked up one of the largest of +the stones that Mark had emptied into the shallow margin of the pond; he +threw it with all his force, and hurriedly pushed off from shore without +stopping to ascertain the extent of the mischief he had done. He knew that +the stone did not miss, for he saw Mark fall heavily to the ground, and +that was enough. The injury was serious. Mark was carried to the farm- +house and was confined to his bed for six weeks with a brain fever, being +delirious for the greater part of the time. Hugh Branning found the town +quite uncomfortable; the eyes of all the people he met seemed to scorch +him. He was bold and self-reliant; but no man can stand up singly against +the indignation of a whole community. He went on a visit to Boston, and +not long after, to the exceeding grief of his mother, entered the navy. + +When Mark was recovering, Mr. Rook, +the clergyman, called and offered to aid him in his college course, if he +would agree to study for the ministry. But the young man declined the +proposal, because he thought himself unfitted for the sacred calling. + +"No," he added, with a smile, "I'm not made for an evangelist; not much +like the beloved disciple at all events, but rather like peppery Peter,-- +ready, if provoked, to whisk off an ignoble ear." + +Mr. Rook returned home sorrowful; and at the next meeting of the sewing- +circle the unfortunate Mark received a full share of attention; for the +offer of aid came partly from this society. When this matter had been the +talk of the village for a day or two, Squire Kinloch made some errand to +the house where Mark was. What passed between them the young man did not +choose to relate, but he showed his Uncle Hardwick the Squire's check for +two hundred and fifty dollars, and told him he should receive a similar +sum each year until he finished his collegiate course. + +The promise was kept; the yearly supply was furnished; and Mark graduated +with honor, having given notes amounting to a thousand dollars. With +cheerful alacrity he commenced teaching in a popular seminary, intending +to pay his debts before studying a profession. + + +CHAPTER V. + +It was Saturday night, and Mr. Hardwick was closing his shop. A customer +was just leaving, his horse's feet newly rasped and white, and a sack of +harrow-teeth thrown across his back. The boys, James and Milton, had been +putting a load of charcoal under cover, for the wind was southerly and +there were signs of rain. Of course they had become black enough with +coal-dust,--not a streak of light was visible, except around their eyes. +They were capering about and contemplating each other's face with +uproarious delight, while the blacksmith, though internally chuckling at +their antics, preserved a decent gravity, and prepared to go to his house. +He drew a bucket of water, and bared his muscular arms, then, after +washing them, soused his curly hair and begrimed face, and came out +wonderfully brightened by the operation. The boys continued their sports, +racing, wrestling, and putting on grotesque grimaces. + +Charlotte, the youngest child, now came to the shop to say that supper was +ready. + +"C-come, boys, you've ha-had play enough," said Mr. Hardwick. "J-James, +put Ch-Charlotte down. M-M-Milton, it's close on to S-Sabba'day. Now w- +wash yourselves." + +Just as the merriment was highest, Charlotte standing on James's +shoulders, and Milton chasing them, while the blacksmith was looking on,-- +his honest face glistening with soap and good-humor,--Mildred Kinloch +passed by on her way home from a walk by the river. She looked towards the +shop-door and bowed to Mr. Hardwick. + +"G-good evenin', M-Miss Mildred," said he; "I'm g-glad to see you lookin' +so ch-cheerful." + +The tone was hearty, and with a dash of chivalrous sentiment rarely heard +in a smithy. His look of half-parental, half-admiring fondness was +touching to see. + +"Oh, Uncle Ralph," she replied, "I am never melancholy when I see you. You +have all the cheerfulness of this spring day in your face." + +"Y-yes, I hev to stay here in the old shop; b-but I hear the b-birds in +the mornin', and all day I f-feel as ef I was out under the b-blue sky, +an' rejoicin' with all livin' creaturs in the sun and the s-sweet air of +heaven." + +"I envy you your happy frame; everything has some form or hue of beauty +for you. I must have you read to me again. I never take up Milton without +thinking of you." + +"I c-couldn't wish to be remembered in any p-pleasanter way." + +"Well, good evening. I must hurry home, for it grows damp here by the + mill-race. Tell Lizzy and Anna to come and see me. We are quite lonesome +now." + +"P-p'raps Mark'll come with 'em." + +"Mark? Is he here? When did he come?" + +"H-he'll be here t-to-night." + +"You surprise me!" + +"'Tis rather s-sudden. He wrote y-yes-terday 't he'd g-got to come on +urgent b-business." + +"Urgent business?" she repeated, thoughtfully. "I wonder if Squire +Clamp"---- + +The blacksmith nodded, with a gesture towards his children, as though he +would not have them hear. + +"Yes," he added, in a low tone, "I g-guess that is it." + +"I must go home," said Mildred, hurriedly. + +"Well, G-God bless you, my daughter! D-don't forgit your old sooty friend. +And ef ever y-you want the help of a s-stout hand, or of an old gray head, +don't fail to come to the ber-blacksmith's shop." + +"Thank you, Uncle Ralph! thank you with all my heart! Good-night!" + +She walked lightly up the hill towards the principal street. But she had +not gone half a dozen yards before a hand grasped her arm. She turned with +a start. + +"Mark Davenport!" she exclaimed, "Is it you? How you frightened me!" + +"Yes, Mildred, it is Mark, your old friend" (with a meaning emphasis). "I +couldn't resist the temptation of giving you a little surprise." + +"But when did you come to town?" + +"I have just reached here from the station at Riverbank. I went to the +house first, and was just going to see Uncle at the shop, when I caught +sight of you." + +Mark drew her arm within his own, and noticed, not without pleasure, how +she yet trembled with agitation. + +"I am very glad to see you," said Mildred; "but isn't your coming sudden?" + +"Yes, I had some news from home yesterday which determined me to come, and +I started this morning." + +"Quick and impetuous as ever!" + +"Yes, I don't deliberate long." + +There was a pause. + +"I wish you had only been here to see father before he died." + +"I wish I might have seen him." + +"I am sure _he_ would never have desired to put you to any trouble." + +"I suppose he would not have _troubled_ me, though I never expected to do +less than repay him the money he was so good as to lend me; but I don't +think he would have been so abrupt and peremptory as Squire Clamp." + +"Why, what has he done?" + +"This is what he has done. A lawyer's clerk, as I supposed him to be, +called upon me yesterday morning with a statement of the debt and +interest, and made a formal demand of payment. I had only about half the +amount in bank, and therefore could not meet it. Then the clerk appeared +in his true character as a sheriff's officer, drew out his papers, and +served a writ upon me, besides a trustee process on the principal of the +school, so as to attach whatever might be due to me." + +"Oh, Mark, were you treated so?" + +"Just so,--entrapped like a wild animal. To be sure, it was a legal +process, but one designed only for extreme cases, and which no gentleman +ever puts in force against another." + +"I don't know what this can mean. Squire Clamp is cruel enough, I know; +but mother, surely, would never approve such conduct." + +"After all, the mortification is the principal thing; for, with what I +have, and what Uncle can raise for me, I can pay the debt. I have said too +much already, Mildred. I don't want to put any of my burdens on your +little shoulders. In fact, I am quite ashamed of having spoken on the +subject at all; but I have so little concealment, that it popped out +before I thought twice." + +They were approaching the house, both silent, neither seeming to be bold +enough to touch the tenderer chords that thrilled in unison. + +"Mildred," said Mark, "I don't know how much is meant by this suit. I +don't know that I shall be able to see you again, unless it be casually, +in the street, as to-night, (blessed accident!)--but remember, that, +whatever may happen, I am always the same that I have been to you." + +Here his voice failed him. With such a crowd of memories,--of hopes and +desires yet unsatisfied,--with the crushing burden of debt and poverty,-- +he could not command himself to say what his heart, nevertheless, ached in +retaining. Here he was, with the opportunity for which during all his +boyhood he had scarcely dared to hope, and yet he was dumb. They were at +the gate, under the dense shade of the maples. + +"Good-night, dear Mildred!" said Mark. + +He took her hand, which was fluttering as by electrical influence, and +raised it tenderly to his lips. + +"Good-night," he said again. + +She did not speak, but grasped his hand with fervor. He walked away slowly +towards his uncle's house, but often stopped and looked back at the +slender figure whose outlines he could barely see in the gateway under the +trees. Then, as he lost sight of her, he remembered with shame the selfish +prominence he had given to his own troubles. He was ashamed, too, of the +cowardice which had kept him from uttering the words which had trembled on +his lips. But in a moment the thought of the future checked that regret. +Gloomy as his own lot might be, he could bear it; but he had no right to +involve another's happiness. Thus he alternated between pride and +abasement, hope and dejection, as many a lover has done before and since. + + +CHAPTER VI. + +Sunday was a great day in Innisfield; for there, as in all Puritan +communities, religion was the central and engrossing idea. As the bell +rang for service, every ear in town heard it, and all who were not sick or +kept at home by the care of young children turned their steps towards the +house of God. The idea that there could be any choice between going to +hear preaching and remaining at home was so preposterous, that it never +entered into the minds of any but the openly wicked. Whatever might be +their inclinations, few had the hardihood to absent themselves from +meeting, still less to ride out for pleasure, or to stroll through the +woods or upon the bank of the river. A steady succession of vehicles-- +"thorough-braced" wagons, a few more stylish carriages with elliptic +springs, and here and there an ancient chaise--tended from all quarters to +the meeting-house. The horses, from the veteran of twenty years' service +down to the untrimmed and half-trained colt, knew what the proprieties of +the day required. They trotted soberly, with faces as sedate as their +drivers', and never stopped to look in the fence-corners as they passed +along, to see what they could find to be frightened at. Nor would they +often disturb worship by neighing, unless they became impatient at the +length of the sermon. + +Mr. Hardwick and his family, as we have before mentioned, went regularly +to meeting; Lizzy and Mark sat with him in the singers' seats, the others +in a pew below. The only guardian of the house on Sundays was a large +ungainly cur, named Caesar. The habits of this dog deserve a brief +mention. On all ordinary occasions he followed his master or others of the +family, seeming to take a human delight in their company. Whenever it was +desirable to have him remain at home, nothing short of tying him would +answer the purpose. After a time he came to know the signs of preparation, +and would skulk. Upon setting out, Mr. Hardwick would tell one of the boys +to catch Caesar so that he should not follow, but he was not to be found; +and in the course of ten minutes he would be trotting after his master as +composedly as if nothing had ever happened to interrupt their friendly +relations. It was impossible to resist such persevering affection, and at +length Mr. Hardwick gave up the contest, and allowed Caesar to travel when +and where he chose. But on Sunday he sat on the front-door step, erect +upon his haunches, with one ear dropping forward, and the other upright +like the point of a starched shirt-collar; and though on week-days he was +fond of paying the usual courtesies to his canine acquaintances, and (if +the truth must be told) of barking at strange horses occasionally, yet +nothing could induce him either to follow any of the family, or accost a +dog, or chase after foreign vehicles, on the day of rest. Once only he +forgot what was due to his character, and gave a few yelps in holy time. +But James, with a glance at his father, who was stoutly orthodox, averred +that Caesar's conduct was justifiable, inasmuch as the man he barked at +was one of a band of new-light fanatics who worshipped in the school- +house, and the horse, moreover, was not shod at a respectable place, but +at a tinker's shop in the verge of the township. A dog with such powers of +discrimination certainly merits a place in this true history. + +The services of Sunday were finished. Those who, with dill and caraway, +had vainly struggled against drowsiness, had waked up with a jerk at the +benediction, and moved with their neighbors along the aisles, a slow and +sluggish stream. The nearest friends passed out side by side with meekly +composed faces, and without greeting each other until they reached the +vestibule. So slow and solemn was the progress out of church, that merry +James Hardwick averred that he saw Deacon Stone, a short fat man, actually +dozing, his eyes softly shutting and opening like a hen's, as he was borne +along by the crowd. The Deacon had been known to sleep while he stood up +in his pew during prayer, but perhaps James's story was rather apocryphal. + +Mark Davenport, of course, had been the object of considerable attention +during the day, and at the meeting-house-door numbers of his old +acquaintances gathered round him. No one was more cordial in manner than +Squire Clamp. His face was wrinkled into what were meant for smiles, and +his voice was even smoother and more insinuating than usual. It was only +by a strong effort that Mark gulped down his rising indignation, and +replied civilly. + +Sunday in Innisfield ended at sunset, though labor was not resumed until +the next day; but neighbors called upon each other in the twilight, and +talked over the sermons of the day, and the affairs of the church and +parish. That evening, while Mr. Hardwick's family were sitting around the +table reading, a long growl was heard from Caesar at the door, followed by +an emphatic "Get out!" The growls grew fiercer, and James went to the door +to see what was the matter. Squire Clamp was the luckless man. The dog had +seized his coat-tail, and had pulled it forward, so that he stood face to +face with the Squire, who was vainly trying to free himself by poking at +his adversary with a great baggy umbrella. James sent away the dog with a +reprimand, but laughed as he followed the angry man into the house. He +always cited this afterwards as a new proof of the sagacity of the grim +and uncompromising Caesar. + +"S-sorry you've had such a t-time with the dog," said Mr. Hardwick; "he +don't g-ginerally bark at pup-people." + +"Oh, no matter," said the Squire, contemplating the measure of damage in +the skirt of his coat. "A good, sound sermon Mr. Rook gave us to-day. The +doctrines of the decrees and sovereignty, and the eternal destruction of +the impenitent, were strongly set forth." + +"Y-yes, I sp-spose so. I d-don't profit so m-much by that inst-struction, +however. I th-think more of the e-every-day religion he u-usually +preaches."--Mr. Hardwick trotted one foot with a leg crossed and with an +air which showed to his children and to Mark plainly enough how impatient +he was of the Squire's beginning so far away from what he came to say. + +"Why, you don't doubt these fundamental points?" asked Mr. Clamp. + +"No, I don't d-doubt, n-nor I don't th-think much about 'em; they're t-too +deep for me, and I ler-let 'em alone. We shall all un-know about these +things in God's goo-good time. I th-think more about keepin' peace among +n-neighbors, bein' kuh-kindly to the poor, h-helpin' on the cause of +eddication, and d-doin' ginerally as I would be done by."--Mr. Hardwick's +emphasis could not be mistaken, and Squire Clamp was a little uneasy. + +"Oh, yes, Mr. Hardwick," he replied, "all the town knows of your practical +religion." Then turning to Mark, he said, blandly, "So you came home +yesterday. How long do you propose to stay?" + +The young man never had the best control of his temper, and it was now +rapidly coming up to the boiling-point. "Mr. Clamp," said he, "if you had +asked a pickerel the same question, he would probably tell you that you +knew best how and when he came on shore, and that for himself he expected +to get back into water as soon as he got the hook out of his jaws." + +"I am sorry to see this warmth," said Mr. Clamp; "I trust you have not +been put to any trouble." + +"Really," said Mark, bitterly, "you have done your best to ruin me in the +place where I earn my living, but 'trust I have not been put to any +trouble'! Your sympathy is as deep as your sincerity." + +"Mark," said Mr. Hardwick, "you're sa-sayin' more than is necess-ssary." + +"Indeed, he is quite unjust," rejoined the lawyer. "I saw an alteration in +his manner to-day, and for that reason I came here. I prefer to keep the +friendship of all men, especially of those of my townsmen and brethren in +the church whose piety and talents I so highly respect." + +"S-sartinly, th-that's right. I don't like to look around, wh-when I take +the ker-cup at the Sacrament, and see any man that I've wronged; an' I +don't f-feel comf'table nuther to see anybody der-drinkin' from the same +cup that I think has tried to w-wrong me or mine." + +"You can save yourself that anxiety about Mr. Clamp, Uncle," said Mark. +"He is not so much concerned about our Christian fellowship as he is about +his fees. He couldn't live here, if he didn't manage to keep on both sides +of every little quarrel in town. Having done me what mischief he could, he +wants now to salve the wound over." + +"My young friend, what is the reason of this heat?" asked Mr. Clamp, +mildly. + +"I don't care to talk further," Mark retorted. "I might as well explain +the pathology of flesh bruises to a donkey who had maliciously kicked me." + +Mr. Clamp wiped his bald head, on which the perspiration was beginning to +gather. His stock of pious commonplaces was exhausted, and he saw no +prospect of calming Mark's rage, or of making any deep impression on the +blacksmith. He therefore rose to depart. "Good evening," said he. "I pray +you may become more reasonable, and less disposed to judge harshly of your +friend and brother." + +Mark turned his back on him. Mr. Hardwick civilly bade him good-night. +Lizzy and Anna, who had retreated during the war of words, came back, and +the circle round the table was renewed. + +"Yer-you'll see one thing," said Mr. Hardwick. "He'll b-bring you, and +p'r'aps me, too, afore the church for this talk." + +"The sooner, the better," said Mark. + +"I d'no," said Mr. Hardwick. "Ef we must live in f-fellowship, a der- +diffi-culty in church isn't per-pleasant. But 'tis uncomf'table for +straight wood to be ker-corded up with such ker-crooked sticks as him." + +[To be continued.] + + + + +A PERILOUS BIVOUAC. + + +It is a pleasant June morning out on the Beauport slopes; the breeze comes +laden with perfume from shady Mount Lilac; and it is good to bask here in +the meadows and look out upon the grand panorama of Quebec, with its +beautiful bay sweeping in bold segments of shoreline to the mouth of the +River St Charles. The king-bird, too lazy to give chase to his proper +quarry, the wavering butterfly, sways to and fro upon a tall weed; and +there, at the bend of the brook, sits an old kingfisher on a dead branch, +gorged with his morning meal, and regardless of his reflected image in the +still pool beneath. The _goguelu_[1] rises suddenly up from his tuft of +grass, and, having sung a few staves of his gurgling song, drops down +again like a cricket-ball and is no more seen. Smooth-plumaged wax-wings +are pruning their feathers in the tamarac-trees; and high up over the +waters of the bay sails a long-winged fish-hawk, taking an extended and +generally liberal view of sundry important matters connected with the +fishery question. + +[Footnote 1: This name is given by the French Canadians to the bobolink or +rice bunting. It is an old, I believe an obsolete, French word, and means +"braggart."] + +Many a year has gone by since I last looked upon this picture, and then it +was a winter scene; for it was near the end of March, which is winter +enough in this region, and the blue water of the bay there was flagged +over with a rough white pavement of crisp snow. I think I see it now, +faintly ruled with two lines of _sapins_, or young fir saplings,--one +marking out the winter road to the Island of Orleans, and the other that +from Quebec to Montmorency; and this memory recalls to me how it fell upon +a certain day, the incidents of which are expanding upon my mind like +those dissolving views that come up out of the dark, I set up a camp-fire +just where that wood-barge nods drowsily at anchor, about a mile this side +of the town. It was a sort of bivouac a man is not likely to forget in a +hurry; not that it makes much of a story, after all,--but a trifling +scratch will sometimes leave its mark on a man for life. I was quartered +in Quebec then; didn't go much into society, though, because I devoted +much of my young energies to shooting and fishing, which were worth any +expenditure of energy in those days. And so I restricted my evening rounds +of duty to one or two houses which were conducted on the always-at-home +principle, walking in and hanging up my wide-awake when it suited me, and +staying away when it didn't,--which was about the oftener. + +In the winter of eighteen hundred and no matter what, I got three months' +leave of absence, with the intention of devoting a great portion of it to +a long-planned expedition, an invasion of the wild mountain-region lying +north of Quebec, towards the head-waters of the Saguenay,--a district +seldom disturbed by the presence of civilized man, but abandoned to the +semi-barbarous hunter and trapper, and frequented much by that prince of +roving bucks, the shy but stately caribou. I need not go into the details +of my two-months' hunt. It was like any other expedition of the sort, +about which so much information has already been given to the world in the +pleasant narratives of the wandering family of MacNimrod. I succeeded in +procuring many hairy and horned trophies of trap and rifle, as well as in +converting myself from some semblance of respectability into the veriest +looking cannibal that ever breakfasted on an underdone enemy. The return +from the chase furnished the little adventure I have alluded to,--a very +small adventure, but deeply impressed upon a memory now a good deal cut up +with tracks and traces of strange beasts of accidents, quaint "vestiges of +creation," ineffaceably stamped upon what poor Andrew Romer used to call +the "old red sandstone," in playful allusion to what his friends well knew +was a heart of hearts. + +The snow lay heavy in the woods, wet and heavy with the breath of coming +spring, as I tramped out of them one March morning, and found myself on +the queen's highway, within short rifle-shot of the rushing Montmorency, +whose roar had reached us through the forest an hour or two before. In the +early days of our hunt I had been so lucky as to run down and kill a large +moose, whose antlered head was a valuable trophy; and so I confided it to +the especial charge of my faithful follower, Zachary Hiver, a _brule_ or +half-breed of the Chippewa nation, who had hunted buffaloes with me on the +plains of the Saskatchewan and gaffed my salmon in the swift waters of the +Mingan and Escoumains. I had promised him powder and lead enough to +maintain his rifle for the probable remainder of his earthly hunting- +career, if he succeeded in safely conveying to Quebec the hide and horns +of the mammoth stag of the forest. These he had concealed, accordingly, in +a safe hiding-place, or _cache_, to be touched at on our return; and now +as he emerged from the dark pine copse, with his ropy locks tasselling his +flat skull, and a tattered blanket-coat fluttering in ribbons from his +brown and brawny chest, his interest in the venture appeared in the +careful manner in which he drew after him a long, slender _tobaugan_, +heavily packed with the hard-won proceeds of trap and gun. Foremost among +these were displayed the broad antlers of the moose of my affections, +whose skin served as a tarpaulin for the remainder of the baggage, round +which it was snugly tucked in with thongs of kindred material. + +We halted on a broad ledge of rock by the western verge of the bay of the +Falls, glad of an opportunity of enjoying my independence to the last, +unfettered by the conventionalities for which I was beginning to be imbued +with a savage contempt. Here we set up a primitive kitchen-range, and, +having feasted upon cutlets of the caribou, scientifically treated by a +skewer process with which Zach was familiar, we lounged like "lazy +shepherds" in the sun, and the eye of the Indian flashed as I produced +from the folds of my sash a leather-covered flask which did not look as if +it was meant to contain water. During the weeks of the chase I had been +very careful to conceal this treasure from Zach, knowing how helpless an +Indian becomes under the influence of the "fire-water"; and as I had had a +pull at it myself only two or three times, under circumstances of unusual +adversity and hardship, there still remained in it a very respectable +allowance for two, from which I subtracted a liberal measure, handing over +the balance to Zach, who gulped down the _skiltiwauboh_ with a fiendish +grin and a subsequent inhuman grunt. As I lit my pipe after this +satisfactory arrangement, the roar of the mighty Montmorency, whirling +down its turbulent perpendicular flood behind a half-drawn curtain of +green and azure ice, sounded like exquisite music to my ears, and I looked +towards Quebec and blinked at its fire-flashing tin spires and house-tops +burning through the coppery morning fog, until my mind's eye became +telescopic, and my thoughts, unsentimental though I be, reverted to +civilized society and its _agrements_, and particularly to a certain +steep-roofed cottage situated on a suburban road, in the boudoirs of which +I liked to imagine one pined for my return. If memory has its pleasures, +has it not also its glimpses of regret?--and who can say that the former +compensate for the latter? Even now I see her as she used to step out on +the veranda,--the lithe Indian girl, rivalling the choicest "desert- +flower" of Arabia in the rich darkness of her eyes and hair, and in the +warm mantling of her golden-ripe complexion,--unutterably graceful in the +thorough-bred ease of her elastic movements,--Zosime MacGillivray, perfect +type and model of the style and beauty of the _brulee_. She was the only +child of a retired trader of the old North-West Fur Company and his Indian +wife; had been partly educated in England; possessed rather more than the +then average Colonial allowance of accomplishments; and was, altogether, +so much in harmony with my roving forest-inclinations, that I sometimes +thought, half seriously, how pleasant and respectable it would be to have +one such at the head of one's camp-equipage, and how much nicer a +companion she would be on a hunt than that disreputable old scoundrel, +Zach Hiver. + +"Pack the _tobaugan_, Zach! The sun will come out strong by and by, and +the longer we tarry here, the heavier the snow will be for our stretch to +the Citadel. Up, there! _leve-toi, cochon!_" shouted I, in the elegant +terms of address which experience had taught me were the only ones that +had any effect upon the stolid sensibilities of the half-breed,--at the +same time administering to him a kick that produced a _thud_ and a grunt, +as if actually bestowed on the unclean quadruped to which I had just +likened him. The ragamuffin was very slow this time in getting the traps +together on the _tobaugan_, and, if I had not attended to the matter +myself, the moose trophy, at least, would in all probability have been +left to perish, and would never have pointed a moral and adorned a tale, +as it now does, in its exalted position among the reminiscences of things +past. At length we got under way, and, as a walk over the open plain +offered a pleasing variety to a man who had been feeling his way so long +through the dim old woods, I determined to descend from the ridge of +Beauport, and proceed over the snow-covered surface of the bay, in a +bird's-eye line, to our point of destination. Winding down the almost +perpendicular declivity, sometimes sliding down on our snow-shoes, with +the _tobaugan_ running before us, "on its own hook," at a fearful pace, +and sometimes obliged to descend, hand under hand, by the tangled roots +and shrubs, we soon found ourselves on the great white winter-prairie of +the grand St. Lawrence, upon which I strode forward with renewed energy, +steering my course, like the primitive steeple-chasers of my boyhood's +home, upon the highest church-tower looming up from the heterogeneous +huddle of motley houses that just showed their gable-tops over the low +ring of mist which mingled with the smoke of the Lower Town. + +After a progress of about five miles, I found I had very materially +widened the distance between myself and Zach, who, encumbered by the +baggage, and by the spring snow which each moment accumulated in wet heavy +cakes upon his snow-shoes, was now a good mile in my rear. This I was +surprised at, as he generally outwalked me, even when carrying on his back +a heavy load, with perhaps a canoe on his head, cocked-hat fashion, as he +was often obliged to do in our fishing-excursions to the northern lakes. +It now occurred to me, however, that I had incautiously left the brandy- +flask in his charge, and when he came up with me I gathered from his fishy +eye, and the thick dribblings of his macaronic gibberish,--which was +compounded of sundry Indian dialects and French-Canadian _patois_, +coarsely ground up with bits of broken English,--that the modern Circe, +who changes men into beasts, had wrought her spells upon him; a +circumstance at which I was terribly annoyed, as foreboding an ignominious +entry into the city by back-lane and sally-port, instead of my long- +anticipated triumphal progress up St. Louis Street, bearded in splendor, +bristling with knife and rifle, and followed by my wild Indian _coureur- +des-bois_, drawing my antlered trophies after him upon the _tobaugan_ as +upon a festival car. + +"Kaween nishishin! kaw-ween!" howled the big monster, in his mixed-pickle +macaronio,--"je me sens saisi du mal-aux-raquettes, je ne pouvons plus. +Why you go so dam fast, when hot sun he make snow for tire, eh? Sacr-r-re +raquettes! il me semble qu'ils se grossissent de plus en plus a chaque +demarche. Stop for smoke, eh?--v'la! good place for camp away there, +kitchee hogeemaus endaut, big chief's house may-be!" grinned he, as he +indicated with Indian instinct and a wavering finger a structure of some +kind that peered through the fog at a short distance on our left. + +We were now within about a mile of Quebec. The Indian's intoxication had +increased to a ludicrous extent, so that to have ventured into the town +with him must have resulted in a reckless exposure of myself to the just +obloquy and derision of the public; while, on the other hand, if I left +him alone upon the wide world of ice, and dragged the _tobaugan_ to town +myself, the unfortunate _brule_ must inevitably have stepped into some +treacherous snow-drift or air-hole, and thus miserably perished. So I made +up my mind for a camp on the ice; and, diverging from our course in the +direction pointed out by the Indian, we soon arrived at the object +indicated by him, which proved to be a stout framework about twelve feet +square, constructed of good heavy timber solidly covered with deal +boarding, and conveying indubitable evidence, to my thinking, of the +remains of one of the _cabanes_ or shanties commonly erected on the ice by +those engaged in the "tommy-cod" fishery,--portable structures, so fitted +together as to admit of being put up and removed piecemeal, to suit the +convenience of their proprietors. I blessed mentally the careless +individual who had thus unconsciously provided for our especial shelter; +and as the wind had now suddenly arisen sharp from the west, driving the +fog before it with clouds of fine drifting snow, I was glad to get under +the lee of the providential wall, in the hospitable shelter of which, +before two minutes had elapsed, "Stephano, my drunken butler," was snoring +away like a phalanx of bullfrogs, with his head bolstered up somehow +between the great moose-horns, and his brawny limbs rolled carelessly in +the warm but somewhat unsavory skin of the dead monarch of the forest. I +gloried in his calm repose; for the day was yet young, and I flattered +myself that a three-hours' snooze would restore his muddled intellects to +their normal mediocrity of useful instinct, and that I might still achieve +my triumphal entry into the city,--a procession I had been so much in the +habit of picturing to myself over the nocturnal camp-fire, that it had +become a sort of nightmare with me. Indeed, I had idealized it roughly in +my pocket-book, intending to transfer the sketches, for elaboration on +canvas, to Tankerville, the regimental Landseer, whose menagerie of living +models, consisting of two bears, one calf-moose, one _loup-cervier_, three +bloated raccoons, and a bald eagle, formed at once the terror and delight +of the rising generation of the barracks. + +Having got up a small fire with the assistance of the chips and scraps of +wood that were plentifully scattered around, I placed my snow-shoes one on +top of the other, and sat down on them,--a sort of preparatory step in my +transition to civilization, for they had somewhat the effect of a cane- +bottomed chair minus the legs and without a back. Then I filled my short +black pipe from the seal-skin tobacco-pouch, the contents of which had so +often assuaged my troubled spirit when I brooded over griefs which _then_ +were immature, if not imaginary. It was a very pleasant smoke, I +recollect,--so pleasant, that I rather congratulated myself upon my +position; the only drawback to it being that I was shut out from a view of +the town, as the wind and drift rendered it indispensable for comfort in +smoking that I should keep strictly to leeward of my bulwark. Tobacco is +notoriously a promoter of reflection; there must be something essentially +retrospective in the nature of the weed. I retired upon the days of my +boyhood, my legs and feet becoming clairvoyant of the corduroys and +highlows of that happy period of my existence, as the revolving curls of +pale smoke exhibited to me, with marvellous fidelity, many quaint +successive _tableaux_ of the old familiar scenes of home,--sentimental, +some of them,--comic, others,--like the domestic incidents revealed with +exaggerations on the hazy field of a magic-lantern. I thought of my poor +mother, and of the excellent parting advice she gave me,--but more +particularly of the night-caps with strings, which she extracted such a +solemn promise from me to wear carefully every night in all climates, and +which, on the second evening of my sojourn in barracks, were so +unceremoniously reduced to ashes in a noisy _auto-da-fe_. These +retrospective pictures were succeeded by others of more modern date, +coming round in a progressive series, until I had painted myself up to +within a few weeks of my present position, the foreground of my existence. +Then I remembered promises made by me of contributions to a certain +album,--further contributions,--for I had already furnished several pages +of it with food for mind and eye in the form of melancholy verses and +"funny" sketches, with brief dramatic dialogues beneath the latter, to +elucidate the "story." I particularly recollected having volunteered a +translation or imitation of a pretty song in Ruy Blas; and as the fit was +upon me, I produced my pocketbook, to commit to paper a version of it +which I had mentally devised. The leaves of my book were all filled, +however; some with memoranda,--a sort of savage diary it was,--some with +sketches of scenes in the wilderness: there was not a corner vacant. +Turning towards the planking of my bulwark, I perceived that it was +smoothly planed and clean, and to work on it I went, pencil in hand. First +I wrote "Zosime MacGillivray," in several different styles of chirography, +flourished and plain, and even in old text. Then I sketched out a rough +design for an ornamental heading, with a wreath of flowers encircling the +words "To Zozzy," and beneath this work of Art I inscribed the effort of +my muse, which ran thus:-- + + Fields and forests rejoice + In their silver-toned throng; + _I_ hear but the voice + Of the bird in thy song! + + In April's glad shower + Flash petals and leaves, + Less bright than the flower + Round thy heart that weaves! + + Stars waken, stars slumber, + Stars wink in the sky, + Bright numberless number; + But none like thine eye! + + For bird-song and flower + And star from above + Combine in thy bower; + Their union is love! + +My mind being considerably relieved by this gush of sentiment, I felt +myself entitled to unbend a little, and, turning my attention to artistic +pursuits, principally of a humorous character, I developed successively +many long-pent-up imaginings in the way of severe studies of sundry +garrison notables. There was "Bendigo" Phillips, with boxing-gloves +fearfully brandished, appearing in the attitude in which he polished off +young Thurlow of the R.A., under the pretence of giving him a lesson in +the noble art of self-defence, but in reality to revenge himself upon him +for an ill-timed interference in a certain _affaire du coeur_. The agony +of young Thurlow, pretending to look pleased, was depicted by a very +successful stroke of Art. To the extreme right you might have beheld +Vegetable Warren, the staff-surgeon, slightly exaggerated in the semblance +of a South-Down wether nibbling at a gigantic Swedish turnip. Written +lampoons of the fiercest character accompanied the illustrations. But my +boldest effort was an atrocious and libellous cartoon of the commandant of +the garrison, popularly known as "Old Wabbles,"--I believe from the +preternatural manner in which his wide Esquimaux boots vacillated about +his long, lean shanks. This _chef d'oeuvre_ was executed upon a rather +large scale, and I imparted considerable force and breadth to the design +by "coaling in" the shadows with a charred stick. Then calling color to my +aid, as far as my limited means admitted, I scraped from the edges of the +moose-hide a portion of the red-streaked fat, and, having impasted +therewith the bacchanalian nose of my subject, I stepped back a few paces +to contemplate the effect. So ludicrous was the resemblance, that I +laughed outright in the pride of my success,--a transient hilarity, nipped +suddenly in the bud by the loud boom of a cannon, accompanied rather than +followed by a rushing sound a few feet above my head, and a thundering +bump and splutter upon the ice some thirty or forty yards beyond me, as +the heavy shot skipped and ricochetted away with receding bounds to its +vanishing-point somewhere in the neighborhood of the Island of Orleans. +Two strides to the front, and a glance at the broad, black ring emblazoned +on the hitherto disregarded face of my bulwark, and the truth flashed upon +my staggering senses. + +I was encamped in the lee of the bran-new artillery target, and they were +just commencing practice, on this fine bright afternoon, by pitching +thirty-two-pound shot into and about it, at intervals--as I pretty well +knew--of distressingly uncertain duration. With frantic strength I grasped +the Indian by the neck, and, plunging madly through the snow, dragged him +after me a few paces in the direction of our former track; but, hampered +as he was by the moose-trappings, the weight was too much for me, and I +dropped him, instinctively continuing to run with breathless speed, until, +having gained a considerable distance away from any probable line of fire, +I flung myself down upon the snow, and was somewhat startled at finding +Zach very close upon my tracks, tearing along on all fours with a vague +sense of danger of some kind, and looking, in his strange envelope, like +an infuriated bull-moose in the act of charging a hunter. A shot struck +the corner of the target just as we got away from it, slightly splintering +it, so as to give the bewildered Indian a pleasant practical lesson in the +science of gunnery and fortification. + +Two minutes elapsed,--three minutes,--five minutes,--not another shot; but +it might commence again at any moment, and I stood at a respectful +distance from the danger, uncertain what course to pursue for the recovery +of my traps, all of which, rifle, snow-shoes, and _tobaugan_ loaded with +spoils, lay in pledge with the two-faced friend whose treacherous shelter +had no longer any charm for me, when I beheld several sleighs approaching +us from the town at a fearful pace, in the foremost of which, when within +range of rifle, I recognized Old Wabbles, the commandant. + +"Who the Devil are you?" shouted he, as he drove right at us. "Two +Indians, ha!--somebody said it was _one_ Indian with a moose after him, a +man and a moose. Where's Thurlow?--_he_ had the telescope, and asserted +there was a man running round the target and a moose after him. I don't +see the moose." Zach had dropped the hide and horns from his "recreant +limbs," and was seated solemnly upon the snow, in all the majesty of his +native dirt. + +"By Jove, it's Kennedy!" cried Tankerville, whose artistical eye detected +me through my hirsute and fluttering disguise. "What a picturesque +object!--I congratulate you, old fellow!--easiest and pleasantest way in +the world of making a living!--lose no time about it, but send in your +papers at once!--continue assiduously to neglect your person, and you're +worth a guinea an hour for the rest of your prime, as a living model on +the full pay of the Academies!" + +I was soon bewildered by a torrent of inquiries from all sides: as to how +I came behind the target,--what success I had had in the woods,--how many +miles I had come to-day,--whether I had got the martin-skin I had promised +to this one, and the silver fox I undertook to trap for that,--when, +suddenly, a diversion was created by a roar from Phillips, who had +proceeded to inspect my spoils behind the target, and now stood looking at +my portrait-gallery of living celebrities, his great chest heaving with +laughter; and before I could satisfy my inquiring friends, the whole crowd +had rushed pell-mell to the exhibition. + +"Caught, by all that's lovely!" shouted Phillips, repeating my verses at +the top of his voice,-- + + "The bird-song and flower + And star from above + Combine in thy bower; + Their union is love!" + +"Ritoorala loorala loorala loo, ritoorala loorala loorala loo!" chorused +everybody, as he sang the last verse to the vulgar melody of 'Tatter Jack +Welch,' knocking the poetry out of my constitution at once and forever, +like the ashes out of a pipe. "Hooray for Miss Mac! Who should have +thought it, Darby?"--That was _my_ pet name in the regiment. + +"How like!--how very like!--That's Warren there, nibbling the turnip. And +there's Thurlow,--ha! ha! ha! how good! And that--that--that's me, by +Jingo!--he he! he! he!--not so good that, somehow,--neck too long by half +a foot. But the Colonel!--only look at his boots!--He must'n't see this, +though, by Jove!--Choke the Colonel off, boys!--take him round to the +front!--do something!" whispered good-natured Symonds, anxious to keep me +clear of the scrape. + +But it was too late. The last objects that met my view were the ghastly +legs of the Commandant, as he strode through the circle in front of my +Art-exhibition. I saw no more. A soldier is but a mortal man. Rushing to +the nearest cariole,--it was the Commandant's,--I leaped into it, and, +lashing the horse furiously towards the town, never pulled rein until I +got up to my long-deserted quarters in the Citadel. There I barricaded +myself into my own room, directing my servant to proceed to the target +for my scattered property. I had still a month's leave of absence before +me, availing myself of which, I started next morning for New York, +subsequently obtained an extension of leave, sailed for England, and +there negotiating an exchange from a regiment whose facings no longer +suited my taste for colors, I soon found myself gazetted into a less +objectionable one lying at Corfu. + +I have never seen Tankerville's famous picture of my triumphal entry into +Quebec. + + + + +I.--NOVEMBER. + + +The dead leaves their rich mosaics, + Of olive and gold and brown, +Had laid on the rain-wet pavements, + Through all the embowered town. + +They were washed by the Autumn tempest, + They were trod by hurrying feet, +And the maids came out with their besoms + And swept them into the street, + +To be crushed and lost forever + 'Neath the wheels, in the black mire lost,-- +The Summer's precious darlings, + She nurtured at such cost! + +O words that have fallen from me! + O golden thoughts and true! +Must I see in the leaves a symbol + Of the fate which awaiteth you? + + +II.--APRIL. + +Again has come the Spring-time, + With the crocus's golden bloom, +With the smell of the fresh-turned earth-mould, + And the violet's perfume. + +O gardener! tell me the secret + Of thy flowers so rare and sweet!-- +--"I have only enriched my garden + With the black mire from the street." + + + + +THE GAUCHO. + + +What _is_ a Gaucho? + +That is precisely what I am going to tell you. + +Take my hand, if you please. Shod with the shoes of swiftness, we have +annihilated space and time. We are standing in the centre of a boundless +plain. Look north and south and east and west: for five hundred miles +beyond the limit of your vision, the scarcely undulating level stretches +on either hand. Miles, leagues, away from us, the green of the torrid +grass is melting into a misty dun; still further miles, and the misty dun +has faded to a shadowy blue; more miles, it rounds at last away into the +sky. A hundred miles behind us lies the nearest village; two hundred in +another direction will bring you to the nearest town. The swiftest horse +may gallop for a day and night unswervingly, and still not reach a +dwelling-place of man. We are placed in the midst of a vast, unpeopled +circle, whose radii measure a thousand miles. + +But see! a cloud arises in the South. Swiftly it rolls towards us; behind +it there is tumult and alarm. The ground trembles at its approach; the air +is shaken by the bellowing that it covers. Quick! let us stand aside! for, +as the haze is lifted, we can see the hurrying forms of a thousand cattle, +speeding with lowered horns and fiery eyes across the plain. Fortunately, +they do not observe our presence; were it otherwise, we should be trampled +or gored to death in the twinkling of an eye. Onward they rush; at last +the hindmost animals have passed; and see, behind them all there scours a +man! + +He glances at us, as he rushes by, and determines to give us a specimen of +his only art. Shaking his long, wild locks, as he rises in the stirrup and +presses his horse to its maddest gallop, he snatches from his saddle-bow +the loop of a coil of rope, whirls it in his right hand for an instant, +then hurls it, singing through the air, a distance of fifty paces. A jerk +and a strain,--a bellow and a convulsive leap,--his lasso is fast around +the horns of a bull in the galloping herd. The horseman flashes a +murderous knife from his belt, winds himself up to the plunging beast, +severs at one swoop the tendon of its hind leg, and buries the point of +his weapon in the victim's spinal marrow. It falls dead. The man, my +friend, is a Gaucho; and we are standing on the Pampas of the Argentine +Republic. + +Let us examine this dexterous wielder of the knife and cord. _He, Juan de +Dios!_ Come hither, O Centaur of the boundless cattle-plains! We will not +ask you to dismount,--for that you never do, we know, except to eat and +sleep, or when your horse falls dead, or tumbles into a _bizcachero_; but +we want to have a look at your savage self, and the appurtenances +thereunto belonging. + +And first, you say, the meaning of his name. The title, Gaucho, is applied +to the descendants of the early Spanish colonists, whose homes are on the +Pampa, instead of in the town,--to the rich _estanciero_, or owner of +square leagues of cattle, in common with the savage herdsman whom he +employs,--to Generals and Dictators, as well as to the most ragged Pampa- +Cossack in their pay. Our language is incapable of expressing the idea +conveyed by this term; and the Western qualification "backwoodsman" is +perhaps the nearest approach to a synonyme that we can attain. + +The head of our swarthy friend is covered with a species of Neapolitan +cap, (let me confess, in a parenthesis, that my ideas of such head- +coverings are derived from the costume of graceful Signor Brignoli in +"Masaniello,") which was once, in all probability, of scarlet hue, but now +almost rivals in color the jet-black locks which it confines. His face-- +well, we will pass that over, and, on our return to civilized life, will +refer the curious inquirer for a fac-simile to the first best painting of +Salvator, there to select at pleasure the most ferocious bandit +countenance that he can find. And now the remainder of his person. He +wears an open jacket of dirt-crusted serge, covered in front with a +gorgeous eruption of plated buttons, and a waistcoat of the same material, +adorned with equal profuseness, and showing at the neck a substratum of +dubious crimson, supposed to be a flannel shirt. So far, you may say, +there is nothing suspicious or very outlandish about his rig; but +_turpiter desinit formosus superne_,--there is something highly remarkable +_a continuacion_. Do you see that blanket which is drawn tightly up, fore +and aft, toward his waist, and, there confined by means of a belt which +his _querida_ has richly ornamented for him, falls over in uneven folds +like an abbreviated kilt? That is the famous _chiripa_, or Gaucho +petticoat, which, like the _bracae_ of the Northern barbarians some +nineteen hundred years ago, distinguishes him from the inhabitants of +civilized communities. Below the _chiripa_, his limbs are cased in +_calzoncillos_, stout cotton drawers or pantalets, which terminate in a +fringe (you should see the elaborate worsted-work that adorns the hem of +his gala-pair) an inch or two above the ankle. His feet are thrust into a +pair of _botas de potro_, or colt's-foot boots, manufactured from the hide +of a colt's fore-leg, which he strips off whole, chafes in his hand until +it becomes pliable and soft, sews up at the lower extremity,--and puts on, +the best riding-boot that the habitable world can show. Add a monstrous +spur to each heel of this _chaussure_, and you will have fully equipped +the worthy Juan de Dios for active service.--But stay! his accoutrements! +We must not forget that Birmingham-made butcher-knife, which, for a dozen +years, has never been for a moment beyond his reach; nor the coiling +lasso, and the _bolas_, or balls of iron, fastened at each end of a thong +of hide, which he can hurl a distance of sixty feet, and inextricably +entangle around the legs of beast or man; nor the _recado_, or saddle, his +only seat by day, and his pillow when he throws himself upon the ground to +sleep under the canopy of heaven. Neither must we omit the _mate_ gourd +which dangles at his waist, in readiness to receive its infusion of +_yerba_, or Paraguay tea, which he sucks through that tin tube, called +_bombilla_, and looking for all the world like the broken spout of an oil- +can with a couple of pieces of nutmeg-grater soldered on, as strainers, at +the lower end; nor the string of sapless _charque_ beef, nor the pouchful +of villanous tobacco, nor the paper for manufacturing it into +_cigarritos_, nor the cow's-horn filled with tinder, and the flint and +steel attached. Thus mounted, clothed, and equipped, he is ready for a +gallop of a thousand leagues. + +He is a strange individual, this Gaucho Juan. Born in a hut built of mud +and maize-stalks somewhere on the superficies of these limitless plains, +he differs little, in the first two years of his existence, from peasant +babies all the world over; but so soon as he can walk, he becomes an +equestrian. By the time he is four years old there is scarcely a colt in +all the Argentine that he will not fearlessly mount; at six, he whirls a +miniature lasso around the horns of every goat or ram he meets. In those +important years when our American youth are shyly beginning to claim the +title of young men, and are spending anxious hours before the mirror in +contemplation of the slowly-coming down upon their lip, young Juan (who +never saw a dozen printed books, and perhaps has only _heard_ of looking- +glasses) is galloping, like a portion of the beast he rides, over a +thousand miles of prairie, lassoing cattle, ostriches, and guanacos, +fighting single-handed with the jaguar, or lying stiff and stark behind +the heels of some plunging colt that he has too carelessly bestrid. + +At twenty-one he is in his glory. Then we must look for him in the +_pulperias_, the bar-rooms of the Pampas, whither he repairs on Sundays +and _fiestas_, to get drunk on _aguardiente_ or on Paraguay rum. There you +may see him seated, listening open-mouthed to the _cantor_, or Gaucho +troubadour, as he sings the marvellous deeds of some desert hero, +persecuted, unfortunately, by the myrmidons of justice for the numerous +_misfortunes_ (_Anglice_, murders) upon his head,--or narrates in +impassioned strain, to the accompaniment of his guitar, the circumstances +of one in which he has borne a part himself,--or chants the frightful end +of the Gaucho Attila, Quiroga, and the punishment that overtook his +murderer, the daring Santos Perez. When the song is over, the cards are +dealt. Seated upon a dried bull's-hide, each man with his unsheathed knife +placed ostentatiously at his side, the jolly Gauchos commence their game. +Suddenly Manuel exclaims, that Pedro or Estanislao or Antonio is playing +false. Down fly the cards; up flash the blades; a ring is formed. Manuel, +to tell the truth, has accused his friend Pedro only for the sake of a +little sport; he has never _marked_ a man yet, and thinks it high time +that that honor were attained. So the sparks fly from the flashing blades, +and Pedro's nose has got another gash in it, and Manuel is bleeding in a +dozen places, but he will not give in just yet. Unfortunate Gaucho! Pedro +the next moment slips in a sticky pool of his own blood, and Manuel's +knife is buried in his heart! "He is killed! Manuel has had a misfortune!" +exclaim the ring; "fly, Manuel, fly!" In another minute, and just as the +_vigilantes_ are throwing themselves upon their horses to pursue him, he +has galloped out of sight. + +Twenty miles from the _pulperia_ he draws rein, dismounts, wipes his +bloody knife on the grass, and slices off a collop of _charque_, which he +munches composedly for his supper. Very likely this _misfortune_ will make +him a _Gaucho malo_. The _Gaucho malo_ is an outlaw, at home only in the +desert, intangible as the wind, sanguinary, remorseless, swift. His +brethren of the _estancia_ pronounce his name occasionally, but in lowered +tones, and with a mixture of terror and respect; he is looked up to by +them as a sort of higher being. His home is a movable point upon an area +of twenty thousand square miles; his horse, the finest steed that he can +find upon the Pampas between Buenos Ayres and the Andes, between the Gran +Chaco and Cape Horn; his food, the first beef that he captures with his +lasso; his dainties, the tongues of cows which he kills, and abandons, +when he has stripped them of his favorite titbit, to the birds of prey. +Sometimes he dashes into a village, drinks a gourdful of _aguardiente_ +with the admiring guests at the _pulperia_, and spurs away again into +obscurity, until at length the increasing number of his _desgracias_ +tempts the mounted emissaries of justice to pursue him, in the hope of +extra reward. If suddenly beset by seven or eight of these desert police, +the _Gaucho malo_ slashes right and left with his redoubted knife,--kills +one, maims another, wounds them all. Perhaps he reaches his horse and is +off and away amid a shower of harmless balls;--or he is taken; in which +case, all that remains, the day after, of the _Gaucho malo_, is a lump of +soulless clay. + +Then there is the guide, or _vaqueano_. This man, as one who knows him +well informs us, is a grave and reserved Gaucho, who knows by heart the +peculiarities of twenty thousand leagues of mountain, wood, and plain! He +is the only _map_ that an Argentinian general takes with him in a +campaign; and the _vaqueano_ is never absent from his side. No plan is +formed without his concurrence. The army's fate, the success of a battle, +the conquest of a province, is entirely dependent upon his integrity and +skill; and, strange to say, there is scarcely an instance on record of +treachery on the part of a _vaqueano_. He meets a pathway which crosses +the road upon which he is travelling, and he can tell you the exact +distance of the remote watering-place to which it leads; if he meet with a +thousand similar pathways in a journey of five hundred miles, it will +still be the same. He can point out the fords of a hundred rivers; he can +guide you in safety through a hundred trackless woods. Stand with him at +midnight on the Pampa,--let the track be lost,--no moon or stars; the +_vaqueano_ quietly dismounts, examines the foliage of the trees, if any +are near, and if there are none, plucks from the ground a handful of +roots, chews them, smells and tastes the soil, and tells +you that so many hours' travel due north or south will bring you to your +destination. Do not doubt him; he is infallible. + +A mere _vaqueano_ was General Rivera of Uruguay,--but he knew every tree, +every hillock, every dell, in a region extending over more than 70,000 +square miles! Without his aid, Brazil would have been powerless in the +Banda Oriental; without his aid, the Argentinians would never have +triumphed over Brazil. As a smuggler in 1804, as a custom-house officer a +few years later, as a patriot, a freebooter, a Brazilian general, an +Argentinian commander, as President of Uruguay against Lavalleja, as an +outlaw against General Oribe, and finally against Rosas, allied with +Oribe, as champion of the Banda Oriental del Uruguay, Rivera had certainly +ample opportunities for perfecting himself in that study of which he was +the ardent devotee. + +Cooper has told us how and by what signs, in years that have forever +faded, the Huron tracked his flying foe through the forests of the North; +we read of Cuban bloodhounds, and of their frightful baying on the scent +of the wretched maroon; we know how the Bedouin follows his tribe over +pathless sands;--and yet all these are bunglers, in comparison with the +_Gaucho rastreador_! + +In the interior of the Argentine every Gaucho is a trailer or +_rastreador_. On those vast feeding-grounds of a million cattle, whose +tracks intersect each other in every direction, the herdsman can +distinguish with unerring accuracy the footprints of his own peculiar +charge. When an animal is missing from the herd, he throws himself upon +his horse, gallops to the spot where he remembers having seen it last, +gazes for a moment upon the trampled soil, and then shoots off for miles +across the waste. Every now and then he halts, surveys the trail, and +again speeds onward in pursuit. At last he reaches the limits of another +_estancia_, and the pasturage of a stranger herd. His eagle eye singles +out at a glance the estray; rising in his stirrup, he whirls the lasso for +a moment above his head, launches it through the air, and coolly drags the +recalcitrant beast away on the homeward trail. He is nothing but a common, +comparatively unskilled, _rastreador_. + +The official trailer is of another stamp. Like his kinsman, the +_vaqueano_, he is a personage well convinced of his own importance; grave, +reserved, taciturn, whose word is law. Such a one was the famous Calebar, +the dreaded thief-taker of the Pampas, the Vidocq of Buenos Ayres. This +man during more than forty years exercised his profession in the Republic, +and a few years since was living, at an advanced age, not far from Buenos +Ayres. There appeared to be concentrated in him the acuteness and keen +perceptions of all the brethren of his craft; it was impossible to deceive +him; no one whose trail he had once beheld could hope to escape discovery. +An adventurous vagabond once entered his house, during his temporary +absence on a journey to Buenos Ayres, and purloined his best saddle. When +the robbery was discovered, his wife covered the robber's trail with a +kneading-trough. Two months later Calebar returned, and was shown the +almost obliterated footprint. Months rolled by; the saddle was apparently +forgotten; but a year and a half later, as the _rastreador_ was again at +Buenos Ayres, a footprint in the street attracted his notice. He followed +the trail; passed from street to street and from _plaza_ to _plaza_, and +finally entering a house in the suburbs, laid his hand upon the begrimed +and worn-out saddle which had once been his own _montura de fiesta_! + +In 1830, a prisoner, awaiting the death-penalty, effected his escape from +jail. Calebar, with a detachment of soldiers, was put upon the scent. +Expecting this, and knowing that the gallows lay behind him, the fugitive +had adopted every expedient for baffling his pursuers: he had walked long +distances upon tiptoe; had scrambled along walls; had walked backwards, +crawled, doubled, leaped; but all in vain! Calebar's blood was up; his +reputation was at stake; to fail now would be an indelible disgrace. If +now and then he found himself at fault, he as often recovered the trail, +until the bank of a water-course was reached, to which the flying criminal +had taken. The trail was lost; the soldiers would have turned back; but +Calebar had no such thought. He patiently followed the course of the +_acequia_ for a few rods, and suddenly halting, said to his companions, +"Here is the spot at which he left the canal; there is no trail,--not a +footprint,--but do you see those drops of water upon the grass?" With this +slight clue they were led towards a vineyard. Calebar examined it at every +side, and bade the soldiers enter, saying, "He is there!" The men obeyed +him, but shortly reported that no living being was within the walls. "He +is there!" quietly reiterated Calebar; and, in fact, a second more +thorough examination resulted in the capture of the trembling fugitive, +who was executed on the following day.--There can be no doubt regarding +the literal exactness of this anecdote. + +At another time, we are told, a party of political prisoners, incarcerated +by General Rosas, had contrived a plan of escape, in which they were to be +aided by friends outside. When all was ready, one of the party suddenly +exclaimed,-- + +"But Calebar! you forget him!" + +"Calebar!" echoed his friends; "true, it is useless to escape while he can +pursue us!" + +Nor was any flight attempted until the dreaded trailer had been bribed to +fall ill for a few days, when the prisoners succeeded in making good their +escape. + +He who would learn more of Calebar and his brother-trailers, let him +procure a copy of the little work that now lies before us,[1] in the shape +of a tattered duo-decimo, which has come to us across the Andes and around +Cape Horn, from the most secluded corner of the Argentine Confederation. +Badly printed and barbarously bound, this "Life of Juan Facundo Quiroga" +is nevertheless replete with the evidence of genius, and bears the stamp +of a generously-cultivated mind. Its author, indeed, the poet-patriot- +philosopher, Don Domingo F. Sarmiento, may be called the Lamartine of +South America, whose eventful career may some day invite us to an +examination. Suffice it now to say, that he was expelled by Rosas in 1840 +from Buenos Ayres, and that he took his way to Chile, with the intention +in that hospitable republic of devoting his pen to the service of his +oppressed country. At the baths of Zonda he wrote with charcoal, under a +delineation of the national arms: _On ne tue point les idees_! which +inscription, having been reported to the Gaucho chieftain, a committee was +appointed to decipher and translate it. When the wording of the +significant hint was conveyed to Rosas, he exclaimed,--"Well, what does it +mean?" The answer was conveyed to him in 1852; and the sentence serves as +epigraph to the present life of his associate and victim, Facundo Quiroga. + +[Footnote 1: _Vida de Juan Facundo Quiroga_, etc., por Domingo F. +Sarmiento. Santiago, 1845.] + +In this extraordinary character we see the quintessence of that desert- +life some types of which we have endeavored to delineate. As one who, +rising from the lowest station to heights of uncontrolled power, as a +representative of a class of rulers unfortunately too common in the +republics that descend from Spain, and as a remarkable instance of brutal +force and barbaric stubbornness triumphing over reason, science, +education, and, in a word, civilization, he is admirably portrayed by Sr. +Sarmiento. Ours be the task to condense into a few pages the story of his +life and death. + +The Argentine province of La Rioja embraces vast tracts of sandy desert. +Destitute of rivers, bare of trees, it is only by means of artificial and +scanty irrigation that the peasant can cultivate a narrow strip of land. +Inclosed by these arid wastes lies, nevertheless, a fertile region +entitled the Plains, which, in despite of its name, is broken by ridges of +hills, and supports a luxuriant vegetation with pastures trodden by +unnumbered herds. The character of the people is Oriental; their +appearance actually recalls, as we are told, that of the ancient dwellers +about Jerusalem; their very customs have rather an Arabic than a Spanish +tinge. + +Somewhere upon these _Llanos_, and toward the close of the eighteenth +century, Don Prudencio Quiroga, as a well-to-do _estanciero_ or grazier, +was gladdened (doubtless) by the birth of a lusty son. He called him Juan +Facundo. For the first few years of his existence, we may safely believe, +the future general was scarcely distinguishable from a common baby. +Obstinate he doubtless was, and fierce and cruel in his tiny way; were his +mother still alive, the good woman could doubtless tell us of many a +bitter moment spent in lamenting her infant's waywardness; but we hear +nothing of him until the year 1799, when he was sent to San Juan, a town +then celebrated for its schools and learning, to acquire the rudiments of +knowledge. At the age of eleven the boy already manifested the character +of the future man. Solitary, disdainful, rebellious, his intercourse with +his schoolfellows was limited to the interchange of blows, his only +amusement lay in the annoyance of those with whom he was brought in +contact. He is already a perfect Gaucho; can wield the lasso, and the +_bolas_, and the knife; is a fearless _ginete_, a consummate horseman. One +day at school, the master, irritated beyond endurance, exhibits a new rod, +bought expressly, so he says, "for flogging Facundo." When the boy is +called up to recite, he blunders, stammers, hesitates, on purpose. Down +comes the rod; with a vigorous kick Facundo upsets the pedagogue's rickety +throne, and takes to his heels. After a three-days' search, he is +discovered secreted in a vineyard outside the town. + +This little incident, of so trifling import at the time, was remembered +in after years as an early indication of the ferocious and uncontrollable +_caudillo's_ character. But it was soon eclipsed by the reckless deeds +that followed each other in quick succession between his fifteenth and +twentieth years. He speedily became notorious in the little town for his +wild moroseness, for his savage ferocity when excited, for his inordinate +love of cards. Gaming, a passion with many, was a necessary of life to +him; it was the only pursuit to which he was ever constant; it gave rise +to the quarrel in which, while yet a schoolboy, he for the first time +spilt blood. + +By and by we lose sight of the student of San Juan. He has absolutely +_sunk_ out of sight. Yet, if we peer into filthy _pulperias_ here and +there between San Luis and San Juan, we may catch a glimpse of a shaggy, +swarthy savage, gambling, gambling as if for life; and we may also hear of +more than one affray in which his dagger has "come home richer than it +went." A little later, the son of wealthy Don Prudencio has become--not a +common laborer--but a comrade of common laborers. He chooses the most +toilsome, the most unintellectual, but, at the same time, the most +remunerative handicraft,--that of the _tapiador_, or builder of mud +walls. At San Juan, in the orchard of the Godoys,--at Fiambala, in La +Rioja, in the city of Mendoza,--they will show you walls which the hands +of General Facundo Quiroga, _Comandante de Campana_, etc., etc., put +together. Wherever he works, he is noted for the ascendency which he +maintains over the other peons. They are entirely subject to his will; +they do nothing without his advice; he is worth, say his employers, a +dozen overseers. Ah, he is yet to rule on a larger scale! + +Did these people ever think,--as they watched the sombre, stubborn Gaucho +sweating over a _tapia_, subjecting a drove of peons to his authority, or, +stretched upon a hide, growing ferocious as the luck went against him at +cards,--that here was one of those forces which mould or overturn the +world? Could it ever have occurred to the Godoys of San Juan, to the +worthy municipality of Mendoza, that this scowling savage was yet to place +his heel upon their prostrate forms, and most thoroughly to exhibit, +through weary, sanguinary years, the reality of that tremendous saying,-- +"The State? _I_ am the State!"? + +Doubtless no. Little as the comrades of Maximin imagined that the +truculent Goth was yet to wear the blood-stained purple, little as the +clients of Robespierre dreamed of the vortex toward which he was being +insensibly hurried by the stream of years, did the men, whose names are +thrown out from their obscurity by the glare of his misdeeds, conceive +that their fortunes, their lives, all things but their souls, were shortly +to depend upon the capricious breath of this servant who so quietly pounds +away upon their mud inclosures. + +He does not long, however, remain the companion of peons. Eighteen hundred +and ten has come, bringing with it liberty, and bloodshed, and universal +discord. The sun of May beams down upon a desolated land. For the mild, +although repressive viceregal sway is substituted that of a swarm of +military chieftains, who, fighting as patriots against Liniers and his +ill-fated troops, as rivals with each other, or as _montanero_-freebooters +against all combined, swept the plains with their harrying lancers from +the seacoast to the base of the Cordillera. + +In this period of anarchy we catch another glimpse of Juan Facundo. He has +worked his way down to Buenos Ayres, nine hundred miles from home, and +enlists in the regiment of _Arribenos_, raised by his countryman, General +Ocampo, to take part in the liberation of Chile. But even the +infinitesimal degree of discipline to which his fellow-soldiers had been +reduced was too much for his wild spirit; already he feels that command, +and not obedience, is his birthright; there is soon a vacancy in the +ranks. + +With three companions Quiroga took to the desert. He was followed and +overtaken by an armed detachment, or _partida_; summoned to surrender; the +odds are overpowering. But this man bids defiance to the world; he is yet, +in this very region, to rout well-appointed and disciplined armies with a +handful of men; and he engages the _partida_. A sanguinary conflict is the +result, in which Quiroga, slaying four or five of his assailants, comes +off victorious, and pursues his journey in the teeth of other bands which +are ordered to arrest him. He reaches his native plains, and, after a +flying visit to his parents, we again lose sight of the _Gaucho malo_. +Blurred rumors of his actions have, indeed, been preserved; accounts of +brutality toward his gray-haired father, of burnings of the dwelling in +which he first saw the light, of endless gaming, and plentiful shedding of +blood; but we hear nothing positive concerning him until the year 1818. +Somewhere in that year he determines to join the band of freebooters under +Ramirez, which was then devastating the eastern provinces. And here--O +deep designs of Fate!--the very means intended to check his mad career +serve only to accelerate its development. Dupuis, governor of San Luis, +through which province he is passing on his way to join Ramirez, arrests +the _Gaucho malo_, and throws him into the common jail, there to rot or +starve as Fortune may direct. + +But she had other things in store for him. A number of Spanish officers, +captured by San Martin in Chile, were confined within the same walls. +Goaded to the energy of despair by their sufferings, and convinced that +after all they could die no more than once, the Spaniards rose one day, +broke open the doors of their prison, and proceeded to that part of the +building where the common malefactors, and among them Juan Facundo, were +confined. No sooner was Facundo set at liberty, than he snatched the bolt +of the prison-gate, from the very hand which had just withdrawn it to set +him free, crushed the Spaniard's skull with the heavy iron, and swung it +right and left, until, according to his own statement, made at a later +date, no less than fourteen corpses were stiffening on the ground. His +example incited his companions to aid him in subduing the revolt of their +fellow-prisoners; and, as a reward for "loyal and heroic conduct," he was +restored to his privileges as a citizen. + +Thus, in the energetic language of his biographer, was his name ennobled, +and cleansed, but with _blood_, from the stains that defiled it. +Persecuted no longer, nay, even caressed by the government, he returned to +his native plains, to stalk with added haughtiness and new titles to +esteem among his brother Gauchos of La Rioja. + +Having in this manner taken a rapid survey of the most salient points in +his private career up to the year 1820, we may pause for a moment, before +studying his public life, to glance at the condition of his native country +in the first decade of its independence. The partial separation from +Spain, which was effected on the 25th May, 1810, was followed by a long +and bloody struggle, in all the southern provinces, between the royal +forces and the adherents of the Provisional Junta. Such framework of +government as had been in existence was practically annihilated, and the +various provinces of the late Viceroyalty of Buenos Ayres fell a prey to +the military chieftains who could attract around them the largest number +of Gaucho cavalry,--while civilization, commerce, and every peaceful art, +declined at a rapid rate. No alteration in this state of affairs was +effected by the final Declaration of Independence, made at Tucuman, July +9, 1816; and in 1820, Buenos Ayres, the seat of the government which +claimed to be supreme, was seized by a confederacy of the provincial +chiefs, who secured, by the destruction of the Directorial Government, +complete and unchallenged independence for themselves. During this +anarchical period, the famous Artigas was harrying the Banda Oriental; +Rosas and Lopez were preparing for their blood-stained careers; Bustos, +Ibarra, and a host of other _caudillos_, ruled the interior provinces; and +Juan Facundo Quiroga was raised to irresponsible power. + +In his native province of La Rioja the mastery had for many years been +disputed by two powerful houses, the Ocampos and the Davilas, both +descended from noble families in Spain. In the year 1820 the former were +triumphant, and possessed all the authority then wielded in the province. +From them Facundo received the appointment of Sergeant-Major of Militia, +with the powers of _Comandante de Campana_, or District Commandant. + +In any other country the nomination to such a post of a man rendered +notorious by his contempt for authority, who already boasted of no less +than thirty murders, and who had voluntarily placed himself in the lowest +ranks of society, would be a thing absolutely incredible; but the Ocampos +probably felt the insecurity of their authority, and were sufficiently +sagacious to attempt, at least, to render that man a useful adherent or +ally, who might, if allured by their foes, prove a terrible weapon against +them. But they found in Quiroga no submissive servant. So openly did he +disregard the injunctions of his superiors, that a corps of the principal +officers in the army entreated their general, Ocampo, to seize upon and +execute the rebellious Gaucho, but failed in inducing him to adopt their +advice. It was not long before he had occasion to repent his leniency, or +his weakness. + +A mutiny having occurred among some troops at San Juan, a detachment was +sent against them, and with it Quiroga and his horsemen. The mutineers +proved victorious, and, headed by their ringleaders, Aldao and Corro, +continued their line of march towards the North. While Ocampo with his +beaten troops fell back to wait for reinforcements, Quiroga pursued the +retreating victors, harassed their rear, clogged their every movement, and +proved so formidable to the enemy, that Aldao, abandoning his companion, +made an arrangement with the government of La Rioja, by which he was to be +allowed free passage into San Luis, whither Quiroga was ordered to conduct +him. He joined Aldao. + +And here, close upon the summit of the steep he has so easily ascended, we +cannot help pausing for an instant to reflect upon the singular +manifestation of _destiny_ in his life. History acquaints us with no +similar character who displayed so little forethought with such +astonishing results. He premeditated nothing, unless now and then a +murder. He took no trouble to form a plan of government, yet his authority +was unquestioned during many years in Mendoza, Cordova, and San Juan. Even +his most monstrous acts of perfidy appear to have been committed on the +spur of the moment, with less calculation than he gave to a game at cards. +Thrown upon the world with brutal passions scarcely controlled by a +particle of reason, whirled hither and thither in a general and fearful +cataclysm, he shows us preeminently the wonderful designs of Providence +carried into effect, as it were, by a succession of blind and sudden +impulses. In a community of established order the gallows would have put a +speedy check upon his misdeeds; in the Argentine Confederation of 1820 he +was gradually lifted, by an ever-rising tide of blood, to the eminence of +lawless power. + +Only for a while, however; for the stream did not cease to rise. The flood +that had elevated him alone disregarded his commands. For a few moments he +might maintain his footing upon the fearful peak; and then-- + +But as yet he is only _Comandante de Campana_, escorting the rebel Aldao +into San Luis. He took no pains to conceal his discontent with the +government of Ocampo, nor was Aldao slow in noticing or availing himself +of his disaffection. He offered Quiroga a hundred men, if he chose to +overturn the government and seize upon La Rioja. Quiroga eagerly accepted, +marched upon the city, took it by surprise, threw the Ocampos and their +subordinates into prison, and sent them confessors, with the order to +prepare for death. The remainder of Aldao's force was subsequently induced +to join his cause, and, on the intercession of some of its leaders, the +incarcerated Ocampos were suffered to escape with their lives. + +Their banished enemy, Don Nicolas Davila, was called from Tucuman to the +nominal governorship of La Rioja, while Quiroga retained, with his old +title, the actual rule of the province. But Davila was not long content +with this mere semblance of authority. During the temporary absence of +Quiroga, he concerted with Araya, one of the men of Aldao, a plan for the +capture of their master. Quiroga heard of it,--he heard of everything,-- +and his answer was the assassination of Captain Araya! Summoned by the +government which he himself had created to answer the accusation of +instigated murder, he advanced upon the Davilas with his Llanista +horsemen. Miguel and Nicolas Davila hastily assembled a body of troops, +and prepared for a final struggle. While the two armies were in presence +of each other, a commissioner from Mendoza endeavored to effect a +peaceable arrangement between their chiefs. Passing from one camp to the +other with propositions and conditions, he inspired the soldiers of the +Davilas with a fatal security. Quiroga, falling suddenly upon them in the +midst of the negotiations, routed them with ease, and slew their general, +who, with a small body of devoted followers, made a fierce onslaught upon +him personally, and succeeded in inflicting upon him a severe wound before +he was shot down. Thenceforth,--from the year 1823,--Quiroga was despot +of La Rioja. + +His government was simple enough. His two engrossing objects--if objects, +indeed, he may be said to have possessed--were extortion and the +uprooting of the last vestiges of civilization and law; his instruments, +the dagger and the lash; his amusement, the torture of unwitting +offenders; his serious occupation, the shuffling of cards. For gambling +the man had an insatiable thirst; he played once for forty hours without +intermission; it was death to refuse a game with him; no one might cease +playing without his express commands; no one durst win the stakes; and as +a consequence, he accumulated at cards in a few years almost all the +coined money then existing in the province.[2] Not content with this +source of revenue, he became a farmer of the _diezmo_ or tithes, +appropriated to himself the _mostrenco_ or unbranded cattle, by which +means he speedily became proprietor of many thousand head, even +established a monopoly of beef in his own favor,--and woe to the luckless +fool who should dare to infringe upon the terrible barbarian's +prerogative! + +[Footnote 2: Thus the Monagas, the late rulers of Venezuela, are accused +of denuding their country of specie in order to accumulate a vast treasure +abroad in expectation of a rainy day.] + +What was the state of society, it will undoubtedly be inquired, in which +the defeat of a handful of men could result in such a despotism? We have +already glanced at the people of La Rioja,--at their dreamy, Oriental +character, at their pastoral pursuits. A community of herdsmen, scattered +over an extensive territory, and deprived at one blow of the two great +families to whom they had been accustomed to look up, with infantine +submission, as their God-appointed chiefs,--these were not the men to +stand up, unprompted by a single master-mind, to rid themselves of one +whose oppression was, after all, only a new form of the treatment to +which, for an entire generation, they had been subjected. La Rioja and San +Juan were the only two provinces in which Quiroga's heavy hand was felt +continuously; in the others he ruled rather by influence than in person; +and the Gauchos, as a matter of course, were enthusiastic for a man who +exalted the peasant at the expense of the citizen, whose exactions were +actually burdensome only to the wealthy, and who permitted every license +to his followers, with the single exception of disobedience to himself. + +He was not without--it is impossible that he should have lacked--some of +those instinctive and personal attributes with which almost every savage +chieftain who has maintained so extraordinary an ascendency over his +fellows has been endowed. Sarmiento tells us that he was tall, immensely +powerful, a famous _ginete_ or horseman, a more adroit wielder of the +lasso and the _bolas_ than even his rival, Rosas, capable of great +endurance, and abstinent from intoxicating drinks. + +His eye and voice were dreaded more by his soldiers than the lances of +their antagonists. He could wring a Gaucho's secret from his breast; it +was useless to attempt a subterfuge before him. Some article, we are told, +was once stolen from a company of his troops, and every effort for its +recovery proved fruitless. It was reported to Quiroga. He paraded the men, +and, having procured a number of sticks, exactly equal in length, gave to +each man one, proclaiming that the soldier whose stick should be found +longer than the others next morning had been the thief. Next morning he +again drew up his troops. The sticks were mustered by Quiroga himself. Not +one had grown since the previous day; but there was one which was shorter +than the rest. With a terrible roar, Quiroga seized the trembling Gaucho +to whom the stick belonged. "Thou art the thief!" he exclaimed. It was so; +the fellow had cut off a portion of the wood, hoping thus to escape +detection by its growth![3]-- + +[Footnote 3: Since the above was written, we have heard of the adoption of +an expedient identical with that of Quiroga, under similar circumstances, +and with the same result. The detector was, however, an English seaman, +now captain of a well-known steam-vessel, who forming part of a crew one +of whom had lost a sum of money, broke off ten twigs of equal length from +a broom, and distributed them among his shipmates, with the same +observation as was used by the Argentine chief. Two hours later he +examined them, and found that the negro steward had _shortened_ his +allotted twig. The money was restored.--The coincidence is instructive.] + +Another time, one of his soldiers had been robbed of some trappings, and +no trace of the thief could be discovered. Quiroga ordered the detachment +to file past him, one by one. He stood, himself, with folded arms and +terrible eyes, perusing each man as he passed. At length he darted +forward, pounced upon one of the soldiers, and shouted, "Where is the +_montura_?" "In yonder thicket!" stammered out the self-convicted thief. +"Four musketeers this way!" and the commander was not out of sight before +the wretched Gaucho was a corpse. In these instinctive qualities, so awful +to untutored minds, lay the secret of the power of Quiroga,--and of how +many others of the world's most famous names! + +Already in 1825 he was recognized as a lawful authority by the government +of Buenos Ayres, and invited to take part in a Congress of Generals at +that city. At the same time, however, he received a military errand. The +Province of Tucuman having been seized by a young Buenos Ayrean officer, +Colonel Madrid, Quiroga was requested to march against the successful +upstart, and to restore the cause of law and order,--an undertaking +scarcely congruous with his own antecedents. The chief of La Rioja, +however, eagerly accepted the mission, marched with a small force into +Tucuman, routed Madrid, (and this literally, for his army ran away, +leaving the Colonel to charge Quiroga's force alone, which he did, +escaping by a miracle with his life,) and returned to La Rioja and San +Juan. Into the latter town he made a triumphal entry, through streets +lined on both sides with the principal inhabitants, whom he passed by in +disdainful silence, and who humbly followed the Gaucho tyrant to his +quarters in a clover-field, where he allowed them to stand in anxious +humiliation while he conversed at length with an old negress whom he +seated by his side. Not ten years had elapsed since these very men might +have beheld him pounding _tapias_ on this spot! + +We do not propose following the blood-stained career of Juan Facundo +through all its windings and episodes of cruelty and blood. Suffice it to +say, that, with the title of _Comandante de Campana_, he retained in La +Rioja every fraction of actual power,--nominating, nevertheless, a shadowy +governor, who, if he attempted any independent action, was instantly +deposed. His influence gradually extended over the neighboring provinces; +thrice he encountered and defeated Madrid; while at home he gambled, +levied contributions, bastinadoed, and added largely to his army. He +excelled his contemporary, Francia, in the art of inspiring terror; he +only fell short of Rosas in the results. A wry look might at any time call +down upon a luckless child a hundred lashes. He once split the skull of +his own illegitimate son for some trifling act of disobedience. A lady, +who once said to him, while he was in a bad humor, _Adios, mi General_, +was publicly flogged. A young girl, who would not yield to his wishes, he +threw down upon the floor, and kicked her with his heavy boots until she +lay in a pool of blood. Truly, a ruler after the Russian sort! + +Dorrego, meanwhile, was at the head of affairs at Buenos Ayres. Opposed to +the "Unitarianism" of Lavalle and Paz, who would have made of their +country, not a republic "one and indivisible," but a confederation after +the model in the North, Dorrego was chiefly anxious to consolidate his +power in the maritime state of Buenos Ayres, leaving the interior +provinces to their own devices, and to the tender mercies of Lopez, +Quiroga, Bustos, with a dozen other Gaucho chiefs. Rosas, the incarnation +of the spirit which was then distracting the entire Confederation, was +made Commandant General by Dorrego, who, however, frequently threatened to +shoot "the insolent boor," but who, unfortunately for his country, never +fulfilled the threat. As for himself, he, indeed, met with that fate at +the hands of Lavalle, who landed with an army from the opposite coast of +Uruguay, defeated Dorrego and Rosas in a pitched battle at the gates of +Buenos Ayres, and entered the city in triumph a few hours later. + +With the ascendency of Lavalle came the inauguration--and, alas! only the +inauguration--of a new system. Paz, one of the few Argentinians who really +deserved the name of General that they bore, was sent to Cordova, with +eight hundred veterans of his old command. He defeated Bustos, the tyrant +of Cordova, took possession of the city, (one of the most important +strategic points upon the Pampas,) and restored that confidence and +security to which its inhabitants had so long been strangers. This action +was at the same time a challenge to Quiroga in his neighboring domain. It +was a warning that right was beginning to assert its supremacy over might; +nor was the hero of La Rioja slow to understand it. Collecting a band of +four thousand Gaucho lancers, he marched upon Cordova with the assurance +of an easy victory. The _boleado_ General! The idea of _his_ opposing the +Tiger of the Plains! + +What followed this movement is a matter of general history. The battle of +the Tablada has had European, and therefore American, celebrity. It is +known to those who think of Chacabuco and Maipu, of Navarro and Monte +Caseros, only as of spots upon the map; let it, therefore, suffice to say +that Quiroga was beaten decisively, unmistakably, terribly. The serried +veterans of Paz, schooled in the Brazilian wars, stood grimly to the death +before the fiery onslaught of Quiroga; in vain did his horsemen shatter +themselves against the Unitarian General's scanty squares; the tactics of +civilized warfare proved for the first time successful on these plains +against wild ferocity and a larger force; Quiroga was driven back at +length with fearful slaughter, with the loss of arms, ammunition, +reputation, and of seventeen hundred men. He returned to La Rioja, with +the disorganized remnant of his band, marking his path with blood and the +infliction of atrocious chastisements. Even in adversity he is terrible +and is obeyed. + +For nearly two years he divided his time between the provinces of San +Juan, Tucuman, and La Rioja, engaged in the prosecution of his designs, +chief among which was the destruction of Paz, who remained at Cordova, +intending to act only on the defensive. At length, in 1830, he considered +himself sufficiently strong for an attack on his recent conqueror. Paz was +unwilling to shed blood a second time; he offered advantageous terms to +Quiroga; but the boastful Gaucho, full of confidence in his savage +lancers, refused to negotiate, and marched against his skilful but +unpresuming antagonist. Paz secretly evacuated Cordova, and, moving +westward, hazarded a feat which is alone sufficient to establish his +character as the best tactician of the New World,--San Martin alone, +perhaps, excepted. Splitting his little army into a dozen brigades, he +occupied the entire mountain-range behind the town, operated, with scarce +five thousand men, upon a front of two hundred miles in extent, held in +his own unwavering grasp the reins which controlled the movements of every +division, and gradually inclosed, as in a net, the forces of Quiroga and +Villafane. In vain they struggled and blindly sought an exit; every door +was closed; until, finally, after a campaign of fifteen days, the +narrowing battalions of Paz surrounded, engaged, and utterly defeated at +Oncativo the bewildered army on whose success Quiroga had staked his all. + +The Gaucho himself again escaped. After seven years of dictatorial power, +he is once more reduced to the level upon which we saw him standing in +1818, a vagabond at Buenos Ayres, although from that level he may raise +his head a trifle higher. + +And here we might conclude, having seen his rocket-like ascent, and the +swiftly-falling night of his career,--having seen him a laborer, a +deserter, a General, a Dictator, a fugitive; but much remains to be +narrated. Passing over, with the barest mention, his temporary return to +power, which he accomplished by one of those lightning-like expeditions +that even among Gaucho horsemen rendered him conspicuous, let us hasten on +to the great dramatic crisis of his history; and taking no notice of the +five years of marching and countermarching, scheming, fighting, and +negotiating, that intervened between his defeat at the Laguna Larga and +1835, draw to a close our hasty sketch. + +In that year, after taking part in a disorderly and fruitless expedition +planned by Rosas to secure the southern frontier against Indian attacks, +he suddenly made his appearance at Buenos Ayres, with a body of armed +satellites, who inspired the newly-seated Dictator--the famous Juan Manuel +de Rosas, who has been already so often mentioned in these pages--with +vivid apprehensions. Rosas, Quiroga, Lopez--the Triumvirate of La Plata-- +were bound together, it is true, by a potent tie,--by the strongest, +indeed,--that of self-interest; but as each of the three, and especially +Rosas, was in continual dread lest that consideration in his colleagues +should clash with his own intentions, the presence of Quiroga at Buenos + Ayres was far from satisfactory to the remaining two. His influence over +half a dozen of the despotic governors in the interior was still immense; +the Pampa was his own, after all his defeats; and it was shrewdly +suspected that his indifference to power in La Rioja, and his mysterious +visit to the maritime capital, were indications of a design to seize upon +the government of Buenos Ayres itself. Nor were the actions of Quiroga +suited to remove these apprehensions. The sanguinary despot of the +interior bloomed in the Buenos Ayrean _cafes_ into a profound admirer of +Rivadavia, Lavalle, and Paz, his ancient Unitarian enemies; Buenos Ayres, +the Confederation, he loudly proclaimed, must have a Constitution; +conciliation must supplant the iron-heeled tyranny under which the people +had groaned so long; the very jaguar of the Pampa, said the Porteno wits, +--not yet wholly muzzled by the dread _Mazorca_, or Club, of Rosas,--was +to be stripped of his claws, and made to live on _matagusano_ twigs and +thistles! _Redeunt Saturnia regna!_ The reign of blood, according to +Quiroga, its chief evangelist, was approaching its termination. + +In order to form a conception of the effect produced by these +transactions, we must imagine Pelissier or Walewski entertaining, twenty- +three years later, the _cercles_ at Paris with discourses from the beauty +of the last _regime_, with eulogies of Lamartine, and apotheoses of Louis +Blanc; sneering at Espinasse, and eulogizing Cavaignac; vowing that France +can be governed only under a liberal constitution, and paying a visit to +his Majesty, the Elect of December, with a rough-and-tumble suite of +Republican bravos. Assuredly, were such a thing possible in Paris, the +gentlemen in question would very shortly be reviling English hospitality +under its protecting aegis, if not dying of fever at Cayenne. Nor could +Rosas, who was at that time far less firmly seated on his throne than is +at present the man who wields the destinies of France, endure so powerful +a rival in his vicinity. But how to get rid of him? Assassination, by +which a minor offender was so speedily put out of the way, could not +safely be attempted with a man who yet retained a singular mastery over +the minds of thousands of brutal and strong-armed horsemen; a false step +would result in inevitable destruction; and many anxious days were spent +by the gloomy tyrant ere he could decide upon a plan for disposing of his +inconvenient friend. + +In the midst of this perplexity intelligence was received of a +disagreement between the governments of Salta, Tucuman, and Santiago, +provinces of the interior, which threatened to expand into warlike +proceedings. Rosas sent for Quiroga. No one but the hero of La Rioja, he +insinuated, had sufficient influence to bring about a settlement of these +disputes; no one but he had power to prevent a war; would he not, +therefore, hasten to Tucuman, and obviate so dire a calamity? Quiroga +hesitated, refused, consented, wavered, and again declined the task. With +a vacillation to which he had hitherto been a stranger, he remained for +many days undecided; a suspicion of deceit appears to have presented +itself to his mind; but at length he resolved to accept the commission. +His hesitation, meanwhile, had completed his ruin; it had given time for +the maturing of deadly plans. + +In midsummer, 1835, (December 18th,) the Gaucho chieftain commenced his +fateful journey. As he entered the carriage which was to be his home for +many days, and bade farewell to the adherents who were assembled to +witness his departure, he turned toward the city with a wild expression +and words that were remembered afterwards. _Si salgo bien_, he said, _te +volevre a ver; si no, adios para siempre!_ "If I succeed, I shall see thee +again; if not, farewell forever!" Was it a presentiment of the truth which +came upon him, like that which clouded the great mind of the first +Napoleon as he left the Tuileries when the Hundred Days were running out? + +One hour before his departure, a mounted messenger had been dispatched +from Buenos Ayres in the same direction as that he was about to follow; +and the city was scarcely out of sight when Quiroga manifested the most +feverish anxiety to overtake this man. His travelling companions were his +secretary, Dr. Ortiz, and a young man of his acquaintance, bound for +Cordova, to whom he had given a seat in his vehicle. The postilions were +incessantly admonished to make haste. At a shallow stream which they +forded, in the mud of which the wheels became imbedded, resisting every +effort for their release, Quiroga actually hooked the postmaster of the +district, who had hastened to the spot, to the carriage, and made him join +his exertions to those of the horses until the vehicle was extricated, +when he sped onward with fearful velocity, asking at every post-station, +"When did the _chasqui_ from Buenos Ayres pass? An hour ago! Forward, +then!" and the carriage swept onward, on unceasingly, across the lonely +Pampa,--racing, as it afterwards proved, with Death. + +At last, Cordova, nearly six hundred miles from his starting-point, was +reached, just one hour after the arrival of the hunted courier. Quiroga +was besought by the cringing magistracy to spend the night in their city. +His only answer was, "Give me horses!" and two hours before midnight he +rolled out of Cordova, having _beaten_ in the grisly race. + +Beaten, inasmuch as he was yet alive. For Cordova was ringing with the +details of his intended assassination. Such and such men were to have done +the deed; at such a shop the pistol had been bought; at such a spot it was +to have been fired;--but the marvellous swiftness of the intended victim +had ruined all. + +Meanwhile, Quiroga sped onward more at ease toward Tucuman. Arrived there, +he speedily arranged the matters in dispute, and was entreated by the +governors of that province and of Santiago to accept of an escort on his +return; he was besought to avoid Cordova, to avoid Buenos Ayres; he was +counselled to throw off the mask of subservience, and to rally his +numerous adherents in La Rioja and San Juan;--but remonstrance and advice +were alike thrown away upon him. In vain was the most circumstantial +account of the preparations for his murder sent by friends from Cordova; +he appeared as foolhardy now in February as in December he had been panic- +stricken. "To Cordova!" he shouted, as he entered his _galera_; and for +Cordova the postilions steered. + +At the little post-hut of Ojos del Agua, in the State of Cordova, Quiroga, +with his secretary, Ortiz, halted one night on the homeward journey. +Shortly before reaching the place, a young man had mysteriously stopped +the carriage, and had warned its hurrying inmates that at a spot called +Barranca Yaco a _partida_, headed by one Santos Perez, was awaiting the +arrival of Quiroga. There the massacre was to take place. The youth, who +had formerly experienced kindness at the hands of Ortiz, begged him to +avoid the danger. The unhappy secretary was rendered almost insane with +terror, but his master sternly rebuked his fears.--"The man is not yet +born," he said, "who shall slay Facundo Quiroga! At a word from me these +fellows will put themselves at my command, and form my escort into +Cordova!" + +The night at Ojos del Agua was passed sleeplessly enough by the unhappy +Ortiz, but Quiroga was not to be persuaded into ordinary precautions. +Confident in his mastery over the minds of men, he set out unguarded, on +the 18th of February, at break of day. The party consisted of the +chieftain and his trembling secretary, a negro servant on horseback, two +postilions,--one of them a mere lad,--and a couple of couriers who were +travelling in the same direction. + +Who that has been on the Pampas but can picture to himself this party as +it left the little mud-hut on the plain? The cumbrous, oscillating +_galera_, with its shaggy, straggling four-in-hand,--the caracoling Gaucho +couriers,--the negro pricking on behind,--the tall grass rolling out on +every side,--the muddy pool that forms the watering-place for beasts and +men scattered over a hundred miles of brookless plain,--the great sun +streaming up from the herbage just in front, awakening the voices of a +million insects and the carols of unnumbered birds in the thickets here +and there! Look long, Quiroga, on that rising sun! listen to the well- +known melody that welcomes his approach! gaze once more upon the rolling +Pampa! look again upon those flying hills! Thou who hast said, "There is +no life but this life," who didst "believe in nothing," shalt know these +things no more! five minutes hence thy statecraft will be over, thy long +apprenticeship will have expired! thou shalt be standing--where thou mayst +learn the secret that the wisest man of all the bookworms thou despisest +will never know alive! + +Barranca Yaco is reached. The warning was well founded. A crack is heard, +--there is a puff of smoke,--and two musket-balls pass each other in the +carriage, yet without inflicting injury on its occupants. From either side +the road, however, the _partida_ dashes forth. In a moment the horses are +disabled, the postilions, the negro, and the couriers cut down. Ortiz +trembles more violently than ever; Quiroga rises above himself. Looking +from the carriage while the butchery is going on, he addresses the +murderers with a few unfaltering words. There is glamour in his speech; +the ensanguined assassins hesitate,--another instant, only one moment +more, and they will be on their knees before him; but Santos Perez, who +was at one side, comes up, raises his piece,--and the body of Juan Fecundo +Quiroga falls in a soulless heap with a bullet in the brain! Ortiz was +immediately hacked to pieces; and the tragedy of Cordova is at an end. + +Such were the life, misdeeds, and death of the Terror of the Pampas. +Having in the most rapid and imperfect manner sketched the career of this +extraordinary Fortune's-child, his rise from the most abject condition to +unbridled power, his ferocious rule, and his almost heroic end, we may +surely exclaim, that "nothing in his life became him like the leaving of +it," and, presenting this bare _resume_ of facts as a mere outline, a mere +pen-and-ink sketch of the terrible chieftain, refer the curious student to +the impassioned narrative whence our facts are mainly derived. + +It may be well to add, that Santos Perez, who was actively pursued by the +government of Buenos Ayres, which itself had instigated him to the +commission of the crime, was finally, after many hairbreadth escapes, +betrayed by his mistress to the agents of Rosas, and suffered death at +Buenos Ayres with savage fortitude. The Lord have mercy on his soul! + + + + +MADEMOISELLE'S CAMPAIGNS. + + +THE SCENE AND THE ACTORS. + +The heroine of our tale is one so famous in history that her proper name +never appears in it. The seeming paradox is the soberest fact. To us +Americans, glory lies in the abundant display of one's personal +appellation in the newspapers. Our heroine lived in the most gossiping of +all ages, herself its greatest gossip; yet her own name, patronymic or +baptismal, never was talked about. It was not that she sank that name +beneath high-sounding titles; she only elevated the most commonplace of +all titles till she monopolized it, and it monopolized her. Anne Marie +Louise d'Orleans, Souveraine de Dombes, Princesse Dauphine d'Auvergne, +Duchesse de Montpensier, is forgotten, or rather was never remembered; but +the great name of MADEMOISELLE, _La Grande Mademoiselle_, gleams like a +golden thread shot through and through that gorgeous tapestry of crimson +and purple which records for us the age of Louis Quatorze. + +In May of the year 1627, while the Queen and Princess of England lived in +weary exile at Paris,--while the slow tide of events was drawing their +husband and father to his scaffold,--while Sir John Eliot was awaiting in +the Tower of London the summoning of the Third Parliament,--while the +troops of Buckingham lay dying, without an enemy, upon the Isle of Rhe,-- +while the Council of Plymouth were selling their title to the lands of +Massachusetts Bay,--at the very crisis of the terrible siege of Rochelle, +and perhaps during the very hour when the Three Guardsmen of Dumas held +that famous bastion against an army, the heroine of our story was born. +And she, like the Three Guardsmen, waited till twenty years after for a +career. + +The twenty years are over. Richelieu is dead. The strongest will that ever +ruled France has passed away; and the poor, broken King has hunted his +last badger at St. Germain, and meekly followed his master to the grave, +as he had always followed him. Louis XIII., called Louis Le Juste, not +from the predominance of that particular virtue (or any other) in his +character, but simply because he happened to be born under the +constellation of the Scales, has died like a Frenchman, in peace with all +the world except his wife. That beautiful and queenly wife, Anne of +Austria, (Spaniard though she was,)--no longer the wild and passionate +girl who fascinated Buckingham and embroiled two kingdoms,--has hastened +within four days to defy all the dying imprecations of her husband, by +reversing every plan and every appointment he has made. The little prince +has already shown all the Grand Monarque in his childish "Je suis Louis +Quatorze," and has been carried in his bib to hold his first parliament. +That parliament, heroic as its English contemporary, though less +successful, has reached the point of revolution at last. Civil war is +impending. Conde, at twenty-one the greatest general in Europe, after +changing sides a hundred times in a week, is fixed at last. Turenne is +arrayed against him. The young, the brave, the beautiful cluster around +them. The performers are drawn up in line,--the curtain rises,--the play +is "The Wars of the Fronde,"--and into that brilliant arena, like some +fair circus equestrian, gay, spangled, and daring, rides Mademoiselle. + +Almost all French historians, from Voltaire to Cousin, (St. Aulaire being +the chief exception,) speak lightly of the Wars of the Fronde. "La Fronde +n'est pas serieuse." Of course it was not. If it had been serious, it +would not have been French. Of course, French insurrections, like French +despotisms, have always been tempered by epigrams; of course, the people +went out to the conflicts in ribbons and feathers; of course, over every +battle there pelted down a shower of satire, like the rain at the Eglinton +tournament. More than two hundred pamphlets rattled on the head of Conde +alone, and the collection of _Mazarinades_, preserved by the Cardinal +himself, fills sixty-nine volumes in quarto. From every field the first +crop was glory, the second a _bon-mot_. When the dagger of De Retz fell +from his breast-pocket, it was "our good archbishop's breviary"; and when +his famous Corinthian troop was defeated in battle, it was "the First +Epistle to the Corinthians." While, across the Channel, Charles Stuart was +listening to his doom, Paris was gay in the midst of dangers, Madame de +Longueville was receiving her gallants in mimic court at the Hotel de +Ville, De Retz was wearing his sword-belt over his archbishop's gown, the +little hunchback Conti was generalissimo, and the starving people were +pillaging Mazarin's library, in joke, "to find something to gnaw upon." +Outside the walls, the maids-of-honor were quarrelling over the straw beds +which annihilated all the romance of martyrdom, and Conde, with five +thousand men, was besieging five hundred thousand. No matter, they all +laughed through it, and through every succeeding turn of the kaleidoscope; +and the "Anything may happen in France," with which La Rochefoucauld +jumped amicably into the carriage of his mortal enemy, was not only the +first and best of his maxims, but the key-note of French history for all +coming time. + +But behind all this sport, as in all the annals of the nation, were +mysteries and terrors and crimes. It was the age of cabalistic ciphers, +like that of De Retz, of which Guy Joli dreamed the solution; of +inexplicable secrets, like the Man in the Iron Mask, whereof no solution +was ever dreamed; of poisons, like that diamond-dust which in six hours +transformed the fresh beauty of the Princess Royal into foul decay; of +dungeons, like that cell at Vincennes which Madame de Rambouillet +pronounced to be "worth its weight in arsenic." War or peace hung on the +color of a ball-dress, and Madame de Chevreuse knew which party was coming +uppermost, by observing whether the binding of Madame de Hautefort's +prayer-book was red or green. Perhaps it was all a little theatrical, but +the performers were all Rachels. + +And behind the crimes and the frivolities stood the Parliaments, calm and +undaunted, with leaders, like Mole and Talon, who needed nothing but +success to make their names as grand in history as those of Pym and +Hampden. Among the Brienne Papers in the British Museum there is a +collection of the manifestoes and proclamations of that time, and they are +earnest, eloquent, and powerful, from beginning to end. Lord Mahon alone +among historians, so far as our knowledge goes, has done fit and full +justice to the French parliaments, those assemblies which refused +admission to the foreign armies which the nobles would gladly have +summoned in,--but fed and protected the banished princesses of England, +when the court party had left those descendants of the Bourbons to die of +cold and hunger in the palace of their ancestors. And we have the +testimony of Henrietta Maria herself, the only person who had seen both +revolutions near at hand, that "the troubles in England never appeared so +formidable in their early days, nor were the leaders of the revolutionary +party so ardent or so united." The character of the agitation was no more +to be judged by its jokes and epigrams, than the gloomy glory of the +English Puritans by the grotesque names of their saints, or the stern +resolution of the Dutch burghers by their guilds of rhetoric and +symbolical melodrama. + +But popular power was not yet developed in France, as it was in England; +all social order was unsettled and changing, and well Mazarin knew it. He +knew the pieces with which he played his game of chess: the king +powerless, the queen mighty, the bishops unable to take a single +straightforward move, and the knights going naturally zigzag; but a host +of plebeian pawns, every one fit for a possible royalty, and therefore to +be used shrewdly, or else annihilated as soon as practicable. True, the +game would not last forever; but after him the deluge. + +Our age has forgotten even the meaning of the word Fronde; but here also +the French and Flemish histories run parallel, and the Frondeurs, like the +Gueux, were children of a sarcasm. The Counsellor Bachaumont one day +ridiculed insurrectionists, as resembling the boys who played with slings +(_frondes_) about the streets of Paris, but scattered at the first glimpse +of a policeman. The phrase organized the party. Next morning all fashions +were _a la fronde_,--hats, gloves, fans, bread, and ballads; and it cost +six years of civil war to pay for the Counsellor's facetiousness. + +That which was, after all, the most remarkable characteristic of these +wars might be guessed from this fact about the fashions. The Fronde was +preeminently "the War of the Ladies." Educated far beyond the Englishwomen +of their time, they took a controlling share, sometimes ignoble, as often +noble, always powerful, in the affairs of the time. It was not merely a +courtly gallantry which flattered them with a hollow importance. De Retz, +in his Memoirs, compares the women of his age with Elizabeth of England. A +Spanish ambassador once congratulated Mazarin on obtaining temporary +repose. "You are mistaken," he replied, "there is no repose in France, for +I have always women to contend with. In Spain, women have only love- +affairs to employ them; but here we have three who are capable of +governing or overthrowing great kingdoms: the Duchess de Longueville, the +Princess Palatine, and the Duchess de Chevreuse." And there were others as +great as these; and the women who for years outwitted Mazarin and +outgeneralled Conde are deserving of a stronger praise than they have yet +obtained, even from the classic and courtly Cousin. + +What men of that age eclipsed or equalled the address and daring of those +delicate and highborn women? What a romance was their ordinary existence! +The Princess Palatine gave refuge to Mme. de Longueville when that alone +saved her from sharing the imprisonment of her brothers Conde and Conti,-- +then fled for her own life, by night, with Rochefoucauld. Mme. de +Longueville herself, pursued afterwards by the royal troops, wished to +embark in a little boat, on a dangerous shore, during a midnight storm so +wild that not a fisherman could at first be found to venture forth; the +beautiful fugitive threatened and implored till they consented; the sailor +who bore her in his arms to the boat let her fall amid the furious surges; +she was dragged senseless to the shore again, and, on the instant of +reviving, demanded to repeat the experiment; but as they utterly refused, +she rode inland beneath the tempest, and travelled for fourteen nights +before she could find another place of embarkation. + +Madame de Chevreuse rode with one attendant from Paris to Madrid, fleeing +from Richelieu, remaining day and night on her horse, attracting perilous +admiration by the womanly loveliness which no male attire could obscure. +From Spain she went to England, organizing there the French exiles into a +strength which frightened Richelieu; thence to Holland, to conspire nearer +home; back to Paris, on the minister's death, to form the faction of the +Importants; and when the Duke of Beaufort was imprisoned, Mazarin said, +"Of what use to cut off the arms while the head remains?" Ten years from +her first perilous escape, she made a second, dashed through La Vendee, +embarked at St. Malo for Dunkirk, was captured by the fleet of the +Parliament, was released by the Governor of the Isle of Wight, unable to +imprison so beautiful a butterfly, reached her port at last, and in a few +weeks was intriguing at Liege again. + +The Duchess de Bouillon, Turenne's sister, purer than those we have named, +but not less daring or determined, after charming the whole population of +Paris by her rebel beauty at the Hotel de Ville, escaped from her sudden +incarceration by walking through the midst of her guards at dusk, +crouching in the shadow of her little daughter, and afterwards allowed +herself to be recaptured, rather than desert that child's sick-bed. + +Then there was Clemence de Maille, purest and noblest of all, niece of +Richelieu and hapless wife of the cruel ingrate Conde, his equal in daring +and his superior in every other high quality. Married a child still +playing with her dolls, and sent at once to a convent to learn to read and +write, she became a woman the instant her husband became a captive; while +he watered his pinks in the garden at Vincennes, she went through France +and raised an army for his relief. Her means were as noble as her ends. +She would not surrender the humblest of her friends to an enemy, or suffer +the massacre of her worst enemy by a friend. She threw herself between the +fire of two hostile parties at Bordeaux, and, while men were falling each +side of her, compelled them to peace. Her deeds rang through Europe. When +she sailed from Bordeaux for Paris at last, thirty thousand people +assembled to bid her farewell. She was loved and admired by all the world, +except that husband for whom she dared so much,--and the Archbishop of +Taen. The respectable Archbishop complained, that "this lady did not prove +that she had been authorized by her husband, an essential provision, +without which no woman can act in law." And Conde himself, whose heart, +physically twice as large as other men's, was spiritually imperceptible, +repaid this stainless nobleness by years of persecution, and bequeathed +her, as a life-long prisoner, to his dastard son. + +Then, on the royal side, there was Anne of Austria, sufficient unto +herself, Queen Regent, and every inch a queen, (before all but Mazarin,)-- +from the moment when the mob of Paris filed through the chamber of the +boy-king, in his pretended sleep, and the motionless and stately mother +held back the crimson draperies, with the same lovely arm which had waved +perilous farewells to Buckingham,--to the day when the news of the fatal +battle of Gien came to her in her dressing-room, and "she remained +undisturbed before the mirror, not neglecting the arrangement of a single +curl." + +In short, every woman who took part in the Ladies' War became heroic,-- +from Marguerite of Lorraine, who snatched the pen from her weak husband's +hand and gave De Retz the order for the first insurrection, down to the +wife of the commandant of the Porte St. Roche, who, springing from her bed +to obey that order, made the drums beat to arms and secured the barrier; +and fitly, amid adventurous days like these, opened the career of +Mademoiselle. + + +II. + +THE FIRST CAMPAIGN. + +Grandchild of Henri Quatre, niece of Louis XIII., cousin of Louis XIV., +first princess of the blood, and with the largest income in the nation, +(500,000 livres,) to support these dignities, Mademoiselle was certainly +born in the purple. Her autobiography admits us to very gorgeous company; +the stream of her personal recollections is a perfect Pactolus. There is +almost a surfeit of royalty in it; every card is a court-card, and all her +counters are counts. "I wore at this festival all the crown-jewels of +France, and also those of the Queen of England." "A far greater +establishment was assigned to me than any _fille de France_ had ever had, +not excepting any of my aunts, the Queens of England and of Spain, and the +Duchess of Savoy." "The Queen, my grandmother, gave me as a governess the +same lady who had been governess to the late King." Pageant or funeral, it +is the same thing. "In the midst of these festivities we heard of the +death of the King of Spain; whereat the Queens were greatly afflicted, and +we all went into mourning." Thus, throughout, her Memoirs glitter like the +coat with which the splendid Buckingham astonished the cheaper chivalry of +France: they drop diamonds. + +But for any personal career Mademoiselle found at first no opportunity, in +the earlier years of the Fronde. A gay, fearless, flattered girl, she +simply shared the fortunes of the court; laughed at the +festivals in the palace, laughed at the ominous insurrections in the +streets; laughed when the people cheered her, their pet princess; and when +the royal party fled from Paris, she adroitly secured for herself the best +straw-bed at St. Germain, and laughed louder than ever. She despised the +courtiers who flattered her; secretly admired her young cousin Conde, whom +she affected to despise; danced when the court danced, and ran away when +it mourned. She made all manner of fun of her English lover, the future +Charles II., whom she alone of all the world found bashful; and in general +she wasted the golden hours with much excellent fooling. Nor would she, +perhaps, ever have found herself a heroine, but that her respectable +father was a poltroon. + +Lord Mahon ventures to assert, that Gaston, Duke of Orleans, was "the most +cowardly prince of whom history makes mention." A strong expression, but +perhaps safe. Holding the most powerful position in the nation, he never +came upon the scene but to commit some new act of ingenious pusillanimity; +while, by some extraordinary chance, every woman of his immediate kindred +was a natural heroine, and became more heroic through disgust at him. His +wife was Marguerite of Lorraine, who originated the first Fronde +insurrection; his daughter turned the scale of the second. But, +personally, he not only had not the courage to act, but he had not the +courage to abstain from acting; he could no more keep out of parties than +in them; but was always busy, waging war in spite of Mars, and negotiating +in spite of Minerva. + +And when the second war of the Fronde broke out, it was in spite of +himself that he gave his name and his daughter to the popular cause. When +the fate of the two nations hung trembling in the balance, the royal army +under Turenne advancing on Paris, and almost arrived at the city of +Orleans, and that city likely to take the side of the strongest,--then +Mademoiselle's hour had come. All her sympathies were more and more +inclining to the side of Conde and the people. Orleans was her own +hereditary city. Her father, as was his custom in great emergencies, +declared that he was very ill and must go to bed immediately; but it was +as easy for her to be strong as it was for him to be weak; so she wrung +from him a reluctant plenipotentiary power; she might go herself and try +what her influence could do. And so she rode forth from Paris, one fine +morning, March 27, 1652,--rode with a few attendants, half in enthusiasm, +half in levity, aiming to become a second Joan of Arc, secure the city, +and save the nation. "I felt perfectly delighted," says the young girl, +"at having to play so extraordinary a part." + +The people of Paris had heard of her mission, and cheered her as she went. +The officers of the army, with an escort of five hundred men, met her half +way from Paris. Most of them evidently knew her calibre, were delighted to +see her, and installed her at once over a regular council of war. She +entered into the position with her natural promptness. A certain grave M. +de Rohan undertook to tutor her privately, and met his match. In the +public deliberation, there were some differences of opinion. All agreed +that the army should not pass beyond the Loire: this was Gaston's +suggestion, and nevertheless a good one. Beyond this all was left to +Mademoiselle. Mademoiselle intended to go straight to Orleans. "But the +royal army had reached there already." Mademoiselle did not believe it. +"The citizens would not admit her." Mademoiselle would see about that. +Presently the city government of Orleans sent her a letter, in great +dismay, particularly requesting her to keep her distance. Mademoiselle +immediately ordered her coach, and set out for the city. "I was naturally +resolute," she naively remarks. + +Her siege of Orleans is perhaps the most remarkable on record. She was +right in one thing; the royal army had not arrived: but it might appear at +any moment; so the magistrates quietly shut all their gates, and waited to +see what would happen. + +Mademoiselle happened. It was eleven in the morning when she reached the +Porte Banniere, and she sat three hours in her state carriage without +seeing a person. With amusing politeness, the governor of the city at last +sent her some confectionery,--agreeing with John Keats, who held that +young women were beings fitter to be presented with sugar-plums than with +one's time. But he took care to explain that the bonbons were not +official, and did not recognize her authority. So she quietly ate them, +and then decided to take a walk outside the walls. Her council of war +opposed this step, as they did every other; but she coolly said (as the +event proved) that the enthusiasm of the populace would carry the city for +her, if she could only get at them. + +So she set out on her walk. Her two beautiful ladies-of-honor, the +Countesses de Fiesque and de Frontenac, went with her; a few attendants +behind. She came to a gate. The people were all gathered inside the +ramparts. "Let me in," demanded the imperious young lady. The astonished +citizens looked at each other and said nothing. She walked on,--the crowd +inside keeping pace with her. She reached another gate. The enthusiasm was +increased. The captain of the guard formed his troops in line and saluted +her. "Open the gate," she again insisted. The poor captain made signs that +he had not the keys. "Break it down, then," coolly suggested the daughter +of the House of Orleans; to which his only reply was a profusion of +profound bows, and the lady walked on. + +Those were the days of astrology, and at this moment it occurred to our +Mademoiselle, that the chief astrologer of Paris had predicted success to +all her undertakings, from the noon of this very day until the noon +following. She had never had the slightest faith in the mystic science, +but she turned to her attendant ladies, and remarked that the matter was +settled; she should get in. On went the three, until they reached the bank +of the river, and saw, opposite, the gates which opened on the quay. The +Orleans boatmen came flocking round her, a hardy race, who feared neither +queen nor Mazarin. They would break down any gate she chose. She selected +one, got into a boat, and sending back her terrified male attendants, that +they might have no responsibility in the case, she was rowed to the other +side. Her new allies were already at work, and she climbed from the boat +upon the quay by a high ladder, of which several rounds were broken away. +They worked more and more enthusiastically, though the gate was built to +stand a siege, and stoutly resisted this one. Courage is magnetic; every +moment increased the popular enthusiasm, as these highborn ladies stood +alone among the boatmen; the crowd inside joined in the attack upon the +gate; the guard looked on; the city government remained irresolute at the +Hotel de Ville, fairly beleaguered and stormed by one princess and two +maids-of-honor. + +A crash, and the mighty timbers of the Porte Brulee yield in the centre. +Aided by the strong and exceedingly soiled hands of her new friends, our +elegant Mademoiselle is lifted, pulled, pushed, and tugged between the +vast iron bars which fortify the gate; and in this fashion, torn, +splashed, and dishevelled generally, she makes entrance into her city. The +guard, promptly adhering to the winning side, present arms to the heroine. +The people fill the air with their applauses; they place her in a large, +wooden chair, and bear her in triumph through the streets. "Everybody came +to kiss my hands, while I was dying with laughter to find myself in so odd +a situation." + +Presently our volatile lady told them that she had learned how to walk, +and begged to be put down; then she waited for her countesses, who arrived +bespattered with mud. The drums beat before her, as she set forth again, +and the city government, yielding to the feminine conqueror, came to do +her homage. She carelessly assured them of her clemency. She "had no doubt +that they would soon have opened the gates, but she was naturally of a +very impatient disposition, and could not wait." Moreover, she kindly +suggested, neither party could now find fault with them; and as for the +future, she would save them all trouble, and govern the city herself,-- +which she accordingly did. + +By confession of all historians, she alone saved the city for the Fronde, +and, for the moment, secured that party the ascendency in the nation. Next +day the advance-guard of the royal forces appeared,--a day too late. +Mademoiselle made a speech (the first in her life) to the city government; +then went forth to her own small army, by this time drawn near, and held +another council. The next day she received a letter from her father, +(whose health was now decidedly restored,) declaring that she had "saved +Orleans and secured Paris, and shown yet more judgment than courage." The +next day Conde came up with his forces, compared his fair cousin to +Gustavus Adolphus, and wrote to her that "her exploit was such as she only +could have performed, and was of the greatest importance." + +Mademoiselle staid a little longer at Orleans, while the armies lay +watching each other, or fighting the battle of Bleneau, of which Conde +wrote her an official bulletin, as being generalissimo. She amused herself +easily, went to mass, played at bowls, received the magistrates, stopped +couriers to laugh over their letters, reviewed the troops, signed +passports, held councils, and did many things "for which she should have +thought herself quite unfitted, if she had not found she did them very +well." The enthusiasm she had inspired kept itself unabated, for she +really deserved it. She was everywhere recognized as head of affairs; the +officers of the army drank her health on their knees, when she dined with +them, while the trumpets sounded and the cannons roared; Conde, when +absent, left instructions to his officers, "Obey the commands of +Mademoiselle, as my own"; and her father addressed a despatch from Paris +to her ladies of honor, as Field-Marshals in her army: "A Mesdames les +Comtesses Marechales de Camp dans l'Armee de ma Fille contre le Mazarin." + + +III. + +CAMPAIGN THE SECOND. + +Mademoiselle went back to Paris. Half the population met her outside the +walls; she kept up the heroine, by compulsion, and for a few weeks held +her court as Queen of France. If the Fronde had held its position, she +might very probably have held hers. Conde, being unable to marry her +himself, on account of the continued existence of his invalid wife, (which +he sincerely regretted,) had a fixed design of marrying her to the young +King. Queen Henrietta Maria cordially greeted her, lamented more than ever +her rejection of the "bashful" Charles II., and compared her to the +original Maid of Orleans,--an ominous compliment from an English source. + +The royal army drew near; on July 1, 1652, Mademoiselle heard their drums +beating outside. "I shall not stay at home to-day," she said to her +attendants, at two in the morning; "I feel convinced that I shall be +called to do some unforeseen act, as I was at Orleans." And she was not +far wrong. The battle of the Porte St. Antoine was at hand. + +Conde and Turenne! The two greatest names in the history of European wars, +until a greater eclipsed them both. Conde, a prophecy of Napoleon, a +general by instinct, incapable of defeat, insatiable of glory, throwing +his marshal's baton within the lines of the enemy, and following it; +passionate, false, unscrupulous, mean. Turenne, the precursor of +Wellington rather, simple, honest, truthful, humble, eating off his iron +camp-equipage to the end of life. If it be true, as the ancients said, +that an army of stags led by a lion is more formidable than an army of +lions led by a stag, then the presence of two such heroes would have given +lustre to the most trivial conflict. But that fight was not trivial upon +which hung the possession of Paris and the fate of France; and between +these two great soldiers it was our Mademoiselle who was again to hold the +balance, and to decide the day. + +The battle raged furiously outside the city. Frenchman fought against +Frenchman, and nothing distinguished the two armies except a wisp of straw +in the hat, on the one side, and a piece of paper on the other. The people +of the metropolis, fearing equally the Prince and the King, had shut the +gates against all but the wounded and the dying. The Parliament was +awaiting the result of the battle, before taking sides. The Queen was on +her knees in the Carmelite Chapel. De Retz was shut up in his palace, and +Gaston of Orleans in his,--the latter, as usual, slightly indisposed; and +Mademoiselle, passing anxiously through the streets, met nobleman after +nobleman of her acquaintance, borne with ghastly wounds to his residence. +She knew that the numbers were unequal; she knew that her friends must be +losing ground. She rushed back to her father, and implored him to go forth +in person, rally the citizens, and relieve Conde. It was quite impossible; +he was so exceedingly feeble; he could not walk a hundred yards. "Then, +Sir," said the indignant Princess, "I advise you to go immediately to bed. +The world had better believe that you cannot do your duty, than that you +will not." + +Time passed on, each moment registered in blood. Mademoiselle went and +came; still the same sad procession of dead and dying; still the same mad +conflict, Frenchman against Frenchman, in the three great avenues of the +Faubourg St. Antoine. She watched it from the city walls till she could +bear it no longer. One final, desperate appeal, and her dastard father +consented, not to act himself, but again to appoint her his substitute. +Armed with the highest authority, she hastened to the Hotel de Ville, +where the Parliament was in irresolute session. The citizens thronged +round her, as she went, imploring her to become their leader. She reached +the scene, exhibited her credentials, and breathlessly issued demands +which would have made Gaston's hair stand on end. + +"I desire three things," announced Mademoiselle: "first, that the citizens +shall be called to arms." + +"It is done," answered the obsequious officials. + +"Next," she resolutely went on, "that two thousand men shall be sent to +relieve the troops of the Prince." + +They pledged themselves to this also. + +"Finally," said the daring lady, conscious of the mine she was springing, +and reserving the one essential point till the last, "that the army of +Conde shall be allowed free passage into the city." + +The officials, headed by the Marechal de l'Hopital, at once exhibited the +most extreme courtesy of demeanor, and begged leave to assure her Highness +that under no conceivable circumstances could this request be granted. + +She let loose upon them all the royal anger of the House of Bourbon. She +remembered the sights she had just seen; she thought of Rochefoucauld, +with his eye shot out and his white garments stained with blood,--of +Guitant shot through the body,--of Roche-Giffard, whom she pitied, "though +a Protestant." Conde might, at that moment, be sharing their fate; all +depended on her; and so Conrart declares, in his Memoirs, that +"Mademoiselle said some strange things to these gentlemen": as, for +instance, that her attendants should throw them out of the window; that +she would pluck off the Marshal's beard; that he should die by no hand but +her's, and the like. When it came to this, the Marechal de l'Hopital +stroked his chin with a sense of insecurity, and called the council away +to deliberate; "during which time," says the softened Princess, "leaning +on a window which looked on the St. Esprit, where they were saying mass, I +offered up my prayers to God." At last they came back, and assented to +every one of her propositions. + +In a moment she was in the streets again. The first person she met was +Vallon, terribly wounded. "We are lost!" he said. "You are saved!" she +cried, proudly. "I command to-day in Paris, as I commanded in Orleans." +"Vous me rendez la vie," said the reanimated soldier, who had been with +her in her first campaign. On she went, meeting at every step men wounded +in the head, in the body, in the limbs,--on horseback, on foot, on planks, +on barrows,--besides the bodies of the slain. She reached the windows +beside the Porte St. Antoine, and Conde met her there; he rode up, covered +with blood and dust, his scabbard lost, his sword in hand. Before she +could speak, that soul of fire uttered, for the only recorded time in his +career, the word _Despair_: "Ma cousine, vous voyez un homme au +desespoir,"--and burst into tears. But her news instantly revived him, and +his army with him. "Mademoiselle is at the gate," the soldiers cried; and, +with this certainty of a place of refuge, they could do all things. In +this famous fight, five thousand men defended themselves against twelve +thousand, for eight hours. "Did you see Conde himself?" they asked +Turenne, after it was over. "I saw not one, but a dozen Condes," was the +answer; "he was in every place at once." + +But there was one danger more for Conde, one opportunity more for +Mademoiselle, that day. Climbing the neighboring towers of the Bastille, +she watched the royal party on the heights of Charonne, and saw fresh +cavalry and artillery detached to aid the army of Turenne. The odds were +already enormous, and there was but one course left for her. She was +mistress of Paris, and therefore mistress of the Bastille. She sent for +the governor of the fortress, and showed him the advancing troops. "Turn +the cannon under your charge, Sir, upon the royal army." Without waiting +to heed the consternation she left behind her, Mademoiselle returned to +the gate. The troops had heard of the advancing reinforcements, and were +drooping again; when, suddenly, the cannon of the Bastille, those Spanish +cannon; flamed out their powerful succor, the royal army halted and +retreated, and the day was won. + +The Queen and the Cardinal, watching from Charonne, saw their victims +escape them. But the cannon-shots bewildered them all. "It was probably a +salute to Mademoiselle," suggested some comforting adviser. "No," said the +experienced Marechal de Villeroi, "if Mademoiselle had a hand in it, the +salute was for us." At this, Mazarin comprehended the whole proceeding, +and coldly consoled himself with a _bon-mot_ that became historic. "Elle a +tue son mari," he said,--meaning that her dreams of matrimony with the +young king must now be ended. No matter; the battle of the Porte St. +Antoine was ended also. + +There have been many narratives of that battle, including Napoleon's; they +are hard to reconcile, and our heroine's own is by no means the clearest; +but all essentially agree in the part they ascribe to her. One brief +appendix to the campaign, and her short career of heroism fades into the +light of common day. + +Yet a third time did Fortune, showering upon one maiden so many +opportunities at once, summon her to arm herself with her father's +authority, that she might go in his stead into that terrible riot which, +two days after, tarnished the glories of Conde, and by its reaction +overthrew the party of the Fronde ere long. None but Mademoiselle dared to +take the part of that doomed minority in the city government, which, for +resisting her own demands, were to be terribly punished on that fourth-of- +July night. "A conspiracy so base," said the generous Talon, "never +stained the soil of France." By deliberate premeditation, an assault was +made by five hundred disguised soldiers on the Parliament assembled in the +Hotel de Ville; the tumult spread; the night rang with a civil conflict +more terrible than that of the day. Conde and Gaston were vainly summoned; +the one cared not, the other dared not. Mademoiselle again took her place +in her carriage and drove forth amid the terrors of the night. The sudden +conflict had passed its cruel climax, but she rode through streets +slippery with blood; she was stopped at every corner. Once a man laid his +arm on the window, and asked if Conde was within the carriage. She +answered "No," and he retreated, the flambeaux gleaming on a weapon +beneath his cloak. Through these interruptions, she did not reach the +half-burned and smoking Hotel de Ville till most of its inmates had left +it; the few remaining she aided to conceal, and emerged again amid the +lingering, yawning crowd, who cheered her with, "God bless Mademoiselle! +all she does is well done." + +At four o'clock that morning she went to rest, weary with these days and +nights of responsibility. Sleep soundly, Mademoiselle, you will be +troubled with such no longer. An ignominious peace is at hand; and though +peace, too, has her victories, yours is not a nature grand enough to grasp +them. Last to yield, last to be forgiven, there will yet be little in your +future career to justify the distrust of despots, or to recall the young +heroine of Orleans and St Antoine. + + +IV. + +THE CONCLUSION. + +Like a river which loses itself, by infinite subdivision, in the sands, so +the wars of the Fronde disappeared in petty intrigues at last. As the +fighting ended and manoeuvring became the game, of course Mazarin came +uppermost,--Mazarin, that super-Italian, finessing and fascinating, so +deadly sweet, _l'homme plus agreable du monde_, as Madame de Motteville +and Bussy-Rabutin call him,--flattering that he might win, avaricious that +he might be magnificent, winning kings by jewelry and princesses by +lapdogs,--too cowardly for any avoidable collision,--too cool and +economical in his hatred to waste an antagonist by killing him, but always +luring and cajoling him into an unwilling tool,--too serenely careless of +popular emotion even to hate the mob of Paris, any more than a surgeon +hates his own lancet when it cuts him; he only changes his grasp and holds +it more cautiously. Mazarin ruled. And the King was soon joking over the +fight at the Porte St. Antoine, with Conde and Mademoiselle; the Queen at +the same time affectionately assuring our heroine, that, if she could have +got at her on that day, she would certainly have strangled her, but that, +since it was past, she would love her as ever,--as ever; while +Mademoiselle, not to be outdone, lies like a Frenchwoman, and assures the +Queen that really she did not mean to be so naughty, but "she was with +those who induced her to act against her sense of duty!" + +The day of civil war was over. The daring heroines and voluptuous blonde +beauties of the Frondeur party must seek excitement elsewhere. Some looked +for it in literature; for the female education of France in that age was +far higher than England could show. The intellectual glory of the reign of +the Grand Monarque began in its women. Marie de Medicis had imported the +Italian grace and wit,--Anne of Austria the Spanish courtesy and romance; +the Hotel de Rambouillet had united the two, and introduced the _genre +precieux_, or stately style, which was superb in its origin, and dwindled +to absurdity in the hands of Mlle. de Scudery and her valets, before +Moliere smiled it away forever. And now that the wars were done, literary +society came up again. Madame de Sable exhausted the wit and the cookery +of the age in her fascinating entertainments,--_pates_ and Pascal, +Rochefoucauld and _ragouts_,--Mme. de Bregy's Epictetus, Mme. de Choisy's +salads,--confectionery, marmalade, elixirs, Des Cartes, Arnould, +Calvinism, and the barometer. Mme. de Sable had a sentimental theory that +no woman should eat at the same table with a lover, but she liked to see +her lovers eat, and Mademoiselle, in her obsolete novel of the "Princesse +de Paphlagonie," gently satirizes this passion of her friend. And +Mademoiselle herself finally eclipsed the Sable by her own entertainments +at her palace of the Luxembourg, where she offered no dish but one of +gossip, serving up herself and friends in a course of "Portraits" so +appetizing that it became the fashion for ten years, and reached +perfection at last in the famous "Characters" of La Bruyere. + +Other heroines went into convents, joined the Carmelites, or those nuns of +Port-Royal of whom the Archbishop of Paris said that they lived in the +purity of angels and the pride of devils. Thither went Madame de Sable +herself, finally,--"the late Madame," as the dashing young abbes called +her when she renounced the world. Thither she drew the beautiful +Longueville also, and Heaven smiled on one repentance that seemed sincere. +There they found peace in the home of Angelique Arnould and Jacqueline +Pascal. And thence those heroic women came forth again, when religious war +threatened to take the place of civil: again they put to shame their more +timid male companions, and by their labors Jesuit and Jansenist found +peace. + +But not such was to be the career of our Mademoiselle, who, at twenty, had +tried the part of devotee for one week and renounced it forever. No doubt, +at thirty-five, she "began to understand that it is part of the duty of a +Christian to attend High Mass on Sundays and holy days"; and her +description of the deathbed of Anne of Austria is a most extraordinary +jumble of the next world and this. But thus much of devotion was to her +only a part of the proprieties of life, and before the altar of those +proprieties she served, for the rest of her existence, with exemplary +zeal. At forty, she was still the wealthiest unmarried princess in Europe; +fastidious in toilette, stainless in reputation, not lovely in temper, +rigid in etiquette, learned in precedence, an oracle in court traditions, +a terror to the young maids-of-honor, and always quarrelling with her own +sisters, younger, fairer, poorer than herself. Her mind and will were as +active as in her girlhood, but they ground chaff instead of wheat. Whether +her sisters should dine at the Queen's table, when she never had; who +should be her trainbearer at the royal marriage; whether the royal Spanish +father-in-law, on the same occasion, should or should not salute the +Queen-mother; who, on any given occasion, should have a _tabouret_, who a +_pliant_, who a chair, who an arm-chair; who should enter the King's +_ruelle_, or her own, or pass out by the private stairway; how she should +arrange the duchesses at state-funerals: these were the things which tried +Mademoiselle's soul, and these fill the later volumes of that +autobiography whose earlier record was all a battle and a march. From +Conde's "Obey Mademoiselle's orders as my own," we come down to this: "For +my part, I had been worrying myself all day; having been told that the new +Queen would not salute me on the lips, and that the King had decided to +sustain her in this position. I therefore spoke to Monsieur the Cardinal +on the subject, bringing forward as an important precedent in my favor, +that the Queen-mother had always kissed the princesses of the blood"; and +so on through many pages. Thus lapsed her youth of frolics into an old age +of cards. + +It is a slight compensation, that this very pettiness makes her chronicles +of the age very vivid in details. How she revels in the silver brocades, +the violet-colored velvet robes, the crimson velvet carpets, the purple +damask curtains fringed with gold and silver, the embroidered _fleurs de +lis_, the wedding-caskets, the cordons of diamonds, the clusters of +emeralds _en poires_ with diamonds, and the Isabelle-colored linen, +whereby hangs a tale! She still kept up her youthful habit of avoiding the +sick-rooms of her kindred, but how magnificently she mourned them when +they died! Her brief, genuine, but quite unexpected sorrow for her father +was speedily assuaged by the opportunity it gave her to introduce the +fashion of gray mourning, instead of black; it had previously, it seems, +been worn by widows only. Servants and horses were all put in deep black, +however, and "the court observed that I was very _magnifique_ in all my +arrangements." On the other hand, be it recorded, that our Mademoiselle, +chivalrous royalist to the last, was the only person at the French court +who refused to wear mourning for the usurper Cromwell! + +But, if thus addicted to funeral pageants, it is needless to say that +weddings occupied their full proportion of her thoughts. Her schemes for +matrimony fill the larger portion of her history, and are, like all the +rest, a diamond necklace of great names. In the boudoir, as in the field, +her campaigns were superb, but she was cheated of the results. Her picture +should have been painted, like that of Justice, with sword and scales,-- +the one for foes, the other for lovers. She spent her life in weighing +them,--monarch against monarch, a king in hand against an emperor in the +bush. We have it on her own authority, which, in such matters, was +unsurpassable, that she was "the best match in Europe, except the Infanta +of Spain." Not a marriageable prince in Christendom, therefore, can hover +near the French court, but this middle-aged sensitive-plant prepares to +close her leaves and be coy. The procession of her wooers files before our +wondering eyes, and each the likeness of a kingly crown has on: Louis +himself, her bright possibility of twenty years, till he takes her at her +own estimate and prefers the Infanta,--Monsieur, his younger brother, +Philip IV. of Spain, Charles II. of England, the Emperor of Germany, the +Archduke Leopold of Austria,--prospective king of Holland,--the King of +Portugal, the Prince of Denmark, the Elector of Bavaria, the Duke of +Savoy, Conde's son, and Conde himself. For the last of these alone she +seems to have felt any real affection. Their tie was more than cousinly; +the same heroic blood of the early Bourbons was in them, they were trained +by the same precocious successes, only six years apart in age, and +beginning with that hearty mutual aversion which is so often the parent of +love, in impulsive natures like theirs. Their flirtation was platonic, but +chronic; and whenever poor, heroic, desolate Clemence de Maille was sicker +than usual, these cousins were walking side by side in the Tuileries +gardens, and dreaming, almost in silence, of what might be, while Mazarin +shuddered at the thought of mating two such eagles together.--So passed +her life, and at last, like many a matchmaking lady, she baffled all the +gossips, and left them all in laughter when her choice was made. + +The tale stands embalmed forever in the famous letter of Madame de Sevigne +to her cousin, M. de Coulanges, written on Monday, December 15, 1670. It +can never be translated too often, so we will risk it again. + +"I have now to announce to you the most astonishing circumstance, the most +surprising, most marvellous, most triumphant, most bewildering, most +unheard-of, most singular, most extraordinary, most incredible, most +unexpected, most grand, most trivial, most rare, most common, most +notorious, most secret, (till to-day,) most brilliant, most desirable; +indeed, a thing to which past ages afford but one parallel, and that a +poor one; a thing which we can scarcely believe at Paris; how can it be +believed at Lyons? a thing which excites the compassion of all the world, +and the delight of Madame de Rohan and Madame de Hauterive; a thing which +is to be done on Sunday, when those who see it will hardly believe their +eyes; a thing which will be done on Sunday, and which might perhaps be +impossible on Monday: I cannot possibly announce it; guess it; I give you +three guesses; try now. If you will not, I must tell you. M. de Lauzun +marries on Sunday, at the Louvre,--whom now? I give you three guesses,-- +six,--a hundred. Madame de Coulanges says, 'It is not hard to guess; it is +Madame de la Valliere.' Not at all, Madame! 'Mlle. de Retz?' Not a bit; +you are a mere provincial. 'How absurd!' you say; 'it is Mlle. Colbert.' +Not that, either. 'Then, of course, it is Mlle. de Crequi.' Not right yet. +Must I tell you, then? Listen! he marries on Sunday, at the Louvre, by his +Majesty's permission, Mademoiselle,--Mademoiselle de,--Mademoiselle (will +you guess again?)--he marries MADEMOISELLE,--La Grande Mademoiselle,-- +Mademoiselle, daughter of the late Monsieur,--Mademoiselle, grand- +daughter of Henri Quatre,--Mademoiselle d'Eu,--Mademoiselle de Dombes,-- +Mademoiselle de Montpensier,--Mademoiselle d'Orleans,--Mademoiselle, the +King's own cousin,--Mademoiselle, destined for the throne,--Mademoiselle, +the only fit match in France for Monsieur [the King's brother];--there's +a piece of information for you! If you shriek,--if you are beside +yourself,--if you say it is a hoax, false, mere gossip, stuff, and +nonsense,--if, finally, you say hard things about us, we do not complain; +we took the news in the same way. Adieu; the letters by this post will +show you whether we have told the truth." + +Poor Mademoiselle! Madame de Sevigne was right in one thing,--if it were +not done promptly, it might prove impracticable. Like Ralph Roister +Doister, she should ha' been married o' Sunday. Duly the contract was +signed, by which Lauzun took the name of M. de Montpensier and the largest +fortune in the kingdom, surrendered without reservation, all, all to him; +but Mazarin had bribed the notary to four hours' delay, and during that +time the King was brought to change his mind, to revoke his consent, and +to contradict the letters he had written to foreign courts, formally +announcing the nuptials of the first princess of the blood. In reading the +Memoirs of Mademoiselle, one forgets all the absurdity of all her long +amatory angling for the handsome young guardsman, in pity for her deep +despair. When she went to remonstrate with the King, the two royal cousins +fell on their knees, embraced, "and thus we remained for near three +quarters of an hour, not a word being spoken during the whole time, but +both drowned in tears." Reviving, she told the King, with her usual +frankness, that he was "like apes who caress children and suffocate them"; +and this high-minded monarch soon proceeded to justify her remark by +ordering her lover to the Castle of Pignerol, to prevent a private +marriage,--which had probably taken place already. Ten years passed, +before the labors and wealth of this constant and untiring wife could +obtain her husband's release; and when he was discharged at last, he came +out a changed, soured, selfish, ungrateful man. "Just Heaven," she had +exclaimed in her youth, "would not bestow such a woman as myself upon a +man who was unworthy of her." But perhaps Heaven was juster than she +thought. They soon parted again forever, and he went to England, there to +atone for these inglorious earlier days by one deed of heroic loyalty +which it is not ours to tell. + +And then unrolled the gorgeous tapestry of the maturer reign of the Grand +Monarque,--that sovereign whom his priests in their liturgy styled "the +chief work of the Divine hands," and of whom Mazarin said, more honestly, +that there was material enough in him for four kings and one honest man. +The "Moi-meme" of his boyish resolution became the "L'etat, c'est moi" of +his maturer egotism; Spain yielded to France the mastery of the land, as +she had already yielded to Holland and England the sea; Turenne fell at +Sassbach, Conde sheathed his sword at Chantilly; Bossuet and Bourdaloue, +preaching the funeral sermons of these heroes, praised their glories, and +forgot, as preachers will, their sins; Vatel committed suicide because his +Majesty had not fish enough for breakfast; the Princess Palatine died in a +convent, and the Princess Conde in a prison; the fair Sevigne chose the +better part, and the fairer Montespan the worse; the lovely La Valliere +walked through sin to saintliness, and poor Marie de Mancini through +saintliness to sin; Voiture and Benserade and Corneille passed away, and +Racine and Moliere reigned in their stead; and Mademoiselle, who had won +the first campaigns of her life and lost all the rest, died a weary old +woman at sixty-seven. + +Thus wrecked and wasted, her opportunity past, her career a +disappointment, she leaves us only the passing glimpse of what she was, +and the hazy possibility of what she might have been. Perhaps the defect +was, after all, in herself; perhaps the soil was not deep enough to +produce anything but a few stray heroisms, bright and transitory;--perhaps +otherwise. What fascinates us in her is simply her daring, that inborn +fire of the blood to which danger is its own exceeding great reward; a +quality which always kindles enthusiasm, and justly,--but which is a thing +of temperament, not necessarily joined with any other great qualities, and +worthless when it stands alone--But she had other resources,--weapons, at +least, if not qualities; she had birth, wealth, ambition, decision, pride, +perseverance, ingenuity; beauty not slight, though not equalling the +superb Longuevilles and Chevreuses of the age; great personal magnetism, +more than average cultivation for that period, and unsullied chastity. Who +can say what these things might have ended in, under other circumstances? +We have seen how Mazarin, who read all hearts but the saintly, dreaded the +conjunction of herself and Conde; it is scarcely possible to doubt that it +would have placed a new line of Bourbons on the throne. Had she married +Louis XIV., she might not have controlled that steadier will, but there +would have been two Grand Monarques instead of one; had she accepted +Charles II. of England, she might have only increased his despotic +tendencies, but she would easily have disposed of the Duchess of +Portsmouth; had she won Ferdinand III., Germany might have suffered less +by the Peace of Westphalia; had she chosen Alphonso Henry, the House of +Braganza would again have been upheld by a woman's hand. But she did none +of these things, and her only epitaph is that dreary might-have-been. + +Nay, not the only one,--for one visible record of her, at least, the soil +of France cherishes among its chiefest treasures. When the Paris +butterflies flutter for a summer day to the decaying watering-place of +Dieppe, some American wanderer, who flutters with them, may cast perchance +a longing eye to where the hamlet of Eu stands amid its verdant meadows, +two miles away, still lovely as when the Archbishop Laurent chose it out +of all the world for his "place of eternal rest," six centuries ago. But +it is not for its memories of priestly tombs and miracles that the summer +visitor seeks it now, nor because the _savant_ loves its ancient sea- +margin or its Roman remains; nor is it because the little Bresle winds +gracefully through its soft bed, beneath forests green in the sunshine, +glorious in the gloom; it is not for the memories of Rollo and William the +Conqueror, which fill with visionary shapes, grander than the living, the +corridors of its half-desolate chateau. It is because these storied walls, +often ruined, often rebuilt, still shelter a gallery of historic portraits +such as the world cannot equal; there is not a Bourbon king, nor a Bourbon +battle, nor one great name among the courtier contemporaries of Bourbons, +that is not represented there; the "Hall of the Guises" contains kindred +faces, from all the realms of Christendom; the "Salon des Rois" holds Joan +of Arc, sculptured in marble by the hand of a princess; in the drawing- +room, Pere la Chaise and Marion de l'Orme are side by side, and the +angelic beauty of Agnes Sorel floods the great hall with light, like a +sunbeam; and in this priceless treasure-house, worth more to France than +almost fair Normandy itself, this gallery of glory, first arranged at +Choisy, then transferred hither to console the solitude of a weeping +woman, the wanderer finds the only remaining memorial of La Grande +Mademoiselle. + + + + +THE SWAN-SONG OF PARSON AVERY. +1635. + + +When the reaper's task was ended, and the summer wearing late, +Parson Avery sailed from Newbury with his wife and children eight, +Dropping down the river harbor in the shallop Watch and Wait. + +Pleasantly lay the clearings in the mellow summer-morn, +And the newly-planted orchards dropping their fruits first-born, +And the homesteads like brown islands amidst a sea of corn. + +Broad meadows reaching seaward the tided creeks between, +And hills rolled, wave-like, inland, with oaks and walnuts green: +A fairer home, a goodlier land, his eye had never seen. + +Yet away sailed Parson Avery, away where duty led, +And the voice of God seemed calling, to break the living bread +To the souls of fishers starving on the rocks of Marblehead! + +All day they sailed: at nightfall the pleasant land-breeze died, +The blackening sky at midnight its starry lights denied, +And, far and low, the thunder of tempest prophesied. + +Blotted out was all the coast-line, gone were rock and wood and sand; +Grimly anxious stood the helmsman with the tiller in his hand, +And questioned of the darkness what was sea and what was land. + +And the preacher heard his dear ones, nestled round him, weeping sore: +"Never heed, my little children! Christ is walking on before +To the pleasant land of Heaven, where the sea shall be no more!" + +All at once the great cloud parted, like a curtain drawn aside, +To let down the torch of lightning on the terror far and wide; +And the thunder and the whirlwind together smote the tide. + +There was wailing in the shallop, woman's wail and man's despair, +A crash of breaking timbers on the rocks so sharp and bare, +And through it all the murmur of Father Avery's prayer. + +From the struggle in the darkness with the wild waves and the blast, +On a rock, where every billow broke above him as it passed, +Alone of all his household the man of God was cast. + +There a comrade heard him praying in the pause of wave and wind: +"All my own have gone before me, and I linger just behind; +Not for life I ask, but only for the rest thy ransomed find! + +"In this night of death I challenge the promise of thy Word! +Let me see the great salvation of which mine ears have heard! +Let me pass from hence forgiven, through the grace of Christ, our Lord! + +"In the baptism of these waters wash white my every sin, +And let me follow up to Thee my household and my kin! +Open the sea-gate of thy Heaven and let me enter in!" + +The ear of God was open to his servant's last request; +As the strong wave swept him downward the sweet prayer upward pressed, +And the soul of Father Avery went with it to his rest. + +There was wailing on the mainland from the rocks of Marblehead, +In the stricken church of Newbury the notes for prayer were read, +And long by board and hearthstone the living mourned the dead. + +And still the fishers out-bound, or scudding from the squall, +With grave and reverent faces the ancient tale recall, +When they see the white waves breaking on the "Rock of Avery's Fall!" + + + + +THE DENSLOW PALACE. + + +It is the privilege of authors and artists to see and to describe; to "see +clearly and describe vividly" gives the pass on all state occasions. It is +the "cap of darkness" and the _talaria_, and wafts them whither they will. +The doors of boudoirs and senate-chambers open quickly, and close after +them,--excluding the talentless and staring rabble. I, who am one of the +humblest of the seers,--a universal admirer of all things beautiful and +great,--from the commonwealths of Plato and Solon, severally, expulsed, as +poet without music or politic, and a follower of the great,--I, from my +dormitory, or nest, of twelve feet square, can, at an hour's notice, or +less, enter palaces, and bear away, unchecked and unquestioned, those +_imagines_ of Des Cartes which emanate or are thrown off from all forms,-- +and this, not in imagination, but in the flesh. + +Whether it was the "tone of society" which pervaded my "Florentine +letters," or my noted description of the boudoir of Egeria Mentale, I +could not just now determine; but these, and other humble efforts of mine, +made me known in palaces as a painter of beauty and magnificence; and I +have been in demand, to do for wealth what wealth cannot do for itself,-- +namely, make it live a little, or, at least, spread as far, in fame, as +the rings of a stone-plash on a great pond. + +I enjoy friendships and regards which would satisfy the most fastidious. +Are not the Denslows enormously rich? Is not Dalton a sovereign of +elegance? It was I who gave the fame of these qualities to the world, in +true colors, not flattered. And _they_ know it, and love me. Honoria +Denslow is the most beautiful and truly charming woman of society. It was +I who first said it; and she is my friend, and loves me. I defy poverty; +the wealth of all the senses is mine, without effort. I desire not to be +one of those who mingle as principals and sufferers; for they are less +causes than effects. As the Florentine in the Inferno saw the souls of +unfortunate lovers borne upon a whirlwind, so have I seen all things fair +and precious,--outpourings of wealth,--all the talents,--all the offerings +of duty and devotion,--angelic graces of person and of soul,--borne and +swept violently around on the circular gale. Wealth is only an enlargement +of the material boundary, and leaves the spirit free to dash to and fro, +and exhaust itself in vain efforts.--But I am philosophizing,--oddly +enough,--when I should describe. + +An exquisite little note from Honoria, sent at the last moment, asking me +to be present that evening at a "select" party, which was to open the "new +house,"--the little palace of the Denslows,--lay beside me on the table. +It was within thirty minutes of nine o'clock, the hour I had fixed for +going. A howling winter out of doors, a clear fire glowing in my little +grate. My arm-chair, a magnificent present from Honoria, shaming the +wooden fixtures of the poor room, invited to meditation, and perhaps the +composition of some delicate periods. They formed slowly. Time, it is +said, devours all things; but imagination, in turn, devours time,--and, +indeed, swallowed my half-hour at a gulp. The neighboring church-clock +tolled nine. I was belated, and hurried away. + +It was a _reunion_ of only three hundred invitations, selected by my +friend Dalton, the intimate and adviser of Honoria. So happy were their +combinations, scarce a dozen were absent or declined. + +At eleven, the guests began to assemble. Introductions were almost +needless. Each person was a recognized member of "society." One-half of +the number were women,--many of them young, beautiful, accomplished,-- +heiresses, "charming widows," poetesses of real celebrity, and, rarer +still, of good repute,--wives of millionnaires, flashing in satin and +diamonds. The men, on their side, were of all professions and arts, and of +every grade of celebrity, from senator to merchant,--each distinguished by +some personal attribute or talent; and in all was the gift, so rare, of +manners and conversation. It was a company of undoubted gentlemen, as +truly entitled to respect and admiration as if they stood about a throne. +They were the untitled nobility of Nature, wealth, and genius. + +As I stood looking, with placid admiration, from a recess, upon a +brilliant _tableau_ of beautiful women and celebrated men that had +accidentally arranged itself before me, Dalton touched my arm. + +"I have seen," said he, "aristocratic and republican _reunions_ of the +purest mode in Paris, the court and the banker's circle of London, +_conversazioni_ at Rome and Florence. Every face in this room is +intelligent, and nearly all either beautiful, remarkable, or commanding. + Observe those five women standing with Denslow and Adonais,--grandeur, +sweetness, grace, form, purity; each has an attribute. It is a rare +assemblage of superior human beings. The world cannot surpass it. And, by +the by, the rooms are superb." + +They were, indeed, magnificent: two grand suites, on either side a central +hall of Gothic structure, in white marble, with light, aerial staircases +and gilded balconies. Each suite was a separate miracle: the height, the +breadth, the columnal divisions; the wonderful delicacy of the arches, +upon which rested ceilings frescoed with incomparable art. In one +compartment the arches and caryatides were of black marble; in another, of +snowy Parian; in a third, of wood, exquisitely carved, and joined like one +piece, as if it were a natural growth; vines rising at the bases of the +walls, and spreading under the roof. There was no forced consistency. +Forms suitable only for the support of heavy masses of masonry, or for the +solemn effects of church interiors, were not here introduced. From +straight window-cornices of dark wood, slenderly gilt, but richly carved, +fell cataracts of gleaming satin, softened in effect with laces of rare +appreciation. + +The frescoes and panel-work were a study by themselves, uniting the +classic and modern styles in allegorical subjects. The paintings, selected +by the taste of Dalton, to overpower the darkness of the rooms by +intensity of color, were incorporated with the walls. There were but few +mirrors. At the end of each suite, one, of fabulous size, without frame, +made to appear, by a cunning arrangement of dark draperies, like a +transparent portion of the wall itself, extended the magnificence of the +apartments. + +Not a flame nor a jet was anywhere visible. Tinted vases, pendent, or +resting upon pedestals, distributed harmonies and thoughts of light rather +than light itself; and yet all was visible, effulgent. The columns which +separated the apartments seemed to be composed of masses of richly-colored +flames, compelled, by some ingenious alchemy, to assume the form and +office of columns. + +In New York, _par excellence_ the city of private gorgeousness and +_petite_ magnificence, nothing had yet been seen equal to the rooms of the +glorious Denslow Palace. Even Dalton, the most capricious and critical of +men, whose nice vision had absorbed the elegancies of European taste, +pronounced them superb. The upholstery and ornamentation were composed +under the direction of celebrated artists. Palmer was consulted on the +marbles. Page (at Rome) advised the cartoons for the frescoes, and gave +laws for the colors and disposition of the draperies. The paintings, +panelled in the walls, were modern, triumphs of the art and genius of the +New World. + +Until the hour for dancing, prolonged melodies of themes modulated in the +happiest moments of the great composers floated in the perfumed air from a +company of unseen musicians, while the guests moved through the vast +apartments, charmed or exalted by their splendor, or conversed in groups, +every voice subdued and intelligent. + +At midnight began the modish music of the dance, and groups of beautiful +girls moved like the atoms of Chladni on the vibrating crystal, with their +partners, to the sound of harps and violins, in pleasing figures or +inebriating spirals. + +When supper was served, the ivory fronts of a cabinet of gems divided +itself in the centre,--the two halves revolving upon silver hinges,--and +discovered a hall of great height and dimensions, walled with crimson +damask, supporting pictures of all the masters of modern art. The dome- +like roof of this hall was of marble variously colored, and the floor +tessellated and mosaicked in grotesque and graceful figures of Vesuvian +lavas and painted porcelain. + +The tables, couches, chairs, and _vis-a-vis_ in this hall were of plain +pattern and neutral dead colors, not to overpower or fade the pictures on +the walls, or the gold and Parian service of the cedar tables. + +But the chief beauty of this unequalled supper-room was an immense bronze +candelabrum, which rose in the centre from a column of black marble. It +was the figure of an Italian elm, slender and of thin foliage, embraced, +almost enveloped, in a vine, which reached out and supported itself in +hanging from all the branches; the twigs bearing fruit, not of grapes, but +of a hundred little spheres of crimson, violet, and golden light, whose +combination produced a soft atmosphere of no certain color. + +Neither Honoria, Dalton, nor myself remained long in the gallery. We +retired with a select few, and were served in an antechamber, separated +from the grand reception-room by an arch, through which, by putting aside +a silk curtain, Honoria could see, at a distance, any that entered, as +they passed in from the hall. + +My own position was such that I could look over her shoulder and see as +she saw. _Vis-a-vis_ with her, and consequently with myself, was Adonais, +a celebrated author, and person of the _beau monde_. On his left, Dalton, +always mysteriously elegant and dangerously witty. Denslow and Jeffrey +Lethal, the critic, completed our circle. The conversation was easy, +animated, personal. + +"You are fortunate in having a woman of taste to manage your +entertainments," said Lethal, in answer to a remark of Denslow's,--"but in +bringing these people together she has made a sad blunder." + +"And what may that be?" inquired Dalton, mildly. + +"Your guests are too well behaved, too fine, and on their guard; there are +no butts, no palpable fools or vulgarians; and, worse, there are many +distinguished, but no one great man,--no social or intellectual sovereign +of the occasion." + +Honoria looked inquiringly at Lethal. "Pray, Mr. Lethal, tell me who he +is? I thought there was no such person in America," she added, with a look +of reproachful inquiry at Dalton and myself, as if we should have found +this sovereign and suggested him. + +"You are right, my dear queen; Lethal is joking," responded Dalton; "we +are a democracy, and have only a queen of"---- + +"Water ices," interrupted Lethal; "but, as for the king you seek, as +democracies finally come to that,"---- + +"Good Heavens!" exclaimed Honoria, raising the curtain, "it must be he +that is coming in." + +Honoria frowned slightly, rose, and advanced to meet a new-comer, who had +entered unannounced, and was advancing alone. Dalton followed to support +her. I observed their movements,--Lethal and Adonais using my face as a +mirror of what was passing beyond the curtain. + +The masses of level light from the columns on the left seemed to envelope +the stranger, who came toward us from the entrance, as if he had divined +the presence of Honoria in the alcove. + +He was about the middle height, Napoleonic in form and bearing, with +features of marble paleness, firm, and sharply defined. His hair and +magnificent Asiatic beard were jetty black, curling, and naturally +disposed. Under his dark and solid brows gleamed large eyes of abysmal +blackness and intensity. + +"Is it Lord N----?" whispered Lethal, moved from his habitual coldness by +the astonishment which he read in my face. + +"Senator D----, perhaps," suggested Denslow, whose ideas, like his person, +aspired to the senatorial. + +"Dumas," hinted Adonais, an admirer of French literature. "I heard he was +expected." + +"No," I answered, "but certainly in appearance the most noticeable man +living. Let us go out and be introduced." + +"Perhaps," said Lethal, "it is the d----." + +All rose instantly at the idea, and we went forward, urged by irresistible +curiosity. + +As we drew near the stranger, who was conversing with Honoria and Dalton, +a shudder went through me. It was a thrill of the universal Boswell; I +seemed to feel the presence of "the most aristocratic man of the age." + +Honoria introduced me. "My Lord Duke, allow me to present my friend, Mr. +De Vere; Mr. De Vere, the Duke of Rosecouleur." + +Was I, then, face to face with, nay, touching the hand of a highness,--and +that highness the monarch of the _ton_? And is this a ducal hand, white as +the albescent down of the eider-duck, which presses mine with a tender +touch, so haughty and so delicately graduated to my standing as "friend" +of the exquisite Honoria? It was too much; I could have wept; my senses +rather failed. + +Dalton fell short of himself; for, though his head stooped to none, unless +conventionally, the sudden and unaccountable presence of the Duke of +Rosecouleur annoyed and perplexed him. His own sovereignty was threatened. + +Lethal stiffened himself to the ordeal of an introduction; the affair +seemed to exasperate him. Denslow alone, of the men, was in his element. +Pompous and soft, he "cottoned" to the grandeur with the instinct of a +born satellite, and his eyes grew brighter, his body more shining and +rotund, his back more concave. His _bon-vivant_ tones, jolly and +conventional, sounded a pure barytone to the clear soprano of Honoria, in +the harmony of an obsequious welcome. + +The Duke of Rosecouleur glanced around him approvingly upon the +apartments. I believed that he had never seen anything more beautiful than +the _petite_ palace of Honoria, or more ravishing than herself. He said +little, in a low voice, and always to one person at a time. His answers +and remarks were simple and well-turned. + +Dalton allowed the others to move on, and by a slight sign drew me to him. + +"It is unexpected," he said, in a thoughtful manner, looking me full in +the eyes. + +"You knew the Duke of Rosecouleur in Europe?" + +"At Paris, yes,--and in Italy he was a travel friend; but we heard lately +that he had retired upon his estates in England; and certainly, he is the +last person we looked for here." + +"Unannounced." + +"That is a part of the singularity." + +"His name was not in the published list of arrivals; but he may have left +England incognito. Is a mistake possible?" + +"No! there is but one such man in Europe;--a handsomer or a richer does +not live." + +"An eye of wonderful depth." + +"Hands exquisite." + +"Feet, ditto." + +"And his dress and manner." + +"Unapproachable!" + +"Not a shadow of pretence;--the essence of good-breeding founded upon +extensive knowledge, and a thorough sense of position and its advantages; +--in fact, the Napoleon of the parlor." + +"But, Dalton," said I, nervously, "no one attends him." + +"No,--I thought so at first; but do you see that Mephistophelean figure, +in black, who follows the Duke a few paces behind, and is introduced to no +one?" + +"Yes. A singular creature, truly!--how thin he is!" + +"That shadow that follows his Highness is, in fact, the famous valet, Reve +de Noir,--the prince of servants. The Duke goes nowhere without this man +as a shadow. He asserts that Reve de Noir has no soul; and I believe him. +The face is that of a demon. It is a separate creation, equally wonderful +with the master, but not human. He was condensed out of the atmosphere of +the great world." + +As we were speaking, we observed a crowd of distinguished persons +gathered about and following his Highness, as he moved. He spoke now to +one; now to another. Honoria, fascinated, her beauty every instant +becoming more radiant, just leaned, with the lightest pressure, upon the +Duke's arm. They were promenading through the rooms. The music, soft and +low, continued, but the groups of dancers broke up, the loiterers in the +gallery came in, and as the sun draws his fifty, perhaps his hundreds of +planets, circling around and near him, this noble luminary centred in +himself the attention of all. If they could not speak with him, they could +at least speak of him. If they could not touch his hand, they could pass +before him and give one glance at his eyes. The less aristocratic were +even satisfied for the moment with watching the singular being, Reve de +Noir,--who caught no one's eye, seemed to see no one but his master,--and +yet was not here nor there, nor in any place,--never in the way, a thing +of air, and not tangible, but only black. + +At a signal, he would advance and present to his master a perfume, a laced +handkerchief, a rose of rubies, a diamond clasp; of many with whom he +spoke the liberal Duke begged the acceptance of some little token, as an +earnest of his esteem. After interchanging a few words with Jeffrey +Lethal,--who dared not utter a sarcasm, though he chafed visibly under the +restraint,--the Duke's tasteful generosity suggested a seal ring, with an +intaglio head of Swift cut in opal, the mineral emblem of wit, which dulls +in the sunlight of fortune, and recovers its fiery points in the shade of +adversity;--Reve de Noir, with a movement so slight, 'twas like the +flitting of a bat, placed the seal in the hand of the Duke, who, with a +charming and irresistible grace, compelled Lethal to receive it. + +To Denslow, Honoria, Dalton, and myself he offered nothing.--Strange?--Not +at all. Was he not the guest, and had not I been presented to him by +Honoria as her "friend?"--a word of pregnant meaning to a Duke of +Rosecouleur! + +To Adonais he gave _a lock of hair_ of the great novelist, Dumas, in a +locket of yellow tourmaline,--a stone usually black. Lethal smiled at +this. He felt relieved. + +"The Duke," thought he, "must be a humorist." + +From my coarse way of describing this, you would suppose that it was a +farcical exhibition of vulgar extravagance, and the Duke a madman or an +impostor; but the effect was different. It was done with grace, and, in +the midst of so much else, it attracted only that side regard, at +intervals, which is sure to surprise and excite awe. + +Honoria had almost ceased to converse with us. It was painful to her to +talk with any person. She followed the Duke with her eyes. When, by some +delicate allusion or attention, he let her perceive that she was in his +thoughts, a mantling color overspread her features, and then gave way to +paleness, and a manner which attracted universal remark. It was then +Honoria abdicated that throne of conventional purity which hitherto she +had held undisputed. Women who were plain in her presence outshone +Honoria, by meeting this ducal apparition, that called itself +Rosecouleur,--and which might have been, for aught they knew, a fume of +the Infernal, shaped to deceive us all,--with calm and haughty propriety. + +The sensation did not subside. The music of the waltz invited a renewal of +that intoxicating whirl which isolates friends and lovers, in whispering +and sighing pairs, in the midst of a great assemblage. All the world +looked on, when Honoria Denslow placed her hand upon the shoulder of the +Duke of Rosecouleur, and the noble and beautiful forms began silently and +smoothly turning, with a dream-like motion. Soon she lifted her lovely +eyes and steadied their rays upon his. She leaned wholly upon his arm, and +the gloved hands completed the magnetic circle. At the close of the first +waltz, she rested a moment, leaning upon his shoulder, and his hand still +held hers,--a liberty often assumed and permitted, but not to the nobles +and the monarchs of society. She fell farther, and her ideal beauty faded +into a sensuous. + +Honoria was lost. Dalton saw it. We retired together to a room apart. He +was dispirited; called for and drank rapidly a bottle of Champagne;--it +was insufficient. + +"De Vere," said he, "affairs go badly." + +"Explain." + +"This cursed thing that people call a duke--it kills me." + +"I saw." + +"Of course you did;--the world saw; the servants saw. Honoria has fallen +to-night. I shall transfer my allegiance." + +"And Denslow?" + +"A born sycophant;--he thinks it natural that his wife should love a duke, +and a duke love his wife." + +"So would you, if you were any other than you are." + +"Faugh! it is human nature." + +"Not so; would you not as soon strangle this Rosecouleur for making love +to your wife in public, as you would another man?" + +"Rather." + +"Pooh! I give you up. If you had + simply said, 'Yes,' it would have satisfied me." + +Dalton seemed perplexed. He called a servant and sent him with an order +for Nalson, the usher, to come instantly to him. + +Nalson appeared, with his white gloves and mahogany face. + +"Nalson, you were a servant of the Duke in England?" + +"Yes, Sir." + +"Is the person now in the rooms the Duke of Rosecouleur?" + +"I have not seen him, Sir." + +"Go immediately, study the man well,--do you hear?--and come to me. Let no +one know your purpose." + +Nalson disappeared. + +I was alarmed. If "the Duke" should prove to be an impostor, we were +indeed ruined. + +In five minutes,--an hour, it seemed,--Nalson stood before us. + +"Is it he?" said Dalton, looking fixedly upon the face of the usher. + +No reply. + +"Speak the truth; you need not be afraid." + +"I cannot tell, Sir." + +"Nonsense! go and look again." + +"It is of no use, Mr. Dalton; you, who are as well acquainted with the +personal appearance of his Highness as I am, you have been deceived,--if I +have." + +"Nalson, do you believe that this person is an impostor?" said Dalton, +pointing at myself. + +"Who? Mr. De Vere, Sir?" + +"If, then, you know at sight that this gentleman is my friend Mr. De Vere, +why do you hesitate about the other?" + +"But the imitation is perfect. And there is Reve de Noir." + +"Yes, did Reve de Noir recognize you?" + +"I have not caught his eye. You know, Sir, that this Reve is not, and +never was, like other men; he is a devil. One knows, and one does not know +him." + +"Were you at the door when the Duke entered?" + +"I think not; at least--I cannot tell. When I first saw him, he was in the +room, speaking with Madam Denslow." + +"Nalson, you have done wrong; no one should have entered unannounced. Send +the doorkeeper to me." + +The doorkeeper came; a gigantic negro, magnificently attired. + +"Jupiter, you were at the door when the Duke of Rosecouleur entered?" + +"Yes, Sir." + +"Did the Duke and his man come in a carriage?" + +"Yes, Sir,--a hack." + +"You may go. They are not devils," said Dalton, musingly, "or they would +not have come in a carriage." + +"You seem to have studied the spiritual mode of locomotion," said I. + +Dalton frowned. "This is serious, De Vere." + +"What mean you?" + +"I mean that Denslow is a bankrupt." + +"Explain yourself." + +"You know what an influence he carries in political circles. The G----rs, +the S----es, and their kind, have more talent, but Denslow enjoys the +secret of popularity." + +"Well, I know it." + +"In the middle counties, where he owns vast estates, and has been liberal +to debtors and tenants, he carries great favor; both parties respect him +for his ignorance and pomposity, which they mistake for simplicity and +power, as usual. The estates are mortgaged three deep, and will not hold +out a year. The shares of the Millionnaire's Hotel and the Poor Man's Bank +in the B----y are worthless. Denslow's railroad schemes have absorbed the +capital of those concerns." + +"But he had three millions." + +"Nominally. This palace has actually sunk his income." + +"Madness!" + +"Wisdom, if you will listen." + +"I am all attention." + +"The use of money is to create and hold power. Denslow was certain of the +popular and county votes; he needed only the aristocratic support, and the +A---- people would have made him Senator." + +"Fool, why was he not satisfied with his money?" + +"Do you call the farmer fool, because he is not satisfied with the soil, +but wishes to grow wheat thereon? Money is the soil of power. For much +less than a million one may gratify the senses; great fortunes are not for +sensual luxuries, but for those of the soul. To the facts, then. The +advent of this mysterious duke,--whom I doubt,--hailed by Denslow and +Honoria as a piece of wonderful good-fortune, has already shaken him and +ruined the _prestige_ of his wife. They are mad and blind." + +"Tell me, in plain prose, the _how_ and the _why_." + +"De Vere, you are dull. There are three hundred people in the rooms of the +Denslow Palace; these people are the 'aristocracy.' They control the +sentiments of the 'better class.' Opinion, like dress, descends from them. +They no longer respect Denslow, and their women have seen the weakness of +Honoria." + +"Yes, but Denslow still has 'the people.'" + +"That is not enough. I have calculated the chances, and mustered all our +available force. We shall have no support among the 'better class,' since +we are disgraced with the 'millionnaires.'" + +At this moment Denslow came in. + +"Ah! Dalton,--like you! I have been looking for you to show the pictures. +Devil a thing I know about them. The Duke wondered at your absence." + +"Where is Honoria?" + +"Ill, ill,--fainted. The house is new; smell of new wood and mortar; +deused disagreeable in Honoria. If it had not been for the Duke, she would +have fallen. That's a monstrous clever fellow, that Rosecouleur. Admires +Honoria vastly. Come,--the pictures." + +"Mr. John Vanbrugen Denslow, you are an ass!" + +The large, smooth, florid millionnaire, dreaming only of senatorial +honors, the shouts of the multitude, and the adoration of a party press, +cowered like a dog under the lash of the "man of society." + +"Rather rough,--ha, De Vere? What have _I_ done? Am I an ass because I +know nothing of pictures? Come, Dalton, you are harsh with your old +friend." + +"Denslow, I have told you a thousand times never to concede position." + +"Yes, but this is a duke, man,--a prince!" + +"This from you? By Jove, De Vere, I wish you and I could live a hundred +years, to see a republican aristocrat. We are still mere provincials," +added Dalton, with a sigh. + +Denslow perspired with mortification. + +"You use me badly,--I tell you, Dalton, this Rosecouleur is a devil. +Condescend to him! be haughty and--what do you call it?--urbane to him! I +defy _you_ to do it, with all your impudence. Why, his valet, that shadow +that glides after him, is too much for me. Try him yourself, man." + +"Who, the valet?" + +"No, the master,--though I might have said the valet." + +"Did I yield in Paris?" + +"No, but you were of the embassy, and--and--_no one really knew us_, you +know." + +Dalton pressed his lips hard together. + +"Come," said he, "De Vere, let us try a fall with this Titan of the +carpet." + +Denslow hastened back to the Duke. I followed Dalton; but as for me, bah! +I am a cipher. + +The room in which we were adjoined Honoria's boudoir, from which a secret +passage led down by a spiral to a panel behind hangings; raising these, +one could enter the drawing-room unobserved. Dalton paused midway in the +secret passage, and through a loop or narrow window concealed by +architectural ornaments, and which overlooked the great drawing-rooms, +made a reconnaissance of the field. + +Nights of Venice! what a scene was there! The vine-branch chandeliers, +crystal-fruited, which depended from the slender ribs of the ceiling, cast +a rosy dawn of light, deepening the green and crimson of draperies and +carpets, making an air like sunrise in the bowers of a forest. Form and +order were everywhere visible, though unobtrusive. Arch beyond arch, to +fourth apartments, lessening in dimension, with increase of wealth;-- +groups of beautiful women, on either hand, seated or half reclined; the +pure or rich hues of their robes blending imperceptibly, or in gorgeous +contrasts, with the soft outlines and colors of their supports; a banquet +for the eyes and the mind; the perfect work of art and culture;--gliding +about and among these, or, with others, springing and revolving in that +monarch of all measures, which blends luxury and purity, until it is +either the one or the other, moved the men. + +"That is my work," exclaimed Dalton, unconsciously. + +"Not _all_, I think." + +"I mean the combinations,--the effect. But see! Honoria will again accept +the Duke's invitation. He is coming to her. Let us prevent it." + +He slipped away; and I, remaining at my post of observation, saw him, an +instant later, passing quickly across the floor among the dancers, toward +Honoria. The Duke of Rosecouleur arrived at the same instant before her. +She smiled sorrowfully upon Dalton, and held out her hand in a languid +manner toward the Duke, and again they floated away upon the eddies of the +music. I followed them with eyes fixed in admiration. It was a vision of +the orgies of Olympus,--Zeus and Aphrodite circling to a theme of Chronos. + +Had Honoria tasted of the Indian drug, the weed of paradise? Her eyes, +fixed upon the Duke's, shone like molten sapphires. A tress of chestnut +hair, escaping from the diamond coronet, sprang lovingly forward and +twined itself over her white shoulder and still fairer bosom. Tints like +flitting clouds, Titianic, the mystery and despair of art, disclosed to +the intelligent eye the feeling that mastered her spirit and her sense. +Admirable beauty! Unrivalled, unhappy! The Phidian idol of gold and ivory, +into which a demon had entered, overthrown, and the worshippers gazing on +it with a scorn unmixed with pity! + +The sullen animal rage of battle is nothing to the livor, the burning +hatred of the drawing-room. Dalton, defeated, cast a glance of deadly +hostility on the Duke. Nor was it lost. While the waltz continued, for ten +minutes, he stood motionless. Fearing some untoward event, I came down and +took my place near him. + +The Duke led Honoria to a sofa. But for his arm she would again have +fallen. Dalton had recovered his courage and natural haughtiness. The tone +of his voice, rich, tender, and delicately expressive, did not change. + +"Honoria, you sent for _me_; and the Duke wishes to see the pictures. The +air of the gallery will relieve your faintness." + +He offered his arm, which she, rising mechanically, accepted. A deep blush +crimsoned her features, at the allusion to her weakness. Several of the +guests moved after us, as we passed into the gallery. The Duke's shadow, +Reve de Noir, following last, closed the ivory doors. We passed through +the gallery,--where pyramids of sunny fruits, in baskets of fine +porcelain, stood relieved by gold and silver services for wine and coffee, +disposed on the tables,--and thence entered another and smaller room, +devoid of ornament, but the crimson tapestried walls were covered with +works or copies of the great masters of Italy. + +Opposite the entrance there was a picture of a woman seated on a throne, +behind which stood a demon whispering in her ear and pointing to a +handsome youth in the circle of the courtiers. The design and color were +in the style of Correggio. Denslow stood close behind me. In advance were +Honoria, Dalton, and the Duke, whose conversation was addressed +alternately to her and Dalton. The lights of the gallery burst forth in +their full refulgence as we approached the picture. + +The glorious harmony of its colors,--the force of the shadows, which +seemed to be converging in the rays of a single unseen source of light,-- +the unity of sentiment, which drew all the groups together, in the idea;-- +I had seen all this before, but with the eyes of supercilious criticism. +Now the picture smote us with awe. + +"I have the original of this excellent work," said the Duke, "in my house +at A----, but your copy is nearly as good." + +The remark, intended for Honoria, reached the pride of her companion, who +blandly replied,-- + +"Your Highness's exquisite judgment is for once at fault. The piece is +original. It was purchased from a well-known collection in Italy, where +there are none others of the school." + +Honoria was gazing upon the picture, as I was, in silent astonishment. + +"If this," said she, "is a copy, what must have been the genuine work? Did +you never before notice the likeness between the queen, in that picture, +and myself?" she asked, addressing Dalton. + +The remark excited general attention. Every one murmured, "The likeness is +perfect." + +"And the demon behind the queen," said Denslow, insipidly, "resembles your +Highness's valet." + +There was another exclamation. No sooner was it observed, than the +likeness to Reve de Noir seemed to be even more perfect. + +The Duke made a sign. + +Reve de Noir placed himself near the canvas. His profile was the +counterpart of that in the painting. He seemed to have stepped out of it. + +"It was I," said the Duke, in a gentle voice, and with a smile which just +disclosed the ivory line under the black moustache, "who caused this +picture to be copied and altered. The beauty of the Hon. Mrs. Denslow, +whom it was my highest pleasure to know, seemed to me to surpass that of +the queen of my original. I first, with great secrecy, unknown to your +wife," continued the Duke, turning to Denslow, "procured a portrait from +the life by memory, which was afterwards transferred to this canvas. The +resemblance to my attendant is, I confess, remarkable and inexplicable." + +"But will you tell us by what accident this copy happened to be in Italy?" +asked Dalton. + +"You will remember," replied the Duke, coldly, "that at Paris, noticing +your expressions of admiration for the picture, which you had seen in my +English gallery, I gave you a history of its purchase at Bologna by +myself. I sent my artist to Bologna, with orders to place the copy in the +gallery and to introduce the portrait of the lady; it was a freak of +fancy; I meant it for a surprise; as I felt sure, that, if you saw the +picture, you would secure it. + +"It seems to me," replied Dalton, "that the _onus_ of proof rests with +your Highness." + +The Duke made a signal to Reve de Noir, who again stepped up to the +canvas, and, with a short knife or stiletto, removed a small portion of +the outer layer of paint, disclosing a very ancient ground of some other +and inferior work, over which the copy seemed to have been painted. The +proof was unanswerable. + +"Good copies," remarked the Duke, "are often better than originals." + +He offered his arm to Honoria, and they walked through the gallery,--he +entertaining her, and those near him, with comments upon other works. The +crowd followed them, as they moved on or returned, as a cloud of gnats +follow up and down, and to and fro, a branch tossing in the wind. + +"Beaten at every point," I said, mentally, looking on the pale features of +the defeated Dalton. + +"Yes," he replied, seeing the remark in my face; "but there is yet time. I +am satisfied this is the man with whom we travelled; none other could have +devised such a plan, or carried it out. He must have fallen in love with +Honoria at that time; and simply to see her is the object of his visit to +America. He is a connoisseur in pictures as in women; but he must not be +allowed to ruin us by his arrogant assumptions." + +"Excepting his manner and extraordinary personal advantages, I find +nothing in him to awe or astonish." + +"His wealth is incalculable; he is used to victories; and that manner +which you affect to slight,--that is everything. 'Tis power, success, +victory. This man of millions, this prince, does not talk; he has but +little use for words. It is manner, and not words, that achieves social +and amatory conquests." + +"Bah! You are like the politicians, who mistake accidents for principles. +But even you are talking, while this pernicious foreigner is acting. See! +they have left the gallery, and the crowd of fools is following them. You +cannot stem such a tide of folly." + +"I deny that they are fools. Why does that sallow wretch, Lethal, follow +them? Or that enamelled person, Adonais? They are at a serpent-charming, +and Honoria is the bird-of-paradise. They watch with delight, and sketch +as they observe, the struggles of the poor bird. The others are +indifferent or curious, envious or amused. It is only Denslow who is +capped and antlered, and the shafts aimed at his foolish brow glance and +wound us." + +We were left alone in the gallery. Dalton paced back and forth, in his +slow, erect, and graceful manner; there was no hurry or agitation. + +"How quickly," said he, as his moist eyes met mine, "how like a dream, +this glorious vision, this beautiful work, will fade and be forgotten! +Nevertheless, I made it," he added, musingly. "It was I who moulded and +expanded the sluggish millions." + +"You will still be what you are, Dalton,--an artist, more than a man of +society. You work with a soft and perishable material." + +"A distinction without a difference. Every _man_ is a politician, but only +every artist is a gentleman." + +"Denslow, then, is ruined." + +"Yes and no;--there is nothing in him to ruin. It is I who am the +sufferer." + +"And Honoria?" + +"It was I who formed her manners, and guided her perceptions of the +beautiful. It was I who married her to a mass of money, De Vere." + +"Did you never love Honoria?" + +He laughed. + +"Loved? Yes; as Praxiteles may have loved the clay he moulded,--for its +smoothness and ductility under the hand." + +"The day has not come for such men as you, Dalton." + +"Come, and gone, and coming. It has come in dream-land. Let us follow your +fools." + +The larger gallery was crowded. The pyramids of glowing fruit had +disappeared; there was a confused murmur of pairs and parties, chatting +and taking wine. The master of the house, his wife, and guest were nowhere +to be seen. Lethal and Adonais stood apart, conversing. As we approached +them unobserved, Dalton checked me. "Hear what these people are saying," +said he. + +"My opinion is," said Lethal, holding out his crooked forefinger like a +claw, "that this _soi-disant_ duke--what the deuse is his name?" + +"Rosecouleur," interposed Adonais, in a tone of society. + +"Right,--Couleur de Rose is an impostor,--an impostor, a sharper. +Everything tends that way. What an utter sell it would be!" + +"You were with us at the picture scene?" murmured Adonais. + +"Yes. Dalton looked wretchedly cut up, when that devil of a valet, who +must be an accomplice, scraped the new paint off. The picture must have +been got up in New York by Dalton and the Denslows." + +"Perhaps the Duke, too, was got up in New York, on the same principle," +suggested Adonais. "Such things are possible. Society is intrinsically +rotten, you know, and Dalton"---- + +"Is a fellow of considerable talent," sneered Lethal,--"but has enemies, +who may have planned a duke." + +Adonais coughed in his cravat, and hinted,--"How would it do to call him +'Barnum Dalton'?" + +Adonais appeared shocked at himself, and swallowed a minim of wine to +cleanse his vocal apparatus from the stain of so coarse an illustration. + +"Do you hear those creatures?" whispered Dalton. "They are arranging +scandalous paragraphs for the 'Illustration.'" + +A moment after, he was gone. I spoke to Lethal and Adonais. + +"Gentlemen, you are in error about the picture and the Duke; they are as +they now appear;--the one, an excellent copy, purchased as an original,-- +no uncommon mistake; the other, a genuine highness. How does he strike +you?" + +Lethal cast his eyes around to see who listened. + +"The person," said he, "who is announced here to-night as an English duke +seemed to me, of all men I could select, least like one." + +"Pray, what is your ideal of an English duke, Mr. Lethal?" asked Adonais, +with the air of a connoisseur, sure of himself, but hating to offend. + +"A plain, solid person, well dressed, but simple; mutton-chop whiskers; +and the manners of a--a----" + +"Bear!" said a soft female voice. + +"Precisely,--the manners of a bear; a kind of gentlemanly bear, perhaps,-- +but still, ursine and heavy; while this person, who seems to have walked +out of ----- or a novel, affects me, by his ways and appearance, like a-- +a--h'm"---- + +"Gambler!" said the same female voice, in a conclusive tone. + +There was a general soft laugh. Everybody was pleased. All admired, hated, +and envied the Duke. It was settled beyond a doubt that he was an +impostor,--and that the Denslows were either grossly taken in, or were +"selling" their friends. In either case, it was shocking and delightful. + +"The fun of the thing," continued Lethal, raising his voice a little, "is, +that the painter who got up the old picture must have been as much an +admirer of the Hon. Mrs. Denslow as--his--Highness; for, in touching in +the queen, he has unconsciously made it a portrait." + +The blow was final. I moved away, grieved and mortified to the soul, +cursing the intrusion of the mysterious personage whose insolent +superiority had overthrown the hopes of my friends. + +At the door of the gallery I met G----, the painter, just returned from +London. I drew him with me into the inner gallery, to make a thorough +examination of the picture. I called his attention to the wonderful +resemblance of the queen to Honoria. He did not see it; we looked +together, and I began to think that it might have been a delusion. I told +the Duke's story of the picture to G----. He examined the canvas, tested +the layers of color, and pronounced the work genuine and of immense value. +We looked again and again at the queen's head, viewing it in every light. +The resemblance to Honoria had disappeared; nor was the demon any longer a +figure of the Duke's valet. + +"One would think," said G----, laughing, "that you had been mesmerized. If +you have been so deceived in a picture, may you not be equally cheated in +a man? I am loath to offend; but, indeed, the person whom you call +Rosecouleur cannot be the Duke of that title, whom I saw in England. I had +leave to copy a picture in his gallery. He was often present. His manners +were mild and unassuming,--not at all like those of this man, to whom, I +acknowledge, the personal resemblance is surprising. I am afraid our good +friends, the Denslows, and Mr. Dalton,--whom I esteem for their patronage +of art,--have been taken in by an adventurer." + +"But the valet, Reve de Noir?" + +"The Duke had a valet of that name who attended him, and who may, for +aught I know, have resembled this one; but probability is against +concurrent resemblances. There is also an original of the picture in the +Duke's gallery; in fact, the artist, as was not unusual in those days, +painted two pictures of the same subject. Both, then, are genuine." + +Returning my cordial thanks to the good painter for his timely +explanation, I hastened to find Dalton. Drawing him from the midst of a +group whom he was entertaining, I communicated G----'s account of the two +pictures, and his suspicions in regard to the Duke. + +His perplexity was great. "Worse and worse, De Vere! To be ruined by a +common adventurer is more disgraceful even than the other misfortune. +Besides, our guests are leaving us. At least a hundred of them have gone +away with the first impression, and the whole city will have it. The +journal reporters have been here. Denslow's principal creditors were among +the guests to-night; they went away soon, just after the affair with the +picture; to-morrow will be our dark day. If it had not been for this demon +of a duke and his familiar, whoever they are, all would have gone well. +Now we are distrusted, and they will crush us. Let us fall facing the +enemy. Within an hour I will have the truth about the Duke. Did I ever +tell you what a price Denslow paid for that picture?" + +"No, I do not wish to hear." + +"You are right. Come with me." + +The novel disrespect excited by the scandal of Honoria and the picture +seemed to have inspired the two hundred people who remained with a +cheerful ease. Eating, drinking excessively of Denslow's costly wines, +dancing to music which grew livelier and more boisterous as the musicians +imbibed more of the inspiriting juice, and, catching scraps of the +scandal, threw out significant airs, the company of young persons, +deserted by their scandalized seniors, had converted the magnificent suite +of drawing-rooms into a carnival theatre. Parties of three and four were +junketing in corners; laughing servants rushed to and fro as in a _cafe_; +the lounges were occupied by reclining beauties or languid fops +overpowered with wine, about whom lovely young women, flushed with +Champagne and mischief, were coquetting and frolicking. + +"I warrant you, these people know it is our last night," said Dalton; "and +see what a use they make of us! Denslow's rich wines poured away like +water; everything soiled, smeared, and overturned; our entertainment, at +first stately and gracious as a queen's drawing-room, ending, with the +loss of _prestige_, in the riot of a _bal masque_. So fades ambition! But +to this duke." + +Denslow, who had passed into the polite stage of inebriation, evident to +close observers, had arranged a little exclusive circle, which included +three women of fashionable reputation, his wife, the Duke, Jeffrey Lethal, +and Adonais. Reve de Noir officiated as attendant. The _fauteuils_ and +couches were disposed around a pearl table, on which were liquors, coffee, +wines, and a few delicacies for Honoria, who had not supped. They were in +the purple recess adjoining the third drawing-room. Adonais talked with +the Duke about Italy; Lethal criticized; while Honoria, in the full +splendor of her beauty, outshining and overpowering, dropped here and +there a few musical words, like service-notes, to harmonize. + +There is no beauty like the newly-enamored. Dalton seemed to forget +himself, as he contemplated her, for a moment. Spaces had been left for +us; the valet placed chairs. + +"Dalton," cried Lethal, "you are in time to decide a question of deep +interest;--your friend, De Vere, will assist you. His Highness has given +preference to the women of America over those of Italy. Adonais, the +exquisite and mild, settles his neck-tie against the Duke, and objects in +that bland but firm manner which is his. I am the Duke's bottle-holder; +Denslow and wife accept that function for the chivalrous Adonais." + +"I am of the Duke's party," replied Dalton, in his most agreeable manner. +"To be in the daily converse and view of the most beautiful women in +America, as I have been for years, is a privilege in the cultivation of a +pure taste. I saw nothing in Italy, except on canvas, comparable with what +I see at this moment. The Duke is right; but in commending his judgment, I +attribute to him also sagacity. Beauty is like language; its use is to +conceal. One may, under rose-colored commendations, a fine manner, and a +flowing style, conceal, as Nature does with personal advantages in men, +the gross tastes and vulgar cunning of a charlatan." + +Dalton, in saying this, with a manner free from suspicion or excitement, +fixed his eyes upon the Duke's. + +"You seem to have no faith in either men or women," responded the rich +barytone voice of his Highness, the dark upper lip disclosing, as before, +the row of square, sharp, ivory teeth. + +"Little, very little," responded Dalton, with a sigh. "Your Highness will +understand me,--or if not now, presently." + +Lethal trod upon Adonais's foot; I saw him do it. Adonais exchanged +glances with a brilliant hawk-faced lady who sat opposite. The lady smiled +and touched her companion. Honoria, who saw everything, opened her +magnificent eyes to their full extent. Denslow was oblivious. + +"In fact," continued Dalton, perceiving the electric flash he had excited, +"skepticism is a disease of my intellect. Perhaps the most noticeable and +palpable fact of the moment is the presence and identity of the Duke who +is opposite to me; and yet, doubting as I sometimes do my own existence, +is it not natural, that, philosophically speaking, the presence and +identity of your Highness are at moments a subject of philosophical +doubt?" + +"In cases of this kind," replied the Duke, "we rest upon circumstantial +evidence." + +So saying, he drew from his finger a ring and handed it to Dalton, who +went to the light and examined it closely, and passed it to me. It was a +minute cameo, no larger than a grain of wheat, in a ring of plain gold; a +rare and beautiful work of microscopic art. + +"I seem to remember presenting the Duke of Rosecouleur with a similar +ring, in Italy," said Dalton, resuming his seat; "but the coincidence does +not resolve my philosophic doubt, excited by the affair of the picture. We +all supposed that we saw a portrait of the Hon. Mrs. Denslow in yon +picture; and we seemed to discover, under the management of your valet, +that Denslow's picture, a genuine duplicate of the original by the author, +was a modern copy. Since your Highness quitted the gallery, those +delusions have ceased. The picture appears now to be genuine. The +likeness to Mrs. Denslow has vanished." + +An exclamation of surprise from all present, except the Duke, followed +this announcement. + +"And so," continued Dalton, "it may be with this ring, which now seems to +be the one I gave the Duke at Rome, but to-morrow may be different." + +As he spoke, Dalton gave back the ring to the Duke, who received it with +his usual grace. + +"Who knows," said Lethal, with a deceptive innocence of manner, "whether +aristocracy itself be not founded in mesmerical deceptions?" + +"I think, Lethal," observed Adonais, "you push the matter. It would be +impossible, for instance, even for his Highness, to make Honoria Denslow +appear ugly." + +We all looked at Honoria, to whom the Duke leaned over and said,-- + +"Would you be willing for a moment to lose that exquisite beauty?" + +"For my sake, Honoria," said Dalton, "refuse him." + +The request, so simply made, was rewarded by a ravishing smile. + +"Edward, do you know that you have not spoken a kind word to me to-night, +until now?" + +Their eyes met, and I saw that Dalton trembled with a deep emotion. "I +will save you yet," he murmured. + +A tall, black hound, of the slender breed, rose up near Honoria, and, +placing his fore-paws upon the edge of the pearl table, turned and licked +her face and eyes. + +It was the vision of a moment. The dog sprang upon the sofa by the Duke's +side, growling and snapping. + +"Reve de Noir," cried Lethal and Adonais, "drive the dog away!" + +The valet had disappeared. + +"I have no fear of him, gentlemen," said the Duke, patting the head of the +hound; "he is a faithful servant, and has a faculty of reading thoughts. +Go bring my servant, Demon," said the Duke. + +The hound sprang away with a great bound, and in an instant Reve de Noir +was standing behind us. The dog did not appear again. + +Honoria looked bewildered. "Of what dog were you speaking, Edward?" + +"The hound that licked your face." + +"You are joking. I saw no hound." + +"See, gentlemen," exclaimed Lethal, "his Highness shows us tricks. He is a +wizard." + +The three women gave little shrieks,--half pleasure, half terror. + +Denslow, who had fallen back in his chair asleep, awoke and rubbed his +eyes. + +"What is all this, Honoria?" + +"That his Highness is a wizard," she said, with a forced laugh, glancing +at Dalton. + +"Will his Highness do us the honor to lay aside the mask, and appear in +his true colors?" said Dalton, returning Honoria's glance with an +encouraging look. + +"Gentlemen," said the Duke, haughtily, "I am your guest, and by +hospitality protected from insult." + +"Insult, most noble Duke!" exclaimed Lethal, with a sneer,--"impossible, +under the roof of our friend, the Honorable Walter Denslow, in the small +hours of the night, and in the presence of the finest women in the world. +Dalton, pray, reassure his Highness!" + +"Edward! Edward!" murmured Honoria, "have a care,--even if it be as you +think." + +Dalton remained bland and collected. + +"Pardon, my Lord, the effect of a little wine, and of those wonderful +fantasies you have shown us. Your dog, your servant, and yourself interest +us equally; the picture, the ring,--all are wonderful. In supposing that +you had assumed a mask, and one so noble, I was led into an error by these +miracles, expecting no less than a translation of yourself into the person +of some famous wonder-worker. It is, you know, a day of miracles, and even +kings have their salaried seers, and take counsel of the spiritual world. +More!--let us have more!" + +The circle were amazed; the spirit of superstitious curiosity seized upon +them. + +"Reve de Noir," said the Duke, "a carafe, and less light." + +The candelabra became dim. The Duke took the carafe of water from the +valet, and, standing up, poured it upon the air; it broke into flames, +which mounted and floated away, singly or in little crowds. Still the Duke +poured, and dashing up the water with his hand, by and by the ceiling was +illuminated with a thousand miniature tongues of violet-colored fire. We +clapped our hands, and applauded,--"Beautiful I marvellous! wonderful, +Duke!--your Highness is the only magician,"--when, on a sudden, the flames +disappeared and the lights rose again. + +"The world is weary of skepticism," remarked Lethal; "there is no +chemistry for that. It is the true magic, doubtless,--recovered from +antiquity by his Highness. Are the wonders exhausted?" + +The Duke smiled again. He stretched out his hand toward Honoria, and she +slept. It was the work of an instant. + +"I have seen that before," said Dalton. + +"Not as we see it," responded his Highness. "Reve de Noir, less light!" +The room was dark in a moment. Over the head of Honoria appeared a cloud, +at first black, and soon in this a nucleus of light, which expanded and +shaped itself into an image and took the form of the sleeper, nude and +spiritual, a belt of rosy mist enveloping and concealing all but a head +and bust of ravishing beauty. The vision gazed with languid and beseeching +eyes upon Dalton, and a sigh seemed to heave the bosom. In scarce a +breathing-time, it was gone. Honoria waked, unconscious of what had +passed. + +Deep terror and amazement fell upon us all. + +"I have seen enough," said Dalton, rising slowly, and drawing a small +riding-whip, "to know now that this person is no duke, but either a +charlatan or a devil. In either case, since he has intruded here, to +desecrate and degrade, I find it proper to apply a magic more material." + +At the word, all rose exclaiming,--"For God's sake, Dalton!" He pressed +forward and laid his hand upon the Duke. A cry burst from Reve de Noir +which rent our very souls; and a flash followed, unspeakably bright, which +revealed the demoniacal features of the Duke, who sat motionless, +regarding Dalton's uplifted arm. A darkness followed, profound and +palpable. I listened in terror. There was no sound. Were we transformed? +Silence, darkness, still. I closed my eyes, and opened them again. A pale, +cold light became slowly perceptible, stealing through a crevice, and +revealing the walls and ceiling of my narrow room. The dream still +oppressed me. I went to the window, and let in reality with the morning +light. Yet, for days after, the images of the real Honoria and Dalton, my +friends, remained separated from the creatures of the vision; and the +Denslow Palace of dreamland, the pictures, the revelry, and the magic of +the Demon Duke haunted my memory, and kept with them all their visionary +splendors and regrets. + + + + +MYRTLE FLOWERS + + +Since Love within my heart made nest, + With the fond trust of brooding bird, + I find no all-embracing word +To say how deeply I am blest. + +Though wintry clouds are in the air + And the dead leaves unburied lie, + Nor open is the violet's eye, +I see new beauty everywhere. + +I walk beneath the naked trees, + Where wild streams shiver as they pass, + Yet in the sere and sighing grass +I hear a murmur as of bees,-- + +The bees that in love's morning rise + From tender eyes and lips to drain, + In ecstasies of blissful pain, +The sweets that bloomed in Paradise. + +There twines a joy with every care + That springs within this sacred ground; + But, oh! to give what I have found +Doth thrill me with divine despair. + +If distant, thou dost rise a star + Whose beams are with my being wrought, + And curvest all my teeming thought +With sweet attractions from afar. + +As a winged ship, in calmest hour, + Still moves upon the mighty sea + To some deep ocean melody, +I feel thy spirit and thy power. + + + + +CHESUNCOOK + +[Continued] + + +How far men go for the material of their houses! The inhabitants of the +most civilized cities, in all ages, send into far, primitive forests, +beyond the bounds of their civilization, where the moose and bear and +savage dwell, for their pine-boards for ordinary use. And, on the other +hand, the savage soon receives from cities iron arrow-points, hatchets, +and guns to point his savageness with. + +The solid and well-defined fir-tops, like sharp and regular spear-heads, +black against the sky, gave a peculiar, dark, and sombre look to the +forest. The spruce-tops have a similar, but more ragged outline,--their +shafts also merely feathered below. The firs were somewhat oftener regular +and dense pyramids. I was struck by this universal spiring upward of the +forest evergreens. The tendency is to slender, spiring tops, while they +are narrower below. Not only the spruce and fir, but even the arbor-vitae +and white pine, unlike the soft, spreading second-growth, of which I saw +none, all spire upwards, lifting a dense spear-head of cones to the light +and air, at any rate, while their branches straggle after as they may; as +Indians lift the ball over the heads of the crowd in their desperate game. +In this they resemble grasses, as also palms somewhat. The hemlock is +commonly a tent-like pyramid from the ground to its summit. + +After passing through some long rips and by a large island, we reached an +interesting part of the river called the Pine-Stream Dead-Water, about six +miles below Ragmuff, where the river expanded to thirty rods in width and +had many islands in it, with elms and canoe-birches, now yellowing, along +the shore, and we got our first sight of Katadn. + +Here, about two o'clock, we turned up a small branch three or four rods +wide, which comes in on the right from the south, called Pine Stream, to +look for moose signs. We had gone but a few rods before we saw very recent +signs along the water's edge, the mud lifted up by their feet being quite +fresh, and Joe declared that they had gone along there but a short time +before. We soon reached a small meadow on the east side, at an angle in +the stream, which was for the most part densely covered with alders. As we +were advancing along the edge of this, rather more quietly than usual, +perhaps, on account of the freshness of the signs,--the design being to +camp up this stream, if it promised well,--I heard a slight crackling of +twigs deep in the alders, and turned Joe's attention to it; whereupon he +began to push the canoe back rapidly; and we had receded thus half a dozen +rods, when we suddenly spied two moose standing just on the edge of the +open part of the meadow which we had passed, not more than six or seven +rods distant, looking round the alders at us. They made me think of great +frightened rabbits, with their long ears and half-inquisitive, half- +frightened looks; the true denizens of the forest, (I saw at once,) +filling a vacuum which now first I discovered had not been filled for me, +--_moose-_men, _wood-eaters_, the word is said to mean,--clad in a sort of +Vermont gray, or homespun. Our Nimrod, owing to the retrograde movement, +was now the farthest from the game; but being warned of its neighborhood, +he hastily stood up, and, while we ducked, fired over our heads one barrel +at the foremost, which alone he saw, though he did not know what kind of +creature it was; whereupon this one dashed across the meadow and up a high +bank on the north-east, so rapidly as to leave but an indistinct +impression of its outlines on my mind. At the same instant, the other, a +young one, but as tall as a horse, leaped out into the stream, in full +sight, and there stood cowering for a moment, or rather its +disproportionate lowness behind gave it that appearance, and uttering two +or three trumpeting squeaks. I have an indistinct recollection of seeing +the old one pause an instant on the top of the bank in the woods, look +toward its shivering young, and then dash away again. The second barrel +was levelled at the calf, and when we expected to see it drop in the +water, after a little hesitation, it, too, got out of the water, and +dashed up the hill, though in a somewhat different direction. All this was +the work of a few seconds, and our hunter, having never seen a moose +before, did not know but they were deer, for they stood partly in the +water, nor whether he had fired at the same one twice or not. From the +style in which they went off, and the fact that he was not used to +standing up and firing from a canoe, I judged that we should not see +anything more of them. The Indian said that they were a cow and her calf, +--a yearling, or perhaps two years old, for they accompany their dams so +long; but, for my part, I had not noticed much difference in their size. +It was but two or three rods across the meadow to the foot of the bank, +which, like all the world thereabouts, was densely wooded; but I was +surprised to notice, that, as soon as the moose had passed behind the veil +of the woods, there was no sound of foot-steps to be heard from the soft, +damp moss which carpets that forest, and long before we landed, perfect +silence reigned. Joe said, "If you wound 'em moose, me sure get 'em." + +We all landed at once. My companion reloaded; the Indian fastened his +birch, threw off his hat, adjusted his waistband, seized the hatchet, and +set out. He told me afterward, casually, that before we landed he had seen +a drop of blood on the bank, when it was two or three rods off. He +proceeded rapidly up the bank and through the woods, with a peculiar, +elastic, noiseless, and stealthy tread, looking to right and left on the +ground, and stepping in the faint tracks of the wounded moose, now and +then pointing in silence to a single drop of blood on the handsome, +shining leaves of the Clintonia Borealis, which, on every side, covered +the ground, or to a dry fern-stem freshly broken, all the while chewing +some leaf or else the spruce gum. I followed, watching his motions more +than the trail of the moose. After following the trail about forty rods in +a pretty direct course, stepping over fallen trees and winding between +standing ones, he at length lost it, for there were many other moose- +tracks there, and, returning once more to the last bloodstain, traced it a +little way and lost it again, and, too soon, I thought, for a good hunter, +gave it up entirely. He traced a few steps, also, the tracks of the calf; +but, seeing no blood, soon relinquished the search. + +I observed, while he was tracking the moose, a certain reticence or +moderation in him. He did not communicate several observations of interest +which he made, as a white man would have done, though they may have leaked +out afterward. At another time, when we heard a slight crackling of twigs +and he landed to reconnoitre, he stepped lightly and gracefully, stealing +through the bushes with the least possible noise, in a way in which no +white man does,--as it were, finding a place for his foot each time. + +About half an hour after seeing the moose, we pursued our voyage up Pine +Stream, and soon, coming to a part which was very shoal and also rapid, we +took out the baggage, and proceeded to carry it round, while Joe got up +with the canoe alone. We were just completing our portage and I was +absorbed in the plants, admiring the leaves of the aster macrophyllus, ten +inches wide, and plucking the seeds of the great round-leaved orchis, when +Joe exclaimed from the stream that he had killed a moose. He had found the +cow-moose lying dead, but quite warm, in the middle of the stream, which +was so shallow that it rested on the bottom, with hardly a third of its +body above water. It was about an hour after it was shot, and it was +swollen with water. It had run about a hundred rods and sought the stream +again, cutting off a slight bend. No doubt, a better hunter would have +tracked it to this spot at once. I was surprised at its great size, horse- +like, but Joe said it was not a large cow-moose. My companion went in +search of the calf again. I took hold of the ears of the moose, while Joe +pushed his canoe down stream toward a favorable shore, and so we made out, +though with some difficulty, its long nose frequently sticking in the +bottom, to drag it into still shallower water. It was a brownish black, or +perhaps a dark iron-gray, on the back and sides, but lighter beneath and +in front. I took the cord which served for the canoe's painter, and with +Joe's assistance measured it carefully, the greatest distances first, +making a knot each time. The painter being wanted, I reduced these +measures that night with equal care to lengths and fractions of my +umbrella, beginning with the smallest measures, and untying the knots as I +proceeded; and when we arrived at Chesuncook the next day, finding a two- +foot rule there, I reduced the last to feet and inches; and, moreover, I +made myself a two-foot rule of a thin and narrow strip of black ash which +would fold up conveniently to six inches. All this pains I took because I +did not wish to be obliged to say merely that the moose was very large. Of +the various dimensions which I obtained I will mention only two. The +distance from the tips of the hoofs of the fore-feet, stretched out, to +the top of the back between the shoulders, was seven feet and five inches. +I can hardly believe my own measure, for this is about two feet greater +than the height of a tall horse. The extreme length was eight feet and two +inches. Another cow-moose, which I have since measured in those woods with +a tape, was just six feet from the tip of the hoof to the shoulders, and +eight feet long as she lay. + +When afterward I asked an Indian at the carry how much taller the male +was, he answered, "Eighteen inches," and made me observe the height of a +cross-stake over the fire, more than four feet from the ground, to give +me some idea of the depth of his chest. Another Indian, at Oldtown, told +me that they were nine feet high to the top of the back, and that one +which he tried weighed eight hundred pounds. The length of the spinal +projections between the shoulders is very great. A white hunter, who was +the best authority among hunters that I could have, told me that the male +was _not_ eighteen inches taller than the female; yet he agreed that he +was sometimes nine feet high to the top of the back, and weighed a +thousand pounds. Only the male has horns, and they rise two feet or more +above the shoulders,--spreading three or four, and sometimes six feet,-- +which would make him in all, sometimes, eleven feet high! According to +this calculation, the moose is as tall, though it may not be as large, as +the great Irish elk, Megaceros Hibernicus, of a former period, of which +Mantell says that it "very far exceeded in magnitude any living species, +the skeleton" being "upward of ten feet high from the ground to the +highest point of the antlers." Joe said, that, though the moose shed the +whole horn annually, each new horn has an additional prong; but I have +noticed that they sometimes have more prongs on one side than on the +other. I was struck with the delicacy and tenderness of the hoofs, which +divide very far up, and the one half could be pressed very much behind the +other, thus probably making the animal surer-footed on the uneven ground +and slippery moss-covered logs of the primitive forest. They were very +unlike the stiff and battered feet of our horses and oxen. The bare, horny +part of the fore-foot was just six inches long, and the two portions could +be separated four inches at the extremities. + +The moose is singularly grotesque and awkward to look at. Why should it +stand so high at the shoulders? Why have so long a head? Why have no tail +to speak of? for in my examination I overlooked it entirely. Naturalists +say it is an inch and a half long. It reminded me at once of the +camelopard, high before and low behind,--and no wonder, for, like it, it +is fitted to browse on trees. The upper lip projected two inches beyond +the lower for this purpose. This was the kind of man that was at home +there; for, as near as I can learn, that has never been the residence, but +rather the hunting-ground of the Indian. The moose will perhaps one day +become extinct; but how naturally then, when it exists only as a fossil +relic, and unseen as that, may the poet or sculptor invent a fabulous +animal with similar branching and leafy horns,--a sort of fucus or lichen +in bone,--to be the inhabitant of such a forest as this! + +Here, just at the head of the murmuring rapids, Joe now proceeded to skin +the moose with a pocket-knife, while I looked on; and a tragical business +it was,--to see that still warm and palpitating body pierced with a +knife, to see the warm milk stream from the rent udder, and the ghastly +naked red carcass appearing from within its seemly robe, which was made to +hide it. The ball had passed through the shoulder-blade diagonally and +lodged under the skin on the opposite side, and was partially flattened. +My companion keeps it to show to his grandchildren. He has the shanks of +another moose which he has since shot, skinned and stuffed, ready to be +made into boots by putting in a thick leather sole. Joe said, if a moose +stood fronting you, you must not fire, but advance toward him, for he will +turn slowly and give you a fair shot. In the bed of this narrow, wild, and +rocky stream, between two lofty walls of spruce and firs, a mere cleft in +the forest which the stream had made, this work went on. At length Joe had +stripped off the hide and dragged it trailing to the shore, declaring that +it weighed a hundred pounds, though probably fifty would have been nearer +the truth. He cut off a large mass of the meat to carry along, and +another, together with the tongue and nose, he put with the hide on the +shore to lie there all night, or till we returned. I was surprised that he +thought of leaving this meat thus exposed by the side of the carcass, as +the simplest course, not fearing that any creature would touch it; but +nothing did. This could hardly have happened on the bank of one of our +rivers in the eastern part of Massachusetts; but I suspect that fewer +small wild animals are prowling there than with us. Twice, however, in +this excursion I had a glimpse of a species of large mouse. + +This stream was so withdrawn, and the moose-tracks were so fresh, that my +companions, still bent on hunting, concluded to go farther up it and camp, +and then hunt up or down at night. Half a mile above this, at a place +where I saw the aster puniceus and the beaked hazel, as we paddled along, +Joe, hearing a slight rustling amid the alders, and seeing something black +about two rods off, jumped up and whispered, "Bear!" but before the hunter +had discharged his piece, he corrected himself to "Beaver!"--"Hedgehog!" +The bullet killed a large hedgehog, more than two feet and eight inches +long. The quills were rayed out and flattened on the hinder part of its +back, even as if it had lain on that part, but were erect and long between +this and the tail. Their points, closely examined, were seen to be finely +bearded or barbed, and shaped like an awl, that is, a little concave, to +give the barbs effect. After about a mile of still water, we prepared our +camp on the right side, just at the foot of a considerable fall. Little +chopping was done that night, for fear of scaring the moose. We had moose- +meat fried for supper. It tasted like tender beef, with perhaps more +flavor,--sometimes like veal. + +After supper, the moon having risen, we proceeded to hunt a mile up this +stream, first "carrying" about the falls. We made a picturesque sight, +wending single-file along the shore, climbing over rocks and logs,--Joe, +who brought up the rear, twirling his canoe in his hands as if it were a +feather, in places where it was difficult to get along without a burden. + +We launched the canoe again from the ledge over which the stream fell, but +after half a mile of still water, suitable for hunting, it became rapid +again, and we were compelled to make our way along the shore, while Joe +endeavored to get up in the birch alone, though it was still very +difficult for him to pick his way amid the rocks in the night. We on the +shore found the worst of walking, a perfect chaos of fallen and drifted +trees, and of bushes projecting far over the water, and now and then we +made our way across the mouth of a small tributary on a kind of net-work +of alders. So we went tumbling on in the dark, being on the shady side, +effectually scaring all the moose and bears that might be thereabouts. At +length we came to a standstill, and Joe went forward to reconnoitre; but +he reported that it was still a continuous rapid as far as he went, or +half a mile, with no prospect of improvement, as if it were coming down +from a mountain. So we turned about, hunting back to the camp through the +still water. It was a splendid moonlight night, and I, getting sleepy as +it grew late,--for I had nothing to do,--found it difficult to realize +where I was. This stream was much more unfrequented than the main one, +lumbering operations being no longer carried on in this quarter. It was +only three or four rods wide, but the firs and spruce through which it +trickled seemed yet taller by contrast. Being in this dreamy state, which +the moonlight enhanced, I did not clearly discern the shore, but seemed, +most of the time, to be floating through ornamental grounds,--for I +associated the fir-tops with such scenes;--very high up some Broadway, and +beneath or between their tops, I thought I saw an endless succession of +porticos and columns, cornices and facades, verandas and churches. I did +not merely fancy this, but in my drowsy state such was the illusion. I +fairly lost myself in sleep several times, still dreaming of that +architecture and the nobility that dwelt behind and might issue from it; +but all at once I would be aroused and brought back to a sense of my +actual position by the sound of Joe's birch horn in the midst of all this +silence calling the moose, _ugh, ugh, oo-oo-oo-oo-oo-oo_, and I prepared +to hear a furious moose come rushing and crashing through the forest, and +see him burst out on to the little strip of meadow by our side. + +But, on more accounts than one, I had had enough of moose-hunting. I had +not come to the woods for this purpose, nor had I foreseen it, though I +had been willing to learn how the Indian manoeuvred; but one moose killed +was as good, if not as bad, as a dozen. The afternoon's tragedy, and my +share in it, as it affected the innocence, destroyed the pleasure of my +adventure. It is true, I came as near as is possible to come to being a +hunter and miss it, myself; and as it is, I think that I could spend a +year in the woods, fishing and hunting, just enough to sustain myself, +with satisfaction. This would be next to living like a philosopher on the +fruits of the earth which you had raised, which also attracts me. But this +hunting of the moose merely for the satisfaction of killing him,--not even +for the sake of his hide,--without making any extraordinary exertion or +running any risk yourself, is too much like going out by night to some +wood-side pasture and shooting your neighbor's horses. These are God's own +horses, poor, timid creatures, that will run fast enough as soon as they +smell you, though they _are_ nine feet high. Joe told us of some hunters +who a year or two before had shot down several oxen by night, somewhere in +the Maine woods, mistaking them for moose. And so might any of the +hunters; and what is the difference in the sport, but the name? In the +former case, having killed one of God's and _your own_ oxen, you strip off +its hide,--because that is the common trophy, and, moreover, you have +heard that it may be sold for moccasins,--cut a steak from its haunches, +and leave the huge carcass to smell to heaven for you. It is no better, at +least, than to assist at a slaughter-house. + +This afternoon's experience suggested to me how base or coarse are the +motives which commonly carry men into the wilderness. The explorers and +lumberers generally are all hirelings, paid so much a day for their labor, +and as such they have no more love for wild nature than wood-sawyers have +for forests. Other white men and Indians who come here are for the most +part hunters, whose object is to slay as many moose and other wild animals +as possible. But, pray, could not one spend some weeks or years in the +solitude of this vast wilderness with other employments than these,-- +employments perfectly sweet and innocent and ennobling? For one that comes +with a pencil to sketch or sing, a thousand come with an axe or rifle. +What a coarse and imperfect use Indians and hunters make of Nature! No +wonder that their race is so soon exterminated. I already, and for weeks +afterward, felt my nature the coarser for this part of my woodland +experience, and was reminded that our life should be lived as tenderly and +daintily as one would pluck a flower. + +With these thoughts, when we reached our camping-ground, I decided to +leave my companions to continue moose-hunting down the stream, while I +prepared the camp, though they requested me not to chop much nor make a +large fire, for fear I should scare their game. In the midst of the damp +fir-wood, high on the mossy bank, about nine o'clock of this bright +moonlight night, I kindled a fire, when they were gone, and, sitting on +the fir-twigs, within sound of the falls, examined by its light the +botanical specimens which I had collected that afternoon, and wrote down +some of the reflections which I have here expanded; or I walked along the +shore and gazed up the stream, where the whole space above the falls was +filled with mellow light. As I sat before the fire on my fir-twig seat, +without walls above or around me, I remembered how far on every hand that +wilderness stretched, before you came to cleared or cultivated fields, and +wondered if any bear or moose was watching the light of my fire; for +Nature looked sternly upon me on account of the murder of the moose. + +Strange that so few ever come to the woods to see how the pine lives and +grows and spires, lifting its evergreen arms to the light,--to see its +perfect success; but most are content to behold it in the shape of many +broad boards brought to market, and deem that its true success! But the +pine is no more lumber than man is, and to be made into boards and houses +is no more its true and highest use than the truest use of a man is to be +cut down and made into manure. There is a higher law affecting our +relation to pines as well as to men. A pine cut down, a dead pine, is no +more a pine than a dead human carcass is a man. Can he who has discovered +only some of the values of whalebone and whale oil be said to have +discovered the true use of the whale? Can he who slays the elephant for +his ivory be said to have "seen the elephant"? These are petty and +accidental uses; just as if a stronger race were to kill us in order to +make buttons and flageolets of our bones; for everything may serve a lower +as well as a higher use. Every creature is better alive than dead, men and +moose and pine-trees, and he who understands it aright will rather +preserve its life than destroy it. + +Is it the lumberman, then, who is the friend and lover of the pine, stands +nearest to it, and understands its nature best? Is it the tanner who has +barked it, or he who has boxed it for turpentine, whom posterity will +fable to have been changed into a pine at last? No! no! it is the poet; he +it is who makes the truest use of the pine,--who does not fondle it with +an axe, nor tickle it with a saw, nor stroke it with a plane,--who knows +whether its heart is false without cutting into it,--who has not bought +the stumpage of the township on which it stands. All the pines shudder and +heave a sigh when _that_ man steps on the forest floor. No, it is the +poet, who loves them as his own shadow in the air, and lets them stand. I +have been into the lumber-yard, and the carpenter's shop, and the tannery, +and the lampblack-factory, and the turpentine clearing; but when at length +I saw the tops of the pines waving and reflecting the light at a distance +high over all the rest of the forest, I realized that the former were not +the highest use of the pine. It is not their bones or hide or tallow that +I love most. It is the living spirit of the tree, not its spirit of +turpentine, with which I sympathize, and which heals my cuts. + +Ere long, the hunters returned, not having seen a moose, but, in +consequence of my suggestions, bringing a quarter of the dead one, which, +with ourselves, made quite a load for the canoe. + +After breakfasting on moose-meat, we returned down Pine Stream on our way +to Chesuncook Lake, which was about five miles distant. We could see the +red carcass of the moose lying in Pine Stream when nearly half a mile off. +Just below the mouth of this stream were the most considerable rapids +between the two lakes, called Pine-Stream Falls, where were large flat +rocks washed smooth, and at this time you could easily wade across above +them. Joe ran down alone while we walked over the portage, my companion +collecting spruce gum for his friends at home, and I looking for flowers. +Near the lake, which we were approaching with as much expectation as if it +had been a university,--for it is not often that the stream of our life +opens into such expansions,--were islands, and a low and meadowy shore +with scattered trees, birches, white and yellow, slanted over the water, +and maples,--many of the white birches killed, apparently by inundations. +There was considerable native grass; and even a few cattle--whose +movements we heard, though we did not see them, mistaking them at first +for moose--were pastured there. + +On entering the lake, where the stream runs southeasterly, and for some +time before, we had a view of the mountains about Katadn, +(_Katahdinauquoh_ one says they are called,) like a cluster of blue fungi +of rank growth, apparently twenty-five or thirty miles distant, in a +southeast direction, their summits concealed by clouds. Joe called some of +them the _Souadneunk_ mountains. This is the name of a stream there, which +another Indian told us meant "Running between mountains." Though some +lower summits were afterward uncovered, we got no more complete view of +Katadn while we were in the woods. The clearing to which we were bound was +on the right of the mouth of the river, and was reached by going round a +low point, where the water was shallow to a great distance from the shore. +Chesuncook Lake extends northwest and southeast, and is called eighteen +miles long and three wide, without an island. We had entered the northwest +corner of it, and when near the shore could see only part way down it. The +principal mountains visible from the land here were those already +mentioned, between southeast and east, and a few summits a little west of +north, but generally the north and northwest horizon about the St. John +and the British boundary was comparatively level. + +Ansell Smith's, the oldest and principal clearing about this lake, +appeared to be quite a harbor for _bateaux_ and canoes; seven or eight of +the former were lying about, and there was a small scow for hay, and a +capstan on a platform, now high and dry, ready to be floated and anchored +to tow rafts with. It was a very primitive kind of harbor, where boats +were drawn up amid the stumps,--such a one, methought, as the Argo might +have been launched in. There were five other huts with small clearings on +the opposite side of the lake, all at this end and visible from this +point. One of the Smiths told me that it was so far cleared that they came +here to live and built the present house four years before, though the +family had been here but a few months. + +I was interested to see how a pioneer lived on this side of the country. +His life is in some respects more adventurous than that of his brother in +the West; for he contends with winter as well as the wilderness, and there +is a greater interval of time at least between him and the army which is +to follow. Here immigration is a tide which may ebb when it has swept away +the pines; there it is not a tide, but an inundation, and roads and other +improvements come steadily rushing after. + +As we approached the log-house, a dozen rods from the lake, and +considerably elevated above it, the projecting ends of the logs lapping +over each other irregularly several feet at the corners gave it a very +rich and picturesque look, far removed from the meanness of weather- +boards. It was a very spacious, low building, about eighty feet long, with +many large apartments. The walls were well clayed between the logs, which +were large and round, except on the upper and under sides, and as visible +inside as out, successive bulging cheeks gradually lessening upwards and +tuned to each other with the axe, like Pandean pipes. Probably the musical +forest-gods had not yet cast them aside; they never do till they are split +or the bark is gone. It was a style of architecture not described by +Vitruvius, I suspect, though possibly hinted at in the biography of +Orpheus; none of your frilled or fluted columns, which have cut such a +false swell, and support nothing but a gable end and their builder's +pretensions,--that is, with the multitude; and as for "ornamentation," one +of those words with a dead tail which architects very properly use to +describe their flourishes, there were the lichens and mosses and fringes +of bark, which nobody troubled himself about. We certainly leave the +handsomest paint and clapboards behind in the woods, when we strip off the +bark and poison ourselves with white-lead in the towns. We get but half +the spoils of the forest. For beauty, give me trees with the fur on. This +house was designed and constructed with the freedom of stroke of a +forester's axe, without other compass and square than Nature uses. +Wherever the logs were cut off by a window or door, that is, were not kept +in place by alternate overlapping, they were held one upon another by very +large pins driven in diagonally on each side, where branches might have +been, and then cut off so close up and down as not to project beyond the +bulge of the log, as if the logs clasped each other in their arms. These +logs were posts, studs, boards, clapboards, laths, plaster, and nails, all +in one. Where the citizen uses a mere sliver or board, the pioneer uses +the whole trunk of a tree. The house had large stone chimneys, and was +roofed with spruce-bark. The windows were imported, all but the casings. +One end was a regular logger's camp, for the boarders, with the usual fir +floor and log benches. Thus this house was but a slight departure from the +hollow tree, which the bear still inhabits,--being a hollow made with +trees piled up, with a coating of bark like its original. + +The cellar was a separate building, like an ice-house, and it answered for +a refrigerator at this season, our moose-meat being kept there. It was a +potato-hole with a permanent roof. Each structure and institution here was +so primitive that you could at once refer it to its source; but our +buildings commonly suggest neither their origin nor their purpose. There +was a large, and what farmers would call handsome, barn, part of whose +boards had been sawed by a whip-saw; and the saw-pit, with its great pile +of dust, remained before the house. The long split shingles on a portion +of the barn were laid a foot to the weather, suggesting what kind of +weather they have there. Grant's barn at Caribou Lake was said to be still +larger, the biggest ox-nest in the woods, fifty feet by a hundred. Think +of a monster barn in that primitive forest lifting its gray back above the +tree-tops! Man makes very much such a nest for his domestic animals, of +withered grass and fodder, as the squirrels and many other wild creatures +do for themselves. + +There was also a blacksmith's shop, where plainly a good deal of work was +done. The oxen and horses used in lumbering operations were shod, and all +the iron-work of sleds, etc., was repaired or made here. I saw them load a +_bateau_ at the Moosehead carry, the next Tuesday, with about thirteen +hundred weight of bar iron for this shop. This reminded me how primitive +and honorable a trade was Vulcan's. I do not hear that there was any +carpenter or tailor among the gods. The smith seems to have preceded these +and every other mechanic at Chesuncook as well as on Olympus, and his +family is the most widely dispersed, whether he be christened John or +Ansell. + +Smith owned two miles down the lake by half a mile in width. There were +about one hundred acres cleared here. He cut seventy tons of English hay +this year on this ground, and twenty more on another clearing, and he uses +it all himself in lumbering operations. The barn was crowded with pressed +hay and a machine to press it. There was a large garden full of roots, +turnips, beets, carrots, potatoes, etc., all of great size. They said that +they were worth as much here as in New York. I suggested some currants for +sauce, especially as they had no apple-trees set out, and showed how +easily they could be obtained. + +There was the usual long-handled axe of the primitive woods by the door, +three and a half feet long,--for my new black-ash rule was in constant +use,--and a large, shaggy dog, whose nose, report said, was full of +porcupine quills. I can testify that he looked very sober. This is the +usual fortune of pioneer dogs, for they have to face the brunt of the +battle for their race, and act the part of Arnold Winkelried without +intending it. If he should invite one of his town friends up this way, +suggesting moose-meat and unlimited freedom, the latter might pertinently +inquire, "What is that sticking in your nose?" When a generation or two +have used up all the enemies' darts, their successors lead a comparatively +easy life. We owe to our fathers analogous blessings. Many old people +receive pensions for no other reason, it seems to me, but as a +compensation for having lived a long time ago. No doubt, our town dogs +still talk, in a snuffling way, about the days that tried dogs' noses. How +they got a cat up there I do not know, for they are as shy as my aunt +about entering a canoe. I wondered that she did not run up a tree on the +way; but perhaps she was bewildered by the very crowd of opportunities. + +Twenty or thirty lumberers, Yankee and Canadian, were coming and going,-- +Aleck among the rest,--and from time to time an Indian touched here. In +the winter there are sometimes a hundred men lodged here at once. The most +interesting piece of news that circulated among them appeared to be, that +four horses belonging to Smith, worth seven hundred dollars, had passed by +further into the woods a week before. + +The white-pine-tree was at the bottom or further end of all this. It is a +war against the pines, the only real Aroostook or Penobscot war. I have no +doubt that they lived pretty much the same sort of life in the Homeric +age, for men have always thought more of eating than of fighting; then, as +now, their minds ran chiefly on the "hot bread and sweet cakes"; and the +fur and lumber trade is an old story to Asia and Europe. I doubt if men +ever made a trade of heroism. In the days of Achilles, even, they +delighted in big barns, and perchance in pressed hay, and he who possessed +the most valuable team was the best fellow. + +We had designed to go on at evening up the Caucomgomoc, whose mouth was a +mile or two distant, to the lake of the same name, about ten miles off; +but some Indians of Joe's acquaintance, who were making canoes on the +Caucomgomoc, came over from that side, and gave so poor an account of the +moose-hunting, so many had been killed there lately, that my companions +concluded not to go there. Joe spent this Sunday and the night with his +acquaintances. The lumberers told me that there were many moose +hereabouts, but no caribou or deer. A man from Oldtown had killed ten or +twelve moose, within a year, so near the house that they heard all his +guns. His name may have been Hercules, for aught I know, though I should +rather have expected to hear the rattling of his club; but, no doubt, he +keeps pace with the improvements of the age, and uses a Sharpe's rifle +now; probably he gets all his armor made and repaired at Smith's shop. One +moose had been killed and another shot at within sight of the house within +two years. I do not know whether Smith has yet got a poet to look after +the cattle, which, on account of the early breaking up of the ice, are +compelled to summer in the woods, but I would suggest this office to such +of my acquaintances as love to write verses and go a-gunning. + +After a dinner, at which apple-sauce was the greatest luxury to me, but +our moose-meat was oftenest called for by the lumberers, I walked across +the clearing into the forest, southward, returning along the shore. For my +dessert, I helped myself to a large slice of the Chesuncook woods, and +took a hearty draught of its waters with all my senses. The woods were as +fresh and full of vegetable life as a lichen in wet weather, and contained +many interesting plants; but unless they are of white pine, they are +treated with as little respect here as a mildew, and in the other case +they are only the more quickly cut down. The shore was of coarse, flat, +slate rocks, often in slabs, with the surf beating on it. The rocks and +bleached drift-logs, extending some way into the shaggy woods, showed a +rise and fall of six or eight feet, caused partly by the dam at the +outlet. They said that in winter the snow was three feet deep on a level +here, and sometimes four or five,--that the ice on the lake was two feet +thick, clear, and four feet, including the snow-ice. Ice had already +formed in vessels. + +We lodged here this Sunday night in a comfortable bed-room, apparently the +best one; and all that I noticed unusual in the night--for I still kept +taking notes, like a spy in the camp--was the creaking of the thin split +boards, when any of our neighbors stirred. + +Such were the first rude beginnings of a town. They spoke of the +practicability of a winter-road to the Moosehead carry, which would not +cost much, and would connect them with steam and staging and all the busy +world. I almost doubted if the lake would be there,--the self-same lake,-- +preserve its form and identity, when the shores should be cleared and +settled; as if these lakes and streams which explorers report never +awaited the advent of the citizen. + +The sight of one of these frontier-houses, built of these great logs, +whose inhabitants have unflinchingly maintained their ground many summers +and winters in the wilderness, reminds me of famous forts, like +Ticonderoga, or Crown Point, which have sustained memorable sieges. They +are especially winter-quarters, and at this season this one had a +partially deserted look, as if the siege were raised a little, the snow- +banks being melted from before it, and its garrison accordingly reduced. I +think of their daily food as rations,--it is called "supplies"; a Bible +and a great coat are munitions of war, and a single man seen about the +premises is a sentinel on duty. You expect that he will require the +countersign, and will perchance take you for Ethan Allen, come to demand +the surrender of his fort in the name of the Continental Congress. It is a +sort of ranger service. Arnold's expedition is a daily experience with +these settlers. They can prove that they were out at almost any time; and +I think that all the first generation of them deserve a pension more than +any that went to the Mexican war. + +[To be continued.] + + + + +THE AUTOCRAT OF THE BREAKFAST-TABLE. + +EVERY MAN HIS OWN BOSWELL. + +_Aqui esta encerrada el alma del licenciado +Pedro Garcias_. + + +If I should ever make a little book out of these papers, which I hope you +are not getting tired of, I suppose I ought to save the above sentence for +a motto on the title-page. But I want it now, and must use it. I need not +say to you that the words are Spanish, nor that they are to be found in +the short Introduction to "Gil Blas," nor that they mean, "Here lies +buried the soul of the licentiate Pedro Garcias." + +I warned all young people off the premises when I began my notes referring +to old age. I must be equally fair with old people now. They are earnestly +requested to leave this paper to young persons from the age of twelve to +that of four-score years and ten, at which latter period of life I am sure +that I shall have at least one youthful reader. You know well enough what +I mean by youth and age;--something in the soul, which has no more to do +with the color of the hair than the vein of gold in a rock has to do with +the grass a thousand feet above it. + +I am growing bolder as I write. I think it requires not only youth, but +genius, to read this paper. I don't mean to imply that it required any +whatsoever to talk what I have here written down. It did demand a certain +amount of memory, and such command of the English tongue as is given by a +common school education. So much I do claim. But here I have related, at +length, a string of trivialities. You must have the imagination of a poet +to transfigure them. These little colored patches are stains upon the +windows of a human soul; stand on the outside, they are but dull and +meaningless spots of color; seen from within, they are glorified shapes +with empurpled wings and sunbright aureoles. + +My hand trembles when I offer you this. Many times I have come bearing +flowers such as my garden grew; but now I offer you this poor, brown, +homely growth, you may cast it away as worthless. And yet--and yet--it is +something better than flowers; it is a _seed-capsule_. Many a gardener +will cut you a bouquet of his choicest blossoms for small fee, but he does +not love to let the seeds of his rarest varieties go out of his own hands. + +It is by little things that we know ourselves; a soul would very probably +mistake itself for another, when once disembodied, were it not for +individual experiences that differed from those of others only in details +seemingly trifling. All of us have been thirsty thousands of times, and +felt, with Pindar, that water was the best of things. I alone, as I think, +of all mankind, remember one particular pailful of water, flavored with +the white-pine of which the pail was made, and the brown mug out of which +one Edmund, a red-faced and curly-haired boy, was averred to have bitten a +fragment in his haste to drink; it being then high summer, and little +full-blooded boys feeling very warm and porous in the low-"studded" +school-room where Dame Prentiss, dead and gone, ruled over young children, +many of whom are old ghosts now, and have known Abraham for twenty or +thirty years of our mortal time. + +Thirst belongs to humanity, everywhere, in all ages; but that white-pine +pail and that brown mug belong to me in particular; and just so of my +special relationships with other things and with my race. One could never +remember himself in eternity by the mere fact of having loved or hated any +more than by that of having thirsted; love and hate have no more +individuality in them than single waves in the ocean;--but the accidents +or trivial marks which distinguished those whom we loved or hated make +their memory our own forever, and with it that of our own personality +also. + +Therefore, my aged friend of five-and-twenty, or thereabouts, pause at the +threshold of this particular record, and ask yourself seriously whether +you are fit to read such revelations as are to follow. For observe, you +have here no splendid array of petals such as poets offer you,--nothing +but a dry shell, containing, if you will get out what is in it, a few +small seeds of poems. You may laugh at them, if you like. I shall never +tell you what I think of you for so doing. But if you can read into the +heart of these things, in the light of other memories as slight, yet as +dear to your soul, then you are neither more nor less than a POET, and can +afford to write no more verses during the rest of your natural life,-- +which abstinence I take to be one of the surest marks of your meriting the +divine name I have just bestowed upon you. + +[May I beg of you who have begun this paper, nobly trusting to your own +imagination and sensibilities to give it the significance which it does +not lay claim to without your kind assistance,--may I beg of you, I say, +to pay particular attention to the _brackets_ which enclose certain +paragraphs? I want my "asides," you see, to whisper loud to you who read +my notes, and sometimes I talk a page or two to you without pretending +that I said a word of it to our boarders. You will find a very long +"aside" to you almost as soon as you begin to read. And so, dear young +friend, fall to at once, taking such things as I have provided for you; +and if you turn them, by the aid of your powerful imagination, into a fair +banquet, why, then, peace be with you, and a summer by the still waters of +some quiet river, or by some yellow beach, where, as my friend, the +Professor, says, you can sit with Nature's wrist in your hand and count +her ocean-pulses.] + +I should like to make a few intimate revelations relating especially to my +early life, if I thought you would like to hear them. + +[The schoolmistress turned a little in +her chair, and sat with her face directed partly towards me.--Half- +mourning now;--purple ribbon. That breastpin she wears has _gray_ hair in +it; her mother's, no doubt;--I remember our landlady's daughter telling +me, soon after the school-mistress came to board with us, that she had +lately "buried a payrent." That's what made her look so pale,--kept the +poor sick thing alive with her own blood. Ah! long illness is the real +vampyrism; think of living a year or two after one is dead, by sucking the +life-blood out of a frail young creature at one's bedside!--Well, souls +grow white, as well as cheeks, in these holy duties; one that goes in a +nurse may come out an angel.--God bless all good women!--to their soft +hands and pitying hearts we must all come at last!----The schoolmistress +has a better color than when she came.---- ---- Too late!----"It might +have been."----Amen! + +----How many thoughts go to a dozen heart-beats, sometimes! There was no +long pause after my remark addressed to the company, but in that time I +had the train of ideas and feelings I have just given flash through my +consciousness sudden and sharp as the crooked red streak that springs out +of its black sheath like the creese of a Malay in his death-rage, and +stabs the earth right and left in its blind rage. + +I don't deny that there was a pang in it,--yes, a stab; but there was a +prayer, too,--the "Amen" belonged to that.--Also, a vision of a four-story +brick house, nicely furnished,--I actually saw many specific articles,-- +curtains, sofas, tables, and others, and could draw the patterns of them +at this moment,--a brick house, I say, looking out on the water, with a +fair parlor, and books and busts and pots of flowers and bird-cages, all +complete; and at the window, looking on the water, two of us.--"Male and +female created He them."--These two were standing at the window, when a +little boy that was playing near them looked up at me with such a look +that I---- ----poured out a glass of water, drank it all down, and then +continued.] + +I said I should like to tell you some things, such as people commonly +never tell, about my early recollections. Should you like to hear them? + +Should we _like_ to hear them?--said the schoolmistress;--no, but we +should _love_ to. + +[The voice was a sweet one, naturally, and had something very pleasant in +its tone, just then.--The four-story brick house, which had gone out like +a transparency when the light behind it is quenched, glimmered again for a +moment; parlor, books, busts, flower-pots, bird-cages, all complete,--and +the figures as before.] + +We are waiting with eagerness, Sir,--said the divinity-student. + +[The transparency went out as if a flash of black lightning had struck +it.] + +If you want to hear my confessions, the next thing--I said--is to know +whether I can trust you with them. It is only fair to say that there are a +great many people in the world that laugh at such things. _I_ think they +are fools, but perhaps you don't all agree with me. + +Here are children of tender age talked to as if they were capable of +understanding Calvin's "Institutes," and nobody has honesty or sense +enough to tell the plain truth about the little wretches: that they are as +superstitious as naked savages, and such miserable spiritual cowards--that +is, if they have any imagination--that they will believe anything which is +taught them, and a great deal more which they teach themselves. + +I was born and bred, as I have told you twenty times, among books and +those who knew what was in books. I was carefully instructed in things +temporal and spiritual. But up to a considerable maturity of childhood I +believed Raphael and Michel Angelo to have been super-human beings. The +central doctrine of the prevalent religious faith of Christendom was +utterly confused and neutralized in my mind for years by one of those too +common stories of actual life, which I overheard repeated in a whisper.-- +Why did I not ask? you will say.--You don't remember the rosy pudency of +sensitive children. The first instinctive movement of the little creatures +is to make a _cache_, and bury in it beliefs, doubts, dreams, hopes, and +terrors. I am uncovering one of these _caches_. Do you think I was +necessarily a greater fool and coward than another? + +I was afraid of ships. Why, I could never tell. The masts looked +frightfully tall,--but they were not so tall as the steeple of our old +yellow meeting-house. At any rate, I used to hide my eyes from the sloops +and schooners that were wont to lie at the end of the bridge, and I +confess that traces of this undefined terror lasted very long.--One other +source of alarm had a still more fearful significance. There was a great +wooden HAND,--a glove-maker's sign, which used to swing and creak in the +blast, as it hung from a pillar before a certain shop a mile or two +outside of the city. Oh, the dreadful hand! Always hanging there ready to +catch up a little boy, who would come home to supper no more, nor yet to +bed,--whose porringer would be laid away empty thenceforth, and his half- +worn shoes wait until his small brother grew to fit them. + +As for all manner of superstitious observances, I used once to think I +must have been peculiar in having such a list of them, but I now believe +that half the children of the same age go through the same experiences. No +Roman soothsayer ever had such a catalogue of _omens_ as I found in the +Sibylline leaves of my childhood. That trick of throwing a stone at a tree +and attaching some mighty issue to hitting or missing, which you will find +mentioned in one or more biographies, I well remember. Stepping on or over +certain particular things or spots--Dr. Johnson's especial weakness--I got +the habit of at a very early age.--I won't swear that I have not some +tendency to these not wise practices even at this present date. [How many +of you that read these notes can say the same thing!] + +With these follies mingled sweet delusions, which I loved so well I would +not outgrow them, even when it required a voluntary effort to put a +momentary trust in them. Here is one which I cannot help telling you. + +The firing of the great guns at the Navy-yard is easily heard at the place +where I was born and lived. "There is a ship of war come in," they used to +say, when they heard them. Of course, I supposed that such vessels came in +unexpectedly, after indefinite years of absence,--suddenly as falling +stones; and that the great guns roared in their astonishment and delight +at the sight of the old warship splitting the bay with her cutwater. Now, +the sloop-of-war the Wasp, Captain Blakely, after gloriously capturing the +Reindeer and the Avon, had disappeared from the face of the ocean, and was +supposed to be lost. But there was no proof of it, and, of course, for a +time, hopes were entertained that she might be heard from. Long after the +last real chance had utterly vanished, I pleased myself with the fond +illusion that somewhere on the waste of waters she was still floating, and +there were _years_ during which I never heard the sound of the great guns +booming inland from the Navy-yard without saying to myself, "The Wasp has +come!" and almost thinking I could see her, as she rolled in, crumpling +the water before her, weather-beaten, barnacled, with shattered spars and +threadbare canvas, welcomed by the shouts and tears of thousands. This was +one of those dreams that I nursed and never told. Let me make a clean +breast of it now, and say, that, so late as to have outgrown childhood, +perhaps to have got far on towards manhood, when the roar of the cannon +has struck suddenly on my ear, I have started with a thrill of vague +expectation and tremulous delight, and the long-unspoken words have +articulated themselves in the mind's dumb whisper, _The Wasp has come!_ + +----Yes, children believe plenty of queer things. I suppose all of you +have had the pocket-book fever when you were little?--What do I mean? Why, +ripping up old pocket-books in the firm belief that bank-bills to an +immense amount were hidden in them.--So, too, you must all remember some +splendid unfulfilled promise of somebody or other, which fed you with +hopes perhaps for years, and which left a blank in your life which nothing +has ever filled up.--O.T. quitted our household carrying with him the +passionate regrets of the more youthful members. He was an ingenious +youngster; wrote wonderful copies, and carved the two initials given above +with great skill on all available surfaces. I thought, by the way, they +were all gone; but the other day I found them on a certain door which I +will show you some time. How it surprised me to find them so near the +ground! I had thought the boy of no trivial dimensions. Well, O.T. when he +went, made a solemn promise to two of us. I was to have a ship, and the +other a mar_tin_-house (last syllable pronounced as in the word _tin_). +Neither ever came; but, oh, how many and many a time I have stolen to the +corner,--the cars pass close by it at this time,--and looked up that long +avenue, thinking that he must be coming now, almost sure, as I turned to +look northward, that there he would be, trudging toward me, the ship in +one hand and the mar_tin_-house in the other! + +[You must not suppose that all I am going to say, as well as all I have +said, was told to the whole company. The young fellow whom they call John +was in the yard, sitting on a barrel and smoking a cheroot, the fumes of +which came in, not ungrateful, through the open window. The divinity- +student disappeared in the midst of our talk. The poor relation in black +bombazine, who looked and moved as if all her articulations were elbow- +joints, had gone off to her chamber, after waiting with a look of soul- +subduing decorum at the foot of the stairs until one of the male sort had +passed her and ascended into the upper regions. This is a famous point of +etiquette in our boarding-house; in fact, between ourselves, they make +such an awful fuss about it, that I, for one, had a great deal rather have +them simple enough not to think of such matters at all. Our land-lady's +daughter said, the other evening, that she was going to "retire"; where- +upon the young fellow called John took up a lamp and insisted on lighting +her to the foot of the staircase. Nothing would induce her to pass by him, +until the schoolmistress, saying in good plain English that it was her +bed-time, walked straight by them both, not seeming to trouble herself +about either of them. + +I have been led away from what I meant the portion included in these +brackets to inform my readers about. I say, then, most of the boarders had +left the table about the time when I began telling some of these secrets +of mine, all of them, in fact, but the old gentleman opposite and the +schoolmistress. I understand why a young woman should like to hear these +homely but genuine experiences of early life, which are, as I have said, +the little brown seeds of what may yet grow to be poems with leaves of +azure and gold; but when the old gentleman pushed up his chair nearer to +me, and slanted round his best ear, and once, when I was speaking of some +trifling, tender reminiscence, drew a long breath, with such a tremor in +it that a little more and it would have been a sob, why, then I felt there +must be something of nature in them which redeemed their seeming +insignificance. Tell me, man or woman with whom I am whispering, have you +not a small store of recollections, such as these I am uncovering, buried +beneath the dead leaves of many summers, perhaps under the unmelting snows +of fast-returning winters,--a few such recollections, which, if you +should write them all out, would be swept into some careless editor's +drawer, and might cost a scanty half-hour's lazy reading to his +subscribers,--and yet, if Death should cheat you of them, you would not +know yourself in eternity?] + +----I made three acquaintances at a +very early period of life, my introduction to whom was never forgotten. +The first unequivocal act of wrong that has left its trace in my memory +was this: it was refusing a small favor asked of me,--nothing more than +telling what had happened at school one morning. No matter who asked it; +but there were circumstances which saddened and awed me. I had no heart to +speak;--I faltered some miserable, perhaps petulant excuse, stole away, +and the first battle of life was lost. What remorse followed I need not +tell. Then and there; to the best of my knowledge, I first consciously +took Sin by the hand and turned my back on Duty. Time has led me to look +upon my offence more leniently; I do not believe it or any other childish +wrong is infinite, as some have pretended, but infinitely finite. Yet, oh +if I had but won that battle! + +The great Destroyer, whose awful shadow it was that had silenced me, came +near me,--but never, so as to be distinctly seen and remembered, during my +tender years. There flits dimly before me the image of a little girl, +whose name even I have forgotten, a schoolmate, whom we missed one day, +and were told that she had died. But what death was I never had any very +distinct idea, until one day I climbed the low stone wall of the old +burial-ground and mingled with a group that were looking into a very deep, +long, narrow hole, dug down through the green sod, down through the brown +loam, down through the yellow gravel, and there at the bottom was an +oblong red box, and a still, sharp, white face of a young man seen through +an opening at one end of it. When the lid was closed, and the gravel and +stones rattled down pell-mell, and the woman in black, who was crying and +wringing her hands, went off with the other mourners, and left him, then I +felt that I had seen Death, and should never forget him. + +One other acquaintance I made at an earlier period of life than the habit +of romancers authorizes.--Love, of course.--She was a famous beauty +afterwards.--I am satisfied that many children rehearse their parts in the +drama of life before they have shed all their milk-teeth.--I think I won't +tell the story of the golden blonde.--I suppose everybody has had his +childish fancies; but sometimes they are passionate impulses, which +anticipate all the tremulous emotions belonging to a later period. Most +children remember seeing and adoring an angel before they were a dozen +years old. + +[The old gentleman had left his chair opposite and taken a seat by the +schoolmistress and myself, a little way from the table.--It's true, it's +true,--said the old gentleman.--He took hold of a steel watch-chain, which +carried a large, square gold key at one end and was supposed to have some +kind of timekeeper at the other. With some trouble he dragged up an +ancient-looking, thick, silver, bull's-eye watch. He looked at it for a +moment,--hesitated,--touched the inner corner of his right eye with the +pulp of his middle finger,--looked at the face of the watch,--said it was +getting into the forenoon,--then opened the watch and handed me the loose +outside case without a word.--The watch-paper had been pink once, and had +a faint tinge still, as if all its tender life had not yet quite faded +out. Two little birds, a flower, and, in small school-girl letters, a +date,--17...--no matter.--Before I was thirteen years old,--said the old +gentleman.--I don't know what was in that young schoolmistress's head, nor +why she should have done it; but she took out the watch-paper and put it +softly to her lips, as if she were kissing the poor thing that made it so +long ago. The old gentleman took the watch-paper carefully from her, +replaced it, turned away and walked out, holding the watch in his hand. I +saw him pass the window a moment after with that foolish white hat on his +head; he couldn't have been thinking what he was about when he put it on. +So the schoolmistress and I were left alone. I drew my chair a shade +nearer to her, and continued.] + +And since I am talking of early recollections, I don't know why I +shouldn't mention some others that still cling to me,--not that you will +attach any very particular meaning to these same images so full of +significance to me, but that you will find something parallel to them in +your own memory. You remember, perhaps, what I said one day about smells. +There were certain _sounds_ also which had a mysterious suggestiveness to +me,--not so intense, perhaps, as that connected with the other sense, but +yet peculiar, and never to be forgotten. + +The first was the creaking of the wood-sleds, bringing their loads of oak +and walnut from the country, as the slow-swinging oxen trailed them along +over the complaining snow, in the cold, brown light of early morning. +Lying in bed and listening to their dreary music had a pleasure in it akin +to that which Lucretius describes in witnessing a ship toiling through the +waves while we sit at ease on shore, or that which Byron speaks of as to +be enjoyed in looking on at a battle by one "who hath no friend, no +brother there." + +There was another sound, in itself so sweet, and so connected with one of +those simple and curious superstitions of childhood of which I have +spoken, that I can never cease to cherish a sad sort of love for it.--Let +me tell the superstitious fancy first. The Puritan "Sabbath," as everybody +knows, began at "sundown" on Saturday evening. To such observance of it I +was born and bred. As the large, round disk of day declined, a stillness, +a solemnity, a somewhat melancholy hush came over us all. It was time for +work to cease, and for playthings to be put away. The world of active life +passed into the shadow of an eclipse, not to emerge until the sun should +sink again beneath the horizon. + +It was in this stillness of the world without and of the soul within that +the pulsating lullaby of the evening crickets used to make itself most +distinctly heard,--so that I well remember I used to think that the +purring of these little creatures, which mingled with the batrachian hymns +from the neighboring swamp, was peculiar to Saturday evenings. I don't +know that anything could give a clearer idea of the quieting and subduing +effect of the old habit of observance of what was considered holy time, +than this strange, childish fancy. + +Yes, and there was still another sound which mingled its solemn cadences +with the waking and sleeping dreams of my boyhood. It was heard only at +times,--a deep, muffled roar, which rose and fell, not loud, but vast,--a +whistling boy would have drowned it for his next neighbor, but it must +have been heard over the space of a hundred square miles. I used to wonder +what this might be. Could it be the roar of the thousand wheels and the +ten thousand footsteps jarring and tramping along the stones of the +neighboring city? That would be continuous; but this, as I have said, rose +and fell in regular rhythm. I remember being told, and I suppose this to +have been the true solution, that it was the sound of the waves, after a +high wind, breaking on the long beaches many miles distant. I should +really like to know whether any observing people living ten miles, more or +less, inland from long beaches,--in such a town, for instance, as +Cantabridge, in the eastern part of the Territory of the Massachusetts,-- +have ever observed any such sound, and whether it was rightly accounted +for as above. + +Mingling with these inarticulate sounds in the low murmur of memory, are +the echoes of certain voices I have heard at rare intervals. I grieve to +say it, but our people, I think, have not generally agreeable voices. The +marrowy organisms, with skins that shed water like the backs of ducks, +with smooth surfaces neatly padded beneath, and velvet linings to their +singing-pipes, are not so common among us as that other pattern of +humanity with angular outlines and plane surfaces, arid integuments, hair +like the fibrous covering of a cocoa-nut in gloss and suppleness as well +as color, and voices at once thin and strenuous,--acidulous enough to +produce effervescence with alkalis, and stridulous enough to sing duets +with the katydids. I think our conversational soprano, as sometimes +overheard in the cars, arising from a group of young persons, who may have +taken the train at one of our great industrial centres, for instance,-- +young persons of the female sex, we will say, who have bustled in full- +dressed, engaged in loud strident speech, and who, after free discussion, +have fixed on two or more double seats, which having secured, they proceed +to eat apples and hand round daguerreotypes,--I say, I think the +conversational soprano, heard under these circumstances, would not be +among the allurements the old Enemy would put in requisition, were he +getting up a new temptation of St. Anthony. + +There are sweet voices among us, we all know, and voices not musical, it +may be, to those who hear them for the first time, yet sweeter to us than +any we shall hear until we listen to some warbling angel in the overture +to that eternity of blissful harmonies we hope to enjoy.--But why should I +tell lies? If my friends love me, it is because I try to tell the truth. I +never heard but two voices in my life that frightened me by their +sweetness. + +----Frightened you?--said the school-mistress.--Yes, frightened me. They +made me feel as if there might be constituted a creature with such a chord +in her voice to some string in another's soul, that, if she but spoke, he +would leave all and follow her, though it were into the jaws of Erebus. +Our only chance to keep our wits is, that there are so few natural chords +between others' voices and this string in our souls, and that those which +at first may have jarred a little by and by come into harmony with it.-- +But I tell you this is no fiction. You may call the story of Ulysses and +the Sirens a fable, but what will you say to Mario and the poor lady who +followed him? + +----Whose were those two voices that bewitched me so?--They both belonged +to German women. One was a chambermaid, not otherwise fascinating. The key +of my room at a certain great hotel was missing, and this Teutonic maiden +was summoned to give information respecting it. The simple soul was +evidently not long from her mother-land, and spoke with sweet uncertainty +of dialect. But to hear her wonder and lament and suggest, with soft, +liquid inflexions, and low, sad murmurs, in tones as full of serious +tenderness for the fate of the lost key as if it had been a child +that had strayed from its mother, was so winning, that, had her features +and figure been as delicious as her accents,--if she had looked like the +marble Clytie, for instance,--why, all I can say is---- + +[The schoolmistress opened her eyes so wide, that I stopped short.] + +I was only going to say that I should have drowned myself. For Lake Erie +was close by, and it is so much better to accept asphyxia, which takes +only three minutes by the watch, than a _mesalliance_, that lasts fifty +years to begin with, and then passes along down the line of descent, +(breaking out in all manner of boorish manifestations of feature and +manner, which, if men were only as short-lived as horses, could be readily +traced back through the square-roots and the cube-roots of the family +stem, on which you have hung the armorial bearings of the De Champignons +or the De la Morues, until one came to beings that ate with knives and +said "Haow?") that no person of right feeling could have hesitated for a +single moment. + +The second of the ravishing voices I have heard was, as I have said, that +of another German woman.--I suppose I shall ruin myself by saying that +such a voice could not have come from any Americanized human being. + +----What was there in it?--said the schoolmistress,--and, upon my word, +her tones were so very musical, that I almost wished I had said three +voices instead of two, and not made the unpatriotic remark above +reported.--Oh, I said, it had so much _woman_ in it,--_muliebrity_, as +well as _femineity_;--no self-assertion, such as free suffrage introduces +into every word and movement; large, vigorous nature, running back to +those huge-limbed Germans of Tacitus, but subdued by the reverential +training and tuned by the kindly culture of fifty generations. Sharp +business habits, a lean soil, independence, enterprise, and east winds, +are not the best things for the larynx. Still, you hear noble voices among +us,--I have known families famous for them,--but ask the first person you +meet a question, and ten to one there is a hard, sharp, metallic, matter- +of-business clink in the accents of the answer, that produces the effect +of one of those bells which small trades-people connect with their shop- +doors, and which spring upon your ear with such vivacity, as you enter, +that your first impulse is to retire at once from the precincts. + +----Ah, but I must not forget that dear little child I saw and heard in a +French hospital. Between two and three years old. Fell out of her chair +and snapped both thigh-bones. Lying in bed, patient, gentle. Rough +students round her, some in white aprons, looking fearfully business-like; +but the child placid, perfectly still. I spoke to her, and the blessed +little creature answered me in a voice of such heavenly sweetness, with +that reedy thrill in it which you have heard in the thrush's even-song, +that I hear it at this moment, while I am writing, so many, many years +afterwards.--_C'est tout comme un serin_, said the French student at my +side. + +These are the voices which struck the key-note of my conceptions as to +what the sounds we are to hear in heaven will be, if we shall enter +through one of the twelve gates of pearl. There must be other things +besides aerolites that wander from their own spheres to ours; and when we +speak of celestial sweetness or beauty, we may be nearer the literal truth +than we dream. If mankind generally are the shipwrecked survivors of some +pre-Adamitic cataclysm, set adrift in these little open boats of humanity +to make one more trial to reach the shore,--as some grave theologians have +maintained,--if, in plain English, men are the ghosts of dead devils who +have "died into life," (to borrow an expression from Keats,) and walk the +earth in a suit of living rags that lasts three or four score summers,-- +why, there must have been a few good spirits sent to keep them company, +and these sweet voices I speak of must belong to them. + +----I wish you could once hear my sister's voice,--said the +schoolmistress. + +If it is like yours, it must be a pleasant one,--said I. + +I never thought mine was anything,--said the schoolmistress. + +How should you know?--said I.--People never hear their own voices,--any +more than they see their own faces. There is not even a looking-glass for +the voice. Of course, there is something audible to us when we speak; but +that something is not our own voice as it is known to all our +acquaintances. I think, if an image spoke to us in our own tones, we +should not know them in the least.--How pleasant it would be, if in +another state of being we could have shapes like our former selves for +playthings,--we standing outside or inside of them, as we liked, and they +being to us just what we used to be to others! + +----I wonder if there will be nothing like what we call "play," after our +earthly toys are broken,--said the schoolmistress. + +Hush,--said I,--what will the divinity-student say? + +[I thought she was hit, that time;--but the shot must have gone over her, +or on one side of her; she did not flinch.] + +Oh,--said the schoolmistress,--he must look out for my sister's heresies; +I am afraid he will be too busy with them to take care of mine. + +Do you mean to say,--said I,--that it is _your sister_ whom that +student---- + +[The young fellow commonly known as John, who had been sitting on the +barrel, smoking, jumped off just then, kicked over the barrel, gave it a +push with his foot that set it rolling, and stuck his saucy-looking face +in at the window so as to cut my question off in the middle; and the +schoolmistress leaving the room a few minutes afterwards, I did not have a +chance to finish it. + +The young fellow came in and sat down in a chair, putting his heels on the +top of another. + +Pooty girl,--said he. + +A fine young lady,--I replied. + +Keeps a fust-rate school, according to accounts,--said he,--teaches all +sorts of things,--Latin and Italian and music. Folks rich once,--smashed +up. She went right ahead as smart as if she'd been born to work. That's +the kind o' girl I go for. I'd marry her, only two or three other girls +would drown themselves, if I did. + +I think the above is the longest speech of this young fellow's which I +have put on record. I do not like to change his peculiar expressions, for +this is one of those cases in which the style is the man, as M. de Buffon +says. The fact is, the young fellow is a good-hearted creature enough, +only too fond of his jokes,--and if it were not for those heat-lightning +winks on one side of his face, I should not mind his fun much.] + +[Some days after this, when the company were together again, I talked a +little.] + +----I don't think I have a genuine hatred for anybody. I am well aware +that I differ herein from the sturdy English moralist and the stout +American tragedian. I don't deny that I hate _the sight_ of certain +people; but the qualities which make me tend to hate the man himself are +such as I am so much disposed to pity, that, except under immediate +aggravation, I feel kindly enough to the worst of them. It is such a sad +thing to be born a sneaking fellow, so much worse than to inherit a hump- +back or a couple of club-feet, that I sometimes feel as if we ought to +love the crippled souls, if I may use this expression, with a certain +tenderness which we need not waste on noble natures. One who is born with +such congenital incapacity that nothing can make a gentleman of him is +entitled, not to our wrath, but to our profoundest sympathy. But as we +cannot help hating the sight of these people, just as we do that of +physical deformities, we gradually eliminate them from our society,--we +love them, but open the window and let them go. By the time decent people +reach middle age they have weeded their circle pretty well of these +unfortunates, unless they have a taste for such animals; in which case, no +matter what their position may be, there is something, you may be sure, in +their natures akin to that of their wretched parasites. + +----The divinity-student wished to know what I thought of affinities, as +well as of antipathies; did I believe in love at first sight? + +Sir,--said I,--all men love all women. That is the _prima-facie_ aspect of +the case. The Court of Nature assumes the law to be, that all men do so; +and the individual man is bound to show cause why he does not love any +particular woman. A man, says one of my old black-letter law-books, may +show divers good reasons, as thus; He hath not seen the person named in +the indictment; she is of tender age, or the reverse of that; she hath +certain personal disqualifications,--as, for instance, she is a +blackamoor, or hath an ill-favored countenance; or, his capacity of loving +being limited, his affections are engrossed by a previous comer; and so of +other conditions. Not the less is it true that he is bound by duty and +inclined by nature to love each and every woman. Therefore it is that each +woman virtually summons every man to show cause why he doth not love her. +This is not by written document, or direct speech, for the most part, but +by certain signs of silk, gold, and other materials, which say to all +men,--Look on me and love, as in duty bound. Then the man pleadeth his +special incapacity, whatsoever that may be,--as, for instance, +impecuniosity, or that he hath one or many wives in his household, or that +he is of mean figure, or small capacity; of which reasons it may be noted, +that the first is, according to late decisions, of chiefest authority.--So +far the old law-book. But there is a note from an older authority, saying +that every woman doth also love each and every man, except there be some +good reason to the contrary; and a very observing friend of mine, a young +unmarried clergyman, tells me, that, so far as his experience goes, he has +reason to think the ancient author had fact to justify his statement. + +I'll tell you how it is with the pictures of women we fall in love with at +first sight. + +----We a'n't talking about pictures,--said the landlady's daughter,-- +we're talking about women. + +I understood that we were speaking of love at sight,--I remarked, mildly. +--Now, as all a man knows about a woman whom he looks at is just what a +picture as big as a copper, or a "nickel," rather, at the bottom of his +eye can teach him, I think I am right in saying we are talking about the +pictures of women.--Well, now, the reason why a man is not desperately in +love with ten thousand women at once is just that which prevents all our +portraits being distinctly seen upon that wall. They all _are_ painted +there by reflection from our faces, but because _all_ of them are painted +on each spot, and each on the same surface, and many other objects at the +same time, no one is seen as a picture. But darken a chamber and let a +single pencil of rays in through a key-hole, then you have a picture on +the wall. We never fall in love with a woman in distinction from women, +until we can get an image of her through a pin-hole; and then we can see +nothing else, and nobody but ourselves can see the image in our mental +camera-obscura. + +----My friend, the Poet, tells me he has to leave town whenever the +anniversaries come round. + +What's the difficulty?--Why, they all want him to get up and make +speeches, or songs, or toasts; which is just the very thing he doesn't +want to do. He is an old story, he says, and hates to show on these +occasions. But they tease him, and coax him, and can't do without him, and +feel all over his poor weak head until they get their fingers on the +_fontanelle_, (the Professor will tell you what this means,--he says the +one at the top of the head always remains open in poets,) until, by gentle +pressure on that soft pulsating spot, they stupefy him to the point of +acquiescence. + +There are times, though, he says, when it is a pleasure, before going to +some agreeable meeting, to rush out into one's garden and clutch up a +handful of what grows there,--weeds and violets together,--not cutting +them off, but pulling them up by the roots with the brown earth they grow +in sticking to them. That's his idea of a post-prandial performance. Look +here, now. These verses I am going to read you, he tells me, were pulled +up by the roots just in that way, the other day.--Beautiful entertainment, +--names there on the plates that flow from all English-speaking tongues as +familiarly as _and_ or _the_; entertainers known wherever good poetry and +fair title-pages are held in esteem; guest a kind-hearted, modest, genial, +hopeful poet, who sings to the hearts of his countrymen, the British +people, the songs of good cheer which the better days to come, as all +honest souls trust and believe, will turn into the prose of common life. +My friend, the Poet, says you must not read such a string of verses too +literally. If he trimmed it nicely below, you wouldn't see the roots, he +says, and he likes to keep them, and a little of the soil clinging to +them. + +This is the farewell my friend, the Poet, read to his and our friend, the +Poet:-- + + +A GOOD TIME GOING! + +Brave singer of the coming time, + Sweet minstrel of the joyous present, +Crowned with the noblest wreath of rhyme, + The holly-leaf of Ayrshire's peasant, +Good-bye! Good-bye!--Our hearts and hands, + Our lips in honest Saxon phrases, +Cry, God be with him, till he stands + His feet among the English daisies! + +'Tis here we part;--for other eyes + The busy deck, the fluttering streamer, +The dripping arms that plunge and rise, + The waves in foam, the ship in tremor, +The kerchiefs waving from the pier, + The cloudy pillar gliding o'er him, +The deep blue desert, lone and drear, + With heaven above and home before him! + +His home!--the Western giant smiles, + And twirls the spotty globe to find it;-- +This little speck the British Isles? + 'Tis but a freckle,--never mind it!-- +He laughs, and all his prairies roll, + Each gurgling cataract roars and chuckles, +And ridges stretched from pole to pole + Heave till they crack their iron knuckles! + +But Memory blushes at the sneer, + And Honor turns with frown defiant, +And Freedom, leaning on her spear, + Laughs louder than the laughing giant:-- +"An islet is a world," she said, + "When glory with its dust has blended, +And Britain keeps her noble dead + Till earth and seas and skies are rended!" + +Beneath each swinging forest-bough + Some arm as stout in death reposes,-- +From wave-washed foot to heaven-kissed brow + Her valor's life-blood runs in roses; +Nay, let our brothers of the West + Write smiling in their florid pages, +One-half her soil has walked the rest + In poets, heroes, martyrs, sages! + +Hugged in the clinging billow's clasp, + From sea-weed fringe to mountain heather, +The British oak with rooted grasp + Her slender handful holds together;-- +With cliffs of white and bowers of green, + And Ocean narrowing to caress her, +And hills and threaded streams between,-- + Our little mother isle, God bless her! + +In earth's broad temple where we stand, + Fanned by the eastern gales that brought us, +We hold the missal in our hand, + Bright with the lines our Mother taught us; +Where'er its blazoned page betrays + The glistening links of gilded fetters, +Behold, the half-turned leaf displays + Her rubric stained in crimson letters! + +Enough! To speed a parting friend + 'Tis vain alike to speak and listen;-- +Yet stay,--these feeble accents blend + With rays of light from eyes that glisten. +Good-bye! once more,--and kindly tell + In words of peace the young world's story,-- +And say, besides,--we love too well + Our mother's soil, our fathers' glory! + + +When my friend, the Professor, found that my friend, the Poet, had been +coming out in this full-blown style, he got a little excited, as you may +have seen a canary, sometimes, when another strikes up. The Professor says +he knows he can lecture, and thinks he can write verses. At any rate, he +has often tried, and now he was determined to try again. So when some +professional friends of his called him up, one day, after a feast of +reason and a regular "freshet" of soul which had lasted two or three +hours, he read them these verses. He introduced them with a few remarks, +he told me, of which the only one he remembered was this: that he had +rather write a single line which one among them should think worth +remembering than set them all laughing with a string of epigrams. It was +all right, I don't doubt; at any rate, that was his fancy then, and +perhaps another time he may be obstinately hilarious; however, it may be +that he is growing graver, for time is a fact so long as clocks and +watches continue to go, and a cat can't be a kitten always, as the old +gentleman opposite said the other day. + +You must listen to this seriously, for I think the Professor was very much +in earnest when he wrote it. + + +THE TWO ARMIES. + +As Life's unending column pours, + Two marshalled hosts are seen,-- +Two armies on the trampled shores + That Death flows black between. + +One marches to the drum-beat's roll, + The wide-mouthed clarion's bray, +And bears upon a crimson scroll, + "Our glory is to slay." + +One moves in silence by the stream, + With sad, yet watchful eyes, +Calm as the patient planet's gleam + That walks the clouded skies. + +Along its front no sabres shine, + No blood-red pennons wave; +Its banner bears the single line, + "Our duty is to save." + +For those no death-bed's lingering shade; + At Honor's trumpet-call, +With knitted brow and lifted blade + In Glory's arms they fall. + +For these no clashing falchions bright, + No stirring battle-cry; +The bloodless stabber calls by night,-- + Each answers, "Here am I!" + +For those the sculptor's laurelled bust, + The builder's marble piles, +The anthems pealing o'er their dust + Through long cathedral aisles. + +For these the blossom-sprinkled turf + That floods the lonely graves, +When Spring rolls in her sea-green surf + In flowery-foaming waves. + +Two paths lead upward from below, + And angels wait above, +Who count each burning life-drop's flow, + Each falling tear of Love. + +Though from the Hero's bleeding breast + Her pulses Freedom drew, +Though the white lilies in her crest + Sprang from that scarlet dew,-- + +While Valor's haughty champions wait + Till all their scars are shown, +Love walks unchallenged through the gate + To sit beside the Throne! + + + + +THE AMERICAN TRACT SOCIETY. + + +There was no apologue more popular in the Middle Ages than that of the +hermit, who, musing on the wickedness and tyranny of those whom the +inscrutable wisdom of Providence had intrusted with the government of the +world, fell asleep and awoke to find himself the very monarch whose abject +life and capricious violence had furnished the subject of his moralizing. +Endowed with irresponsible power, tempted by passions whose existence in +himself he had never suspected, and betrayed by the political necessities +of his position, he became gradually guilty of all the crimes and the +luxury which had seemed so hideous to him in his hermitage over a dish of +water-cresses. + +The American Tract Society from small beginnings has risen to be the +dispenser of a yearly revenue of nearly half a million. It has become a +great establishment, with a traditional policy, with the distrust of +change and the dislike of disturbing questions (especially of such +as would lessen its revenues) natural to great establishments. It had been +poor and weak; it has become rich and powerful. The hermit has become +king. + +If the pious men who founded the American Tract Society had been told that +within forty years they would be watchful of their publications, lest, by +inadvertence, anything disrespectful might be spoken of the African Slave- +trade,--that they would consider it an ample equivalent for compulsory +dumbness on the vices of Slavery, that their colporteurs could awaken the +minds of Southern brethren to the horrors of St. Bartholomew,--that they +would hold their peace about the body of Cuffee dancing to the music of +the cart-whip, provided only they could save the soul of Sambo alive by +presenting him a pamphlet, which he could not read, on the depravity of +the double-shuffle,--that they would consent to be fellow-members in the +Tract Society with him who sold their fellow-members in Christ on the +auction-block, if he agreed with them in condemning Transubstantiation, +(and it would not be difficult for a gentleman who ignored the real +presence of God in his brother man to deny it in the sacramental wafer,)-- +if those excellent men had been told this, they would have shrunk in +horror, and exclaimed, "Are thy servants dogs, that they should do these +things?" + +Yet this is precisely the present position of the Society. + +There are two ways of evading the responsibility of such inconsistency. +The first is by an appeal to the Society's Constitution, and by claiming +to interpret it strictly in accordance with the rules of law as applied to +contracts, whether between individuals or States. The second is by denying +that Slavery is opposed to the genius of Christianity, and that any moral +wrongs are the necessary results of it. We will not be so unjust to the +Society as to suppose that any of its members would rely on this latter +plea, and shall therefore confine ourselves to a brief consideration of +the other. + +In order that the same rules of interpretation should be considered +applicable to the Constitution of the Society and to that of the United +States, we must attribute to the former a solemnity and importance which +involve a palpable absurdity. To claim for it the verbal accuracy and the +legal wariness of a mere contract is equally at war with common sense and +the facts of the case; and even were it not so, the party to a bond who +should attempt to escape its ethical obligation by a legal quibble of +construction would be put in Coventry by all honest men. In point of fact, +the Constitution was simply the minutes of an agreement among certain +gentlemen, to define the limits within which they would accept trust- +funds, and the objects for which they should expend them. + +But if we accept the alternative offered by the advocates of strict +construction, we shall not find that their case is strengthened. Claiming +that where the meaning of an instrument is doubtful, it should be +interpreted according to the contemporary understanding of its framers, +they argue that it would be absurd to suppose that gentlemen from the +Southern States would have united to form a society that included in its +objects any discussion of the moral duties arising from the institution of +Slavery. Admitting the first part of their proposition, we deny the +conclusion they seek to draw from it. They are guilty of a glaring +anachronism in assuming the same opinions and prejudices to have existed +in 1825 which are undoubtedly influential in 1858. The Antislavery +agitation did not begin until 1831, and the debates in the Virginia +Convention prove conclusively that six years after the foundation of the +Tract Society, the leading men in that State, men whose minds had been +trained and whose characters had been tempered in that school of action +and experience which was open to all during the heroic period of our +history, had not yet suffered such distortion of the intellect through +passion, and such deadening of the conscience through interest, as would +have prevented their discussing either the moral or the political aspects +of Slavery, and precluded them from uniting in any effort to make the +relation between master and slave less demoralizing to the one and less +imbruting to the other. + +Again, it is claimed that the words of the Constitution are conclusive, +and that the declaration that the publications of the Society shall be +such as are "satisfactory to all Evangelical Christians" forbids by +implication the issuing of any tract which could possibly offend the +brethren in Slave States. The Society, it is argued, can publish only on +topics about which all Evangelical Christians are agreed, and must, +therefore, avoid everything in which the question of politics is involved. +But what are the facts about matters other than Slavery? Tracts have been +issued and circulated in which Dancing is condemned as sinful; are all +Evangelical Christians agreed about this? On the Temperance question; +against Catholicism;--have these topics never entered into our politics? +The simple truth is, that Slavery is the only subject about which the +Publishing Committee have felt Constitutional scruples. Till this question +arose, they were like me in perfect health, never suspecting that they had +any constitution at all; but now, like hypochondriacs, they feel it in +every pore, at the least breath from the eastward. + +If a strict construction of the words "all Evangelical Christians" be +insisted on, we are at a loss to see where the Committee could draw the +dividing line between what might be offensive and what allowable. The +Society publish tracts in which the study of the Scriptures is enforced +and their denial to the laity by Romanists assailed. But throughout the +South it is criminal to teach a slave to read; throughout the South, no +book could be distributed among the servile population more incendiary +than the Bible, if they could only read it. Will not our Southern brethren +take alarm? The Society is reduced to the dilemma of either denying that +the African has a soul to be saved, or of consenting to the terrible +mockery of assuring him that the way of life is to be found only by +searching a book which he is forbidden to open. + +If we carry out this doctrine of strict construction to its legitimate +results, we shall find that it involves a logical absurdity. What is the +number of men whose outraged sensibilities may claim the suppression of a +tract? Is the _taboo_ of a thousand valid? Of a hundred? Of ten? Or are +tracts to be distributed only to those who will find their doctrine +agreeable, and are the Society's colporteurs to be instructed that a +Temperance essay is the proper thing for a total-abstinent infidel, and a +sermon on the Atonement for a distilling deacon? If the aim of the Society +be only to convert men from sins they have no mind to, and to convince +them of errors to which they have no temptation, they might as well be +spending their money to persuade schoolmasters that two and two make four, +or mathematicians that there cannot be two obtuse angles in a triangle. If +this be their notion of the way in which the gospel is to be preached, we +do not wonder that they have found it necessary to print a tract upon the +impropriety of sleeping in church. + +But the Society are concluded by their own action; for in 1857 they +unanimously adopted the following resolution: "That those moral duties +which grow out of the existence of Slavery, as well as those moral evils +and vices which it is known to promote, and which are condemned in +Scripture, and so much deplored by Evangelical Christians, undoubtedly do +fall within the province of this Society, and can and ought to be +discussed in a fraternal and Christian spirit." The Society saw clearly +that it was impossible to draw a Mason and Dixon's line in the world of +ethics, to divide Duty by a parallel of latitude. The only line which +Christ drew is that which parts the sheep from the goats, that great +horizon-line of the moral nature of man which is the boundary between +light and darkness. The Society, by yielding (as they have done in 1858) +to what are pleasantly called the "objections" of the South, (objections +of so forcible a nature that we are told the colporteurs were "forced to +flee,") virtually exclude the black man, if born to the southward of a +certain arbitrary line, from the operation of God's providence, and +thereby do as great a wrong to the Creator as the Episcopal Church did to +the artist when they published Ary Scheffer's _Christus Consolator_ with +the figure of the slave left out. + +The Society is not asked to disseminate antislavery doctrines, but simply +to be even-handed between master and slave, and, since they have +recommended Sambo and Toney to be obedient to Mr. Legree, to remind him in +turn that he also has duties toward the bodies and souls of his bondmen. +But we are told that the time has not yet arrived, that at present the +ears of our Southern brethren are closed against all appeals, that God in +his good time will turn their hearts, and that then, and not till then, +will be the fitting occasion to do something in the premises. But if the +Society is to await this golden opportunity with such exemplary patience +in one case, why not in all? If it is to decline any attempt at converting +the sinner till after God has converted him, will there be any special +necessity for a tract society at all? Will it not be a little +presumptuous, as well as superfluous, to undertake the doing over again of +what He has already done? We fear that the studies of Blackstone, upon +which the gentlemen who argue thus have entered in order to fit themselves +for the legal and constitutional argument of the question, have confused +their minds, and that they are misled by some fancied analogy between a +tract and an action of trover, and conceive that the one, like the other, +cannot be employed till after an actual conversion has taken place. + +The resolutions reported by the Special Committee at the annual meeting of +1857, drawn up with great caution and with a sincere desire to make whole +the breach in the Society, have had the usual fate of all attempts to +reconcile incompatibilities by compromise. They express confidence in the +Publishing Committee, and at the same time impliedly condemn them by +recommending them to do precisely what they had all along scrupulously +avoided doing. The result was just what might have been expected. Both +parties among the Northern members of the Society, those who approved the +former action of the Publishing Committee, and those who approved the new +policy recommended in the resolutions, those who favored silence and those +who favored speech on the subject of Slavery, claimed the victory, while +the Southern brethren, as usual, refused to be satisfied with anything +short of unconditional submission. The word Compromise, as far as Slavery +is concerned, has always been of fatal augury. The concessions of the +South have been like the "With all my worldly goods I thee endow" of a +bankrupt bridegroom, who thereby generously bestows all his debts upon his +wife, and as a small return for his magnanimity consents to accept all her +personal and a life estate in all her real property. The South is willing +that the Tract Society should expend its money to convince the slave that +he has a soul to be saved so far as he is obedient to his master, but not +to persuade the master that he has a soul to undergo a very different +process so far as he is unmerciful to his slave. + +We Americans are very fond of this glue of compromise. Like so many quack +cements, it is advertised to make the mended parts of the vessel stronger +than those which have never been broken, but, like them, it will not stand +hot water,--and as the question of Slavery is sure to plunge all who +approach it, even with the best intentions, into that fatal element, the +patched-up brotherhood, which but yesterday was warranted to be better +than new, falls once more into a heap of incoherent fragments. The last +trial of the virtues of the Patent Redintegrator by the Special Committee +of the Tract Society has ended like all the rest, and as all attempts to +buy peace at too dear a rate must end. Peace is an excellent thing, but +principle and pluck are better; and the man who sacrifices them to gain it +finds at last that he has crouched under the Caudine yoke to purchase only +a contemptuous toleration that leaves him at war with his own self-respect +and the invincible forces of his higher nature. + +But the peace which Christ promised to his followers was not of this +world; the good gift he brought them was not peace, but a sword. It was no +sword of territorial conquest, but that flaming blade of conscience and +self-conviction which lightened between our first parents and their lost +Eden,--that sword of the Spirit that searcheth all things,--which severs +one by one the ties of passion, of interest, of self-pride, that bind the +soul to earth,--whose implacable edge may divide a man from family, from +friends, from whatever is nearest and dearest,--and which hovers before +him like the air-drawn dagger of Macbeth, beckoning him, not to crime, but +to the legitimate royalties of self-denial and self-sacrifice, to the +freedom which is won only by surrender of the will. Christianity has never +been concession, never peace; it is continual aggression; one province of +wrong conquered, its pioneers are already in the heart of another. The +mile-stones of its onward march down the ages have not been monuments of +material power, but the blackened stakes of martyrs, trophies of +individual fidelity to conviction. For it is the only religion which is +superior to all endowment, to all authority,--which has a bishopric and a +cathedral wherever a single human soul has surrendered itself to God. That +very spirit of doubt, inquiry, and fanaticism for private judgment, with +which Romanists reproach Protestantism, is its stamp and token of +authenticity,--the seal of Christ, and not of the Fisherman. + +We do not wonder at the division which has taken place in the Tract +Society, nor do we regret it. The ideal life of a Christian is possible to +very few, but we naturally look for a nearer approach to it in those who +associate together to disseminate the doctrines which they believe to be +its formative essentials, and there is nothing which the enemies of +religion seize on so gladly as any inconsistency between the conduct and +the professions of such persons. Though utterly indifferent to the wrongs +of the slave, the scoffer would not fail to remark upon the hollowness of +a Christianity which was horror-stricken at a dance or a Sunday-drive, +while it was blandly silent about the separation of families, the putting +asunder whom God had joined, the selling Christian girls for Christian +harems, and the thousand horrors of a system which can lessen the agonies +it inflicts only by debasing the minds and souls of the race on whom it +inflicts them. Is your Christianity, then, he would say, a respecter of +persons, and does it condone the sin because the sinner can contribute to +your coffers? Was there ever a Simony like this,--that does not sell, but +withholds, the gift of God for a price? + +The world naturally holds the Society to a stricter accountability than it +would insist upon in ordinary cases. Were they only a club of gentlemen +associated for their own amusement, it would be very natural and proper +that they should exclude all questions which would introduce controversy, +and that, however individually interested in certain reforms, they should +not force them upon others who would consider them a bore. But a society +of professing Christians, united for the express purpose of carrying both +the theory and the practice of the New Testament into every household in +the land, has voluntarily subjected itself to a graver responsibility, and +renounced all title to fall back upon any reserved right of personal +comfort or convenience. + +We say, then, that we are glad to see this division in the Tract Society, +--not glad because of the division, but because it has sprung from an +earnest effort to relieve the Society of a reproach which was not only +impairing its usefulness, but doing an injury to the cause of truth and +sincerity everywhere. We have no desire to impugn the motives of those who +consider themselves conservative members of the Society; we believe them +to be honest in their convictions, or their want of them; but we think +they have mistaken notions as to what conservatism is, and that they are +wrong in supposing it to consist in refusing to wipe away the film on +their spectacle-glasses which prevents their seeing the handwriting on the +wall, or in conserving reverently the barnacles on their ship's bottom and +the dry-rot in its knees. We yield to none of them in reverence for the +Past; it is there only that the imagination can find repose and seclusion; +there dwells that silent majority whose experience guides our action and +whose wisdom shapes our thought in spite of ourselves;--but it is not +length of days that can make evil reverend, nor persistence in +inconsistency that can give it the power or the claim of orderly +precedent. Wrong, though its title-deeds go back to the days of Sodom, is +by nature a thing of yesterday,--while the right, of which we became +conscious but an hour ago, is more ancient than the stars, and of the +essence of Heaven. If it were proposed to establish Slavery to-morrow, +should we have more patience with its patriarchal argument than with the +parallel claim of Mormonism? That Slavery is old is but its greater +condemnation; that we have tolerated it so long, the strongest plea for +our doing so no longer. There is one institution to which we owe our first +allegiance, one that is more sacred and venerable than any other,--the +soul and conscience of Man. + +What claim has Slavery to immunity from discussion? We are told that +discussion is dangerous. Dangerous to what? Truth invites it, courts the +point of the Ithuriel-spear, whose touch can but reveal more clearly the +grace and grandeur of her angelic proportions. The advocates of Slavery +have taken refuge in the last covert of desperate sophism, and affirm that +their institution is of Divine ordination, that its bases are laid in the +nature of man. Is anything, then, of God's contriving endangered by +inquiry? Was it the system of the universe, or the monks, that trembled at +the telescope of Galileo? Did the circulation of the firmament stop in +terror because Newton laid his daring finger on its pulse? But it is idle +to discuss a proposition so monstrous. There is no right of sanctuary for +a crime against humanity, and they who drag an unclean thing to the horns +of the altar bring it to vengeance and not to safety. + +Even granting that Slavery were all that its apologists assume it to be, +and that the relation of master and slave were of God's appointing, would +not its abuses be just the thing which it was the duty of Christian men to +protest against, and, as far as might be, to root out? Would our courts +feel themselves debarred from interfering to rescue a daughter from a +parent who wished to make merchandise of her purity, or a wife from a +husband who was brutal to her, by the plea that parental authority and +marriage were of Divine ordinance? Would a police-justice discharge a +drunkard who pleaded the patriarchal precedent of Noah? or would he not +rather give him another month in the House of Correction for his +impudence? + +The Antislavery question is not one which the Tract Society can exclude by +triumphant majorities, nor put to shame by a comparison of +respectabilities. Mixed though it has been with politics, it is in no +sense political, and springing naturally from the principles of that +religion which traces its human pedigree to a manger, and whose first +apostles were twelve poor men against the whole world, it can dispense +with numbers and earthly respect. The clergyman may ignore it in the +pulpit, but it confronts him in his study; the church-member, who has +suppressed it in parish-meeting, opens it with the pages of his Testament; +the merchant, who has shut it out of his house and his heart, finds it +lying in wait for him, a gaunt fugitive, in the hold of his ship; the +lawyer, who has declared that it is no concern of his, finds it thrust +upon him in the brief of the slave-hunter; the historian, who had +cautiously evaded it, stumbles over it at Bunker Hill. And why? Because it +is not political, but moral,--because it is not local, but national, +--because it is not a test of party, but of individual honesty and honor. +The wrong which we allow our nation to perpetrate we cannot localize, +if we would; we cannot hem it within the limits of Washington or Kansas; +sooner or later, it will force itself into the conscience and sit by the +hearthstone of every citizen. + +It is not partisanship, it is not fanaticism, that has forced this matter +of Anti-slavery upon the American people; it is the spirit of +Christianity, which appeals from prejudices and predilections to the moral +consciousness of the individual man; that spirit elastic as air, +penetrative as heat, invulnerable as sunshine, against which creed after +creed and institution after institution have measured their strength and +been confounded; that restless spirit which refuses to crystallize in any +sect or form, but persists, a Divinely-commissioned radical and +reconstructor, in trying every generation with a new dilemma between case +and interest on the one hand, and duty on the other. Shall it be said that +its kingdom is not of this world? In one sense, and that the highest, it +certainly is not; but just as certainly Christ never intended those words +to be used as a subterfuge by which to escape our responsibilities in the +life of business and politics. Let the cross, the sword, and the arena +answer, whether the world, that then was, so understood its first +preachers and apostles. Caesar and Flamen both instinctively dreaded it, +not because it aimed at riches or power, but because it strove to conquer +that other world in the moral nature of mankind, where it could establish +a throne against which wealth and force would be weak and contemptible. No +human device has ever prevailed against it, no array of majorities or +respectabilities; but neither Caesar nor Flamen ever conceived a scheme so +cunningly adapted to neutralize its power as that graceful compromise +which accepts it with the lip and denies it in the life, which marries it +at the altar and divorces it at the church-door. + + + + +NOTE TO THE CATACOMBS OF ROME. + + +In our first article on the Roman Catacombs we expressed the belief that +"a year was now hardly likely to pass without the discovery" of new +burial-places of the early Christians,--the fresh interest in Christian +archaeology leading to fresh explorations in the hollow soil of the +Campagna. A letter to us from Rome, of the 2lst of April, confirms the +justness of this expectation. We quote from it the following interesting +passage:-- + +"The excavations on the Via Appia Nuova, which I mentioned in a former +letter, prove very interesting, and have already resulted in most +important discoveries. The spot is at the second milestone outside of the +gate of St. John Lateran. The field is on the left of the road going +towards Albano, and in it are several brick tombs of beautiful fine work, +now or formerly used as dwellings or barns. You and I crossed the very +field on a certain New Year's Day, and lingered to admire the almost +unrivalled view of the Campagna, the mountains, and Rome, which it +affords. + +"The first discovery was an ancient basilica, satisfactorily ascertained +to be the one dedicated to St. Stephen, built by Santa Demetria,--the +first nun,--at the instigation of the pope, St. Leo the Great. [A.D. 440- +461.] Sig. Fortunati, who made the discovery and directs the excavations, +told me at great length how he was led to the investigation; but as he has +published this and much more in a pamphlet, which I shall send to you, I +will not repeat it here. + +"Twenty-two columns have been found, many of rare and beautiful marble, +one of _verde antico_, most superb, others of _breccia_ and of _cipollino +marino_, said to be rare, and certainly very beautiful. Forty bases and +over thirty capitals of various styles have also been found, as well as +architectural ornaments without number, many of them carved with Greek or +Roman crosses. The rare and superb fragments of marble show that there +must have been costly and beautiful linings and finish. There are also +numerous inscriptions of great interest, which connect this church with +illustrious families and famous martyrs. + +"Subsequently, portions of villas were found, with ruined baths, and +mosaics and frescoes, with various pieces of sculpture, some perfect and +of most excellent style. There is also a sarcophagus with bas-relief of a +Bacchic procession, remarkably fine. The government has bought all for the +Museum, and intends spending a large sum in building a basilica over the +remains of the old one, in honor of St. Stephen. + +"But the most remarkable discovery is an old Roman tomb, by far the finest +I have seen in its preservation and perfection. It is about eighteen feet +square, has been lined and paved with white marble, some of which still +remains. The lofty ceiling is covered with bas-reliefs in stucco, of +charming grace and spirit, representing various mythological subjects, in +square compartments united by light and elegant arabesques. They are +really of wonderful merit, and so perfectly preserved, so fresh, that they +seem as if done last year. A massive marble doorway, beautifully corniced, +gives entrance to this superb chamber, in which were found three huge +sarcophagi, containing the bones of nine bodies;--which bones are left to +lie exposed, because the bones of pagans! These sarcophagi are of splendid +workmanship, but, unhappily, broken by former barbarians. Present +barbarians (said to be Inglesi and Americani) have stolen two skulls, and +pick up everything not closely watched. Opposite to this chamber is +another, smaller and more modest in adornment, and by the side of this +descend two flights of steps in perfect repair. Many vases of colored +glass and two very handsome rings were found at the foot of these steps. +This tomb is supposed to be of about 160 of our era. + +"These stairways descend from the ancient Via Latina, which has been +excavated for some distance, and is found with wide sidewalks of stone +(lava) similar to the sidewalks in Pompeii. The narrow carriage-way is +deeply rutted, which makes one think that the old Romans had hard bumps to +contend with. + +"Another tomb with perfect stairway has been discovered, but it is much +more plain. Foundations of villas, and baths with leaden pipes in great +quantity, have been exposed. I hear to-day that the government has ordered +the excavation of a mile and a half of the old Via Latina in this +neighborhood, and much interesting discovery is anticipated." + +We will only add to our correspondent's account the fact that the Basilica +of St. Stephen had been sought for in vain previously to this discovery by +Signor Fortunati. The great explorer, Bosio, failed to find it, and +Aringhi, writing just two hundred years ago, says, "Formerly upon the Via +Latina stood the church erected with great pains in honor of the most +blessed Stephen, the first martyr, by Demetria, a woman of pristine piety; +of which the Bibliothecarius, in his account of Pope Leo the First, thus +makes mention: 'In these days, Demetria, the handmaid of God, made the +Basilica of St. Stephen on the Latin Way, at the third mile-stone, on her +estate:... which afterward, being decayed and near to ruin through the +long course of years, was restored by Pope Leo the Third.' Of this most +noble church, which was one of the chief monuments of the Christian +religion, as well as an ornament of the city of Rome, no vestige at this +day remains." + +It is remarkable that a church restored so late as the time of Leo III. +[A.D. 795-816] should have been so lost without being utterly destroyed, +and so buried under the slowly-accumulating soil of the Campagna, that the +very tradition of the existence of its remains should have disappeared, +and its discovery have been the result of scientific archaeeological +investigation. + +The disappearance and the forgetting of the Church of St. Alexander were +less remarkable, because of its far greater distance from the city, and +its comparative inconspicuousness and poverty. Scarcely a more striking +proof exists of the misery and lowness of Rome during many generations in +the Dark Ages than that she should thus have forgotten the very sites of +the churches which had stood around her walls, the outpost citadels of her +faith. + + + + +LITERARY NOTICES. + + +_The Aquarium: An Unveiling of the Wonders of the Deep Sea_. By P.H. +GOSSE. Second Edition, revised and enlarged. With Illustrations. London: +1866. + +_The Common Objects of the Seashore; including Hints for an Aquarium_. By +the REV. J.G. WOOD. With Illustrations. London: Routledge & Co. 1857. + +We trust that many of our readers, stimulated by the account of an +Aquarium which was given in our number for February, are proposing to set +one up for themselves. + +Let no one who has been to Barnum's Museum, to look at what the naming +advertisement elegantly and grammatically terms "an aquaria," fancy that +he has seen the beauty of the real aquarium. The sea will not show its +treasures in a quarter of an hour, or be made a sight of for a quarter of +a dollar. An aquarium is not to be exhausted in a day, but, if favorably +placed where it may have sufficient direct sunshine, and well stocked with +various creatures, day after day developes within it new beauties and +unexpected sights. It becomes like a secret cave in the ocean, where the +processes of Nature go on in wonderful and silent progression, and the coy +sea displays its rarer beauties of life, of color, and of form before the +watching eyes. Look at it on some clear day, when the sun is bright, and +see the broad leaves of ulva, their vivid green sparkling with the +brilliant bubbles of oxygen which float up to the surface like the bubbles +of Champagne; see the glades of the pink coralline, or the purple Iceland- +moss covered with its plum-like down, in the midst of which the +transparent bodies of the shrimps or the yellow or banded shells of the +sea-snails are lying half hid. See on the brown rock, whose surface is +covered with the softest growth, the white anemone stretching its crown of +delicate tentacles to the light; or the long winding case of the serpula, +from the end of which appear the purple, brown, or yellow feathers that +decorate the head of its timid occupant. Or watch the scallop with his +turquoise eyes; or the comic crabs, or the minnows playing through the +water, in and out of the recesses of the rocks or the thickets of the +seaweed. There is no end of the pleasant sights. And day after day the +creatures will grow more tame, the serpula will not dart back into his +case when you approach, nor the pecten close his beautiful shell as your +shadow passes over it. Moreover, the habits of the creatures grow more +entertaining as you become familiar with them, and even the dull oyster +begins at last to show some signs of individual character. + +And it is easy to have all this away from the seashore. The best tanks, so +far as we know, that are made in this country, are those of Mr. C.E. +Hammett, of Newport, Rhode Island. But the tank is of little importance, +if one cannot get the water, the seaweed, and the stock; and therefore Mr. +Hammett undertakes to supply these also. He will send, not the water +itself, but the salts obtained by evaporation from the quantity of water +necessary for each aquarium. These are to be dissolved in clear spring- +water, (previously boiled, to insure its containing no injurious living +matter,) and then the aquarium, having first had a bed of cleanly-washed +sand put upon its bottom for about an inch or an inch and a half in depth, +and this in turn covered with a thin layer of small pebbles,--though these +last are not essential,--is to be filled with it. Then the seaweed, which +is sent so packed as to preserve its freshness, is to be put in. It will +be attached to small bits of rock, and these should be supported by or +laid upon other pieces of stone, so raised as to secure a free passage for +the water about them, and so afford places of retreat for the animals. The +stock will be sent, if it is to go to any distance, in jars, and anemones, +crabs, shell-fish of various kinds, and many other creatures, will be +found among it. The seaweed should be a day or two in the tank before the +creatures are put into it. + +And now, having got the aquarium in order, comes the point how to keep it +in order,--how to keep the creatures alive, and how to prevent the water +from growing cloudy and thick. The main rule is to secure sunlight,--hot +enough to raise the water to a temperature above that of the outer air,-- +to remove all dirt and floating scum, and to furnish the tank on every +cloudy day with a supply of air and with motion by means of a syringe. The +creatures should never be fed in warm weather with any animal substance, +its decay being certain to corrupt the water. A little meal or a few +crumbs of bread may now and then be given; but even this is not necessary; +for Nature furnishes all the food that is needed, in the spores thrown off +by the seaweed, in the seaweed itself, whose growth is generally +sufficiently rapid to make up for the ravages committed upon it, and in +the host of infusoria constantly produced in the water. If any of the +creatures die, their bodies should be immediately removed,--though +sometimes the omnivorous crabs will do this work rapidly enough. As the +water evaporates, it should be filled up to its original level with fresh +spring-water,--the salts in it undergoing no diminution by evaporation. +If, suddenly, the water should grow thick, it should be taken from the +tank, a portion at a time, and filtered back into it slowly through +pounded charcoal, the process being repeated till the purity seems to be +returning, and at the same time the rocks and seaweed should be removed +and carefully washed in fresh water. If, however, the water should by any +ill chance grow tainted and emit a bad odor, nothing can be done to +restore it, and, unless it is at once changed, the creatures will die. To +meet such an emergency, which is of rare occurrence, it is well to have a +double quantity of the salts sent with the tank to secure a new supply of +water. But we have known aquariums that have kept in order for more than +a year with no change of the water, a supply of spring-water being put in +from time to time as we have directed; and at this moment, as we write, +there is an aquarium at our side which has been in active operation for +six months, and the water is as clear as it was the day it was put in. If, +spite of everything, the seawater fail, then try a fresh-water aquarium. +Use your tank for the pond instead of the ocean; and in the spotted newt, +the tortoise, the tadpole, the caddis-worm, and the thousand other +inhabitants of our inland ponds and brooks, with the weeds among which +they live, you will find as much entertainment as in watching the wonders +of the great sea. + +A camel's-hair brush, a bent spoon on a long handle, a sponge tied to a +stick, and one or two other instruments which use will suggest, are all +that are needed for keeping the sides of the tank free from growth or +removing obnoxious substances from its bottom. + +If, on receiving the animals, any of them should appear exhausted by the +journey, they may sometimes be revived by aerating the water in which they +are by means of a syringe. It should always be remembered, that, though +living in the water, they need a constant supply of air. And it would be +well, in getting an aquarium, to have the tank and the seaweeds sent a few +days in advance of the stock, so that on the arrival of the creatures they +may be at once transferred to their new abode. + +There are no American books upon the subject, and, in the present want of +them, the two whose names are given above are the best that can be +obtained. Mr. Gosse's is expensive, costing between four and five dollars. +"The Common Objects of the Seashore," to be got for a quarter of a dollar, +contains much accurate, unpretending, and pleasant information. + + +_The American Drawing-Book: a Manual for the Amateur, and a Basis of Study +for the Professional Artist_. Especially adapted to the Use of Public and +Private Schools, as well as Home Instruction. By J.G. CHAPMAN, N.A. New +York: J.S. Redfield. 4to. pp. 304. + +Drawing-books, in general, deserve to be put into the same category with +the numerous languages "without a master" which have deluded so many +impatient aspirants to knowledge by royal (and cheap) roads. A drawing- +book, at its very best, is only a partial and lame substitute for a +teacher, giving instruction empirically; so that, be it ever so correct in +principle, it must lack adaptation to the momentary and most pressing +wants of the pupil and to his particular frame of mind; it is too +Procrustean to be of any ultimate use to anybody, except in comparatively +unimportant matters. It is well enough for those who need only amusement +in their drawing, and whose highest idea of Art is copying prints and +pictures; but for those who want assistance from Art in order to the +better understanding of Nature, no man, be he ever so wise, can, by the +drawing-book plan, do much to smooth the way of study. + +All that another mind could do for us by way of teaching Art would be to +save us time,--first, by its experience, in anticipating our failures; +second, by its trained accuracy, to correct our errors of expression more +promptly than our afterthought would do it,--and to systematize our +perceptions for us by showing us the relative and comparative importance +of truths in Nature. In the first two respects, which are merely +practical, the drawing-book, if judiciously prepared, might do somewhat to +assist us; but in the last and most important, only the experienced and +thoughtful artist, standing with us before Nature, can give us further +insight into her system of expression. A good picture may do a little, but +it is Nature's own face we need to study, and that neither book nor +picture can very deeply interpret for our proper and peculiar perception. + +In the practical part, again, the drawing-book can give us no real +assistance in regard to color. And thus the efficacy of it is reduced to +the communication of methods of drawing in white and black. This Chapman's +book does to the best purpose possible under the circumstances, in what is +technically termed the right-line system of drawing,--that is, the +reduction of all forms to their approximate geometrical figures in order +to facilitate the measurements of the eye. Thus, it is easier by far to +determine the proportion which exists between the sides of a triangle +formed by the lines connecting the three principal points in any figure +than any curvilinear connections whatever. The application of the +rectilinear system consists in the use, as a basis of the drawing, of such +a series of triangles as shall at once show the exact relation of the +points of definition or expression to each other; but the successful +application of this depends much on the assistance of the trained eye and +hand of a master watching every step we make. + +When we leave this section of the "American Drawing-Book," we leave all +that is of practical value to the young artist. The prescription of any +particular mode of execution is always injurious, (if in any degree +effective,) for the reason that the student must not think of execution at +all, but simply what the form is which he wants to draw, and how he can +draw it most plainly and promptly. Decision of execution should always be +the result of complete knowledge of the thing to be drawn; if from any +other source, it will assuredly be only heedless scrawling, bad in +proportion as it is energetic and decided. + +The chapter on Perspective is full and well illustrated, and useful to +architectural or mechanical draughtsmen, may-be, but little so to artists. +There are, indeed, no laws of perspective which the careful draughtsman +from Nature need ever apply, for his eye will show him the tendency of +lines and the relative magnitude of bodies quicker than he can find them +by the application of the rules of perspective,--and with much better +result, since all application of science _directly_ to artistic work +endangers its poetic character, and almost invariably gives rise to a +hardness and formalism the reverse of artistic, leading the artist to +depend on what he knows ought to be rather than on what he really sees, a +tendency more to be deprecated than any want of correctness in drawing. + +The book contains chapters on artistic processes and technical matters +generally, making it a useful hand-book to amateurs; but all that is +really valuable to a young student of Art might be compressed into a very +few pages of this ponderous book. To follow its prescriptions _seriatim_ +would be to him a serious loss of time and heart. + + +_The New American Cyclopaedia_. A Popular Dictionary of General Knowledge, +Edited by GEORGE RIPLEY and CHAS. A. DANA. Vol. II. New York: D. Appleton +& Co. 8vo. + +We have spoken so fully of the purpose and general character of this work, +in noticing the first volume, that it is hardly necessary for us to speak +at length of the second. In a rapid glance at its contents, it appears +fully to bear out the promise of the first. We have noticed a few +omissions, and some mistakes of judgment. It is, perhaps, impossible to +preserve the gradation of reputations in such a work; but a zoologist must +be puzzled when he sees Von Baer, the great embryologist, who made a +classification of animals, founded on their development, which +substantially agrees with that of Cuvier, founded on their structure, +occupy about one tenth of the space devoted to Peter T. Barnum; however, +we suppose, that, as Barnum created new animals, he is a more wonderful +personage than Von Baer, who simply classified old ones. These occasional +omissions and disturbances of the scale of reputations are, however, more +than offset by the new information the editors have been able to +incorporate into most of their biographies of the living, and not a few of +those of the dead. Many persons who were mere names to the majority of the +public are here, for the first time, recognized as men engaged in living +lives as well as in writing books. Some of these biographies must have +been obtained at the expense of much time and correspondence. Samuel +Bayley, the author of "Essays on the Formation of Opinions," is one of +these well-known names but unknown men; but in the present volume he has +been compelled to come out of his mysterious seclusion, and present to the +public those credentials of dates and incidents which prove him to be a +positive existence on the planet. + +The papers on Arboriculture, Architecture, Arctic Discovery, Armor, Army, +Asia, Atlantic Ocean, Australia, Balance of Power, Bank, and Barometer, +are excellent examples of compact and connected statement of facts and +principles. The biographies of Aristotle, Aristophanes, Augustine, +Ariosto, and Arnold, and the long article on Athens, are among the most +striking and admirable papers in the volume. As the purpose of the work is +to supply a Cyclopaedia for popular use, it is inevitable that students of +special sciences or subjects should be occasionally disappointed at the +comparatively meagre treatment of their respective departments of +knowledge. In regard to the articles in the present volume, it may be said +that such subjects as Astronomy and the Association of Ideas should have +occupied more space, even if the wants of the ordinary reader were alone +consulted. But still, when we consider the vast range and variety of +topics included in this volume, and the fact that it comprehends a dozen +subjects which a dozen octavos devoted to each would not exhaust, we are +compelled to award praise to the editors for contriving to compress into +so small a space an amount of information so great. + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ATLANTIC MONTHLY, VOLUME 2, +NUMBER 9, JULY, 1858*** + + +******* This file should be named 10079.txt or 10079.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/0/7/10079 + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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